New RF interfaces upgrade video quality monitors

These include full TR 101 290 monitoring and alarming, new RF interfaces and end-to-end closed caption checks to ensure the output meets the latest FCC regulations. The new Sentry capabilities will be demonstrated at NAB Show in Las Vegas (April 18-21.

Many broadcasters and other service providers rely heavily on standards like TR 101 290 to monitor Quality of Service (QoS) and Sentry provides real-time monitoring and alerting to notify broadcasters right away if there are errors related to the priority checks they are most concerned about.

This saves them on operational costs related to resolving issues. In addition to TR 101 290 Priority 1, 2 and 3 checks, Sentry also supports a range of program clock reference (PCR) measurements including PCR jitter, PCR drift, PCR frequency offset and PCR cycle time.

Further adding to its broadcast monitoring capabilities, Sentry's RF monitoring capabilities have been expanded to include two new RF interfaces, DVB-S/S2 and DVB-T/T2. These new interfaces, along with IP, ASI and 8VSB allow easy integration into any broadcast signal distribution monitoring scheme.

Service providers including broadcasters and cable operators must comply with FCC Title 47 rules or face the risk of fines or other actions. For enhanced closed caption monitoring, Nexidia Comply is now integrated with Sentry.

Nexidia Comply provides an accurate, scalable and affordable automation solution that empowers broadcasters to verify that captions and video description across all of their outputs comply with Title 47 FCC regulations.

"Broadcasters turn to Sentry as an affordable QoS monitoring solution for identifying and isolating problems quickly," said Charlie Dunn, general manager, Video Product Line, Tektronix. "Then, over time as they add more services and capabilities, they can very easily and affordably upgrade to full quality of experience (QoE) monitoring."