Robust networking underpinned by the universally acknowledged reliability of Audinate’s Dante media networking technology is among the advantages of the new Symetrix-based DSP installation at Lotte Hotel World in Seoul, South Korea.

Some 40 years after the hotel operator was established in its original form, Lotte Hotels & Resorts is currently in the midst of an ambitious expansion drive to become one of Asia’s top three hotel brands by 2018. As part of this initiative, the chain is making continual improvements to its facilities’ infrastructure, with one recent project revolving around the replacement of an outdated audio routing and distribution system covering public spaces including multiple ballrooms.
“The customer had suffered from errors such as signal dropouts and the occurrence of noise during the middle of an event,” says Lisa Lee, marketing manager at Seoul-based professional A/V distributor Sound Solution, which served as installer for the Lotte Hotel World project. “So reliability was an absolute priority for the new installation, as well as support for the now very widely used Dante technology, which was not compatible with the outgoing system.”

The solution was provided by a redundant set-up incorporating a grand total of ten Symetrix SymNet Edge open architecture Dante-scalable DSPs, configured with 80 analogue inputs and 80 analogue outputs. The flexible new set-up allows the client to control routing and distribution of the live sound, as well as recordings made in two principle ballrooms (Crystal and Emerald) using Cubase recording software, Midas PRO2C and PRO6 consoles, and Klark Teknik DN9650 network bridges.
“The system is designed to allow the capture and distribution of audio from/to eight different ballrooms located on various floors of the hotel,” says Lee. “In contrast to the old installation, the new system with SymNet Edge and bullet-proof Dante networking provides far better stability of the system as well as a superior and highly intuitive user control interface.”

Despite the scale of the project at Lotte Hotel World, work was completed in a mere two weeks this July to the reported satisfaction of both the hotel operator and its staff. According to Lee, ease of zone control, straightforward audio distribution and accessible DSP status monitoring information are among the advantages to have particularly impressed the technical personnel.

“They are very pleased with the convenience and stability that the new Symetrix installation provides,” she concludes. “The overall verdict is that the flexibility and power of the new system represents a huge step forward for the hotel’s audio routing and control capability. Moving forward, the operators now have a plan to purchase further Symetrix units – specifically, Zone Mix 761 zone mixing, paging and music management solutions from the brand’s Integrator Series – for use in its restaurants at some point in the near-future.”