Leading French radio station Europe 1 has equipped its studios with two Studer OnAir 3000 digital consoles.

As part of a redesign to its studios, Europe 1 upgrade to its audio installation, choosing the OnAir 3000 consoles after an extensive review of currently available options. Installing the first at the end of December 2013 and the second in April 2014, the consoles are Modulo types, featuring rack-mountable mainframes that house the power supplies and host processing. The consoles are mounted into the studio desks, integrated with the rooms’ décor.

‘We already have had good experiences with an OnAir 3000 a couple of years ago, the console is reliable, modular, flexible and robust, so it was quite natural to stay with the same model,’ says Michaël Allouche, Europe 1 Head of Engineering.

The OnAir 3000 design is based on a modular desk and new DSP engine. The fader module includes six fader strips, and up to eight fader modules may be fitted, giving a maximum console size of 48 faders. Layout options range from a highly comprehensive engineer-operated continuity console to a single fader panel for DJ and newsroom use or even a PC-operated system with no physical desk controls. The console has three main stereo mix buses plus an audition facility, four stereo aux. buses, 16 mix-minus sends, configurable as auxes and three independent studio monitoring circuits and offers full dynamics, EQ and input/output routing in each channel.

‘The console is very easy to use and the users are happy to get extensive talk-back capabilities on the console from the control room to the headphones in the studio and to external phone lines and codec as well,’ Allouche reports. ‘Using the snapshots is also very useful, there are many different users and they have all their own configuration.’

Established in 1955, Europe 1 is owned and operated by Lagardère Active, a subsidiary of the Lagardère Group. The consoles were supplied by Audiopole, Studer’s French distributor.