Cardone, Solomon & Associates (CS&A) is now representing Symetrix in the New York Metro region of the United States. Founded in 1997, the CS&A team brings a wealth of industry experience and strong connections to the region’s corporate, educational, theatrical, sporting, church, amusement, and medical commercial audio markets. CS&A is representing all of Symetrix’ product lines, including the powerful SymNet line of open architecture DSP, Jupiter line of app based turn-key DSP, and Integrator Series line of application specific installed system DSP.

Noted Dane Butcher, president of Symetrix, “We’re very excited about working with John Cardone, Mike Solomon and their entire crew. These folks have an exceptional track record of service to integrators and consultants. As we looked at their line card it became apparent that, without distraction, they’re hyper-focused on systems integration. We couldn’t ask for better alignment with a rep firm.”

“Symetrix adds an important discipline to our product portfolio, that of superior audio DSP,” explained John Cardone. “They build high-quality audio products that meet the serious and educated demands of our customers, who understand that it’s not just about the box – it’s about the people behind the box. Symetrix has had a long history of introducing innovative products. Their current and upcoming lines will continue that tradition and provide a fresh alternative to the existing market.”

When compared to its peers in other states, the Salt Lake Chamber of Commerce is an especially active and involved institution. Nearly 8,000 businesses statewide hold membership and provide fully half of Utah’s 1,000,000 jobs. Its Salt Lake City headquarters is a bustling hive of activity, with multiple events, such as meetings, trainings, and seminars, scheduled every day. To accommodate a happily burgeoning request for event space, the Salt Lake Chamber worked with member business General Communications of Draper, Utah to expand and update the A/V systems in its executive conference and training rooms. With an eye toward future expansion, General Communications centered the new sound reinforcement equipment on a pair of Symetrix Solus 16 open-architecture, fixed-I/O signal processors.

“Of course, a chamber of commerce is all about helping member businesses make money, but, like every other chamber of commerce, the Salt Lake Chamber needs to use their financial resources judiciously,” said Ingolf de Jong, president of General Communications. “As a result, the budget was exceptionally tight.” The Salt Lake Chamber asked de Jong and General Communications system engineer Brandon Gramse to update the A/V system in the executive conference room, which subdivides into two separate rooms, and to add infrastructure to a larger training room that would allow it to subdivide into four smaller rooms.

“Like other clients that have existing equipment, they hoped we would be able to keep costs down by reusing the existing equipment,” explained de Jong. “However, using the existing equipment we ran into incompatibility issues. To make the Salt Lake Chamber future-proof and still stay within budget, Gramse based the design on Symetrix’ new Solus 16 processor. The Solus 16 offers powerful open-architecture DSP design within a fixed sixteen-input, eight-output frame. The fixed I/O makes the Solus 16 very affordable.

The setup itself is not unlike a small conference center, with the requisite flexibility to accommodate events of widely ranging nature and size. The systems for the executive conference room and the training rooms are entirely separate, and each gets its own Symetrix Solus 16. Two large Crestron touch panels and four smaller Crestron touch panels located in each subdivided space (six total) communicate with the Solus 16 audio processors and the Kramer VP-4x4k video matrix switchers to control audio and video source routing out to ceiling-mounted projectors and LCD displays. The executive conference room can be divided into two conference rooms, and in addition to VGA inputs each contain one owner-furnished Blu-ray player, whereas the training rooms each contain four owner-furnished Blu-ray players, one for each subdivided room. New Listen Technologies ListenPoint ceiling speakers powered by QSC amplifiers deliver clear, intelligible audio. The executive conference room takes four microphone inputs and two stereo line-level inputs, using only half of the Solus 16’s inputs. The training rooms require one stereo input per subdivision, plus two microphone inputs, for a total of ten.

“The Salt Lake Chamber wanted the new system to accommodate future conversion of adjacent office space into meeting space,” said Gramse. “The two Solus 16s have plenty of available inputs and outputs for those expansions. Although it would be simple to collapse the stereo inputs into mono inputs if they need it. In addition, the Solus 16’s open-architecture will allow us to program the requisite functionality for future systems without limitation. “Working with the people at Symetrix was a real pleasure. The sales support and the technical support are both excellent.” Chamber COO Heidi Walker stated that the chamber is extremely pleased with the system. General Communications provided excellent design, installation, and support for our facility. This system allows us to host people from around the world, effectively communicating the chamber message.

Zion School recently completed construction of a brand new building in Makassar, South Sulawesi in Indonesia. The school serves over seven-hundred students from kindergarten through high school and uses state-of-the-art technology to connect with students and to prepare them for an increasingly technological world. An excellent case in point is the school’s 750-seat multipurpose auditorium. The auditorium will be used for seminars, meetings, graduation ceremonies, and performances. Symetrix distributor PT Gracia Auvindo supplied an adept, but cost-effective Symetrix Jupiter 8 to handle all of the audio processing in the auditorium. Local dealer JK Sound in turn furnished the unit to the school, and both companies helped install it

“The processing power of the Symetrix Jupiter is substantial, yet it’s easy to set up and very affordable,” said Hendra Halim, technical manager with PT Gracia Auvindo. “At the Zion School auditorium, just one Jupiter 8 handles everything.” Coda Audio full-range loudspeakers and subwoofers powered by beefy Camco amplifiers give the students at Zion School performance-inspiring fidelity and impact. Full stereo separation heightens the excitement.

The school uses one of the Jupiter’s many apps, which creates a sound processing and mixing tool that is specific to the needs of the auditorium. “The app gives us feedback fighters, parametric equalization, and full loudspeaker management processing, among other modules,” said Halim. “Everything – from the output of the mixer to the monitors to the mains – is handled by the Jupiter 8. The speaker manager provides the crossover between the full-range boxes and the subwoofer. Moreover, the Jupiter 8 sounds fantastic, and the school doesn’t have to worry about feedback or unintelligible audio.”

In addition to the Jupiter 8, a Symetrix Zone Mix 760 handles school-wide paging and background music. Six zones comprise the school, and three strategically-located paging stations provide input. At each station, a wall-mounted Symetrix ARC-XLR push-button XLR input with an attached microphone allows for easy paging. The ARC-XLR’s four selector buttons combine with an ARC-SW4’s four selector buttons to direct pages to any or all of the building’s zones. Setting up the Zone Mix 760 to automatically duck background music for pages proved straightforward. QSC ceiling speakers and amplifiers complete the school-wide paging system.

“We’re very excited about Symetrix’ Jupiter, Integrator, and Solus families of processors,” said Halim. “They provide a comprehensive and well thought out collection of solutions to every audio installation challenge. The products are functional, reliable, and great sounding. The installation at Zion School went smoothly for us. It took just over a day to get everything in place and tuned to perfection. After a brief training, the staff at the school is totally comfortable operating it.”

Symetrix announces that it is now offering technical support and training services in Spanish. This new addition to the company’s dedication to customer service is being handled by Technical Support Specialist, Michael Perry, who recently joined the Symetrix support team. Perry is fluent in both English and Spanish will be handling this service. Perry’s phone number is +1 (425) 778-7728 x234, and Spanish technical support emails can be directed to espanol@symetrix.co

Known as one of Central Florida’s most venerable entertainment complexes, The Lakeland Center challenges the notion that a facility can’t be all things to all people. The sprawling complex includes venues for sports, entertainment, events, meetings and hospitality and despite the breadth of offerings The Lakeland Center consistently exceeds the expectations of its clients, attendees and guests. Creating such a professional atmosphere requires tremendous flexibility on the part of The Lakeland Center’s facilities and staff, a fact underscored by its recent upgrade to a Symetrix Room Combine 788 processor in one of its three modular meeting/event spaces. The Symetrix Room Combine 788 allows The Lakeland Center’s technical staff to merge or split any combination of rooms using an intuitive interface, with comprehensive, high-fidelity signal processing as a bonus!

Using air walls, the 25,000 square-foot facility divides into as many as eight separate spaces of varying size. The old room combiner was installed in the mid-1990s and operated on outdated mechanical relays. “It worked okay,” said Joseph Havens, the technical director at The Lakeland Center. “We installed it and used its limited flexibility to create a few common configurations. It had no DSP and no analog processing of any kind. Recently, the unit gave up the ghost.” Havens removed its carcass and committed to finding a modern replacement.

Based on its flexibility and power, he chose the purpose-built Symetrix Room Combine 788, which takes up to twelve inputs and matrix mixes them into eight outputs. “As many of the technicians on my staff do not have expertise in the arena of installed sound, I had to have a combiner that was intuitive to operate,” said Havens. “The user interface on the 788 is second to none. The new system is very friendly and not at all intimidating.” Indeed, Symetrix’ simple-to-use software allowed Havens to draw a schematic of the event space on the user interface with each of the eight smaller sections outlined. To combine or un-combine sections, his technicians simply highlight the relevant sections on the schematic.

To allow clients a measure of control, Havens positioned a Symetrix ARC-K1 rotary encoder in each of the eight sections to control volume. Because each ARC-K1 receives its power and communicates with the Room Combine 788 via a single Cat5 cable, the installation was painless. “At each position, we used the cable from the old system to pull a fresh Cat5 into place,” said Havens.” That allowed us to keep the power supply in the main rack with the 788. The ARC-K1s communicate with the processor and, ultimately, each other (their controls become redundant when sections are combined) via a star topology. It couldn’t have been easier.”

Although The Lakeland Center was, first and foremost, installing a new room combiner, it received a hi-fi bump as a bonus. “The existing loudspeakers and amps were in good shape, so we left them alone,” said Havens. “Nevertheless, just hooking up the Symetrix Room Combine 788, without turning any processing on, significantly improved the system’s fidelity. Before, it had always had that ‘ceiling speaker’ sound, with an emphasis on the midrange. Now it was fuller and richer.” Havens didn’t stop there however, he used the Room Combine 788’s collection of filters, equalizers, and dynamics processors to dial in an even finer sound.

Havens’ experience installing the Symetrix Room Combine 788 was so pleasant, and the functionality it affords The Lakeland Center is so substantial, he now plans to preempt failures in the center’s two other large, combinable event/meeting spaces by installing 788s there as well. “In those spaces, we’ll definitely take advantage of the unit’s ability to combine non-adjacent rooms,” he said.

After long enduring a substandard concert hall, the Montréal Symphony Orchestra was recently blessed with the La Maison Symphonique de Montréal. Built to exacting acoustical standards by Tateo Nakajima of Artec Consultants, La Maison will host a wide range of musical and theatrical performances. While most of the publicity surrounding the building’s opening is justifiably centered on the stunning, state-of-the-art acoustical experience that awaits its patrons, La Maison is just as sophisticated behind the scenes. Indeed, Artec Consultants designed a comprehensive, yet intuitive paging system that will ensure that the production quality of the events at La Maison will meet the highest expectations. Philippe Beaudoin of Montréal-based A/V integrator Solotech programmed and installed the Symetrix SymNet-based signal processing and interface technology that makes the powerful and elegant paging system possible.

Six zones comprise the paging system. The lobby zone conveys pages for patrons, typically before performances and during intermission and retransmits the audio captured within the hall for late arrivers. [Basically, there’s a camera that captures the video and sends to displays on all 3 levels of the lobby and a microphone gets the audio and sends to the paging system] Based on their physical layout and intended usage, there are two separate dressing room zones. The stage manager’s booth, the recordist’s booth, the house audio mixer, the follow spot operators and the lighting board op, get their own zone. The venue managers’ offices get their own separate zone. The final zone patches through the main audio mixer into the house sound system. Over three-hundred McBride 820CXB paging loudspeakers powered by two QSC CX-204V and two QSC-1202 amplifiers deliver the paging system’s output.

The linchpin of La Maison’s paging system is the Symetrix ARC-SW4 and ARC-XLR, a pair of wall panel remotes with integrator-programmable push buttons and an XLR jack. Room managers and stage managers have their own Symetrix ARC-SW4 and ARC-XLR to handle outgoing pages, and each one is configured the same way. Two mobile racks can be plugged and patched from different areas of the venue for temporary needs of traveling productions and events. Of its eight buttons, six are labeled by zone. To deliver a page, the user pushes a button for each of the zones that he or she wants to include. Then a push-to-talk button, combined with a Shure 527B microphone, executes the page. Additional features include a push-button chime, which calls patrons to the hall prior to a performance or after an intermission, and a volume control override button. Although it may find other uses, the volume override button’s intended purpose is to deliver urgent messages, such as when a musician or the conductor needs to be called from the dressing room to the stage.

An open-architecture Symetrix SymNet 8×8 DSP, supplemented by a Symetrix Control I/O, sits in the middle of the system. It ably handles the complex routing required of the system, along with all of the frequency and dynamics processing nuances that make the pages not only functional, but also pleasant. “Symetrix delivered on two essential features that make the paging system at La Maison comprehensive, easy-to-use, and cost-effective,” said Beaudoin. “First, it has a wealth of flexible logic modules, which meant that I could design the system to hang together robustly. Second, the ARC remotes convey logic controls and audio on a single Cat5 cable with very liberal distance restrictions. That made the physical installation as easy as it could possibly be.”

Symetrix announced its international distributor and sales representative award winners for fiscal year 2011. UK-based World Marketing Associates earned International Rep of the Year for the tremendous strides it made in introducing Symetrix’ innovative solutions to a broad range of industry professionals in Europe, the Middle East, and Africa. Norway-based Fotophono earned Symetrix’ Distributor of the Year Award in Europe. For the second consecutive year, China-based Sanecore Audio Ltd. in the Asia-Pacific region and Canada-based SF Marketing in the Americas earned International Distributor of the Year Awards.

“We’re doing everything we can to build DSP solutions for a wide range of applications,” said Paul Roberts, director of sales and marketing for Symetrix. “But all of our efforts are for naught if our products don’t find their way into the hands of industry professionals. Therefore, we are grateful for the efforts and successes of our reps and international distributors as exemplified by World Marketing Associates, Fotophono, Sanecore, and SF Marketing and are excited for 2012.”

The Hyatt Regency Calgary is one of the finest hotels in the Canadian city for which it is named and, as such, hosts a tremendous volume of extravagant and top-drawer affairs. The hotel’s nine combinable ballrooms and six combinable meeting rooms are constantly in use for business meetings, weddings, and other events. However, until recently, the Hyatt’s management and staff struggled to control the audio system that delivered sound reinforcement to those spaces. It had been a challenge from day one and only became more frustrating as time passed. While in the process of undergoing a seven million dollar renovation to the ballrooms and meeting rooms, hotel management made the decision that it was also time for a major change in regards to the sound and video systems. Hyatt management asked Calgary’s DBI Systems Integration to design and install the new systems. Using Symetrix SymNet DSP technology, Symetrix SymVue user interface technology, and Symetrix ARC-SWK wall panel remotes, DBI Systems Integration provided an audio system that was simultaneously comprehensive enough to allow infinitely flexible use of the event spaces but simple enough to be controlled even by non-technical staff.

“The old system was first-generation digital technology, with one manufacturer for the DSP and one manufacturer for the user control,” said Jerry Van Dyke, owner of DBI Systems Integration. “The interfacing between the sets of technology was very cumbersome and unreliable at best and the hotel had spent a small fortune just keeping it limping along since its original installation by another company.” Our goal was to give them everything that was so obviously lacking in the old system. The systems would have to be simple to operate, flexible, and reliable while still being powerful enough to handle the complex tasks required.”

A significant component of the design solution was to avoid involving two manufacturers, as had been done previously. “Even today, equipment from different manufacturers doesn’t always integrate as seamlessly as it should,” he said. “Often when a problem does arise, each manufacturer will claim that it is the other company’s fault. There have been instances where each company washes its hands of the problem, and you’re left in the middle with an unhappy client. I was impressed with Symetrix’ significant strengths in both the processing and the interface sides. Based on past experience I knew that if I ran into any trouble, Symetrix would be there to help us solve any issues!”

Van Dyke called on three Symetrix SymNet Express 8×8 CobraNet devices to provide the appropriate input/output count with powerful open-architecture processing to customize the routing logic for the Hyatt Regency Calgary. The three units gather inputs from the nine ballroom sections, the six meeting rooms, and four divisible sections of a grand foyer and allow them to be routed anywhere. On average there is one to two inputs in each zone with some zones having up to three inputs with some inputs being summed. To keep it simple, a 15-inch touch screen computer was employed and they overlaid a schematic of the rooms with buttons that allow them to be easily combined or decoupled via the Symetrix SymVue interface technology. “Via the touch panel they just press the rooms they want to combine and those rooms change to a common color to indicate that they are combined,” he said. “They can un-combine them in the same way, or press a reset button to start fresh.” There’s one page for the ballrooms and foyer and another page for the meeting rooms.

In addition, Symetrix ARC-SWK remote wall panels provide each room with local control of input sources and master volume. When rooms are combined, their ARC-SWKs become redundant. A combination CD-player/iPod-player back at the control room provides common background music that each room can tap if needed. “The routing logic and processing at the Hyatt Regency Calgary is actually tremendously complex,” said Van Dyke. “But with Symetrix’ well thought-out interface technologies, we were able to keep all of that under the hood and hidden from view. The controls that we have designated as presets are so intuitive that truly, anyone can figure them out with an absolute minimum of training.”

Two-hundred-watt AMK twelve-inch coaxial ceiling speakers went in with the old sound system, and Van Dyke was happy to tell the hotel that they could be utilized in the new sound system. “Those speakers are very good quality, but the previous installer had tapped them at 30-watts and then used 100-watt amps to power groups of three,” he said. “It was like running a race car on a 40-mph governor when you consider the problem of getting high SPL to the floor cleanly when the Hyatt’s ballroom ceilings are twenty-two feet high.” “The Hyatt often has events where a significant level of SPL is required and we wanted to be sure that this would no longer be a problem for them to achieve.” To give the Hyatt the performance of “new” loudspeakers for a song, he added five 4-channel QSC CX204V and six 2-channel QSC CX302V amplifiers. He added 200-watt transformers to each loudspeaker and then tapped them at a much more generous 100-watts with there being an option to tap them higher if it was required “Even if I ignore the contribution of the new processing, it’s an obvious and drastic improvement to the overall system sound,” said Van Dyke. “Whereas before the Hyatt would suggest that clients bring in their own rented sound system for music-heavy events, the newly-adjusted ceiling speakers sound so good that they often don’t need to.”

“It’s easy to focus on Symetrix’ sophisticated user control, but the sound quality is top-notch as well. Symetrix started in the broadcast and recording markets, where sound quality is a really big component of what matters. That legacy helps to make Symetrix processors sound fantastic,” Van Dyke concluded.

Paul Svenson and business partner Dan Muller run Sound Casework, which melds an audio-visual expertise with those aspects of general contracting – specifically carpentry – that may impact sound. Svenson suggests his involvement in A/V design and installation is a convenient means to support his out-of-control “music habit.” Svenson is a church musician – a guitarist, bandleader, and composer – of forty years. He feels that some mainline churches may be facing some difficult situations. “When congregants have a tough time seeing or hearing what’s going on because a church’s A/V system pales in comparison to what those modern smart phones congregants carry around in their pockets… that church has a problem,” he states flatly.

However, Svenson sees good things happening for those churches with the fortitude and foresight to reinvent themselves, and he counts St. Paul United Methodist Church among them. After years of careful planning and saving, the church moved forward with a plan (by a church member who is also an architect) to renovate the front stage chancel area. At the same time, they would install a new sound system and six flat-panel screens for displaying contents of the hymnal. Because the sanctuary is used for more than just worship service, Svenson used the Symetrix Jupiter 8 and a Symetrix ARC-2i wall panel remote to deliver an intuitive, auto-mixed sound system that would not require a sound tech for modest events. At the same time, the system includes a traditional console for worship services or other events that require nuanced control at the hands of a professional.

Svenson has been happily using Symetrix’ Integrator series of processors – and now the Jupiter series of processors – since he first hooked one up to his laptop. “I was used to wrestling with gear from other manufacturers that sometimes took an hour to get into reliable communication with my laptop,” he said. “With Symetrix, a ‘Wizard’ pops open and twenty seconds later, literally, everything is connected and communicating! Both the Integrator series and the Jupiter series are powerful, cost-effective, and simple to program and install.”

A Bose MA12 line array with an MB4 subwoofer delivers content to the modestly-sized room, and QSC CX-series amplifiers provide the power. By using the Jupiter 8 and Sound Reinforcement 10 app from among the over sixty available, Svenson is able to deliver all of the input conditioning, matrix mixing, user control, and loudspeaker conditioning with just one single-rack unit. Indeed, by programming the MA12’s EQ curves into the Jupiter, he can forego the Bose processor for a cost and space savings. Four Sennheiser G3-series wireless mics and as many Telefunken M80 wired mics provide clear, reliable inputs. A Symetrix ARC-2i wall panel allows users to select an automatic system configuration for “meeting,” “wedding,” “memorial,” or “worship.” In worship mode, the system takes input from a Yamaha LS-9 console. Otherwise, the inputs are auto-mixed directly inside the Jupiter.

“They were one week away from the grand re-opening,” recalled Svenson. “Everything looked beautiful. It was only a matter of applying the finishing touches. The head of the church board came in at 6:30 in the morning the day after we had finished the A/V system to find the sanctuary on fire! If the fire department had been just ten minutes later, the building would have been lost.”

Though much of it was still apparently working, Sound Casework replaced all of the A/V equipment on the assumption that it was likely smoke damaged and thus unreliable. As with the original installation, the Symetrix Jupiter 8 made the re-installation a speedy process, and St. Paul United Methodist Church re-opened in full grandeur, delayed only a few months.

For over half a century, Rodgers Instrument Corporation has been designing and manufacturing church, concert, and home organs that strike a magical balance between the deep traditions of so elegant an instrument and the cutting edge technologies that can make organs accessible to a wider audience. Recently, Rodgers signed Novo Group of San Francisco as the new dealer for Rodgers organs in Northern California. With almost thirty years of parallel experience in the acoustical/audio/video integration business, Novo Group principal Art Yeap made a small tweak to the standard Rodgers installation protocol: he added an 8-in/8-out Symetrix Jupiter 8 processor between the organ outputs and the amplifiers. The addition allows him to make a number of small adjustments that sum to a noticeably more balanced and musical whole.

Rodgers organs are found throughout the world in places both prestigious and intimate. For example, Carnegie Hall boasts a celebrated Rodgers organ that was dedicated by Virgil Fox, the most famous organist of the last century. At the other end of the spectrum, Rodgers organs can be found in the homes of many organ enthusiasts. However, the vast majority of new installations performed by Novo Group go into churches. Most are between two and four manual (i.e. keyboards) and based on proprietary digital synthesis technology. “Not only does Rodgers’ digital synthesis seek to capture the intentional attributes of organ sound, but it also seeks to recreate the anomalies and imperfections,” said Yeap. “For example, a Rodgers organ is continuously detuned in slight and random ways to recreate the nonlinearities of a pipe organ in the context of ever-shifting atmospherics.”

Each organ has multiple unbalanced stereo outputs that correspond with the ranks or sets of each division. In addition to the advanced processing capabilities that it gives him, Yeap inserts the Symetrix Jupiter 8 right at an organ’s output (and housed within the organ chassis!) to provide a true balanced output to the amplifier. “I’m still flexible, but after so many decades working with sound, I do have some strong opinions,” Yeap laughed. “The amplifiers that are standard with a Rodgers organ run close to their limit. So I replace them with Crown XLS-series amplifiers.” Because the amplifiers are sometimes quite remote, the balanced line is guaranteed to be quieter and more reliable.

Once inserted and housed, Yeap loads the “Line Processor 1” app onto the Symetrix Jupiter 8 and uses Symetrix’ simple PC-based software to dial in the perfect speaker sound given the idiosyncrasies of the room that the organ will live in. His baseline processing includes high-pass filtering for those divisions that don’t have low bass and overall limiting to protect the loudspeakers from the potentially more powerful amplifiers. At volumes within the range that the factory speakers are capable of producing, the limiter lets signal pass unaffected. The limiter only kicks in at higher volumes.

“We selected the Symetrix Jupiter processor for this application because it is incredibly transparent, easy to use, and competitively priced,” said Yeap. “Its noise floor is below that of the organ itself and I have no qualms about an additional AD and DA conversion because it’s so faithful. The Jupiter’s app paradigm is simple to use, and even though I’m comfortable with the more complex open-architecture platforms out there, the Jupiter’s simplicity makes installation fast and painless. I just set my laptop on the organ, connect to the Jupiter via Ethernet, and dial it in.” Because the Jupiter powers up without hassle, Yeap can tie it into the master power for the entire organ system. The client doesn’t even need to know it’s there.

“The combination of additional processing and more amplifier headroom makes for a noticeably better organ sound,” said Yeap. “In fact, one of the Rodgers factory personnel who has been working with the organs for decades paid us an unsolicited compliment. He said our installations are the very best he’s ever heard a Rodgers organ sound. I’d say we’re doing something right!”