One of Vienna’s finest concert houses, the Konzerthaus, has completed an upgrade of the public address system serving its Great Hall and Mozart Hall. Installed by ATEC Pro, the new system uses Meyer Sound loudspeakers and Allen & Heath’s iDR installation matrix mixers specifically for voice reinforcement.

The iDR DSP systems comprise an iDR-4 matrix mixer for the Great Hall and an iDR-8 for the Mozart Hall, with a PL10 eight-channel rotary panel for remote control, and a PL-8 logic box installed in the Mozart Hall for interfacing to external systems. Control of the system is via the iDR-8 and additional PL10 controller, including management of a hand-held radio mic and CD players for playback. The system default is Stage Manager mode, enabling limited access and control of settings for simple use.

The iDR-4 and iDR-8 units can be switched in both rooms to Technician mode, enabling control of all the speakers that can be connected to a mobile PA System. The PL-8 in the Mozart Hall is set up to change the sound beam presets of the Meyer Sound system to switch between coverage of the whole room and only the balcony, which is used if a mobile PA is set up without delay speakers for the balcony. Similarly, in the Great Hall, coverage of the main room and balcony can be muted in Technician mode.

‘We selected iDR because it is simple to use, and most of the time the system is used by the stage manager or other non-technical staff,’ says Konzerthaus Head of Sound, Ingeborg Doblander. ‘Settings, such as EQ, volume range and compression, can be programmed in advance by the sound engineer, so that the user only need activate the radio mic or CD player via the clearly arranged PL10.’