MULTICHOICE'S COMMAND CENTRE

For decades, Multichoice, based in the Johannesburg suburb of Randburg, has broadened the TV viewing horizons of South Africans. Today, it supplies satellite-distributed bouquets of TV programming, not only for South Africa, but internationally - on PAS7, W4 and PAS10 bands.

Of course, there's more to providing a service than merely pumping out the goods, however. If it's physical merchandise that you're selling, then you need to know that it's hitting the shelves - and arriving home - in fair nick. When it's television that you're selling, you need to know that it's arriving in people's lounges the way you sent it out; with the picture and sound all there and in sync. There is, of course, no way of simulating that. The only way of accurately checking the end product is to establish a checking station that simulates the home reception environment - or, to be accurate, the variety of home reception environments. This process of checking at the domestic decoder stage is referred to as "home-level monitoring", or "off-air monitoring".

To this end, the Multichoice Command Centre was established, way back when this entertainment service first spread its wings. The purpose of this writer's visit to the Multichoice Head Quarters, however, was to experience, first-hand, the workings of the newest such centre. 

Behind the Scenes

Eugene Coetzee, John Ungerer and Rupert Denoon, the A-Team behind Electrosonic's Systems division, had been tasked with programming the sprawling systems network that would make this multifaceted "war room" run like clockwork.

The ‘worker-ants' behind the scenes? Rack upon rack of home satellite decoders - 13 different types, to be exact, of varying vintage. It's these decoders that receive the programming, off a standard domestic satellite dish, in exactly the same way as your decoder at home does. There are currently 144 DSDs (Digital Satellite Decoders) in use, each individually set for a dedicated band and bouquet. The system can accommodate over 180 decoders, however, should future needs so dictate. All of these decoders fall under the control of the Crestron system, which is programmed to access channels via channel presets.  

One 10.4" rack-mounted touchpanel is located at the DSD racks for easy local setup and testing of DSDs. All automated audio and video monitoring and fault reporting functions are available on this panel for setup and testing purposes.

Overseeing the entire operation behind the scenes, are two foreboding Crestron RACK2 processors; legends in their sphere. These processors were specifically chosen for their ability to accommodate the hot-swapping of the processor, in the event of a problem. Down-time is therefore kept to a minimum.

A Mighty Machine

One entire wall of the room is taken up with a giant rear-projection screen, which is filled with TV images, large and small. Arrays of available channels, each received by its own separate decoder, are displayed in a picture-in-picture fashion, each electronically subtitled to reveal the name of the channel and type of decoder used.

Operators, who do shift work 24/7, sit under sound domes and monitor these channels for irregularities in sound and image. From their hot seats, they can route any channel from the bank of decoders to either of their two 17'' Crestron touch panels. From there, that same channel can be selected for display in giant format on the rear projection wall, for greater scrutiny.  Behind-the-scenes programming ensures that the accompanying audio is automatically routed to the operator's touchpanels and sound dome. 

The sound dome is designed in such a way as to keep the audio localized over that one operator, thereby eliminating unnecessary audio crosstalk between work stations.

A Broadcasting First

The system at Multichoice's Command Centre is unique in that it automatically monitors the audio and video content - in addition to the screening that the operators carry out. That way, the possibility of a sub-standard broadcast slipping through the system is utterly minimised. Each satellite channel in each reception zone is continuously cycled through and monitored by Ethernet-controlled Videotek technology (courtesy of systems programming) for phenomena such as audio peaking, loss of audio, video freeze and "black on air". Should these errant behaviours be detected, the operators are immediately notified. 

Talking to the Decoders

Any decoder can have its channels changed in two ways: by push-button or remote control. Now, seeing as it obviously isn't labour-efficient to have frantic teams of button-pushers sweating over the decoders, the remote control method is the only channel-changing mechanism available to the control centre. Tiny infra-red emitters have been placed at each decoder's infra-red port. These, in turn, are hooked into the master Crestron control system, allowing for the decoders to be automatically cycled through channels, or for an operator to intervene and select a channel at will. This infra-red control network gives operators the run of up to 144 Digital Satellite Decoders, three VCRs and the DVD recorder/player.

A Plethora of Pictures

Despite the proliferation of images on the monitoring wall, there are, in fact, only three JVC video projectors at work. All the smaller screens are created within the larger projected images by a Crestron C2N-DVP4-DI digital video processor. The displays on the extreme left and right hand sides of the wall are primarily used for the automated audio and video monitoring system. A total of 32 video windows are displayed on each of these screens.  Each Videotek automated audio/video level monitoring system feeds 32 video channels to the Miranda display processors.

Follow-Up on Faults

During normal monitoring operation, the Crestron system oversees the automatic cycling of channels via timed presets, and performs multiple routings with a single command. When an audio or video alarm condition occurs, the DSD in question will pause on the faulty channel, and will then be manually routed to the ‘monitoring pen' for further analysis and long term monitoring. Once this process is completed, the DSD is then freed to continue scanning through channels.

Once operators are aware of technically undesirable activity, they can immediately dump it to any one of the three VCRs or the DVD player/recorder for subsequent analysis. This, again, is achieved via the operator's touchpanel. The recording VCR or DVD unit can, of course, be routed to the centre display, or the engineering monitors, for playback purposes.

The Engineering Panel allows the resident engineer to grab the wheel of the ship, so to speak, via a 12" touchpanel. The Crestron system is responsible for AV routing to the engineering monitors consisting of a possible 32 DSDs.  Any of the DSD's (as inputs) can be routed to either the Chromatek or Videotek VTM-300 waveform monitoring system for a more detailed analysis.

A Confluence of Digital Highways

Naturally, you may well ask why something should even go wrong. Television is a high-tech environment, right? Sure it is, but consider this: programming is continuously streaming into Multichoice from the UK, continental Europe, the US and, of course, local sources. These individual streams are combined into what are known as "transport streams", which are shunted off into different paths, where they will be encoded at differing rates and, finally, combined into one digital stream which will be bounced off a satellite into our homes. The possibility for error is enormous: factors such as adverse weather, human error, etc can influence the signal - and it's actually a wonder that the whole process is carried off so smoothly day after day. 

Of course, it's the task of the operators to ensure that the odd glitch that does manage to slip through, is minimised and eliminated; that noble duty which is the very raison d'être of this crucial area of activity - ironically, one of the few places in the country where TV screens are watched the closest, yet where the actual programming content is of utterly no consequence...   

October 2006