At IBC 2015, which ran until 15 September in Amsterdam, Axon Digital
Design, a supplier of broadcast infrastructure solutions, updated visitors on its
latest development work on AVB and S2022-6, and demonstrated both standards working effectively in a live production environment.
As the broadcast industry continues to explore the possibilities offered by the next
generation of standards, Axon is helping organisations prepare for the transition
from SDI, proactively developing solutions using both AVB and S2022-6 to be able
convert to and from SDI and cross-convert. At IBC, Axon showed customers and
manufacturers how these standards could shape production workflows in the future
and unveiled plans for a new range of SDI-AVB converter cards, available later
this year.
The team showed an Ethernet AVB backbone proof of concept (POC) system that
provides an inherently stable and self-managing infrastructure for dynamic
productions. Also known as Time-Sensitive Networking (TSN), AVB has already
been proven in industrial and automotive markets to efficiently deliver auto-management of bandwidth allocation and timing. In broadcast environments, it is
perfectly suited to live video over IP. The POC demonstrated the management of 216 HD streams distributed over IT switchers. New products will be automatically detected in the network and files will be transferred from one switch to another – without the need for a Software Defined Network (SDN). Audio will be sent separately over the same network without the need to embed it. With Clock reference streams embedded in AVB, the POC will show how separate reference distribution is no longer required.
In addition, Axon used the POC system at IBC to show its developments in
S2022-6, with a Utah Scientific router delivering SDI and S2022 content to other
areas of Axon’s booth.
“We see ourselves as a conversion company and our focus is to provide solutions
that enable our customers to enjoy greater flexibility and easier expansion as they
upgrade their operations to 4K and IP – without the need to replace their complete
infrastructure,’ says Peter Schut, Axon’s CTO. “It’s still early days for video and
audio over Ethernet and the majority of broadcast equipment is still SDI. We expect
hybrid systems (a mix of SDI and Ethernet/IP) to emerge and remain for years to
come. With this in mind, our range of Synapse signal-processing cards are already
fitted with both coax and Ethernet connectors, so that they can eventually be
upgraded to accept Ethernet/IP, protecting the initial investment. Later this year, we will also begin to ship a new range of SDI-AVB cards to help those customers who are ready to make the transition.’
