AC/DC, the legendary Australian hard rock band born in 1973, recently began their European tour and touched down in Italy at the new RFC Arena in Reggio Emilia. This massive event was attended by more than 100,000 fans who rocked along to the band’s hits for more than two hours. The event was an important showcase for the advanced technological solutions deployed by Luminex. For this use case, our local Italian distributor, RM Multimedia interviewed Willy Gubellini, external consultant and key interface between local and guest production (Link to the original article below). He explained how the Arena is in fact the only place in Italy that can host huge events like these. The Arena has an impressive infrastructure and logistics as well as being well organised. Thanks to Mr Gubellini’s experience everything went smoothly. His wish is to see festivals as well as individual bands perform here more often.
To gain a better understanding of Luminex’s technological contribution and the work involved in designing the network, RM Multimedia asked Vittorio Sberveglieri, technical and networking coordinator for Orange, the company responsible for the event infrastructure born from the collaboration between Agorà and Piano e Forte.
Angelo “Pavarotti” Camporese , Network System Engineer for Agorà, took care of the project from the very beginning, identifying Luminex as the most suitable product. Mainly because of the possibility to run a full converged network. The 10 Gb connection and the Luminex convergence makes it possible to distribute Dante and AVB/Milan over the entire area. In this way all audio signals, lighting network and multiple 4K video streams for LED walls all went on the same infrastructure separated in different groups (VLAN).
“The RFC Arena is designed to host large events, with a capacity of approximately 103,000 people. The facility includes fixed infrastructure elements, such as the 10 delay towers, each served by 8 duplex LC single mode fibers chosen for future connections as they can reach up to 10 km and high bandwidth. These towers are connected in a physical double ring configuration, ensuring efficient and diverse distribution of Primary and Secondary signals,” said Vittorio. Orange implemented the new Luminex devices without any bandwidth and latency issues.
Regarding the audio signal, Vittorio explained that the system uses the Dante Protocol transported over fiber to each individual tower. Each tower contains RCF devices that can receive the network signal as well as an analog backup connection. Thanks to the Luminex devices, the Dante signal was distributed to the various towers, one for the primary and one for the secondary signal. In addition, the control system used by RCF for the amplifiers and control racks was configured redundantly on the Control VLAN on all amplifiers using Luminex RLinkX (RSTP) algorithms.
The latest series of Luminex switches, GigaCore 10i, was chosen to guarantee optimal and secure performance. The management of the various flows was done with the Luminex Araneo control software, “A great tool that allowed us to check the network status in real time at a higher precision compared to any other software,” explained Vittorio. The fast learning curve that makes it easy to operate, was another key differentiator, emphasised Vittorio.
RM Multimedia also talked to Emanuele Morlini, sound reinforcement system manager, who reiterated how the Luminex switches have simplified life in terms of management and speed. In addition, Pietro Mandelli, technical support for live systems and fixed installations for RCF Arena, shared with RM Multimedia his role in programming the electronics that manage the distribution of the audio signal.
“We receive an input signal from the FoH and distribute it to the other towers with several levels of redundancy (3 levels of redundancy: two on Dante and one analogue). With Vittorio, we defined the redundancy criteria and implemented this logic on the processors. The implementation of three levels of redundancy was crucial to provide maximum security.”
GigaCore 10i:
Luminex GigaCore 10i is a network switch designed specifically for professional audio, video and lighting applications. GigaCore 10i provides intuitive management and the performance to ensure smooth operation in any Pro AV context by supporting data transfer rates of up to 10 Gb. guaranteeing long life and reliability. GigaCore 10i is compatible with Araneo software, which allows pre-programming and configuration of a network as well as real-time monitoring of network status.
Luminex is validated directly by the owners of the various protocols:
About Luminex:
Luminex Network Intelligence is a Belgium-based manufacturer of data distribution equipment for professional lighting, audio and video applications. Besides Ethernet-to-DMX converters & DMX/RDM splitters for lighting control projects, Luminex also produces Ethernet switches, enabling users to build a complete data distribution system for all types of AVL applications. The GigaCore switches are, like almost every other Luminex device, truly plug-and-play products that provide an excellent solution to expand an AVL network in a very user-friendly way, without needing any IT knowledge. Luminex products can be found in the most demanding installation, theatre and touring AVL applications worldwide.
For further information and details: commerciale@rmmultimedia.it or marketing@luminex.be
The original Article from RM Multimedia can be read here at this link: Original article
Credits:
Distributor: RM Multimedia
External consultant: Willy Gubellini
Technical coordinator: Vittorio Sberveglieri
Company responsible for the event infrastructure: Orange
Network System Engineer for Agorà: Angelo “Pavarotti” Camporese
Responsible for sound reinforcement system management: Emanuele Morlini
Technical support for live systems and fixed installations for RCF Arena: Pietro Mandelli