Dolby Builds New Labs in Germany

Nuremberg, Germany (October 23, 2024)—Dolby has augmented its development and testing facilities for automotive and consumer products with a mixing lab and a critical listening lab at its new, larger location in Nuremberg, Germany.

The new Nuremberg facility has been built with software development and testing in an agile scrum environment as its priority. This will see the space used for device testing for head units and loudspeaker setups in cars, as well as TVs, soundbars, set top boxes, AVRs and wireless smart speakers. Additionally, the space will also host scrum teams working on prototypes in dedicated project rooms as the company continues to grow its product offering.

The facility worked with acoustic consultant Radoslaw Arkadiusz Ciszewski from Müller-BBM Building Solutions GmbH in Berlin, who developed the detailed design of the labs while also working closely with the landlord’s architects and the professionals on site.

Dolby content relations manager and sound expert, David Ziegler, handled the monitor selection and room fit out, supported by Georg Biberger from Thomann in Burgebrach, who handled the entire AV installation. The Dolby lab team from Wroclaw were tasked with performing the final measurements and calibration of the room.

Studio Goes Above and Beyond with Immersive Room

When it came to the monitoring systems, Genelec was the brand of choice. “The typical loudspeaker layouts for our use cases are 5.1.2, 5.1.4, 7.1.2, and 7.1.4 for both the mix lab and the critical listening lab,” explains Andreas Ehret, sr. director automotive Dolby and managing director of Dolby Germany. “As a result, we have installed a 9.1.6 Smart Active Monitoring system in both rooms, such that we can switch easily. There is a dedicated processor for each room, and we’re using it to control the routing, switching formats and tuning.”

In the mix lab, this layout takes the form of 8351s as LCR with 8341s for the surround and height channels, assisted by dual 7370 subwoofers. In the critical listening lab, 19 8341s handle all of the channels apart from the low end, which is handled via 7370 subs. Dolby also used Genelec GLM software to calibrate each room, which integrates with the DSP hardware within each individual monitor and subwoofer, allowing control of frequency response, playback level and distance delay.