Turning its back on the dominant line-array trend, Nexo has taken modularity as its central design concept. It promises advanced formatting options by combining four separate loudspeaker elements - main, bass and sub cabinets, with an all-purpose 'omni' 15° option. Building on the discrete main and bass cabinets, STM can be configured at will; from arrays of main cabinets only, to main+bass, or to bass+main+bass. Adding the dedicated subbass cabinets, either in the arrays or as ground-stacks, further increases the options, and the omni units complete the coverage pattern, whatever the scale of the system.
"The modularity of STM makes it truly all-purpose," says Nexo's concert sound specialist Stuart Kerrison, explaining that the badge STM stands for Scale Through Modularity. " A rental provider can scale up his system from just six cabinets a side for a small event, to whatever is needed to handle an arena or stadium application. Even large flown arrays of main+bass+sub are so low-profile that they comply with sightline restrictions for broadcast concerts and events."
A first for Nexo, the main, bass and omni cabinets are injection-moulded for maximum durability and weather-resistance. Technical director Francois Deffarges is proud of the system's bass and sub bass provision, this being one of Nexo's traditional strengths. "Our extremely powerful bass cabinet has a frequency response which overlaps that of the sub and main modules, providing a valuable increase in LF headroom. With the sub, we can achieve a similar SPL output to our CD18 unit, using just one 18" driver. And there are advantages in use; two subs can be used back-to-back in cardioids mode, or side-by-side in omnidirectional mode."
Another first, Nexo is supplying the system road-ready. The STM cabinets are paired with the Nexo Universal Amp Rack, or NUAR, which contains the first plug-and-play digital output patch, real-time system monitoring and EtherSound control network functionality in addition to two NXAMP4x4s, each of which can power up to 12 speakers, in groups of three.?
Nexo is supported by the resources of parent company Yamaha throughout the STM development, with particular regard to the NXAMP power and processing functionality, and with the development of a dual voltage version of the NXAMP, also being unveiled in Frankfurt.
Although their identities are still being kept under wraps, three leading international rental companies have been instrumental in the design of STM and will be the first to put the system through its paces. According to Nexo's Stuart Kerrison, "One of the features of the STM Series that most appealed to them was the new patented rigging system, which allows just one rigging technician to fly an entire stadium system. We didn't cut corners on it, and it represents a sizeable chunk of the cost of an STM cabinet, but it promises huge advantages in terms of speed, efficiency and safety."
(Jim Evans)
