NAB-HD, a fully functional HD broadcast station on the floor of the NAB show will include several new features at NAB2006.
Launched at NAB2005, NAB-HD not only serves as the production arm of the NAB show, providing televised programming to dozens of monitors on the show floor and in thousands of hotel rooms, it also serves as a "living laboratory," to demonstrate how HDTV broadcasting works to show attendees.
Several new features have been added this year to demonstrate new technologies and delivery methods. NAB-HD programming will be made available on Verizon and Nokia handheld devices in a demonstration set up for Crown Castle's Modeo, and Verizon's VCAST mobile video services.
"We will be sending two channels via Verizon to Microsoft and Modeo in Pittsburgh, and then we will re-multiplex that data, creating a multiple stream of mobile media channels and then putting them back on satellite, receiving them back in Las Vegas," to be displayed on handheld devices positioned at various locations around the show, according to Nigel Spratling, project director for NAB-HD. Programming will also be streamed on the Internet as well.
For stations interested in learning more about the 2 GHz BAS transition, NAB-HD will also feature live reports from a helicopter using D-ENG equipment. In addition, the station mock up will feature a "Roving Reporter Xtreme" who will broadcast from secret, remote locations, showcasing the ability to do live remote broadcasts in HD.
Programming will include live interviews with industry leaders, roundtables on electronic media technology and exhibit floor reports.
Among the hotels that will feature programming streamed from NAB-HD is the Wynn, which is the only official NAB hotel that has HD displays in every hotel room.
NAB-HD will be manned by more than 40 volunteers. The station is being built by San Jose, Calif.-based systems integrator Signasys, and will feature equipment provided by 75 exhibitors including:
• Snell & Wilcox, which will provide a 3 M/E Kahuna SD/HD multiformat switcher equipped with FormatFusion.
• Omneon Spectrum servers
• The Dayang D-3-Edit HD8 video editing system
• Titan Automation system from Sundance Digital
• Transmission system from Axcera
A complete list of vendors is available here.
