Nordic broadcaster deploys Nevion’s NX4600 media gateway
When a large Nordic broadcaster needed to extend its coverage of top-flight soccer to include two newly promoted teams, it enlisted the provider of its existing contribution network to set up network links to the new stadia, including selecting and installing the relevant media gateways.
Clearly, it was important for the broadcasters to be able to provide live coverage as quickly and as economically as possible. Given the typical track record of newly promoted teams, it was possible that coverage from those stadia might only be required for one season. As a result, any infrastructure investment needed to be extremely cost effective.
The concern over the possible short length of use excluded the deployment of costly fiber to provide the network connection from the stadia to the main studio. Instead, a solution using IP over microwave link was chosen. This in turn meant that a low bandwidth solution was needed for the media gateways at either end of the link.
The service provider was already using light compression (J2K) gateways from Nevion in areas where sufficient network bandwidth was available; however, the proposed network for the new stadia was too constrained in terms of bandwidth to support this. Instead, H.264 encoding was chosen for its higher compression ratio. However, as these new gateways would have to co-exist with J2K gateways in the network, they would need to be managed in a consistent manner – ideally using an identical interface..
With space at a premium at these remote locations, any gateway solution also had to be as low profile as possible – ideally occupying just one RU. This solution obviously needed to be completely reliable and have built-in monitoring and would also need to easily integrate with their existing network.
Nevion solution
With the exacting demands of any new system in mind, the service provider selected the NX4600 Media Gateway. The NX4600 is Nevion’s latest generation H.264/AVC media gateway, and offers simultaneous encoding and decoding in a compact 1RU form factor. Within this unit up to 4 channels of encoding and/or decoding channels can be run.
Besides an intuitive user interface with built-in monitoring, the NX4600 offers outstanding picture quality relative to the bandwidth usage, giving an optimum experience for viewers.
In addition, because of its versatility in terms of being able to act both as an encoding and decoding device, the NX4600 could be easily redeployed for other uses, should the coverage of the newly promoted teams be no longer needed.
The NX4600 was deployed rapidly at the two stadia and the central production location, in time for the start of the new soccer season. The easy configuration and quick setup meant that minimum outlay on expertise was needed. Capital expenditure was kept to a minimum to avoid over-investment in a potentially temporary situation, while the new professional broadcast contribution added to the broadcaster’s live coverage capability.