Outline releases new GTO-DF speaker

Outline, manufacturer of speaker systems for touring, installation and studio applications, has presented the GTO-DF, the newest member of the Grand Touring Outline series of line array speakers during AES 2011.

First introduced at PLASA 2011, the GTO-DF is designed to provide high-quality sound to the first several rows of the audience at an event, filling the sonic gap often experienced by event attendees who are seated near the stage.

“The GTO-DF rounds out the performance coverage of the highly regarded GTO Line Array speaker systems,” said Tom Bensen, senior vice president and managing director of Outline North America. “In the past, the front several rows of the audience could be slightly off axis to the main FOH arrays, leading to an audible reduction in coverage, especially in the critical high-end frequencies that are responsible for intelligibility. The GTO-DF, with its bottom-mounted constant directivity horn with embedded acoustic lens, is designed to reside on the bottom of a GTO array to provide the first several rows of seating with the signature GTO sound enjoyed by the rest of the audience. GTO has set a high benchmark for audio quality in the live event market and the GTO-DF continues that tradition.”

At the request of Jason Farah, co-owner and vice president of Special Event Services in Winston-Salem, NC, The new waveguide was designed to address the issue of downfill coverage. Outline’s engineering team looked at the problem and designed a solution to simply tag on an Outline Mantas speaker to the bottom of the array. With its purpose built, horn design and acoustic lens, the GTO-DF aims to deliver accurate performance within the form factor of a GTO array. Special Event Services was one of the first companies to adopt the GTO Line Array system and deployed the GTO-DF for the Darius Rucker tour and the ZZ Top/Lynyrd Skynyrd tour.

“The GTO-DF made all the difference in the world,” said Farah. “The coverage was exactly as the Outline 3D Open Array prediction software envisioned and the sound was magnificent. Plus, it’s the same footprint and hardware as the rest of the GTO family, so it made flying the rig so much simpler.”

GTO-DF includes an exclusive acoustic lens aperture that gradually flairs out and downward. It also offers four eight-inch mid-woofers and two three-inch compression drivers (the standard GTO Line Array cabinet features ten speakers with two 15-inch woofers, four eight-inch mid-woofers and four three-inch compression drivers). The GTO-DF can be added to a flying array as it is mechanically compatible with GTO. One of the features of the GTO-DF is its vertical dispersion range of zero-degrees to minus 25-degrees, which ensures that the sound is aimed into the audience and not onto the stage.

The GTO-DF is a bi-amped system which can handle 800 watts AES and 3,200 watts peak for the mid-woofer section covering the 200Hz to 1 kHz range. The waveguide offers 120 degrees of coverage from 315 Hz to 17.5 kHz. The cabinets weigh in at 172 lbs (78 kg) each and the high-frequency section handles 250 watts AES and 1,000 watts peak, covering a 1 kHz to 17.5 kHz range.