The new Nexo ID24 super-compact loudspeakers have been installed for the first time working as under-balcony fills in the 2000-seater Bristol Hippodrome theatre for last year's pantomime production of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs starring Warwick Davis amongst others.

Orbital is the first rental company in the world to deploy the ID Series, used in Bristol alongside two other NEXO systems – an STM M28 modular line array for main PA, augmented by GEO M6 compact line array modules for the upper balcony.

With a view to forthcoming rental projects Orbital stocks ID24 cabinets in black and white. Orbital MD Chris Headlam describes the ID24 as "a latest generation product from the modern era of loudspeaker modelling. The ID24 has a user-rotatable horn and is ideal for our delay/under-balcony/infill applications in the theatre auditorium."

The ID24 cabinet contains twin 4" drivers in combination with an HF compression driver offering two preset directivity options. Since the box can be mounted vertically or horizontally, this effectively gives the user four different directivities in a cabinet that is just 310mm wide x 132mm high.

"Vocal projection is very important and these cabinets sound natural even at high SPL. NEXO has made it easier for theatre sound designers; the ID24 is small enough, powerful enough and light enough for use in multiple applications. In Bristol, we're using two different NEXO line arrays with the ID compacts and as a rental supplier I'm impressed by the 'family sound' that makes all these loudspeakers sound so cohesive as a system."

Orbital Sound is also making extensive use of their recently acquired Nexo compact line array system, the GEO M6, featuring as the main PA in two other major British theatres for their pantomime productions, the Opera House in Manchester (1800-seats) and the Marlowe Theatre in Canterbury (1200-seats).

"This is a totally contemporary loudspeaker," says Headlam. "Made in 2014, it actually sounds more modern than speakers made even in 2010. It has a really low level of distortion, and a lovely spatial top-end. The SPL and throw almost defies logic when you consider its size."

At the Marlowe Theatre, with 2 balconies, Orbital has installed six arrays of GEO M6; lines of 6-a-side at performer level, 3-a-side at upper stage level for Balcony 1 and with left/right 6-cabinet arrays flown over the proscenium arch to address Balcony 2. In Manchester at the historic 1800-seat Opera House the GEO M6 is deployed in left/right 12-cabinet arrays, under the direction of highly experienced sound designer Chris Whybrow who commented "It has outstanding resistance to feedback, so often the problem that lets down the compact line array. GEO M6 conquers this problem completely, and sets a new benchmark."