Meetings

September 2010 Meeting: Boxx Communications

Join us for the SBE San Diego Chapter 36 September meeting. On Wednesday September 15, Mark Walker with Boxx Communications will be talking about wireless HD microwave transmission. The meeting will run from 12 noon – 1:30 PM at TV Magic, 8112 Engineer Road, San Diego 92121. Lunch will be provided by Boxx Communications.

Mark Walker is a film and broadcast video veteran with more than 20 years industry experience. Mark is an Emmy nominee and the recipient of the 2006 Academy of Television Arts & Science award for Outstanding Achievement in Engineering Development.

Meetings

July 2010 Meeting – Fujitsu on Compression

Join us for the SBE San Diego Chapter 36 July meeting. On Wednesday July 21, Rich Harvey with Fujitsu Frontech North America will be talking about Transporting HD/SD Content over a Public IP Link. The meeting will run from 12 noon – 1:30 PM at TV Magic, 8112 Engineer Road, San Diego. Lunch will be provided by Fujitsu.

About Our Presenter

Rich Harvey has over 15 years of experience in the broadcast, satellite and video distribution industry, including the management of a Navy Broadcast Service (NBS) S.I.T.E system, as Sales Manager of the Asia Pacific Rim for a leading digital TV equipment manufacturer and as the Video Product Manager for another industry leader. Rich is a member of the Society of Broadcast Engineers (SBE) and the Society of Motion Picture Television Engineers (SMPTE).

Local News

KPBS-FM Gets CP to Move to Soledad

After a three year wait, the FCC granted KPBS-FM a Construction Permit to move to Mt. Soledad in La Jolla. The proposed CP would have the station broadcasting omnidirectionally with 26 kW ERP from the KFMB-DT/FM transmission site.

The advantage in coverage of communities where wealthy KPBS patrons live is obvious. Residents of Rancho Santa Fe should receive a much stronger signal from Mt. Soledad than what was provided by the 2.7 kW signal from Mt. San Miguel far to the south.

Station Director of Engineering Leon Messenie says he has work to do. First, he would have to file a grant with the Public Telecommunications Facilities Program (PTFP) for the improvement project estimated to cost nearly a million dollars. If he gets that grant money, the station would have to replace the KFMB “Quadzilla” multiuser FM antenna that won’t currently handle KPBS’s input signal at 89.5 MHz.

Messenie considered the UCSD tower on the north edge of Mt. Soledad, but that tower is not built for multiple heavy FM antenna arrays and would likely run into problems with community acceptance should the tower need additional metal or replacement.

KPBS had sought to improve their signal in the past and was always hampered by their non-comm band proximity to XETV channel 6 in Tijuana. In 2007, the FCC changed its policy that previously had protected XETV, saying that the US had no treaty that required a US FM station to protect against interference to a Mexican TV signal penetrating into the US. This gave KSDS 88.3 MHz the green light to increase their power from 800 watts to 22 kW at their Mesa College campus in Linda Vista, though the FCC specified that the signal should be vertically polarized only. (XETV returned to horizontal polarization in 2009 after years as a CP station.) KPBS then felt empowered to increase their signal as well.

Meetings

May 2010 Meeting – Worldcast Systems

“Worldcast Systems delivers an innovative and highly efficient approach to remote control which brings true intelligence to the broadcast site by way of graphic scripting with ScriptEasy and RELIO.

“Learn the benefits of an enhanced broadcast operation through comprehensive and advanced monitoring and control of broadcast equipment,  HVAC, security, elevator control, servers, firewalls, electronic entry, snap-shots of authorized and unauthorized visitors and more!

“ScriptEasy and RELIO use advanced communication techniques such as IP networking, SNMP protocols, logic gates, ping command, timers, counters, schedulers and a remarkable voice DTMF interface, while maintaining legacy communications protocols such as serial connections and high-capacity of conventional I/O connections.

“Tony Peterle will outline the advantages of taking complete command and control of your upgraded broadcast facility with ScriptEasy and RELIO to significantly decrease downtime and maintenance cost while optimizing productivity”

Join us for our monthly meeting Wednesday, May 12 at noon at Western Radio Electronics, 7558 Trade Street, in the Miramar area of San Diego. Steve Moreen of RF Specialties provides lunch for you. We should be finished at about 1:30 PM.

About Our Presenter

Tony Peterle grew up in Central Ohio and began taking things apart at an early age to find out how they worked. Fortunately for his parents’ sanity, he quickly learned how to put things back together, and graduated from the College of Wooster in 1981. He has been involved in radio broadcasting continuously since high school. Tony has held Chief Engineer positions in Honolulu, Kansas City, and Wichita. After attaining his commercial pilot’s license, Tony spent several years as a traffic reporter before receiving CSRE certification from the SBE in 2005. Shortly thereafter, he came to work for Audemat/Worldcast Systems, and enjoys helping customers solve problems, traveling, contributing to the design of new products, and seeing familiar faces at NAB and SBE events.

Society of Broadcast Engineers