Turner Broadcasting System Inc
By Ron Tarasoff, Vice President - Broadcast Technology & Engineering
Turner Broadcasting System, Inc. faces any number of challenges in the pursuit of its core business, which is of course creating and delivering some of the world’s most popular content across some of the world’s most-watched broadcast and new media channels.
Important underlying trends include the convergence of broadcast technology with IT; the necessity to be responsible towards the environment; and, in the volatile economic climate in which we are now living, the need to work as efficiently and cost-effectively as possible.
So when the possibility arises to do something positive which combines all three of those factors, we get really interested…and we have recently implemented just such a project.
It involves the technology known as Virtualization. This is where a single computer can do the job of multiple separate computers, by transforming normal hardware resources…CPU, RAM, hard disk and network controller…into software equivalents to create fully functional “virtual” machines running their own operating systems and applications just like “real” computers.
We decided to apply virtualization to a truly mission-critical part of our operation: playout. This is where the schedule for each of our channels, including major program items, commercials, promotions and channel branding, is delivered by a software-based automation system. Because this is at the core of our business, and where popular program content is involved, we can’t afford to take chances!
Up to now, our automation system, Morpheus from Pro-Bel, has run on a range of individual PCs…quite a number of them, in fact. We calculated that we could virtualize up to 30 separate desktop PCs on a single Hewlett Packard Blade Center, with a number of resulting benefits: cost and environmental, but also improved reliability, flexibility, and time-to-air.
Earlier this year we tested the concept of using virtualization software from VMware for an automation system. The original plan was to move over a single channel, truTV (formerly CourtTV) but at the very last minute we perceived a need to extend the project to include the Cartoon Network.
We immediately noticed a significant time saving when adding an additional system. This could not have been achieved in anything like such a short time using traditional “separate PC” methods.
This project exploited the intelligent fusion of broadcast technology with means and methods from the world of IT. It benefited from a high degree of enthusiasm and co-operation from not only the suppliers involved, but from our engineering staff members as well.
We now have the ability to fundamentally re-engineer the way we work. Automation is just the latest area in which we are using virtualization. Like other industries, we are looking at all processes that might benefit from this technology. In fact anywhere we need to combine cost benefits with improved reliability…and of course that is everywhere!
By using virtualization we can systematically decrease power consumption, reduce physical space requirements, and be mindful of costs.
Company contact:
Katharine Guy
Pro-Bel Ltd
Tel: +44 1189 214 294
katharine.guy@pro-bel.com
Press contact:
Jennie Evans
Manor Marketing
Tel: +44 1635 44991
jennie@manormarketing.tv
Images available at:
www.pro-bel.com/news_and_events/c/Press Information/