Come see the birth of a revolution this month. May 17, Qualcomm’s MediaFLO hosts SBE Chapter 36 for a presentation and demonstration of their new mobile TV system. Find out how and and where it’s done. Meet Fred Baumgartner, project Chief Engineer and nationally known SBE education advocate. If your station generates local content, this presentation may represent a future revenue stream.
One of the reasons we put up with the oppressive ankle and knee fatigue we all seem to get at the NAB Convention is that we get to catch up with old friends and acquaintances. We gray, swap jobs, put children through school, have tragedies–these little dramas connect our past to our present and life seems more interesting.
This year I came across an ex-coworker who had just joined Qualcomm’s MediaFLO project. His experience and computer programming skills make this job swap look like a particularly good fit. And for the first time, I got to see part of our future. He dialed in CNBC on his cell phone and showed it to me. Yeah, the cable channel. I couldn’t really read the ticker, but otherwise, this was a perfectly usable TV signal. You have to view the quarter VGA (QVGA) monitor, 320 x 240 pixels, sideways. Here, deep within the Las Vegas Convention Center’s Central Hall, was mobile TV without ghosting or dropouts. The relatively low power transmitter was far away on a mountaintop near Las Vegas. You probably wouldn’t want to watch Lawrence of Arabia on such a screen, but it might be a great way to catch up with sports highlights or breaking news.
MediaFLO engineers in Sorrento Mesa are busy designing metropolitan transmission sites across the U.S. And in San Diego, they are installing a Network Operations Center here, where they will do commercial and local content insertion.
Qualcomm has invited SBE Chapter 36 to the heart of the revolution. Come to our May 17 meeting and find out what all the fuss is about. We’ll meet, share a snack, then get a presentation on MediaFLO at a technical level broadcast engineers should be able to understand. This will be essentially the same presentation Tom Mikkelsen made at the NAB Convention. Then you can take the facility tour.
SBE members and guests are invited Wednesday, May 17 at 6:00 PM for the usual social hour with snacks, then our regular 7:00 PM meeting and presentation, then a tour of Building E. We’ll meet at Qualcomm Building G located at 4755 Eastgate Mall. From I-805, take La Jolla Village west to Towne Center Drive. Turn right and go north to Eastgate Mall Drive. Proceed to 4755. If you get to the bridge, Fred reminds us, you’ve gone too far. Note that there are card entry points—you will need to buzz security to get in.