The World’s Most Precocious Speaker

The Divine is a small, un-assuming looking speaker, and at first glance doesn’t look too unusual…. until you get into the details. The devil is always in the detail! The Divine is beautifully built from diecast aluminium. It looks wonderful and is reassuringly solid at 1.7kg

Divine Networking

The Divine is a Dante/AES67 network audio speaker, with PoE powering its class D amplifier, from a compatible switch or midspan PoE injector. This means just a single network cable via the EtherCON connection. As well as power, this connection provides 4 audio sources from the network that are available for monitoring. Just connect the Divine to your network and four audio destinations are available when controlling the routing via Dante Controller. For a speaker, transmit channels are not required but the Divine does output a 1kHz test tone back to the network, which is an appreciated feature.

Divine User

The 4 channels can be monitored individually, in pairs, or all 4 mixed together, via the front panel selection button which loops through the available options. This is very useful for monitoring a programme source and a talkback channel together, or if you just need to monitor multi channel audio on a single speaker. Channels or channel mixes can be limited however so the user can’t get to them! There is a volume pot for level which goes all the way up to 11! Both the volume and input select button can be disabled separately so the user can’t have any control. The input trim of any individual channel can be adjusted by the user by holding the select button when on a channel and adjusting the level control.

Divine Control

There are no less that 22 configurable parameters on the Divine. It certainly keeps all the configuration well hidden and it is a surprise when you start to experience the extent of the options available. There is a small display on the back of the Divine that allows control of the main options and happily this can be security locked. The main control though will almost certainly be with the main Glensound Windows 10 remote application called GlenController. This allows control of the 22 variable parameters, and is also a real time monitor of the individual and channel mix levels. For reference, this is the list of possible adjustments (take a deep breath!): level control; individual input trim, individual channel audio delay, voice EQ filter, channel disable, minimum volume, maximum volume, volume boost, 3 level channel priority, priority announcement level, dim level on priority interrupt, meter mode DOTS or PPM, password, brightness, dark mode, button disable, pot disable, lineup level, EQ settings, LF cut, phase, peer group and finally, power save! As Glensound upgrade the remote functionality, upgrades for individual or whole groups of speakers is simple. Select the Divine’s you wish to upgrade via GlenController and press go. GlenController links to the Glensound servers and installs the most update firmware. Very painless.

Divine Interruption

The most interesting of the Divine features is the priority interrupt. Put quite simply, you can just select an input to have priority over the others. For example. Let’s say the Divine is in a theatre dressing room, with the show relay on input 1 so the cast can hear the show. Input 2 is the Stage Manager and is set as a priority. When the Stage Manager needs an actor on stage, they make a page announcement. This interrupts the show relay in the dressing room. The actor hears the call and then after the call the audio reverts to the show relay on input 1. You can set the priority order of all 4 inputs in this way – fire alarm input, paging, background audio for example. As the Divine is just listening for audio, it can come from any source on the network. Out of interest, even if the user turns the speaker all the way down, they will still get the priority calls!

Divine Grouping

Another interesting feature is grouping, with 10 groups to choose from. If an adjustment is made on one speaker, either directly or via the remote, all other speakers in the same group will adjust at the same time. This means if there are 4 Divine’s in a room or you are using them for multi channel audio, you only need to make one level adjustment for all the speakers.

Divine Sound

The Glensound design team have made a great job of making the Divine punchy. It is surprisingly powerful and does a great job in monitoring or background audio situations. There are various EQ settings for a flat sound or more appealing settings for music. You can also set specific voice EQ separately per input which really creates extra punch for speech material.

Divine Options

The Divine launched in all black. With the increasing demand for commercial applications, an all white versions has been added with a white grille and buttons.

Divine Installation

There is no need for any expensive dedicated brackets for the Divine. The rear features a standard 75mm VESA mount allowing use of the hundreds of different types of VESA mounts available at a very low cost. For desk or stage mounting, there is also a full size mic thread on the base to allow use with mic stands.

Divine Awards

The first major exhibition of 2021 for Glensound was the PLASA Show in London where their awards, “celebrate pioneering technology, through new materials or methods that increase safety, efficiency or performance.” The Divine won, with the judges commenting, “The feature set and price set the Divine apart from the competition”. We believe the awards list would’ve been extensive if there were any exhibitions happening during 2020!