At a time when many see Broadcasting in trouble, 104,443 folks showed up to the 2017 NAB Spring Convention. About 2/3 of the world’s countries were represented. There was more exhibition space and new exhibitors, but no Riviera – the implosion has left nothing but one parking garage standing.

It was very interesting to see how radio exhibitors, in particular, were distributed – and distributed they were. More than a couple were so close to Las Vegas Boulevard that you felt you were dodging traffic to get there, others were on the East end of the floor, a few in the middle, and a bunch still in Central Hall.

For us, it has been a busy week, with one of our number slowed down by having his truck broken into and his medications stolen – not to mention his clothes. Another was snared by a job that came up at the last minute – and the situation was confirmed by talking to several folks who are pretty much booked until the end of AMC-8 (If you do not have migration plans, time is running out.) And family issues kept another of us back. Nevertheless, here is a sample of what we did see and hear.

The Chairman Speaks

Opening the show in a literal way as well as symbolic way, Chairman Ajit Pai told broadcasters a lot of what they want to hear – even if a lot of specifics were not available. It was enough to get him a standing ovation as he promised a new translator window this summer and a stiff look at killing outdated rules.

Traffic on the floor was varied, from busy to slow. It did look like those who stayed in the Central Hall got more traffic, but most were happy with what they got.

Anniversaries Galore

This was quite the year for anniversaries of many manufacturers. Most brought some cake and refreshments to the booth. A few had some well-known industry folks in attendance, including Shotgun Tom at the SAS booth.

Some of these, of course, are older than the NAB:

• GatesAir is celebrating 95 years of operations.
• Dielectric Communications has reached 75 years.
• Ward-Beck is now 50 years old, the oldest in Canada.
• Henry Engineering celebrated 35 years
• Sierra Audio Systems (SAS) reached 30 years.
• Omnia processing folks had 20th Anniversary shirts on.

Other anniversaries were on the floor, as well, showing that the industry is mature and yet we see new products and services that can make a big difference in station operations.

Shown on the Floor

It was interesting to see how broadcasting, which has gone through major changes in the past 20 years, especially since consolidation became the norm. Not only seeing the change in technology (some can remember the large number of tape-based products, for example), but watching the march toward streaming, which some – even in government – hope will supercede broadcasting.

There were quite a few streaming applications shown on the floor. Simple, one-way, setups to make remote connections easier were seen in the upcoming Opal from Comrex, as well as the existing application at ipDTL. Other implementations, such as from Enco, have developed several flavors of “video follows audio” for streaming live and delayed “podcasts.”

Speaking of Enco, their WEBDAD is making it easier and easier to incorporate the benefits of automation, wherever you are.

Using any common browser gives the remote the same screen and options as in the studio. From sports shows to inserting news and information during emergency periods, WEBDAD makes it pretty easy.

Around the corner, Lawo showed its new console. Completely software driven, it literally can be set up any way you want – for what ever studio needs you have. The layout, touch screen, and console are able to handle small stations to large studios.

The purchase of the PRE brand, gives Wheatstone a new product, designed for taking one or two studios digital at a modest cost.

The AirAura X4 was released, the latest audio processor at Wheatstone, with HD and receiver capabilities … leading to reliable timing correction.

The Telos Alliance had several new items, but one of the most interesting was the Volt, the new generation of audio processor, having features that meet the needs of experienced users or IT people pressed into station operations.

Another aspect of the consoles and processors was that AES67 was being supported as a standard and “bridges” are now available to connect different encoding techniques.

This might be best exemplified by the new GatesAir Intraplex IP Connect. Said to bridge any current standard, it should help operations that have to import audio from many systems and put out a feed that all can handle.

In the past few years, monitoring equipment has become more popular, to monitor off air, as well as various streams. Inovonics has been in the forefront of providing monitoring gear, from full-blown modulation monitors to modestly priced INOmini boxes designed to do everything from AM or FM or RDS monitoring to stream monitoring and IP return of audio to the studio. There are now plenty of these models, and Inovonics probably will need a larger table next year.

Yes There Was RF

Nautel continues to do things that respond to customer requests. This year, the NVlt series of transmitters was provided with a pathway to HD Radio, should stations change their minds about implementing the system.

American Amplifier Technologies, a newer company, brought several interesting items to the NAB Show, among them a digital power/SWR meter and a new filter.

The line meter is designed to give a reliable reading for power and SWR, no matter where in the output circuit it is connected.

Another welcome trend is some companies like PTEK are taking measures to repair/replace a rather unfortunate reputation with a proactive customer-based approach.

With evermore connections by IP, it was good to see those companies where efforts are being made to better protect station gear from the “script kiddies.”

Crown is among the latest companies to develop a remote display for their systems, including parameters and alarms. They intend to ensure that they are doing all they can to protect most users – with the obvious exception of those who do not change user/password on boxes that are connected to the Internet.

Think this is not necessary? To show how easy it was, one engineer, using a browser in a cell phone, displayed an open Barix box in less than 30 seconds. He could have shut it down or reset the audio from nothing to the “infamous” F Donald Trump loop. Another 1900 boxes were responding to pings. We hope none of them are at your location.

AM RF

It was nice to see more real attention being given to AM Improvement beyond making translator operators very wealthy.

Tom King, at Kintronic Labs had a very interesting display showing how syncing AM transmitters can make a big difference. Also, he ahs done studies looking at the noise floor and other issues will help AM stations improve what is transmitted.

Kurt Gorman at Phasetek was also at the show, with information on new and maintaining existing sites, as well as the current popular move: multiplexing. Whether a pair of ND’s or multiple AM-DAs, Phasetek and Kintronics are ready to help stations see what choice is the best for them.

Bits and Pieces

Needing to show the operator where a problem exists in a multi-station facility is not always easy. Henry Engineering and Paravel Systems are two companies that adding specific visual alarms.

Yes, we did have the 25th Annual Lunch Gathering … and we again filled the room plus some at the Westgate. It was really nice to see some faces that have not been to NAB in recent years.
Some pictures from the Lunch are in Alan Alsobrook’s piece. We have some more and may post them in the coming week.

Another tradition – at the end of the show – had a strangeness this year.

A lot of folks gravitate toward the Telos Alliance booth toward the end of the show. Beach balls are tossed, folks are dancing on the tables, air guitars are played with energy, all to the sounds prepared to backtime to the announcement of the show closing – and led by Frank Foti on the air guitar with “Won’t Get Fooled Again!”

Yes, the speakers are turned up – with clean audio – to be heard more than a few aisles down the way across the Hall. It is a great release after four days of the show.

And then – all of a sudden – it sounded like a 20 dB pad was dropped in .. and the release was more of a whimper.

The Scrooge was the NAB Registration table – although one wonders who/what/why they were still in place as the show closed. In any event, they complained to the NAB Floor Cops, one of which came over and really hassled the Telos folks, telling them to “turn it down now, or we will not give you any power next year” and “if you do not turn it down, we will fine you.”

We have to give it to the Telos audio team, John and Addison, who endured the attack – as if this audio had never been turned up before – and managed a timely recovery at the end of the song, to bring it to a level that allowed everyone to “release” the pent-up emotions!

This aural stand-off to continue next year….

FYI:
The 2013 NAB Show final attendance was 93,850.
The 2014 NAB Show final attendance was 98,015.
The 2015 NAB Show final attendance was 103,042.
The 2016 NAB Show final attendance was 103,012.

Thanks for walking the floor with us!

Well here I am once again traipsing the floor at the NAB Spring Convention in Las Vegas.
I will start off with an admission of guilt: I did not file a report yesterday as the editor in chief was lost somewhere in the Arizona desert. Somehow he managed to find his way out and on to Vegas, so I guess I need to get back to work.

Let us start off with a very brief review of Sunday, I first went to the NUG which was at the Paris this year. (Hearing all sorts of rumblings of no free parking, I rode the Monorail into the site from the WestGate.) NUG was fine as expected, I saw many friends, and learned a bit as well.
Next I was off to the WestGate to hear from GatesAir, they had a growing crowd of people and also presented good information.

Monday at NAB

Now comes Day One of the NAB, and I made my way into the North Hall. One of the first booths to catch my eye was the GatesAir booth. There they were happily showing off their Flexiva Transmitter line. They (along with others) were discussing the idea of “Single Frequency Networks” that will likely be a very big topic moving forward.

I stumbled across a new service from over the pond for remote broadcasts, Kevin Leach of ipDTL told me of their web-based remote broadcast system.

Basically it is service that allows you to make low latency remote connections with full audio quality from anywhere you have Internet connectivity back to your studio. Similar services are starting to pop up from other vendors, but this one looks and sounds nice.

At the Orban booth our old friend Bob Orban was able to take a few moments and talk about the new Orban 8700i processor and its new features including exponential loudness which helps correct and restore over processed source material.

Down at the Kintronics booth they were showing several new products. They now are producing a new larger line of Iso coils that easily allow translators to be placed on hot AM towers.

I will have to make another stop by the Wheatstone booth as when I was there, well Windows10 had decided it wanted to control the demonstration. Opps! Thanks Microsoft….

Honestly, I thought there was more after the Wheatstone Win 10 update, but it’s vanished. I didn’t realize it had truncated until after it was posted. Tis time to move forward.

Day 2 Onward

Unfortunately due to some technical difficulties I fell behind on my daily updates So I will give the rest to you now.

On Tuesday, I arrived on the floor bright and early all bright-eyed and ready to go. As I first wondered in I bumped into Jim Johnson talking with Kurt Gorman at the Phasetek booth.

I should point out that I think the most important part of making the trip to NAB each year is having a chance to have face time with friends and acquaintances from across the country.

When I first came to NAB in 2002, I did not know anyone. Now, I know hundreds of people from across the country.

The State of EAS

I then got down to the meeting rooms to hear what Al Kenyon of FEMA had to say about EAS operations he was joined by Austin Randazzo a attorney advisor for the FCC.

When Al asked one of the big questions on many people’s mind about part 11, “how does the FCC define the word ‘immediately?’” Austin would only reply “No Comment.” I think that pretty much means even the FCC does not know what what they are talking about.

(For a bit of History when Part 11 of the Rules was written, during a national alert was issued your equipment was going to have to pass audio from a live stream. Now when we are using IPAWS and have the advantages of digital playout of a stream from the IPAWS server, I would pretty much think “Immediately” should mean as soon as your box can process the alert and have just a bit of buffer time, in the appropriate language for your format.)

Stopping by the Arrakis booth, Dale was happy to show me that they have added Bluetooth capability to many of their consoles.

BW Broadcast was showing their It’s Alan & Gary Luhrman with Inovonics processors
new audio equipment including the former Ariane line.

If you had a desire to get certified Terry Baun and Ralph Hogan were happy to assist with that. {862}

Time to Meet and Eat!

Then I was off to Barry’s Annual Lunch Gathering at the Westgate hotel, for more on that event check Barry’s report.

After Lunch I bumped into Nigel from the BBC talking to Tom King about BBC HF facilities across the pond.

At the Shivley Booth deep discussions was in progress on antenna topics, or was it about where the best shows were that night?

Over at the Broadcasters General Store booth Kyle Magrill was ready to assist with any questions about Circuit Werks products. {917}

After that it was finally time to bail off the floor for the day, and have dinner with friends.

Wednesday

Wednesday was a bad day for me and I did not spend much time on the floor at all. So we move on to Thursday.

Thursday

While I am not one to be excited about anything “Cloud based” Cloudcast software did catch a bit of my attention with their services.

One that may be handy for stations is one that allows SMS or .txt messages to be directed at the stations request line, and of course studio staff can reply as well.

I noticed a very neat little device at the Rivendell, it i’s called the Wall Time. It is a small Raspberry Pie based device & program that operates with a GPIO box and simply displays the time and any sort of alarm’s or status you can think of as long as you can get a logic line from it.

All this is driven by …………………… this.

In my Hunt for composite STL transmitters I did run across an offering from Armstrong, I am now told this may be a rebranded RVR, but none the less it is getting hard to find true composite transmitters any more. When asked they were very quick to point out that it will not pass the digital composite signal from a Mosley DSP 6000.

At the Kintronics booth I was introduced to Titus Radio receiver, it is a DSP-based receiver in a mini boom box form.

While I did not get the full rundown on its capabilities, I did see it receiving and decoding DRM Shortwave signals. It is also good at receiving standard AM and FM signals and I believe it also does FM IBOC decoding. I will be doing a bit more research on this one and it just might be an excellent item for the service vehicle to be able to monitor all signals I might be working on.

That about wraps up the show from me, I probably did not cover as much ground as I usually do this year, still it was very nice to get to Vegas and see so many friends from all over.

CES had its 50th edition this year. From a small start in NYC in 1967 (17,000 attendees), this year’s edition was expected to welcome about 180,000 attendees (1/3 from other countries) to some 4000 exhibits in over 2.6 million square feet of space. Added to the Las Vegas Convention Center facilities were exhibits in the Sands Convention Center, the Westgate Convention Center, and suites in the Venetian Hotel and other places. Some 600 exhibitors were there for the first time.

You may have read that security was up this year. That is true. All bags were inspected – except for the clear plastic ones issues to the news media, who were just waved through. There also were some dogs in evidence around the Show, but by and large were no big deal. Traffic was pretty thick, as one might expect, with one new complication: most of the big hotels on the Strip now charge for parking. While you could get to much of the Show via monorail, that did not work for the Sands/Venetian site (Shuttle bus, taxi, walking were the alternatives).

Yes, They Had Them!

OK … yes, there were drones at CES, lots of them. A whole section of South Hall was filled with them. Many Virtual Reality products were there, too, as well as 3D printers, robots, concept and connected cars, big, curved screen TVs, and Bluetooth connected anything, which joins the IoT – the Internet of Things.

The Connected Home, The Connected Car, The Connected Pet, Connected Fitness, and the Connected Kitchen were just a few of the items linked via the Internet. What to know when to buy more cereal? Some new garbage cans will tell you, thanks to UPC readers. Monitor your house, car, health of kids and grandparents, anything that you can connect to a server.

And wherever you looked you saw more booths and products with names starting with an “i” than anything Apple or iHeart could do, put together.

Walking the Floor

Once you make up your mind that you cannot cover all of the floor booths and hospitality suites, there is still a lot to see and, if you just keep walking, find a surprise or two. A list helped, but walking with open eyes was helpful, too.

Our goal was to find things that might specifically interest the broadcast community, and we found a number of useful products – and a few vaporware items as well.

For example, those stations that are still using, or considering again using, vinyl records, you should check out the latest Audio Technica belt turntable. It has a built-in preamp (or will let you use your own). While the turntable price is modest, there is a whole series of heads and styli available, including a true audiophile moving coil head that costs just $5000. (yes, the number is correct, but it does sound fine!)

Audio Technica also decided to do something to stand out amongst the hundreds of wired and Bluetooth headphones at CES, with a couple of models that eschew the traditional D/A conversion by using a D-Note chipset using apt-x to directly modulate the diaphragm.
The result was enhanced “Purity of Sound,” as they put it.

Not to be outdone, other companies, including Sennheiser are striving to use the latest and soon to come Bluetooth versions (4.2 and 5.1) and codecs to increase bandwidth and speed, and reduce latency. Few decent headphones want to talk MP3!

Making the Right Earphone Choices

One thing becomes clear as you work your way through the BlueTooth options: everyone needs to take the time to test several products and decide what they want in terms of sound.

Here is where the idea starts: if you get in someone’s car (someone not in broadcast), there is a 1/3rd chance they never touched the default radio EQ settings. On the other hand, you can often predict which folks will turn up just the bass, or do a bass-treble bowl.

It many ways it is the same with earphones. A lot of wired and wireless headphones are sort of “middle of the road.” Not real exciting, but useful.

But then, there are models that help you find the right one. CCrane has released a set of earphones that are optimized for speech. Others, like Monster focus on the best possible D/A as producing audio as clean as possible. And then there are the models for people who never listen to MP3s.

There seemed to be a convergence of Bluetooth and hearing aid technologies. Several of the units on display seemed to work hard to include noise reduction and/or tinnitus reducing features.

Nuhera IQbuds were noteworthy among the companies showing how software applications and the Internet can combine to allow personalization of ear buds without spending the big bucks hear aid companies often charge.

Following up on their success with wired headsets that rely on bone conduction, rather than in the ear, Aftershokz displayed their new Bluetooth wireless headsets. The concept of bone conduction has several benefits. First, they do not block ambient sound (for example, cars while you are walking/jogging) but, even better, most folks with hearing issues get clean, clear audio direct. I tried them and, despite a hearing loss in one ear, instantly enjoyed the way the whole stereo audio image was clearly centered.

One line that really stood out was the Scottish RHA earphones. While you can get $20 units from them, their flagship model, at $250, contains three sets of filters so you can choose the response you want to listen in clarity and comfort. Other manufacturers focused on helping you avoid running out of power: the YEVO comes in a carry-case containing 6 charges before reloading.

Earth Friendly, Too

Again, depending upon what level of reproduction you crave, maybe the House of Marley’s attention to environmentally renewable materials will give you a balance of satisfaction on both an audio and natural level.

For example, the Riddim BT ultra-portable speaker is encased in natural bamboo, a cork base, and fabric made of hemp, organic cotton, and recycled plastic bottles. The new House of Marley in-ear headphones feature “sweat proof” bamboo construction. Given the attention to the product, they are well worth checking out!

Jasco is another company seeking to be environmentally responsible. The gave a large section of their booth to Justin Wren to promote his “Fight for the Forgotten” campaign for water in Africa.

Better Than Tie Wraps!

Building a new studio – or remodeling one? Usually that means a pile of tie wraps (cable ties) and cutting and replacing them each time a change happens.
If so, NiteIze new Gear Ties are really worth a look. Not only can they replace traditional cable ties (the steel center is covered by rubber), they are reusable and have a loop to keep the tie where it belongs.

NiteIze’ Michael Hawks (L) shows off several different Gear Tie product sizes from 3 inch (left hand) to 64 inch that will let you tie anything from a pair of wire to heavy TV video and control cables. It might make your bungee cords obsolete.

Another good tool, found on the floor are the Flir infra-red thermometer products. Some new enhancements make this a valuable tool for transmitter tuning and troubleshooting.

Need some extenders for keyboards and monitors or just plain video?

IO Gear has a brand new KVA Docking station, which will allow you to switch from PCs to laptops effortlessly.

An HDMI extender was also shown, as well as a really nice battery for portable power in the field.
At the size of 20,000 mAH, we only saw one other larger one one the floor (27,000 mAH!) from a startup focused on lighting needs. For a slightly smaller need, GO PUCK’s new 6XR 9000 mAH belt- attached power pack features the new Qualcomm intelligent quick charge circuit that will put out 3.6 Volts for 90 minutes, until the target is charged, then backs off.

Another area showing higher and higher capacity is flash drives. Remember when they were 64MB? How about 2 TB today? Moore’s Law in action.

Back to Audio

The North Hall, as usual, was filled with a lot of auto-based exhibits (in fact, I was told, everything else will be put out of the North Hall next year – sound familiar?).

Among the concept cars, connected cars, speakers with enough power to go further than many PSRA grants, was a new hardware/software control for car audio that, while not cheap, can do a lot for someone who spends a lot of time on the road.

Audio Control was displaying their DM-810, a product taking you back to the installer for a complete system to customize the sound in your car. You can EQ audio, change levels, ever adjust the phase between channels. Not happy with the processing on your favorite station? Adjust away.

Bluetooth Gear

At the other end of the scale, Bluetooth products were everywhere. BT certainly is a workhorse in the IoT. Wireless speakers, ear buds, etc.

Bluetooth speakers, head phones and ear buds were everywhere. Priced from $10 to $450, you can get, if you have the patience, just what you want to hear, fit your ears and lifestyle, and budget. Codec: SBC, AAC, etc. A few of these were mentioned earlier, primarily for headphones, but there is more.

Bluetooth speakers claiming to be waterproof (from 10 seconds on up) were in many booths. Sakar’s Altec Lansing and ZAGG’s lines are quite affordable (as low as $40) with good output levels for use on remotes, etc.

Soundcast’s new VG1 and coming by Spring VG7 Bluetooth speakers range from a one pound carry-along, to a full floor model to fill almost any large area with very clean audio. The unit is waterproof, but you would not know from the crisp audio. Oh, it will also contact Siri, if you want.

Another very nice sounding portable speaker came from Lemon Technology. The California Roll not only is among the environmentally conscious products, its 33 solar panels will allow up to 20 hours of runtime with only 7 hours of sunlight. Also with voice recognition, the California Roll can connect with three devices.

Other Bluetooth uses include one retrofit that many folks (even with new vehicles) should have: Think a backup camera would be useful for your remote van? Several companies, including Cedar Electronics (Cobra) have an aftermarket set of Bluetooth camera and relay to install easily and tell you is going on behind you or, in some cases, alongside – to tell you what is happening in the hard to see “dead spots. Cedar saves you money by using your cellphone to display – others use dedicated monitors.

At the User’s End

Among the new radios on display at CES, CCrane showed off their new Skywave radio, planned for Q2, to have AM/FM/Weather/SW/ … and SSB selections!

While not quite ready for home installations, Sony led the way this year with a truly “life size” display, made up from their Cedia modules: 9 feet tall by 39 feet wide! According to the info sheet, it is not 4k, not 8k, but 16k ready!

Yes … 39 feet wide…. stunning! No, this cannot even give you half of the stunning video effect!

It is hard to explain, except to note the head in the center is an attendee, watching the demo

And For Some Fun!

Maybe you wish you had a juke box for the man (or lady) cave.

If so, you will be pleased to know Crosley has made it it for you. And you only have to save up $12,995,

But it looks good and it plays real 45 RPM records – you know, the ones you have been saving for a decade or two!

There are a couple of cheaper models, but if you are going to spend $10k, you might as well go the whole way, right? Besides, you will have the “best” man (or lady) cave a broadcaster could!

Easy on the Ears

You likely have seen those earphone ads that let you listen to TV without bothering your mate. But then, how do you have enough sound to hear soft speech without rocking you both out of bed when the bomb goes off? AfterMaster, a product from long time radio/TV/studio folks in LA, goes one better than earphones. It lets you take the TV sound output and intelligently processes it, bringing the very low sounds and the very loud sounds into a much better listening experience.

Aftermaster seems like an especially good deal for handling those cable channels that seem never to have heard of the FCC’s rule about audio control not allowing commercials to blast through. On the other hand, those who are streaming will find this a great “leveling” device to process audio going out to the listener/viewer.

And Some More Ideas

MasterLock displayed several safes and locks that were fingerprint or application (via Internet) operated.

Security is becoming more and more important in several areas: transmitter and studios, of course, IT security, and home use, as well. Likely you have seen advertisements on the television with the question: “Who is at the Front Door?,” showing how people can see who is at their front door, even from another country. Ring, is but one of the providers. Qwikset, Brinks, Heath Zenith, FirstAlert, and more companies all had door locks that can be activated by touch, Internet, or, amazingly, a key!

DLink and EZVIZ were among the companies showing off the fixed/PTZ cameras. I heard about, but did not see, a demo from Samsung that has some software with their Internet cameras that will follow “motion” as it moves across the area.

Eureka Park

One of many interesting aspects this year: even some large companies have opted for Crowd Funding .. bringing some interesting products to the Show floor.

Walking among the booths in “Eureka Park’ it was quite interesting to see the wide variety of products and software being shown – sometimes as production gear, sometimes as concepts. For some, it sounded like you were in France. No wonder: 36% of the startups this year were from France!

That is about it for the top of this year. Please check the date at the top, there may be some additions during this coming week. There was just so much to remember, something will pop up in a day or so!

Thanks for reading this review.

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Return to The BDR Menu

103,012 people made it to NAB this spring, according to the official count, wandering over the more than one million square feet of booths.

Even though some fairly famous companies sent few – or no – representatives, it was evident from talking to the manufacturers that many were pleased with the turnout and contracts signed on the floor. Several called it their “best in years” or “best ever.” That in the face of the large move of many radio companies to the North Hall, with more than a few staying in the Central Hall.

This was my 39th NAB, starting in 1977. Looking around, it is obvious how the Show – and the Las Vegas Convention Center – have grown. Reports from the show floor indicated that the streaming and drone areas were packed.

My personal goal this year was to be able to see most of the Radio floor, and the “outliers” in the Central Hall. For the most part, I did better than in recent years, and got to see quite a few friends.

At the same time, the losses of some broadcasters in the past year were noticed – how could you not notice Dave Hultsman missing from the floor? And Paul Schaefer and Bruce Robertson were among those that passed away as the show began.

Getting Untracked

It did take a little more time than expected to get over to the Nautel Users Group (NUG) gathering at the Flamingo. For a long-running meeting that lost its venue, the turnout was impressive, with some 350 attendees catching up on Nautel’s improvements and plans.

Nautel brought some new transmitters to the show this year, and have a new initiative with Omnia to provide high-quality MPX over a 320kbps IP connection. Nautel also has updated much of their firmware/software offerings – some as a reaction to the increased level of hacking this past year, including the furry animal podcast invasion of a Colorado station for some 90 minutes. Jeff Welton stunned many by noting that in less than 10 minutes, we was able to locate over 5000 pieces of broadcast gear open on the Internet

Internet Security

During the program, it was emphasized that every station should immediately change any default username and password for basic protection.

As the discussion enlarged at lunch, it was clear a major educational work was needed, especially for those who have limited IT training and experience. The BDR will do its share, too, in coming months.

But that was not all for this year’s Sunday. In fact, Sunday is getting packed with more and more activities.

Sneak Peak

After lunch with Nautel, a quick run over to the show floor brought me to Inovonics, where it was clear they worked overtime to develop new products; it was literally impossible to show all the new items in one or two pictures. Jim Wood and Ben Barber brought new modulation monitors for AM, FM, and streaming, a couple of new INOmini products, and more.

At the other end of the program chain, so to speak, was LAWO’s new virtual radio mixer, the R3LAY, which Clark Novak was rather pleased to show it off.

From that quick preview, it was over to the GatesAir news conference and reception, where their new models were discussed, including the Flexiva LX low power options.

Then it was on to the ShowStoppers display, where there were some interesting items from the computer companies. HP, for example, displayed a new “all-in-one” workstation based on the Xeon CPU.

The insides of the new HP Z1 workstation

A Xeon laptop model was also shown. At the other end of the floor, Dell as also showing Zeon-based workstations and laptops, as the next generation of computers that claim to handle anything in a broadcast station on a reliable basis.

Sunday also was when SCMS surprised Bob Cauthen with a party to celebrate his 40th anniver-sary as a broadcast rep firm.

Monday/Tuesday

Monday is a good day to get an overview of everything, and for me to get ready for the Annual Lunch Gathering – this year the 24th in a row. Traffic seemed to come in waves, both inside and out (A lot of places stuck up $30 parking signs, although there were a few ways to deal with it), but Monday was very good for companies to do business, so we stayed on the periphery.

In the afternoon, the Broadcast Warning Working Group (BWWG) met with members of the National Weather Service in an effort to communicate broadcasters’ concerns. The NWS representatives did listen and the discussion of how they can meet their required function while avoiding “message flooding” on broadcasters seemed positive and a real search for ways for the EAS community to draw together in a collaborative way.

Tuesday found me back at the Westgate Hotel Buffet to welcome some 65 or so lunch gatherers. It a surprise, this year the hotel seemed to be happy we came and did everything they could to make us comfortable, even bringing in more tables as we filled the back room, which mercifully had no music playing at all!

Pictures by Alan Alsobrook ..

This was a good year for those attending. In addition to the goodies I brought, Comrex sent over a pile of “NAB Survival Kits,” which were popular. Kevin Kidd brought some pens and some nice backup battery packs – among the few I have seen with clips to make it easy to carry in your pocket or on your belt.

But the sponsors and friends of the Lunch really came through with even more goodies to give away. Orban sent not one, but two, copies of their PCn-1600 audio processor, and the Telos Alliance sent a copy of their Zip2Stream encoder.

Added to that was the new HLS Streaming Encoder from StreamS and Inovonics offered any one of their INOmini units to the winner. There was also a $100 Visa Gift Card and piles of pens from the good folks at ESE.

Back to the Floor

Among the stories on Wednesday, The FCC Commissioners and staffers on hand made several announcements regarding broadcast, with many anxious to learn more about AM Improvement.

Comments came fast as well from those companies wanting the FCC to actually enforce the Part 15 and Part 18 rules where signal degradation to AM continues to grow. Others were wishing continued nighttime protection out to 750 miles (although very few, if any, “clear channel” stations actually program to or sell time out of market but still protection quite useful for EAS, especially when power goes out in a storm and the Internet and cellular die).

A few commented that the NAB plans to put the Radio floor in the “West Hall” in future – a possibility enhanced by seeing new paint on the old Riviera Hotel, now owned by the LVCC. On the other hand, next year should be very similar to this one, in terms of booth locations.
Hope you found this look to be enjoyable – and selfie-free – reading!

OK, one selfie. “Hi Alan!”

FYI:
The 2013 NAB Show final attendance was 93,850.
The 2014 NAB Show final attendance was 98,015.
The 2015 NAB Show final attendance was 103,042.

Thanks for walking the floor with us!

Another NAB is behind us. NAB 2016 had a full house with 103,012 attendees. As usual venders were showing their new wares for 2016 and beyond. And, as usual, there seemed to be almost as much vaperware and empty boxes in the TV and post-production halls as actual, in-production equipment and systems. You […]