MUSICAM Codecs Score KO at Tyson Fight

RF Systems Relies on MUSICAM Codec for Sporting Events and Other Live Productions

By Richard Schumaker
President
RF Systems Ltd.

LAS VEGAS

During the past few years, RF Systems Ltd. has broadcast audio for more than 200 major televised events from the United States to international audiences, including Super Bowl XXXIII and Mike Tyson’s bout in January. If you think Francois Botha took some ugly hits from Tyson, you can imagine what would happen to us if we didn’t get the right commentary to the proper country.

     We rely on ISDN technology, and MUSICAM USA codecs, exclusively, to provide our clients with the highest-quality audio worldwide.

IN THE RING

     Like Tyson himself, his fights always grab a lot of attention. Unlike other boxing events that have only four to six on-site foreign broadcasters, Tyson’s recent slug fest on Jan. 16 was broadcast by 14 countries on–site at Las Vegas’ MGM Grand. Nine of these countries broadcasted directly on ISDN. Among them were France and Holland’s Canal +, Germany’s Premiere, Japan’s JSB and the United Kingdom pay-per-view service, On Digital.

     Three ISDN "B" channels at the event were dedicated to On Digital. We used three CDQ1000s for program/mix-minus, production coordination and engineering coordination. In addition, Premiere and JSB used a CDQPrima 120 in a dual-mono configuration for program/mix-minus (left) and production coordination (right).

     It probably sounds excessive, but because this was a pay-per-view event in the U.K., redundant paths — satellite, fiber and ISDN — were required. Codecs are recognized as an important component by the broadcasters and the CDQ Prima certainly met the most demanding expectations during this event.

     Even though I can’t always tell the master control room engineer what configurations I want to use due to a language barrier, it’s easy enough to walk him or her through the Prima menu. It goes even faster when an engineer uses the Windows-based Prima Remote Control software.

     We were up-and-running for more than five hours without any dropouts or loss of framing. Each of the codecs was connected to an audible alarm system to alert me to any loss of framing. Although the front- panel LEDs on the Prima makes "at-a-glance" monitoring easy, there were too many codecs to watch at one time.

This performance is what we have grown to expect from MUSICAM USA products. We still use some of the early Micro56 units as backup or for production coordination.

 

COMPATIBILITY ISSUES

     The MUSICAM USA codecs that we use — including the CDQ-1000, Prima 110 and 120 — work in ISO/MPEG Layer II, Layer III and G.722, so compatibility is not a problem. MUSICAM USA systems seem to be widely available in Germany, France, Spain, the U.K. and Japan, whenever a broadcaster needs to rent additional units.

     We spent a lot of time preparing for the Tyson broadcast. A week before the event, we were up at 2 a.m., calling Europe from our Las Vegas office to pre-test with broadcasters we had not worked with in the past.

     With all this pre-testing complete, our van arrived on-site at the MGM Grand Gardens on Wednesday, Jan. 13. Our ISDN lines were installed at our Transmission van, which was parked in the TV compound. We performed loop-back tests to London the next day and ran 450 feet of cable from our ISDN Transmission van to our ringside commentary position.

     Fortunately, the van is built around "dry pair" (25-pair telephone cable) rather than having to use multiple DT12 audio cables. While the ringside commentary positions were being built on Friday, we did end-to-end audio testing with all the foreign broadcasters from our van. During the event on Saturday, we brought in a standby technician from a local telephone company in case we had any local circuit problems.

     The B-Mac satellite encryption system provides vision and up to six audio channels. This system is normally used for the domestic backhaul and international transmission of most boxing events, but when it is not available at an event for the domestic backhaul, ISDN technology and MUSICAM USA codec’s wide audio bandwidth allows us to match the audio quality of the international B-Mac transmission.

     At Super Bowl XXXIII, NFL Films International provided vision and two audio channels — one for the "American guide" commentary and another for the "international sound" on domestic satellite space. British Telecom provided the turnaround for the overseas B-Mac transmission of the NFL feed and our ISDN backhaul of Canal+Holland and Canal+Spain.

     A Prima codec was used at both ends of this backhaul. In addition to the British Telecom backhaul, MUSICAM USA codecs were used to provide direct ISDN transmission to NTV Moscow and seven other foreign broadcasters. ISDN codecs saved us from relying on standard telephone lines and gave us much better quality for both commentary audio and production coordination circuits.
When you consider that all but three on-site foreign broadcasters had feeds going through ISDN codecs this year, it’s clear that this technology has taken off. n

     Editor’s note: Richard Schumaker is the president of RF Systems Ltd. For the past 10 years, RF Systems has been offering AT&T ISDN connectivity, ISDN Terminal equipment and on-site engineering in the U.S. for European and Pacific Rim clients. He and his staff have provided ISDN transmission for major boxing events, the Super Bowl, NHL Finals, NBA All-Star Games, NBA Finals, The Indianapolis 500, the Sundance Film Festival and the Academy Awards. They also maintain ISDN circuits at British Telecom in Washington D.C., for Strategic Television.

     The opinions expressed above are the author’s alone. For further information, contact David Lin (Phone: 732-739-5600; FAX: 732-739-1818; Web site: www.musicamusa.com)

For more Information Contact:
Cindy DeVito
Marketing Coordinator
MUSICAM USA
732-739-5600
732-739-1818 fax
info@musicamusa.com e-mail

MUSICAM USA is the d/b/a of Corporate Computer Systems, Inc., Holmdel, NJ USA