Adelphia Selects BigBand in Los Angeles

Adelphia Communications has selected BigBand Digital Simulcast for its Los Angeles system. This solution utilizes BigBand platforms to convert all programming to digital formats at sourcing; leverage the advantages of digital ad insertion and Gigabit Ethernet transport; and assure service to all subscribers by providing a completely digital line-up from the network edge, while also maintaining existing analog video offerings. Adelphia is practicing digital simulcasting for a manageable and economical migration towards all-digital cable services, further augmenting the Los Angeles site, which utilizes BigBand Networks solutions for high-speed data, digital television, HDTV and VOD. Financial terms were not disclosed.


BigBand noted that digital video achieves better than 10x bandwidth efficiency versus analog, freeing capacity for more broadcast programming, HDTV, VOD, VoIP and other emerging services. Cable operators are using digital simulcasting to gradually phase out analog services and subscriber devices by offering all programming digitally.


In digital simulcasting, analog source programming is converted to digital by real-time encoding at cable headends, which can be performed by the BigBand BRE (Broadband Real-Time Encoder). This content, combined with programming from digital sources, is groomed into operator-defined channel lineups which can be performed by the BigBand BMR(Broadband Multimedia-Service Router). Gigabit Ethernet transport then delivers to edge locations, with service-level redundancy available for reliability. At hub or headend locations, advertisements can be digitally spliced into the various video programs, including directed delivery towards specific ad zones. At hub locations, basic and enhanced basic programming is decoded for the analog tier, and simultaneously QAM modulated for the digital subscriber base. BigBand Networks also provides platforms for the edge processing in digital simulcasting.


In addition, Adelphia is testing BigBand's hardware and software infrastructure for its VoIP service launch. Adelphia is using the BigBand Cuda CMTS to route and process signals, and BigBand FastFlow broadband provisioning manager to establish and manage subscriber voice accounts.
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