Categories
LEA Professional

LEA Provides Professional-Grade Audio to 20-Zone Houston Residence

We’ve seen our amps power everything from packed stadiums to high-rise landmarks to buzzing restaurants and bars. But every now and then, a project comes along that feels a little more personal.

Set on five acres in Houston, this stunning home is more than just a residence—it’s a fully immersive audio experience. With 20 zones of seamless control, this residential AV system raises the bar for what’s possible at home.

Let’s take a closer look.

THE SPEC

🏡 Venue: Residential Property in Houston, TX | 6 Bedrooms, 5 acres

👷 Integrator: Sound Lab Designs

🔊 Audio Spaces: Full home including 6 Bedrooms, pool, patio, balconies, front and near lawns

🦈 Product Used: CS168 (x5), CS702 (x1), CS354 (x1) 

THE INSTALL

A longtime customer of Texas-based AV integration company Sound Lab Designs, the homeowners were looking for an entirely new AV system across their six-bedroom home which is set over five acres of land in the middle of Houston. Sound Lab Designs designed and installed a new system from scratch to cover the interior and exterior of the large property. 

For Ernie Blumenthal, owner at Sound Lab Designs, this project was different from other residential installations he’s worked on because, for the first time, he used LEA Professional amplifiers. Blumenthal mapped over 20 audio zones in the property, many of which were external zones including the pool, patio, front and near lawns and balconies. Initially, for Blumenthal it was the style and form factor of the LEA amplifiers that convinced him to give them a try.

“Form factor was a huge plus, I knew I could really stack a lot of power in a home and not take up the whole rack,” commented Blumenthal. “I did my research on LEA and saw that the sound quality and the adjustability of the amplifier was highly regarded so I thought this would be a perfect installation to try this product.”

Sound Lab Designs installed five CS168, one CS702, and one CS354 in the home. The team chose to give the homeowners extra power and channel count so they would have plenty of headroom for future expansion.

The Cloud Platform provides systems integrators with powerful, reliable and secure remote monitoring and control capabilities across the entire lineup of IoT-enabled LEA Professional Connect Series amplifiers. Unique within the industry, all LEA Professional amplifiers leverage the built-in Amazon Web Services (AWS) IoT Core. The platform allows integrators to monitor critical operational data points that are integral to maintaining system health remotely. The capability delivers greater visibility to provide preventative maintenance, easier troubleshooting and fewer on-site maintenance requirements. 

“I really like the monitoring ability, you only need to go to one web page to see all the amplifiers and it means we are able to offer our clients a full end-to-end service,” commented Blumenthal. “The amplifiers provide great value and are reasonably priced for what you are getting so we will definitely be using them again.”

THE CONCLUSION

Sound Lab Designs has received great feedback from the client and they are happy with how everything sounds and how it looks in their home. There have been no issues with the system so far but if anything does occur Ernie and the team know that with our cloud platform, they can quickly and easily address almost any issue.

We’d like to thank Ernie and his team at Soundlab Designs for choosing our amps for this killer installation and we hope that the audio systems will continue to deliver reliable audio for the homeowners for years to come.

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Categories
TiMax

TiMax panLab v1.4 Launches with ADM-WAV Playback and New Lower Pricing

Spatial Audio pioneer, TiMax, has announced the release of TiMax panLab version 1.4. which introduces powerful new ADM-WAV playback capabilities alongside several workflow enhancements. The new version also ushers in a new, and lower, pricing structure, designed to make spatial audio tools more accessible to sound designers, integrators and immersive experience creators.

TiMax panLab is widely used as a flexible environment for designing, demonstrating and deploying spatial audio experiences across live events, installations and immersive environments. In version 1.4, users can play back and render audio files that contain Audio Definition Model (ADM) metadata, allowing immersive mixes created in studio environments to be imported directly into a TiMax spatial playback workflow. The software supports playback of WAV, AIF, AIFF and CAF audio files through any connected soundcard, while rendering ADM object position metadata directly to TiMax panLab Sources for output to mixing consoles, system processors or TiMax rendering platforms.

TiMax Product and Software Manager, Dan Higgott, explained, “At TiMax, we are focussed on creating seamless integrations between our products and existing production workflows. The ability to read and re-render ADM WAV files unlocks a professional pipeline from studio to stage. This integration allows sound designers to mix in Dolby Atmos in the studio and directly translate their creative intent to any live event loudspeaker system. This is game changing in the immersive production space, and I am excited to see how our customers take advantage of this new possibility.”

The capabilities available in version 1.4 significantly simplify the traditional workflow for immersive content delivery. Previously, spatial productions often required producers and sound designers to export audio in multiple stems, after which system operators would recreate object positioning and movement within the playback system.

With ADM-WAV support in TiMax panLab, the full creative intent, including audio objects, position automation and track metadata, can be preserved in a single file and rendered directly within the TiMax environment. This enables a much smoother collaboration between content creators and playback engineers, allowing immersive audio production pipelines to mirror the efficiency and clarity often seen in video workflows.

Higgott added, “This feature builds upon an exciting year of integration developments in the TiMax ecosystem, with Solid State Logic, Atlas Show Control, Grapes 3D and Spat AI all launching one click integration with TiMax2 Software. Our support for the ADM-OSC standard has added seamless support for products from Yamaha, Sound Particles, QLab and many more.”

TiMax panLab version 1.4. also introduces several usability improvements designed to streamline setup and operation. Users can now connect or disconnect from mixing consoles and system processors via OSC, while the software automatically reopens the last project file when launched. The ability to create multiple Sources simultaneously and add them directly to the 3D panner significantly speeds up file setup, while batch editing within the Source Manager allows parameters to be adjusted across multiple Sources at once.

Visualisation of spatial Zones has also been improved, offering clearer and more accurate indication of overlaps within the panner interface, and OSC handling has been optimised for smoother positional updates during snapshots, sequences and animated playback.

Alongside the software update, TiMax has also introduced new lower pricing across the TiMax panLab range, making the platform more accessible to a broader community of spatial audio practitioners. The revised pricing reflects the ongoing commitment of TiMax towards creative professionals, enabling the exploration and deployment of spatial audio workflows across live performance, immersive installations, themed environments and experiential events.

For more on TiMax panLab: https://timaxspatial.com/products/timax-panlab/

For Free Trial: https://timaxspatial.com/support/software-downloads/timax-panlab/

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