IT engineers think of network capacity in terms of bits/second, as opposed to broadcast engineers who think in terms of bandwidth, return loss, phase distortion and reflections. Further problems arise when we start discussing actual data throughput in a system.

Broadcasters will assume a 10MHz point-to-point network will allow them to send signals with 10MHz bandwidths. As IT networks are based on packets of data, there is an inherent loss of data in the system due to the headers and spaced distribution. The result is that a 10Mb/s circuit might only have a useful data-rate of 9.5Mbps.

Consultant Tony Orme explains the key differences in how IT and broadcast engineers define network performance so reliable working systems can be built.

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The consumption of OTT and streaming video have increased significantly. Now, 86-percent of U.S. smartphone users watch video on their phones. Given these changing viewer demands, broadcasters need to embrace OTT workflows. To ensure an accurate delivery of technically sound content, engineers need a new set of quality control (QC) and monitoring tools.

In the broadcast realm, stored programs (i.e., VOD assets) are managed via file-based workflows. This gives the broadcaster time to guarantee that all assets are of superior quality by using file-based QC tools during the content preparation stage. However, in the case of live streams, content is transcoded in real time into various ABR formats. This means that any delivery issues with real-time program streams must be verified using real-time OTT content monitoring tools. This article suggests tools and practices.

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