Etere for Roma Channel

Roma Channel: Playout system expansion & Archiving Management

Roma Channel, the pay TV of the Roma football club, after 6 years of using Etere Automation, has decided to modernize and expand the playout system once again with Etere. To understand better the different technologies we can compare the old and the new systems.
Before:
they used the old Etere version based on DBF archive. For 6 years they went on-air without redundancy (a real test of Etere Automation reliability) but any problem, even hardware could have influenced the on-air. Etere controlled one SeaChange BMS video servers.
After:
upgrade to Etere with SQL engine for archives management. A new Grass Valley K2 MediaClient stand-alone will be introduced to manage the main playout while the old SeaChange BMS still continues to be used and controlled by Etere Automation Backup for the channel playout redundancy. A new 5TB disks array (equal to 350hrs @ DV25 approximately) in RAID 5 with a disk hot spare on board, used as an archive on line and as expansion ability of the Grass Valley K2 video servers. The archive/expansion system is integrally managed by Etere Media Manager software able to:
- record automatically into the storage the clips chosen by the customer and/or a defined type of material
- automatically restore the archived clips necessary to go on air based on the playlist created by the operators, on the video server Main

Etere TV Automation Backup will be installed to guarantee the continuity of the emission in break case of the main decoder, the video server Main or the main PC for going on air.
Etere Automation manages the playout of two different playlists at the same time (main and backup) using 2 different decoders of 2 different video servers. In case of problems on the main playout, the operator will start the Etere Automation Backup chain in order to guarantee the video playout. The Etere system installed at Roma Channel allows data exchange and import with a 3rd party commercials scheduling provided by SKY.
The installation of the Roma Channel new system is scheduled in two steps, one of which is already completed and ETERE system is already controlling and will control:
- 1 Grass Valley K2 MediaClient stand-alone video server
- 1 SeaChange BMS video server
- 1 matrix
- 1 master control
- 1 logo generator
- 1 system of diagrams multicast
- 5TB storage as video server expansion and archive system
In the new configuration, Etere allows Roma Channel’s operators to manage a Cartwall/Jingle Machine useful to put on-air the contributions ‘on the fly’, during the lives and toward the studios.