With over 1,200 students a year enrolled on a range of courses from television and radio, to visual and animation, Salford University is well known for preparing students for the realities of the media industry. Central to this preparation are its dedicated studios, opened in 2011, which offer students practical experience and are also used by industry clients including the BBC and ITV.

“In the studio we produce everything from 1 on 1 interviews all the way through to performances of 18-piece Latin bands. We have a large variety of different shows that come in and out. It’s not only for the students, it’s also for working with commercial clients like the BBC, CBEEBIES and ITV,” commented Ash Tidball, TV studio manager. “The university tries to mirror the industry as much as possible, not only in what the academics bring from the outside world in terms of production, presenting and educating, but we also have people like us, Creative Technical Demonstrators, that are bringing in skill sets from the live broadcast and engineering industry. We need to mirror the industry so we can prepare our students to have the transferable skills they need for their jobs in the real world later on.”

After research and testing, the team invested in the new Sony DWX Gen3 Digital Wireless Series, installing the range across Salford University’s three TV studios.

The DWT-B03R bodypack transmitter has a strong magnesium-alloy casing, resistant to rain, spray and sweat; and weighing under 100g, it’s perfect for round-the-clock operation in a wide variety of applications at Salford’s busy studios.

The DWX has a high dynamic range of more than 106dB and excellent transient response. Further features such as support for high density multi-channel operation, accommodating up to 21 channels per 8MHz TV band, make the solution perfect for a diverse range of productions.

Concluded Tidball, “We replaced the existing system with Sony solutions and now no longer have issues with dropouts and disconnects or white out noise; things that were happening in a space where they shouldn’t be happening. Our new Sony DWX Series transmitters and receivers are extremely versatile, offer fantastic audio quality, are future proof and, keeping our students in mind, robust! With hundreds of student studio users each year, we needed a  system  that offered cutting-edge features alongside reliability. The quality has surpassed our old system, delivering clarity for every studio situation. It  reflects the growing standards of the industry and will provide us with bright and reliable audio recordings for many years to come.”