Orbit-Showtime-Network (OSN), the newly merged satellite platform service for the Middle East, has deployed digital headend solutions from Harmonic on its new HD service. It is the first time that MPEG-4 AVC (H.264) has been delivered to multiple countries in the region.
OSN is using Harmonic’s Electra 8000 encoders for both the HD service and an upgrade of existing standard definition line-up from MPEG-2 to MPEG-4. As part of the network upgrade OSN has also introduced Harmonic’s ProStream 1000 stream processing platform for bulk scrambling and descrambling, and NMX Digital Service Manager monitor and control the entire video service.
“The bandwidth efficiency and outstanding video quality offered by Harmonic’s Electra 8000 platform enabled us to add new HD services in a bandwidth efficient way,” said Mike Whittaker, VP Broadcast Operations & Technology of OSN. “The multi-codec capabilities and support for SD and HD services within a single encoder are also very attractive features that give us tremendous flexibility as we migrate our SD services from MPEG-2 to MPEG-4.”
Harmonic’s Dubai partner GloCom handled the installation.
