Tag: Sound360

Cut Through the Noise

How Visual and Audio Alerts Work Together In Noisy Environments

In environments filled with constant motion and background noise — like manufacturing plants, warehouses, airports, and hospitals — clear communication can be the difference between calm and chaos. When every second matters, a single missed alert can compromise safety and response times. That’s why industrial facilities are choosing to incorporate visual and audio emergency notification systems. This approach ensures messages, especially those during emergencies, reach every eye and every ear.

Industrial paging in noisy environments. Image of an industrial worker wearing hearing protection in an industral plant

The Challenge of Noisy or Complex Spaces

Traditional audio alerts often struggle to cut through the sound of machinery, background music, or ambient noise. In these high-decibel settings, relying solely on audio isn’t enough. Many industries, such as manufacturing, require employees to use hearing protection while at work. At the same time, visual cues alone may be missed by employees or visitors who aren’t facing the right direction. Therefore, the most effective strategy is a multi-modal communication approach — combining both sound and visuals to deliver messages with impact and clarity.

Visual Notification: The Silent Messenger

Bright LED displays, strobes, and multicolor flashers serve as visual reinforcements for emergency and routine messaging.

Valcom’s new LCD Display and multi-color flasher elevate visual communication to a new level. LCDs can present scrolling text, custom messages, and even real-time data. Meanwhile, multi-color flashers instantly distinguish the nature of an alert. For example, red for evacuation, blue for lockdown, and amber for weather warnings.

These technologies not only reach those who may not hear an alarm — such as individuals wearing hearing protection or with hearing impairments — but also add clarity and precision to every notification.

Valcom VIP-LD22 Series LCD Dispaly with text

Audio Alerts: Still the Fastest Way to Get Attention

While visual alerts enhance clarity, audio remains the fastest way to capture attention and convey detailed instructions.

With Valcom’s network-based paging and life safety solutions, messages can be broadcast instantly to targeted zones or to the entire facility. Pre-recorded and live announcements ensure flexibility — whether it’s a severe weather alert, evacuation, or routine operational update.

Integrating with overhead speakers, horns, and wide coverage speakers like the Sound360° ensures audio clarity across vast, open spaces without dead zones or echo distortion.

The Power of Integration

When audio and visual systems operate as part of a unified platform — such as Valcom’s enterprise communication solutions — the result is a synchronized, reliable, and scalable notification network.

Integration with third-party systems, such as access control, fire panels, and third-party software providers, ensures that all alerts trigger simultaneously across all channels. The result: faster awareness and response times. Furthermore, it ensures compliance with industry safety standards such as ADA.

A Safer, More Inclusive Environment

Every ear and every eye matters. By pairing visual and audio alerts, organizations can communicate effectively with everyone. This includes employees wearing hearing protection, patients resting in quiet zones, or travelers moving through a busy terminal.

The outcome isn’t just compliance or convenience — it’s life safety when it matters and ensures no one is left uninformed when seconds count. To learn more about how Valcom’s overhead paging and visual notifications fit into your market, click the market icon below.

K-12 icon

K-12

heart icon

Healthcare

gear icon for industrial market

Industrial

globe icon for Valcom Goverment market

Government

Valcom Corporate Market Icon

Corporate

Ready to Connect

Fill out the form below and let’s discuss our solutions.

Contact Us Form

This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.
This field is hidden when viewing the form

Next Steps: Sync an Email Add-On

To get the most out of your form, we suggest that you sync this form with an email add-on. To learn more about your email add-on options, visit the following page (https://www.gravityforms.com/the-8-best-email-plugins-for-wordpress-in-2020/). Important: Delete this tip before you publish the form.

About You

Your Name(Required)
Your Address(Required)
Your Email Address(Required)

How Can We Reach You?

We would love to chat with you. How can we get in touch?

What's on your mind?

Please let us know what's on your mind. Have a question for us? Ask away.

Sound360° Voice Paging Quality

Voice Paging Quality in Warehouse Distribution Centers

August 29, 2024

Distribution centers and warehouses that provide voice paging and background music face significant challenges in optimizing sound quality. These buildings typically have large open spaces with high ceilings, concrete walls and floors. These create reflective surfaces, which cause sound to bounce around. This phenomenon, known as reverberation, degrades overall voice paging quality. The more reflections and reverberations there are, the more likely it is that a voice page will become less intelligible.

How can you overcome these audio challenges in a warehouse enviornment?

To optimize warehouse acoustics, it is crucial to understand how sound disperses from speakers, reflects off surfaces, and what type of speakers can overcome these challenges.
Horns and cone-type speakers are the most installed speakers for warehouses.  Horns are powerful and suited for noisy environments, but they are not designed for music reproduction. Playing music through a horn will sound “tinny” and in some cases cause premature failure. Horns produce sound via a moving coil and diaphragm within their structure. The sound then travels through the horn and is emitted out through the bell. The sound is usually highly amplified to reach long distances and it reflects off the many surfaces it hits. To cover large sound areas, multiple horns must be used and must be spaced a certain distance apart.

Another common and popular style of speaker is the cone-type speaker. These speakers are found in large gymnasiums and warehouses in low to medium ambient noise environments. Cone-type speakers can emit sound in large open spaces and play quality background music but have their limitations. A cone-type speaker is not as efficient (loud) as a horn so to cover the same amount of area, even more speakers would have to be used than horns to provide the necessary sound coverage. This results in many more points in the warehouse where sound is dispersed, and this results in a greater amount of reverberation. Horns and speakers are generally installed facing in one direction and disperse sound in that same direction. The direction/area that each speaker or horn effectively covers can be described as a dispersion angle. Dispersion angles of traditional horns and speakers at low frequencies are fairly wide but as frequencies increase the dispersion angle narrows. The frequencies that provide voice intelligibility are in these higher frequencies. Still, a properly designed and balanced horn or speaker system can provide an intelligible voice paging system in warehouses. But, there is a better solution.

What audio solutions exist that is not a horn or cone-type that will have less reverberation in a warehouse environment?

An alternative solution worth considering is the Sound360° warehouse speaker from Valcom. The flat panel style acts as if it has many tiny speakers in the panel and disperses sound in 360 degrees. The Sound360° speaker replaces up to 3 to 4 horns or speakers in a warehouse design. This results in less points of sound dispersion and therefore results in less reflection points and less reverberation. The graph to the right shows the narrower range of sound dispersed in a horn or cone speakers and the narrow range of intelligibility compared to the Sound360°. The eloquent design disperses sound in a wider area and provides a greater range of intelligibility than a cone or horn type speaker. The cleaner dispersion of sound results in less trouble with blended areas than you have with horn or cone-style speakers. The Sound360° speaker from Valcom provides better quality sound in a warehouse than a traditional horn and can replace up to three to four horns as illustrated by the graphic on the right.

Sound360° Flat Panel Speaker
Valcom’s Sound360° Speaker is availabe in IP, Self-Amplified and 25/70 Volt

The Sound360° Flat Panel Speaker facilitates voice paging and high-quality background music, making it suitable for distribution warehouses, light manufacturing centers, and large retail stores. The Sound360° Flat Panel Speaker come in IP, self-amplified and 25/70 Volt. Other innovative products launched by Valcom to improve workplace efficiency and day-to-day communication include the Building Communication Panel. The Building Communication Panel helps companies streamline daily communications and allows for quick activation of emergency alerts to multiple departments and channels.

Sound360 Improving Audio Solutions

Improving Audio Solutions in Warehouse Distribution and Industrial Facilities

February 2024

Many warehouse distribution centers face limitations in their audio technology, often restricted to basic one-way paging announcements without the ability to play quality background music.  The audio is typically transmitted through horns, which are not designed for music reproduction. This leads to poor audio quality and can cause premature horn failure.  Consequently, workers resort to listening to their music through headphones or the mixed sounds of the conveyor belt, forklift, and other machinery equipment. However, OSHA has cautioned against using headphones since “listening to music via headphones may produce a safety hazard by masking environmental sounds that need to be heard.” In today’s competitive labor market, where companies struggle to hire and retain employees in manufacturing, exploring solutions that will enhance employee satisfaction and well-being is essential.  In a recent study of 500 workers, 87% of those surveyed said they “think that playing music creates a positive working environment.”   

What audio solutions exist that will improve the work environment?

According to this 2023 article from Geekwire.com, Amazon is testing headphones at some fulfillment centers, incorporating strict controls to comply with OSHA safety standards. However, ongoing headphone provision can be costly and does not allow for important paging announcements. 

An alternative solution worth considering is the Sound 360 warehouse speaker from Valcom. This innovative speaker offers 360-degree coverage in open spaces and generates minimal reverberation compared to traditional cone-type speakers. Unlike headphones, Sound 360 can facilitate voice paging and background music, making it suitable for distribution warehouses, light manufacturing centers, and large retail stores. Notably, a prominent home improvement retailer has adopted the Sound 360 in all their US distribution centers.  Other innovative products launched by Valcom to improve workplace efficiency and day-to-day communication include the Building Communication Panel. The Building Communication Panel helps companies streamline daily communications and allows for quick activation of emergency alerts to multiple departments and channels. To learn more, contact your Regional Sales Manager or email us.