DOHA, Qatar — After several years in construction, a new tourist attraction opened recently near Doha: Souq Al Wakrah, with restaurants, shops and cultural installations. Helmet Trading & Contracting installed over 1,000 Electro-Voice ZX1i loudspeakers driven by Contractor Precision Series (CPS) power amplifiers, to provide distributed sound to the quarter, which extends over two kilometers. Twelve N8000 matrices handle the loudspeaker processing, and the entire system can be controlled with ease via touchscreen.
More details from Electro-Voice (www.electro-voice.com):
Electro-Voice was chosen as the company’s partner for the project; the reason was simple, as engineer and project manager Mahmoud Fahmawi from Helmet explained: “Our past experience with the support and quality provided by Electro-Voice made this decision a no-brainer.”
For the design and simulations, Helmet’s technical experts could count on support from the Electro-Voice team. Together they designed a virtual sound concept that included over 1,000 ZX1i loudspeakers, twelve N8000 matrices and Contractor Precision Series (CPS) power amplifiers. “With this system, we have succeeded in providing homogeneous coverage of the entire area — including the 500-meter-long parking lot,” says Mahmoud Fahmawi. “The sound performance of the loudspeakers is great. They are equipped with high-end, lightweight components and are also extremely robust and weatherproof, making them the perfect choice for outdoor installations. With so many cabinets, the integrated QuickSAM heavy-duty, strong-arm mounting kit really proved useful. It made the installation easy and straightforward — saving us a great deal of time and money.” To blend harmoniously into the historic appearance of the Souq Al Wakrah, all the loudspeakers were hidden in recesses and covered with fabric matching the color of the walls.
Mahmoud Fahmawi von Helmet shows the installation of the ZX1i loudspeakers
Not only was the high performance and quality of the system immediately evident but so was its user friendliness. The entire system — with custom-designed IRIS-Net graphical user interface — can be configured, controlled, and supervised via touchscreen.
