Archive
My NAB Round-up
If you were looking for something new and cool, you may have been dissapointed. For me it was refreshing to not be bombarded with” it’s new and fresh” sales pitches. I saw more to my liking the” we have improved this or made this” better in our product. When you purchase products that are meaant to last several years you cannot purchase the latest and greatest, so you look for the improvements.
Sierra Automated Systems showed me the improvements to their routers. IP audio and redundant MCU capability. Nautel previewed a bit of the AUI and I was unable to return for some in-depth insight to a couple of NV questions I have, so a phone call is going to be made. Harris will be providing me another software/firmware update to the Flexstar as I continue to have issues. At least theyare responsive to my needs.
There was one item that I thought was cooland innovative. It belongs to Pelican, the road case guys. It was an LED light that packs within a case. Bright, battery operated, it was exactly what I need for them dark morning show remotes outside. Shoot even in dark venues pop one of them out. The batteries last 8-10hrs. I saw two and four light versions. Switches file each light. Very handy and in its own case. Nice job. That gets my cool stuff vote!
These are the 9400 series remote area lighting systems. I really liked the 9470 package, but may be overkill.
I made my customary stops and expressed my opinions, be that what it may. Some vendors are quite receptive and others think I’m a freak. In either case it was a good show for me this year. Till next time!
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NAB Convention Is Upon Us!
I sit here gathering up my “notes” and listening to my Blues channel on Pandora; NAB is around the corner. No way, it is here! I leave tomorrow! Wow. I have an agenda. The company has an agenda. The show has an agenda. My job is to make them all mesh. Of course it will not prevent me from doing some “vendor disruptions”.
I need to visit vendors regarding remote controls. Burk, Audemat, and Davicom come to mind. Any other suggestions? I’m familiar with Burk. I like the concept and white paper by Audemat, though some reports from the local boys across town will curl your hair. Davicom I’ve seen via web meeting and should be usable. How far do I want to go? This could be fun.
We will attempt to crash the NexGen, so be prepared RCS. We like to dig and we want to push buttons; simultaneously. We did this to WideOrbit and they passed. Others failed in an endless loop in the past, so maybe everyone is robust compared to then. Should be fun.
I will be at the NUG (Nautel Users Group) on Sunday. Hey, that app you posted in the Waves newsletter does not work through VPN. I look forward to seeing what’s new and how things are. I also want to see the advanced AUI presentation.
To bad Verizon won’t be there. Maybe even HTC and Samsung. No VPN through hotspots? NAT issue? Come on, now. How do we run our stuff securely, leave it on an open network? Security first, people. If WiFi is available on the floor or nearby, I will be happy to show you a VPN connection w/VNC to my Nautel transmitters on an eReader, a.k.a. cheap tablet.
I will be talking with SAS (Sierra Automated Systems) regarding my system and integration with our next automation system being mandated by the company. (I’ll elaborate later, and will be a subject of review) I have a studio upgrade coming.
Tieline will get a visit. I see a new box and they did not send me one to play with. Does that mean I can break it at the show? Also I noticed an application to manage the Tieline remote gear. Well, where is it? I know I have 8 boxes I could manage. I like pushing updates. I also like to add and subtract profiles as necessary. Let’s have at it! Oh, and where is the Android app?
I will visit Sage and ask to tear about the Digital Endec. EAS and CAPS is coming and we are to upgrade this year anyways. Just a few questions and a look at the box. This is the one we have decided on.
I’ll visit with Studer as they want to meet with me regarding consoles. This is not a formal thing, but would be cool if it led somewhere. I am quite happy with my SAS Rubicons and SLs. If it leads to anything, it is design, like I know anything about that; I install and make ’em work.
It just piles up. I notice a hard time for Audemat. Hopefully we are discussing remote control and not that stupid Golden Eagle box. I had to reboot that thing 3 times yesterday just to get diversity delay readings! Ouch. The multipath at the studios isn’t much help either.
I think I will swing by Harris and tell them that my Flexstar dropped off once again without any reason. Once in 1 year is a major improvement! Of course a week after that occurred I get an email talking about their new transmitters. WT>>>> I have a “young” transmitter, I cannot get another. There is other competition out there! 😉 (See my article in the Waves newsletter….) I want to see the STL solutions provided by these guys, too. This means I will be visiting Moseley, too. I have Moseley and Intraplex.
Gosh, I just remembered I wanted to look at some audio test gear and modulation monitors that work. The ones I have are in a word, worthless. They will make good air monitors for HD, though.
I will hit the usual suspects as time permits. I have a lot to do with only 2 days on the floor. I’m a bit disappointed I may not get to see interactive and video. I want to delve into some of that and see what ideas I can come away with.
Hope to see you all at the show! Walk up and smack me if you wish to talk.
Cheers!
Same,but Not
Ever get the feeling things stay the same, but then discover they are not? We had anotther UPS fault this week. This time on the processing rack. I did the early morning swap without incident. Off air time was that of the reboot. Phew. Then tonight a surprise; station drops off the air!
There are many frustrations when dealing with old infrastructure. We have an Aux site for three stations, but only the remote control for one operates it! So, said station goes off, it calls me and I go to the Aux transmitter: no audio! I instructed my assistant to turn on the Aux site, if not him I would have to dial up the Aux site and turn it on. Then I would dial back to the main site to make sure all is off there. Annoying and a waste of time.
So much for my rant. We need a better remote system! Anyways our Harris HDHT+ dropped. I could not find a problem. Ran it in a load. Ran it back on air. Nothing. No log entries. These are the very symptoms as last year. I suspect the Flexstar exciter did some barf. Again no logs to confirm or deny it. I checked UPS logs and found no indication of a power event. I looked at other devices for tell-tale signs, and found none. For piece of mind I rebooted the exciter. Let’s see where this goes. Of course all this occurs days before I take a few days off.
Next I will lay out what should be a reliable remote system. All busy work, but becoming necessary. That along with how to deal with the emminent NextGen system being forced upon us. Our 20 year old infrastructure cannot handle this extra hardware. No space and no power. I should detail that story in a future post!
Cheers!
Harris Flexstar Update 6/17/2010
So for all waiting with baited breath on an update regarding the Flexstar situation here. I installed a beta update to the “loaner” Flexstar exciter back in May. Guess what? We’ve been on the air continuously since the update and the diversity delay has be quite stable. Check with Harris and try to get an idea of when they plan to release this version. I thought it would be this month, but I have not heard anything. Then again I usually have to ask for stuff.
What have we done? I do not recall what I wrote before and am too lazy to look back. We changed back to a UDP stream from the TCP. The bottleneck that was being experienced the Flexstar did not like. We forced our Intraplex T-1 NIC (network interface card) to 10/Full on both ends. On the managed switch we made the port feeding the Intraplex 10/Full also. At the transmitter site we decided to take a variable out and feed from the Intraplex to the exciter directly, using a cross-over cable, and set the exciter NIC to 10/Full. This all dropped the jitter down. I recently became aware of someone who discovered that their DS-64NC card in the Intraplex was causing T1 issues. Once replaced they stabilized.
I have been monitoring and checking every 3 to 4 days on the diversity delay. Still good. Mask is great. I feel that we have moved in the right direction. Now of course this is a loaner exciter, so I still wonder what happened to our last exciter and what physically may have happened. I strongly suspect that this current “loaner” will be come our “permanent”, but no word yet.
A little digging on this part sure has gone a long way. Now we just need to close the project. That will happen when the release of the Exgine and Flexstar application are released.
I really hope this has helped some of you out there get your boxes on track!
Be Prepared
An interesting week this turned into. It started with a productive trip to a transmitter site and ended with a visit from the FCC. In the middle, well actually around this was a visit from our corporate officers and a Harris Flexstar update.
The transmitter trip was to our Aux site. In preparations for licensing we did some new remote control wiring and posting of CPs. We discovered a bad switch on the RF load, so a new one will be installed next trip. The cable bridge is still wonky and I have no idea on the repair time frame.
We had a compliance inspection from our friendly FCC. If you are prepared why be worried? We passed with flying colors and I think the inspector was taken by our nonchalance and jovial confidence. Folks, it is not that difficult to maintain EAS compliance. Run the damned things and log them. It helps when a computer does the logging. The public files is the same thing. Get a check list and start making folders and fill them with the appropriate information. Some use binders. Some scan it all and make it available online. Any way you do it, just do it.
Last night I got hit with another mysterious Harris Flexstar outage. My remote reset connection came in handy. After a nice discussion this afternoon we may be testing some more. I am so curious about the cause that I am over the frustration part, though programming has other thoughts. I am at the point where if I do not know the cause I will be disappointed. From a business side we wish we could just replace it. In any case we march forward.
Be prepared for that which you can be and within your means. Try to enjoy the adventure.
Cheers!
Harris FlexStar Issue
I mentioned awhile back that we were having mysterious outages, or off-air events, with our HTHD+ transmitter. This began May or June last year and we’ve spent much time working with Harris to determine where the problem was. Each time we would try or look into something as they suggested. The events were random and quite annoying. Obviously the station PD was becoming quite annoyed. Random issues are the worst.
As we followed suggestions, we connected the remote control to various status and metering locations to determine what and where our RF mute was occurring. We ended up metering the FlexStar exciter forward power. We connected a status monitor to the RF Mute status. Was it the transmitter telling the exciter to mute? Was the exciter muting on its own? More questions and no answers. Was the APC circuit cutting out? Nope. We began to catch events that ruled out the transmitter and APC. The exciter forward power muted without any mute status. Now what?
Next became a look at the HD data network. Could the data cause an RF mute? It seemed a reasonable question as the exciter does lock its PLL to the 10MHz clock that is derived via the Exporter and GPS. We began to gather PLL logs. We did discover some latency that could affect the PLL, but it did not explain why or how it could mute the RF. As we are running in hybrid mode, we really do not want anything that messes with the HD to mess with our analog. We continued to gather more logs and information, but an no point were we able to tie anything together.
Harris decided they wanted the exciter for bench testing. After nearly two weeks of bench testing we did receive an email stating that they captured an RF mute situation and it had nothing to do with the HD data or network. Now we wait to hear what internal issue is causing the random mutes. This whole thing has become quite an interesting ordeal. Sometimes you learn more than your really wanted or needed to know. Stay tune for the final word!
Transmitters and their Quirks
We spent the week working with Harris on the HTHD+. More precisely we have been working with them on the FlexStar exciter. Apparently we have some sort of PLL anomaly, or at least that is what we are investigating now.
We have limited connectivity to our transmitter site, so we use a single T1 circuit that carries our main audio and our HD data. This bottleneck seems to cause a clocking issue and when it gets too far out of whack (for lack of a better descriptor) the PLL goes nuts and mutes RF on the exciter. With more information from our frequency monitoring service we discovered that the transmitter was drifting in frequency, too.
We shipped our exciter back for evaluation and have installed a loaner. We went to air on it Friday, and so far we have been on the air since. I will be checking the PLL logs we are collecting to see how this exciter deals with our bottleneck of a data network.
I cannot blame any manufacturer here. I do feel that iBiquity could have/should have done a bit more testing of their algorithms and encoding so such issues could be avoided. There are many stations with limited bandwidth to their transmitter sites. If we were not forced to jump on this HD bandwagon so soon, maybe this situation would never have happened.
What?! Nothing Happening?
Wow, I cannot believe I have not posted in over two weeks! Well, yes I can. Nothing is going on. As my tweets have mentioned I have updated our NV20’s to Version 2.6. Guess what, 2.7 is available. From what I can tell I may not need 2.7 at this time as i am not experiencing the issues of which it contains. I do not update just for the sake of updating, so on this one I will wait it out just a bit and research more on what it is supposed to do. I am quite happy with 2.6. No issues. Uh, Oh, now there will be something.
Harris? This buffer overflow thing seemed to be the issue. I still am surprised that an HD data overflow would mute the exciter. How can you put something on the air that is NOT critical but can cause a critical outage? Flabbergasted is a word for that. Hey, at least we’ve been on the air since I changed the Exgine delay setting.
DaySequerra M2.2R? Not back yet. Still waiting. This better work when I get it back!
Time change. Hopefully everyone who needs to made their changes. When you get down to it I find it amazing how many things have clocks in them. I also find it amazing why. I know my processors have dayparting, but we do not use it. Need a clock? Not really, but we check them anyways. Anything that logs need updating. Now my Nautel transmitter clocks need to be checked so I can get accurate logs on any issues. Nice feature, eh?
The super secret item mentioned in a tweet? It is a Tieline product. I am beta testing for a week coming up here. I don’t think I am supposed to talk about it yet, though it is a product they demonstrated at NAB. I am honored to be able to test something for a company. They trust I will either like it or can find issues with it. I can’t wait to get my hands on it.
That’s all folks. I’ll keep you posted and may even write an opinion on something like HD power increase.
Harris Fix?
Apparently we me be on the road to the answer of why our HTHD+ transmitter randomly drops off air. If you have followed my posts these random events are annoying to say the least. Recently we discovered the transmitter recovers on its own within 2 minutes, a long time in radio land. What is this potential solution?
Set the Exgine Buffer such that the Buf Used and Buf Max is in the 20-30% range. We moved ours from Default to 0.836 and the system seemed to stabilize. We still experience Exporter Sync Unlocks, but are not as often. Also when using thos setting the Lock Indicator does not swing as much. This will count down to zero, go negative, reverse, and “swing” between random limits. Apparently if the swing is within some tolerance the sync indicates a lock and the buffer is running optimal.
If the buffer is over utilized there seems to be a DSP barf which mutes the exciter. Seems odd that this could happen, but since changing our settings we surpassed our 2 week wall and shut offs. After checking this morning the sync was unlocked and we noticed our T-1 circuit took a hit. Makes sense that some corrupt packets came in and caused loss of sync. We await a re-sync. Too bad there is no good way to remotely monitor this.
I will keep on top of this, so look for tweets and future blog updates.
Week of Fun
So you all saw the updates of the week via Tweets. Some also have seen the latest post regarding the STL. Here is a summary of stuff that will help those troubleshooting (STL) and planning (software updates) in the coming weeks.
1. The STL. The symptoms were quite surprising on the Moseley aural STL. We noticed the failure via audio drop outs. It was somewhat periodic, too, which was quite interesting. As we had planned to drop the system to 32 quam from 64 quam to make it more robust in the first place, we began to do that from the far end (receivers at transmitter sites) back to the near end (studios). No bit errors were being received at the transmitter site, so there was no real need to worry, yet the problem was there. When we got to the transmitter at the studio, and after visiting the mid-point, we noticed the issue after making our Quam adjustment.
As we are running 32 Quam now, an issue like this will not show itself unless you are diligent on routine maintenance. Now we are going to schedule monthly tests of the backup STL system by placing it on air for at least 1 hour. We will also make sure we check the units themselves for any parameters out of range.
2. Harris HTHD+: Amazingly this thing will drop when you least expect it. After spending a better part of the day Friday with tech support we are experimenting with the Exgine buffer. The premise is the buffer is overflowing or having some issue causing a system restart. During the restart RF is muted. I will know more tomorrow when I hit the site and see how are buffer is doing after doing recommended adjustments to buffer timing. If we remain unlocked, then we are looking at some issue. If it is a data stream issue, then we may have something up with our Intraplex STL. It would be odd if this was our issue and I would conclude that the Flexstar processing system and Exgine would need some sort of overhaul. On a side note it also shows how critical a good network path to the transmitter site is for iBiquity HD radio. Nuts considering many transmitter sites have little or no network access.
3. UPSs (Uninterruptible Power Supplies): Never purchase a consumer grade UPS even if it is a “true” UPS. If possible purchase an online UPS large enough to handle the plant or a section thereof. I have 15 more batteries to replace in the next day or two. They are running my budget up and it is killing me. It is worth the money to protect your systems, but a maintenance nightmare. Try to keep it simple.
4. Remote Controls: More monitoring is a definite requirement for major markets. Reliable, too. I need something reliable, versatile, and flexible. Will it be Davicom, Audemat, Burk, or Statmon? I am tending towards Statmon, but the cost may be too steep. I’ll keep you posted on my progress on this one.
Enough rambling, back to more fun!
Tech Notes from the Field 