At NAB, GatesAir will showcase advanced technologies for the RF plant, and provide insight on managing the challenges and opportunities associated with TV spectrum repack and ATSC 3.0, at the 2016 NAB Show.

The transmitter manufacturer will unveil PowerSmart Plus, the next-generation of GatesAir’s PowerSmart innovations. PowerPlus can raise AC to RF efficiencies up to industry-high levels of 50 percent ATSC. At this level, GatesAir Maxiva ULXT liquid-cooled and UAXT air-cooled TV UHF transmitters can operate with 20 percent more efficiency than the leading competitive offerings; and 170 percent more than legacy air-cooled UHF transmitters in operation today, without performance compromises.

PowerSmart Plus achieves its latest efficiency gains through newly available, next-generation LDMOS power amplifiers that additionally further reduce power consumption and transmitter footprint. GatesAir customers can order new Maxiva UHF transmitters with either PowerPlus or PowerSmart 3D. Both design architectures provide the benefits of wideband amplification (fewer spare parts, simplified maintenance and modulation adjustments) that can further lower overall total cost of ownership, and accelerate ROI.

Boosting performance further is Maxiva StreamAssure, a first-of-its-kind QoS and QoE solution for the RF plant. Based on software from cloud monitoring visionary Qligent, StreamAssure gives broadcasters a way to visualize multiple transport layers and streams coming in and out of the transmitter, giving users a clear picture of signal quality and compliance from the time they leave the studio.

Scalable from single transmitter deployments to large-scale, national over-the-air networks, StreamAssure is built to help RF engineers quickly identify and address the source of the problem, which more often than not originates outside the transmitter. The end benefit is improved visibility and quality control across the air chain.

“PowerSmart Plus goes above and beyond the efficiency attained by GatesAir’s previous energy-saving technologies,” said Rich Redmond, chief product officer, GatesAir. “This higher level of efficiency translates directly into less energy consumption, resulting in much lower power bills for our customers. Along with our software-defined Maxiva exciters, TV broadcasters now have the industry’s highest-efficiency, highest-performance over-the-air solution for today and tomorrow’s opportunities.”

Such opportunities include ATSC 3.0, which continues to gain stream as a next-generation TV standard in the US and some international regions.