Electro-Voice loudspeakers, together with sister brand Dynacord’s amplifiers from parent company Bosch, provided the backbone of the sound system for Sud de France Arena’s 15th anniversary event in Montpellier.
The system comprised 60 of Electro-Voice’s X2-212 loudspeakers and 24 X12-128 subwoofers, driven by 19 Dante-networked Dynacord TGX Series amplifiers and managed through SONICUE Sound System Software. The solution was designed using Electro-Voice’s PREVIEW loudspeaker coverage prediction software, which the company says helps deliver accurate performance modelling before installation.
Tribal Sound, the rental company responsible for the project, built the design to meet the acoustic demands of the 14,000-capacity arena. The main arrays consisted of 24 X2 cabinets per side, with six per side used for outfills. Low-end support came from eight sets of three X12-128 subwoofers in an end-fire configuration, crossed over at 70 Hz. MFX-15 wedges were deployed as frontfills and DJ monitors, with additional PX2181 subwoofers in the DJ booth. Ten TGX10 amplifiers powered the X2 loudspeakers while nine TGX20s drove the subwoofers, fills, and monitors.
Julien Garcia, CEO of Tribal Sound, said: “We built the system by using EV’s PREVIEW software and saw that to cover the whole venue properly we would need to dry hire some more X2 and subs from another local rental company. When we flew the system and tested it, the results were exactly as PREVIEW had predicted and we had the power to cover every area without pushing things too hard.”
Garcia added: “The arena team didn’t want the system to be visibly disturbing. The X2 is a small, discreet system with great sound quality. It provided the power of a big system but without taking up the space.”
Garcia noted that the combination of TGX and SONICUE software provided both control and protection during setup. He concluded: “We plugged everything in and the combination of the TGX amps and SONICUE software detected a fault in the cabling. We were able to solve that short circuit before any current was flowing to the speakers.”
