With Lebanon recovering its stability in recent years, the country’s property development the nightlife of Beirut is looking to reclaim its former title of ‘Paris of the Middle East’.
Many of the city’s bars and clubs have gained international acclaim, some attracting Hollywood celebrities on a regular basis. Whether you’re after old world charm, ultra chic modernity or a seamless blend of both; the nightlife in Beirut possesses a distinguishing magic with something to offer everyone…
Quest’s Lebanon distributor, Audiotec Group, recently completed one of the more unique installation projects in Beirut at a venue called Garcia’s Pub – becoming the first installer in the world to use Quest’s HPI-8i speaker systems.
‘This was a new installation with a venue capacity of just over 100 patrons,’ says one of Audiotec’s senior partners, Ralph Choueiri. ‘It was an old house in Beirut with the typical Lebanese architecture [early 20th century, high ceiling, big rooms] and located on the ground floor. It was transformed into a pub after extensive acoustic treatment for the ceiling and the floor. One of the main challenges with the venue was the fact that there were residents still living above the pub’.
The choice to go with Quest products was a simple decision for Ralph and his team given their history of using Quest in projects throughout Lebanon: ‘Our wide experience in Quest products tells us that the HPI series is the high-end for sound performance. This particular client had some specific demands regarding the sound quality and with the considerable amount invested into the acoustic treatment, he needed the best sound system. We originally offered the HPI-8 but during negotiations we were informed that the new model (HPI-8i) became available for shipping so we quickly amended our proposal.’
The team at Audiotec made a comparison between the original HPI-8 and the new HPI-8i in order to gauge the improvement: ‘After we received the new HPI-8i speakers, we setup an A-B to compare the HPI-8 against the new model,’ Choueiri notes. ‘We could definitely hear an improvement in performance. We totally loved the power and clarity of the HPI-8i.’
The team assessed the installation and decided a distributed speaker set-up would achieve the best result both in terms of even dispersion across the venue and minimising any spill to the outside areas or levels above the pub. ‘We chose the 8-inch HPI’s because of the pub dimensions and because we aimed for even distribution. This is why we decided to install 16 speakers. The design was completed in coordination with Quest Engineering in Melbourne who provided great help when consulted.’
The final design was comprised of 16 HPI-8i speakers driven by four QA 2004 amplifiers connected with two speakers per channel.
More: www.questaudio.net
