One month ago, COVID-19 concerns were far from the Boston area. As such, a ribbon-cutting ceremony for a brand-new $125 million media center for NBCUniversal attracted state, city and local official.
The new facilities include System T consoles, from Solid State Logic.
They’re nestled inside the Needham Crossing Business Park home of NBC Boston. Five Solid State Logic System T AoIP-networked audio mixing consoles are in place, and handle all facets of broadcast audio production at the six-studio complex, which was designed and built on a SMPTE ST 2110 IP backbone.
“It was truly a pleasure working in partnership with SSL to build NBCU Boston’s new media facility,” said Jason Kornweiss, VP/GM of Diversified Emerging Technology & Solutions. “Their product ownership, comprehensive engineering training and support for the customer is impressive and we look forward to opportunities to work together again in the future.”
The new NBCU Boston Media Center was built to support news-gathering collaboration between NBC10 Boston, NBC Sports Boston, Telemundo Boston and New England Cable News (NECN), which were previously housed in separate locations around the city.
NBC10, Telemundo Boston and NECN President/GM Chris Wayland, who also serves as GM of NBC Sports Boston, described the complex in a local news report as “the most spectacular news facility in the world.”
Wayland was previously SVP/Station Manager and succeeds Mike St. Peter, who leaves his role as President/GM of the Boston stations and NECN to take on a temporary corporate level position that will support the division’s news operations.
The NBCU Boston Media Center houses six 2,400-sq.-ft. studios. Three dedicated studios serve NBC10 Boston, Telemundo Boston and NECN. NBC Sports Boston’s Studios 4 and 5 are combined into a single 4,800-sq.-ft. space. Studio 6 is a flexible space accommodating town hall meetings and other special presentations. There are six corresponding control rooms, plus a dedicated podcast studio. More than 60 broadcast service panels and over 90 channels of wireless microphones enable productions to broadcast from locations throughout the 160,000-sq.-ft. facility.
SSL’s System T, which is ST 2110-30 ready, comprises Tempest-based rack Processors and a routing and I/O system incorporating Dante AoIP technology offering complete AES67 compliance. The system may be flexibly networked with a variety of hardware control interfaces, from touch screen terminals and remote hardware panels to large-format modular consoles.
The co-location of the local news, regional sports network and regional news network is designed to better serve audiences across all platforms with English- and Spanish-language content. Working with NBCU’s team, systems integrator Diversified built the technical infrastructure to be as compliant with the SMPTE ST 2110 Professional Media Over Managed IP Networks suite of standards as is currently possible, enabling facility-wide collaboration. The ST 2110 IP infrastructure will also allow the facility to adapt and scale its capabilities and operations in the future with minimal additional investment.
