10TH Anniversary EDDY Awards Honor Technical Advancement in Professional Audio

Ellen Lampert-Gréaux Nov 16, 2001 7:00am

Meyer Sound, Midas, PreSonus, RadioCom, and Shure to Receive EDDY Awards in New York City, December 7, 2001

New York, New York - Five outstanding new products representing major technical advancement in the field of professional audio will receive top honors on Friday, December 7, 2001 as Entertainment Design magazine celebrates the 10th anniversary of the EDDY Awards.

The following products will be in the spotlight:

Meyer Sound UPM-2P Self Powered Speaker
Midas Heritage Theatre Software
PreSonus Digimax Eight-Channel Mic Preamp
RadioCom BTR-800 Two-Channel UHF System
Shure WL51 Wireless Series

This special 10th anniversary EDDY event also includes six awards (both group and individual) to outstanding designers and technicians, lighting product awards, and a tribute to all past winners, as well as a special salute to a talented group of young designers. The 2001 EDDY Awards will be presented at 8:30pm, following a 7:00pm cocktail party at John Jay College Theatre (899 10th Avenue between 58th and 59th Streets) in New York City.

Click here for your EDDY Awards Invitation.

“We have a very strong group of professional audio products this year,” explains Entertainment Design editor David Johnson, who worked with a panel of audio industry experts to select the winning products. “Entertainment Design is committed to supporting advances in audio technology and it is very exciting to be able to honor this range of new products.”

The 2001 EDDY Award-winning audio products (by category) are:

Loudspeaker: Meyer Sound UPM-2P Self Powered Speaker

The UPM-2P, “the directional UPM we’ve all been asking for,” say the judges, is a compact, self-powered, bi-amped speaker system with three-way design incorporating dual 5” low/mid transducers, a 1” titanium dome HF driver on a symmetrical 45° horn, a two-channel power amplifier, and Meyer Sound’s proprietary phase-corrected active processing circuits. The UPM-2P is geared to applications requiring high sound pressure levels, extremely low distortion, and tight directional control. “It's small, but it sounds great and it packs a punch,” the judges say. “It's a great product because, as usual, Meyer did it right.”

Console/Software: Midas Heritage Theatre Software

Specifically geared to the theatrical market, this new software, will eventually be available in all Midas consoles; the first benefit is the compact, theatre-friendly Heritage 1000. According to the judges, one of the great features in the Heritage series consoles includes the SIS button to control energy distribution in the LCR outs. For the software itself, the big plus is the ability to work offline from a PC, enabling the user to make global on-line changes to scene set-ups remotely. The second phase, which is due for release in 2002, is the development of dynamic control in the way that already exists for Klark Teknik products such as the DN9848. “This software,” say the judges, “makes an already theater-friendly console that much friendlier.”

Recording Device: PreSonus Digimax Eight-Channel Mic Preamp

An “amazing bargain,” according to the judges, the Digimax features eight channels of mic pre-amplification with 24 simultaneous digital and analog outputs, Class A Discrete Input Buffers followed by a dual servo gain stage giving you 60db of preamp gain with 52 db of headroom. The Digimax uses both RMS and Peak detection to give you the best of both worlds. Note the judges: “Eight great sounding mic pre's, Clean A to D converters, and multiple digital outputs, as well as analog outs, all simultaneously accessible. All in a small package, and it's cheap! What more could you ask for?”

Intercom: RadioCom BTR-800 Two-Channel UHF System

The BTR-800 boasts a full complement of standard features, from four beltpacks per station, to UHF operation to two-intercom channel access from each beltpack, to stage announce output with relay closure, wireless talk around (ISO), and a very easy to use graphical interface that makes it a cinch to get to work right out of the box. It’s also got some cool special features, like Intelligent Power Control, in which each beltpack senses when it is close to the base station and automatically reduces its output by 10dB. Said one especially ebullient judge: “The BTR800 rocks. I love the BTR-500s, which I've been using for years, and am glad to see continued product.”

Microphone: Shure WL51 Wireless Series

Shure Incorporated’s latest addition to its line of subminiature lavalier microphones is the WL51 Series, a product group comprising five new cardioid models. Designed expressly for houses of worship, theatre, and event production, the WL51 weighs in at only .34 grams with a minuscule diameter of 5.8 mm. Each WL51 offering has a frequency response of 20 to 20 kHz, a dynamic range of 103 dB, maximum output of 138 dB SPL, and a low self-noise rating of 35 dB. According to the judges, this award goes as much to Shure and its longtime commitment to theatre sound as it is to the product itself.

Entertainment Design would also like to thank and recognize the 2001-2002 EDDY Awards Corporate Sponsors:

Click here for your EDDY Awards Invitation.

See other recent EDDY news:

EDDY Article: November 2, 2001
EDDY Article: November 13, 2001
EDDY Article: November 21, 2001

The 2001 EDDY Awards are produced by:
Entertainment Design Magazine
32 West 18th Street, New York, NY 10011

For additional information contact: Melissa Pollitt
[email protected]
212-229-2965 x817, Fax: 212-229-2084
www.entertainmentdesignmag.com