‘Reliability & value’: Ross Video marks 15 years of using PHABRIX T&M

Having first incorporated PHABRIX T&M products into its manufacturing test operations in 2009, leading video production solutions developer Ross Video now has more than 50 units in “constant daily use” at its R&D and manufacturing facilities in Canada.

It is no hyperbole to state that Ross Video has been at the heart of every major technological change in broadcasting during the last 50 years. As connectivity, transportation and production formats have shifted, the company’s switchers, video routers and camera motion systems have continued to be employed for ‘mission-critical’ live productions in sports, entertainment, news and more.

In more recent years, Ross Video has also been in the vanguard of companies to have recognized the growing convergence between the requirements of broadcast and pro-AV verticals, such as education and corporate, as well as the demand for hybrid environments accommodating SDI and IP. To this end, it continues to bring significant new solutions to the market, including the Ultrix audio/video routing, multiviewer and signal processing platform with support for 12G/25G SDI and IP ST 2110 formats.

As a brand whose products are both widely deployed and admired, it’s not surprising that Ross Video has always had high expectations of the tools it uses for test & measurement in its manufacturing and R&D departments. Since 2009, it has been meeting its T&M needs by using PHABRIX products, and 15 years on it has more than 50 PHABRIX units in “constant daily use” at its R&D sites and manufacturing base in Iroquois, located in Ontario, Canada.

PHABRIX, now a product brand within the Leader Electronics Corporation group of companies, is renowned for its range of portable and rackmount test and measurement instruments designed for broadcast, production and post-production as well as video technology manufacturing facilities.

SIGNIFICANT INVENTORY

As of July 2024, Ross Video has a total inventory of 56 PHABRIX devices, comprising: 30 SxE portable 3G/HD/SD generation, analysis and monitoring units with Advanced Physical Layer Analysis; 21 Qx advanced rasterizers for hybrid IP/SDI, 4K/UHD, HDR/WCG generation, analysis and monitoring; and 5 units of the QxL compact, feature-rich 25G IP ST 2110 rasterizer.

The SxE and Qx products form an integral part of functional and compliance testing across Ross Video’s award-winning range of production solutions. The QxL rasterizers – which were the most recent additions to the Ross Video PHABRIX inventory – are delivering a broad variety of testing functionality as high-performance IP workflows become more commonplace in broadcast and beyond.

Support for testing automation and the Real-Time Eye and Jitter Analysis functionality are among the capabilities of the PHABRIX products to receive special praise by Ross Video Senior Manufacturing Test Developer Jimmy Mullins and his colleague, Manufacturing Test Development Manager Alan Taylor.

“One of the most desirable features of the Sx and Qx products is the ease of test automation,” says Mullins. “For example, the RESTful API on the Qx product made it simple and easy to implement full automation of our test scripts for Jitter & Eye analysis and CRC error measurements. Also, the automation of the PHABRIX tests in our manufacturing process allowed us to speed up test analysis and the logging of test data.”

Taylor also highlights the Real-Time Eye and Jitter Analysis functionality – “second to none for the price-point” – as well as the robustness of all the PHABRIX T&M products through the years. “The instruments have proven both their reliability and value since Ross first integrated the products into their test operations back in 2009. After 15 years of user experience, we know and trust the products and value the excellent customer service the company provides.

Moreover, he strongly indicates that the already-sizeable inventory of PHABRIX products owned by Ross Video will expand once again in the not-too-distant future as video requirements continue to evolve: “We look forward to further strengthening our relationship with the purchase of additional video test equipment to support the challenging requirements of high-speed video data formats.”

LANDMARK YEAR

The fact that Ross Video products continue to be relied upon to produce and deliver so much high-stakes live programming can be easily gleaned from a look at some of its 2024 sports highlights alone. UEFA Euro 2024, UEFA Champions League, 6-nations Rugby Union, National Football League, Major League Baseball, National Basketball Association, National Hockey League, National Rugby League (Australia) and the recent Summer Games in Paris are among the numerous tournaments or federations where Ross Video solutions have been central to live production.

Increasingly, Ross Video is also attending to ‘in-venue’ video requirements, which have grown in recent years as audiences have come to expect an elaborate match-day production to accompany the action in the stadium. The delivery of immersive AR content to display boards is just one aspect of what is set to be an ever more dynamic area of technological development.

All of which means that the need for access to resilient, high-quality tools at the firm’s manufacturing hub – where approximately 400 of the overall 1,300 workforce is based – will continue to be essential. “I’ve had so much positive feedback about the PHABRIX products from our staff,” says Taylor. “They find the SxE, Qx and, more recently, QxL products to be compact, very rugged, and excellent for various production tests.”

Martin Mulligan, COO of Leader Electronics of Europe, says he is “delighted that our T&M products continue to ‘tick all of the boxes’ for a company as celebrated as Ross Video, whose products are found in broadcast centers, OB trucks and flypacks around the world. Broadcasters know that Ross Video products can be guaranteed to deliver in the most-demanding, round-the-clock live productions, and a big part of having that confidence is that the systems have been so comprehensively tested. The fact that Ross Video has chosen PHABRIX products to enable a huge part of that testing over so many years is a brilliant affirmation of our own commitment to reliability and robust performance.”