One of the greatest challenges in a conference room is the means of providing effective communication during a meeting or other gathering. When participants strain to understand what is being said, more than just the point or message is lost. Typical sound systems place a microphone (and respective cables) close to nearly every person at the table. The resulting sound is not uniform, and it changes with different meetings and groups of participants. More sophisticated sound systems try to compensate automatically, but the speech almost always sounds amplified and unnatural. It might be easier to give everyone in the room a megaphone!

LARES Viva is a quantum leap in conference room acoustical design. Viva is not a public address system – it is a room acoustics system incorporating microphones, loudspeakers, and patented DSP (digital signal processing) that lifts the acoustic level in the room in a manner that sounds natural. It provides a pleasant acoustical environment; one that enables all in attendance to participate effortlessly. Viva can make a conference room feel comfortable for five minutes or even five hours. It helps to minimize the fatigue caused by a poor acoustical environment.

When it is on, Viva distributes sound uniformly throughout the space, making the room come alive. But unlike public address systems, Viva sounds natural. There is no variation in the quality of sound meeting per meeting, or with differing groups of participants. Viva is transparent – that is, when it is on, you won’t realize that it is on; you will simply be able to hear and understand everyone’s speech clearly and easily.

Viva is based on the LARES Acoustic Enhancement system which has become the most widely accepted form of electronic acoustical treatment in use today. LARES overcomes instability encountered when microphones and loudspeakers are used in close proximity to one another. This instability exhibits itself as acoustic feedback or "howling." It is why typical sound systems need to have microphones placed very close to the participants, and as far from the loudspeakers as possible. Unlike typical sound systems, Viva’s microphones can be located in the ceiling or on the walls – even close to the loudspeakers. This allows the entire system to be integrated in a manner that is virtually invisible.

Each Viva system is custom designed to meet the individual requirements of each room. Because Viva incorporates a distributed loudspeaker array, additional sound sources such as multi-media playback, Dolby or THX surround sound can be integrated easily. While Viva’s operation can be as simple as a light-switch, more complete system operation can be provided via a touchscreen control system. The touchscreen control system can also be used to integrate complete room control including CD and DVD transport, slide projector and VTR controls, motorized screens, climate control, lighting, and more.