MicroFirst Engineering of Oakland, N.J., announced that WRAL, the Raleigh, N.C.-based flagship station of the Capitol Broadcasting Co., is automating with one of its Digital Automation Systems.
The Microfirst system adopted by WRAL will control the station's two mirrored Omneon servers with a total of 18 I/O channels as well as eight VTRs, two Thomson Saturn master control switchers, one Pro-Bel Sirius routing switcher, a Thomson/GVG 7000 routing switcher, three Harris/Leitch ICON branding systems; a TeleStream Flip Factory for satellite-delivered programming services from DG Systems, Fast Channel, Vvyx and Pathfire for syndicated programming; and a Wide Orbit traffic system.
The real-time control for the Digital Automation System comprises a MicroFirst Win MOS, a Windows-compatible operating system running on a PowerPC-based multiport microcontroller, the MPC 3200. All serial machine control, database management and schedule processing are contained within one fault-tolerant, 1 RU box. Unlike with traditional PC architecture, the DAS features no single point of failure, with no lockups, viruses, or waiting for long boot-up processes.
