PlayBox Technology Celebrates Big 15

PlayBox Technology celebrated its 15th anniversary at IBC2014 in September, plus the delivery of over 15,000 television playout and branding channels.

"15,000 channel sales is a phenomenal achievement which has left our competitors trailing far behind," comments Don Ash, Managing Partner and Director, Sales. "It is also a great tribute to the skill and dedication of the entire PlayBox Technology team, from software development and technical integration right through to sales and engineering support. PlayBox Technology pioneered the transition from high-cost rigidly-defined dedicated hardware to the much more affordable and versatile server-based systems now used worldwide.
"The key to success in this business is to have total control over both the hardware and the software, giving our customers the security that comes from sourcing a total solution from a single manufacturer. We deliver 24/7 reliability in every playout and branding channel we produce. Our pre-sales and post-sales support are absolutely top grade which is what broadcasters rightly expect when operating round-the-clock transmission services every day of the year.
"PlayBox Technology solutions offer user interfaces which are effortless to operate and provide exactly the information needed to perform a specific task. Operators can easily switch between live and pre-scheduled mode, making practical use of automation while retaining the creative freedom broadcasters appreciate.
"From a single channel playout server to a multi-channel turnkey broadcast centre, PlayBox Technology offers exactly the right solution."

Making their European exhibition debut were CaptureBox PRO, Production AirBox, SocialMediaBox and TimeShiftBox DUO.

NEW CaptureBox PRO: Simultaneous Ingest of Multiple Channels – A successor to the existing CaptureBox ingest server, CaptureBox PRO allows multiple channels of high-definition or standard-definition content to be captured from SDI digital feeds, analogue sources and MPEG transport streams. Four video sources can be monitored on a single screen and controlled via a new streamlined user interface. Audio levels can be monitored as loudness/true-peak displays and adjusted when required. Content ingested to CaptureBox PRO is available for playback within a few seconds of capture commencing.
The CaptureBox PRO feature set also includes capture-list import from third-party traffic systems, support for CEA-608/708 closed-captioning and automated VTR control via RS-422 with batch-capture listing. Additional features include a GPU-accelerated encoding engine, plus expanded metadata handling and creation during the ingest process. Loudness metering with true-peak measurement allowing audio level monitoring and adjustment at any time.

NEW ProductionAirBox: Instant Playout of Multiple Channels – ProductionAirBox provides content playout for news, live broadcasts, virtual-studio screens, and video walls. Four independent players are accommodated in a single server with built in aspect ratio and resolution conversion as well as integral support of a wide variety of compressions. Content can thus be played without transcoding.
A dedicated multiviewer is also incorporated. ProductionAirBox provides 2K/4K SDI output, enhanced playlist handling and end-of-clip actions. The server can be operated from multiple locations via its own remote application, also GPI/VDCP/ MOS control is available.

NEW SocialMediaBox: All Social Media on a Single Screen –
SocialMediaBox enables programme production and presentation creators to incorporate comments from multiple social networking feeds quickly and efficiently into a single ready-for-broadcast stream. Comments can be selected and moderated from a variety of different social media outlets, integrating sources such as Facebook and Twitter on a single feed for transmission. This is extremely useful for live television shows which produce auxiliary-screen pages for viewer feedback. The custom feed can be output as an RSS feed and used in other systems, or sent to TitleBox for on-air presentation. Direct 'push' control to the TitleBox character generator allows better live interaction.


NEW TimeShiftBox DUO: Multi-channel Time zone Offset Server –
TimeShiftBox Duo allows simultaneous programme delay for more than one SD/HD channel. It allows broadcasters to re-transmit television channels across multiple time zones. Designed for easy integration into playout centers, DTH operators or for other applications where delay of SD/HD-SDI is required, TimeShiftBox Duo provides all the resources needed to perform accurate time offsets for any duration ranging from 10 seconds to more than one month. Logo overlay and optional interactive character generation are also available. TimeShiftBox DUO is fully transparent pass-through of ancillary data, including audio streams.

www.playbox.tv

(IT/JP)