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Thunder and LightViper™ Hit the Road with Metallica
— With over 25 years of experience in the entertainment/touring market sector, Taylor, Michigan-based Thunder Audio chooses LightViper™ audio transport system for Metallica Death Magnetic World Tour —
Annapolis Junction, MD, January 20, 2009 — FiberPlex, Inc. announces that its LightViper™ audio transport system was recently acquired by Taylor, Michigan-based audio production company, Thunder Audio, who has employed the advanced fiber optic technology in an innovative sound support touring system for the legendary musical group Metallica. The 27-year old band’s Death Magnetic World Tour kicked off last October and will wrap up a U.S. performance schedule in New Jersey next February. The tour, with high-energy concerts predominantly in large arenas, continues throughout Europe from February through July 2009.
At the heart of the large touring sound system developed by Thunder Audio, a 64-channel LightViper fiber optic audio system is configured as a “drive snake” to provide AES/EBU digital audio signal distribution from FOH equipment racks to a massive, 44-zone loudspeaker array. Nearly 200 self-powered speakers are arranged in a unique “in the round” configuration of eight (8) equally spaced speaker arrays. The LightViper interfaces with the loudspeaker management system via military-grade TAC-4 fiber optic cables and also provides the 96kHz Master System Clock to the entire sound distribution grid.
Tom Hejnicki, Project Manager for Thunder Audio, commented on the benefits of eliminating the super group’s reliance on old-school copper snakes and replacing most of them with fiber optic technology:
“We eliminated more than 2,000 pounds of copper cable from the show with the LightViper system and replaced it with 15 pounds of fiber optic cable. The truck pack is considerably smaller now with less bulky cable cases. And when the whole system ships overseas this February, the weight reduction will save a significant of amount of shipping expense.
Hejnicki, a veteran sound designer for Thunder Audio with more than 17 years of live sound experience, talked about his prior experience with the LightViper system:
“We had great successes with our prior use of the system, one example being the recent Red Wings Stanley Cup Parade network telecasts. All the techs, the guys from broadcast side, loved the LightViper fiber. It’s a stable, rugged design — ultra-quiet. Since all the audio is optically isolated, fiber also completely solves the problem of ground loops that we often run into with complex events that have multiple feeds. Basically, it’s impossible to create a ground loop sending digital audio signals over light!
Hejnicki added:
“There has been a paradigm shift in audio networking in the last year or so. Frankly, the Metallica Tour would have been a patch nightmare without LightViper. It was the only logical approach to achieve the objectives we had for this complex tour. In my opinion, there is absolutely no reason to have any professional audio system without it: it’s my first choice for designing new systems, or upgrading older ones. Paul Owen, co-owner and VP at Thunder, told me early on that we had to push the boundaries for our client Metallica. Judging by the results so far, this cutting-edge, in-the-round touring sound system has achieved this.”
Editor’s Technical Notes:
Fiberplex manufactures the LightViper fiber optic audio cable transport systems. The LightViper systems offer total signal path isolation between both stage and mixer as well as between the mixer and power amplification; the cable is totally immune to ground loops, RFI, EMI and electromechanical noise, and runs of up to 1 1/4 miles (6,600 feet) can be easily accomplished without signal loss or degradation. FiberPlex includes a limited lifetime warranty with all of its LightViper system components.
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