The BBC has ordered a Quantel Enterprise sQ system to support video editing and playout at its Broadcasting House West 1 facility in London that is now undergoing a major renovation intended to reestablish it as the BBC’s live network broadcasting center.
Broadcasting House W1 is currently home to national public service radio, Arabic and Persian services, and London local broadcasting. The completed project will house a state-of-the-art media center for all of the BBC’s digital properties and serve as the new hub for public radio.
The large Enterprise sQ HD system ordered is equipped with 2600 hours of HD storage across 12 sQ servers. It supports 158 Quantel editors and 16 Final Cut Pro editors that are fully integrated into the Quantel workflow. There are also more than 500 journalist workstations running Quantel desktop editing software integrated into the BBC’s own Jupiter asset management system. The system is split into two mirrored SANs for complete system redundancy.
On the playout side, Quantel technology includes 10 sQ servers with a total of 300 hours of HD storage. Using the same technology for production and playout delivers significant workflow gains and provides additional resilience.
