Matrox Video: Solutions to Meet Broadcasters’ Everyday IP Challenges at IBC 2024

At IBC 2024 (September 13-16), Matrox Video will showcase products aimed at solving the ‘everyday challenges’ faced by broadcasters and content producers not only in the capture, production, and delivery of high-quality IP and baseband video, but also in essential management, routing, and orchestration.

In the KVM arena, Matrox Video will showcase the Matrox Extio 3 IP KVM extenders and the Matrox KMLync keyboard and mouse switcher on its booth, solutions designed to provide flexible KVM-over-IP matrix system manageability. According to the company, this approach enhances multi-monitor operator workspaces, increases productivity, and supports innovative workflows. Extio 3 provides low bit-rate 4Kp60 4:4:4:4 and quad 1080p60 4:4:4:4 video scaling and switching over 1GbE networks, with advanced multi-view capabilities, multi-system control with seamless mouse switching and enhanced security.

Also on display at IBC 2024 will be the first IP KVM from Matrox Video: Avio 2, an open standards-based IPMX/ST 2110 solution that will be presented as a technical preview. This tool promises to deliver ‘unprecedented’ video quality and performance with real-time, uncompressed remote operation over 10GbE networks, as well as support for 1G networks with optional JPEG XS codec. Fully NMOS-compliant for easy device discovery and media stream routing, Avio 2 supports superior image quality up to 4K and 4:4:4:4 colour space, as well as offering fast switching and lag-free operation at high resolution, with uninterrupted reliability and robust security.

Monarch Edge and Vion

Le Matrox Monarch Edge encoder/decoder, already known for advanced features such as ultra-low latency, high-resolution multi-stream sync (10-bit 4:2:2 HDR video), 4K/multi-HD support, and genlock, will debut its latest update at IBC 2024. New features in version 2.08 include reprogrammable I/O, encoder and decoder previews and thumbnails, SRT connection, custom PIDs, and more.

Meanwhile, Matrox Vion, the first Matrox Video product to support NDI, will also have a prominent position on the company’s booth. The solution transcodes between NDI 6, NDI HX3, IPMX, ST 2110, SRT, RTSP, and other formats and codecs for flexible routing workflows, including NDI over SRT, that increase productivity and enable new IP-to-IP workflows on-premise and in the cloud. With support for 10-bit HEVC 4:2:0, 4:2:2:2 and 4:4:4:4, and H264 codecs, plus optional SDI/HDMI inputs, SDI/HDMI I/O, the IP-to-IP video gateway, Vion is designed for demanding live production and collaboration applications. With flexible, low latency encoding, decoding, transcoding and multi-channel processing, the gateway handles colour space conversions and changes in transmission protocols and bit rates.

ConvertIP and Origin

Matrox Video will also focus on its ConvertIP family, tailored to serve existing SDI infrastructures and bridge to the growing IP industry. The company will bring to Amsterdam solutions such as the Matrox ConvertIP video encoder/decoder converter with PoE, a ‘practical and cost-effective’ solution for integrating the latest IP video formats into existing SDI video infrastructure and 1/10/25GbE data networks. ConvertIP, which offers quiet, reliable, and flexible operation for demanding applications and supports compressed and uncompressed ST 2110 formats (including JPEG XS for 2110-22, IPMX, 12G-SDI, 4Kp60, and HDMI 2.0), will debut its new ST 2110-7 Daisy Chain mode, which improves flexibility and resiliency, while reducing total cost of ownership by enabling multiple streams per connection.

Matrox Video will also unveil Origin, a tool that provides a cloud-native architecture capable of frame-accurate, low-latency, high-availability operations that rely on interconnected media services with an uncompressed fabric across a distributed environment. The system features open APIs that allow broadcasters to customise workflows tailored to their own dynamic needs, while enabling best-of-breed multi-vendor options. The expanded partner ecosystem includes industry leaders InSync Technology, Pebble Beach Systems, RT Software, Telos Alliance and Visual Research.

IBC 2024 attendees will have the opportunity to see a demonstration of Matrox Origin, which will include a large-scale production workflow of 40 live streams with graphics, DVE, clips, switching, and audio, designed to have no single point of failure and running on multiple AWS systems in different availability zones, all uncompressed.

New ST 2110 network cards

Finally, Matrox will debut the Matrox DSX LE5 D25 LP and DSX LE6 D100 network interface controller (NIC) boards, which join the Matrox DSX developer product line of SMPTE ST 2110 boards. Offering multi-channel video I/O over 10/25/100GbE networks, these NICs allow developers and equipment manufacturers to design COTS-based media solutions – from low-density HD/3G workflows to multi-channel 4K and 8K – ‘at the right price’, all within one SDK.

New features of the ST 2110 NICs include support for RGB 4:4:4:4 formats and custom resolutions, both of which are requirements for media server applications driving large displays for entertainment centres and virtual production applications, as well as a roadmap for IPMX.

Spiro Plagakis, Matrox Video vice president of product management, summarizes the key concepts that will mark the company’s presence at the upcoming IBC 2024: “With longtime expertise in IP standards, Matrox Video provides modern tools that help broadcasters, live event producers, and OEMs implement and leverage ST 2110 to deliver high-quality content over IP. At IBC 2024, we’ll show a broad lineup of point-of-use products for IP infrastructure and remote operation — everything needed to process video and control workstations — as well as a cloud-native, IT-based architecture poised to facilitate the broadcast industry’s transformational shift to software-defined infrastructure.”