NAB Show Product Review: Transmission

There was no shortage of transmission hardware at this year’s NAB Show, with plenty of transmitters, transmission line and antennas.

TRANSMITTERS

ABE ELETTRONICA SRL demo-ed their MTX Series of multistandard, multimode digital and analog TV transmitters, available for UHF and VHF and power outputs of 1Watt to 20,000 Watts. Also shown was the GNS- 1000 transmitter timing reference satellite system for SFN synchronization.

COMARK COMMUNICATIONS introduced the MPTV-8000LDW, a medium and high power solid-state liquid-cooled DTV transmitter for UHF. Also at the show, the DCX Paragon, an MSDC-IOT transmitter, featuring high efficiency solid-state driver amplifiers, optimized IOT performance via Comark’s toaster, and Digital Adaptive Pre-correction.

GATESAIR introduced its next-generation Maxiva TV transmitters. Based on the company’s PowerSmart 3D architecture, the new Maxiva UHF series comprises the ULXT liquid-cooled model for medium- to-high power broadcasts and the UAXT air-cooled model for low-to-medium power requirements. Also shown was the new Maxiva VAX next-generation air-cooled VHF transmitter.

Clarke MacDonald (L), a communications contractor, learns about the new Nautel NT150/250 TV transmitter from Wendell Lonergan. LARCAN promoted their Cool Dock UHF transmitters and Cool Dock VHF Band III PA, MXi Series UHF of DTV translators and transmitters, as well as its Octane MPEG-2/MPEG-4 encoder/multiplexer with IPI/O. Also shown was the Frontier Series convection-cooled 10 Watt VHF DTV transmitter/translator.

NAUTEL featured their NT Series of low-power UHF TV transmitters, including the new 250 Watt NT250.

ROHDE & SCHWARZ introduced their THV9 high-power VHF transmitter that features an output power of 30 kW for digital TV and COFDM Doherty operation for efficiency of up to 46 percent. Also displayed was the TMV9 VHF transmitter family which provides outputs of up to 4,300 Watts for digital TV.

SCREEN SERVICE BROADCASTING TECHNOLOGIES showed their Ultra HE wideband transmitter series that features high performance amplifiers and drivers.

RVR ELETTRONICA showed their 10 KW plug-in Green Line transmitter with an efficiency of more than 70 percent and featuring hot-pluggable amplifier units. Also shown was the Holiday line of air-cooled transmitters with outputs ranging from 3.5 KW to 20 KW. The Barracuda liquid-cooled transmitters were also displayed, along with the Tex2000Light Green Line compact transmitter and the company’s Gold digital exciter.

TEAMCAST introduced its Twister-4000, a ready-to-use 1RU rack exciter specifically designed to be integrated inside new or existing TV transmitter systems. Also new is the RQX1 DTTV monitoring receiver, which allows operators to monitor signals meeting the DVB-T2 Rel 1.3.1, i.e. regular T2-Base signals for fixed reception, or T2-Lite signals for mobile reception, or even a mix of the two types of signals.

ANTENNAS, TRANSMISSION LINE AND FILTERS

ABE ELETTRONICA touted their LB Series of VHF and UHF antenna panels and transmitting arrays which feature rugged construction and are designed for durability and resistance to extreme weather conditions.

ALDENA TELECOMUNICAZIONI showed their line of UHF antennas. The line includes panel and super-turnstile models for medium- and high-power applications.

DIELECTRIC spotlighted their TUA-M series panel antenna, which is designed for broadband horizontally-polarized operation.

ERI (ELECTRONICS RESEARCH INC.) unveiled the UF250 250 Watt UHF filter which is band-tunable and available in six-or eight-pole versions. Also shown was the UF1500 1.5 KW band-tunable UHF filter.

JAMPRO ANTENNAS brought along their UHF broadband medium-power panel antenna, the JVD-U and JCD-U UHF broadband antennas, the JAT-U UHF super-turnstile antenna, and the Prostar JA/MS-BB broadband UHF slot antenna. Also shown were the company’s RCEC mask filters which feature steep rejection skirts and high-Q cavities.

MYAT spotlighted their DTV “STF” mask filters that provide out-of-band rejection needed for adjacent channel sites. Also displayed were the company’s SpectraLine and SpectraGuide wideband transmission line systems in rigid coax and elliptical waveguide designs.

FACILITY CONTROL

BURK TECHNOLOGY demonstrated their ARC Plus Touch Version 5 remote control system that features the “RSI” (Recordable Speech Interface) option. Also shown was the ARC Solo, which offers the power of the ARC PLUS with the simplicity of the ARC 16 in a single package.

DAVICOM brought along their MEXM-2, a 64-digital input expansion module which provides 64 opto-isolated, wet or dry contact digital inputs for use with any product in the DV line of remote monitoring and control systems.

L-S-B displayed their latest VSM broadcast control and monitoring system. It includes new hardware options, a newly designed panel range, and more.

STACO ENERGY PRODUCTS showed off their FirstLine PL/PPC, an electronic precision power conditioner in both 208 VAC, 10-40kVA and 480 VAC, 65-250kVA models.

WORLDCAST SYSTEMS (Audemat) demonstrated MasterView 2.0, an upgrade to part of their ScriptEasy software suite. This new version ensures that Master- View is available on any Internet-enabled device, enabling users to see what’s happening at their transmitter sites from almost anywhere in the world.