Part of an upgrade to its existing stock of audio mixers, London’s QEII Conference Centre has added seven Allen & Heath Qu-16 digital rackmount desks.
The Qu-16s are installed in self-contained portable A/V racks, which can be used in any of the event spaces in the venue: ‘We needed a higher channel count for the mixers installed on our mobile A/V racks,’ explains A/V Production Manager, Derek Chalmers. ‘We were looking around the analogue market as we couldn’t believe there would be a digital mixer to fit a 19-inch rack, and then I saw the Qu-16 at Infocomm, where it won a Best In Show award.
‘Qu-16 has everything we needed – 16 channels, built in processing, and recording facilities as we record all of our events. We’ve had them now for two months and they’ve been fantastic.’
The mixers were supplied by Mercury AV: ‘The QEII deals with exceptionally high-profile events on a daily basis, and often has several large conferences running simultaneously,’ says Director, Ian McDonald. ‘The sound equipment needs to be very flexible but it is also important that it can be set up quickly and operated by a large number of different technicians. QU-16 is therefore perfect for use by the QEII in their mobile PA racks.’
The Centre houses 29 function rooms, running events ranging from conferences and meetings to banquets and receptions. The mobile racks provide a simple, flexible solution for the smaller function rooms. In addition to seven full time in-house A/V technicians, the Centre also has a bank of 50 freelancer engineers.
‘The Qu-16 is new to the market, so many of our staff had not come across the mixer before. However, after some brief training I am pleased to say all of our engineers were really happy to use the Qu-16, and had very positive feedback about the mixer’s ease of use and analogue feel,’ says Chalmers.
‘We have seen a lot of demand for QU-16,’ McDonald adds. ‘We placed a large stock order on the same day that the product release announcement was made, then placed further large orders when it became clear that demand was outstripping supply. The exciting thing about QU-16 is that it makes all of the benefits of a digital mixer available for live sound applications, where a digital mixer would have been too large or too expensive.’
More: www.allen-heath.com
