USA Cable Takes Technological Leap With Network Operations Center Rebuild

USA Cable has selected A. F. Associates (AFA) to design and construct their new digital Network Operations Center (NOC) located in Jersey City, New Jersey.

The existing origination facility is undergoing a complete transformation from a hybrid analog / digital infrastructure into a fully digital, multi-channel NOC, employing advanced archiving and digital asset management systems.

AFA, the nation's leading systems integrator, expects the new facility to be fully operational by May 2001.

"We are excited about rebuilding the NOC to reflect the significant technological advances that have occurred. A major focus of the project is attention to the growing importance of asset management. We believe that the solution that we are employing will make USA Cable a leader in this technology", said Tom Canavan, President of A.F. Associates.

"AFA's ability makes them a great partner as we work through the complex maze of breaking technology and make critical risk/benefit decisions," commented Dick Ross, USA Cable's Senior Vice President, Network Operations.

USA Cable's new NOC employs the latest automation and digital asset storage technologies, including the first ADIC AML/2 near-line archive system employed in the country. The dual robot/dual quadro tower system, which is the primary repository for USA Cable's program and interstitial library, holds 2,688 150GByte DST cassettes, for a total storage capacity of approximately 50,000 hours at a bit rate of 15Mb/sec.

The overall facility is under the control of Omnibus automation. Six Grass Valley Group Profile XP servers are utilized for ingest and mirrored playback tasks. Each playback server has a capacity of at least 48 hours per network feed. A GVG "Profile Network Archive" (PNA) system utilizing Avalon Archive Manager software serves as the bridge between MPEG-2 assets on the Profiles and the ADIC digital tape library.

The new NOC has been designed and built with the ability to scale the system to accommodate additional channels as necessary for USA's growth plans. The facility is centered around a new multi-channel master control room, employing eighteen 42" plasma displays and thirty-six 16x9 capable 20" color monitors. A "live" control room will be built in the future to handle USA's extensive live event programming.

USA currently broadcasts six network feeds from the Jersey City facility: USA Network East and West; Sci-Fi Channel East and West; Trio; and News World International (NWI). The new facility originates these feeds plus provides for a redundant channel, as well as allow for addition of new channels up to twelve discreet and two redundant feeds. Trio and NWI are launching from their permanent facility on April 30th, Sci-Fi East and West will go on-air May 14th, and both USA channels will cut-over on May 21.

"This project has a complexity that requires a seamless transition and needs to be accomplished with no down time," added Bruce Giuriceo, vice president engineering for USA Cable.

The project is being implemented in a phased approach to accommodate USA Cable's requirement to remain on-air throughout the transition. The new system, being built within existing space in the USA facility, will operate concurrently with the existing system prior to decommissioning the old system at the end of May, 2001. A Grass Valley Group 256 X 256 SDI (SMS-7500WB) router has been installed for the new systems; an existing Grass Valley Group 96 X 96 analog router is being retained for legacy systems.

AF Associates, Inc., 100 Stonehurst Court, Northvale, NJ 07647. Tel: 201-767-1200; Fax: 201-784-8637.