The Leading Global Provider of High-Quality ViewCast Audio and Video Communications Products Niagara SCX Software www.viewcast.com | 3701 W. Plano Parkway, Suite 300 | Plano, Texas 75075-7840 | 972-488-7200 | 800-540-4119 Niagara SCX Pro and Niagara SCX Standard ViewCast ViewCast OUTPUT FEATURES Niagara SCX Standard Niagara SCX Pro Niagara SCX Standard File Formats ENCODER MANAGEMENT AND MONITORING SOFTWARE • Uncompressed AVI • Adobe® Flash® • RealVideo® LIVE STREAMING | REMOTE MANAGEMENT | MULTIPLE SOURCES • Windows Media® Streaming Formats The explosive growth of live and on-demand video streaming has created a parallel need for media • RealVideo encoder arrays. In some installations this results in rack after rack of stacked media encoders, each • Windows Media with at least one audio / video capture channel and its own encoding software. Installing and configuring all the software that allows each card to create multiple streams at different bit rates is Niagara SCX Pro extremely time-intensive. Additionally, encoders are often installed in remote locations, making configuring, and maintaining a network of encoders even more difficult. File Formats • Uncompressed AVI Niagara SCX®, ViewCast’s encoder management and monitoring software, manages multiple • Adobe Flash streams of video with a single user interface. This interface includes multi-codec support of multi- • MPEG-4 video sources. Features like monitoring, data reporting, and remote management provide you with • H.263 (MPEG-4, Part 2) ease of use. • H.264 (MPEG-4, Part 10) • RealVideo • Windows Media With Niagara SCX software, users can setup and control encoders throughout an enterprise or over the Internet, eliminating the need for multiple products such as Windows Media Encoder, ® TM Streaming Formats RealProducer or Helix Mobile Producer to control and monitor the encoding process. Niagara • MPEG-4 SCX Pro features the same live streaming encoding abilities for the Windows Media® and • H.263 (MPEG-4, Part 2) RealVideo formats as the standard Niagara SCX version, while adding MPEG-4, H.264 and H.263 • H.264 (MPEG-4, Part 10) formats. • RealVideo • Windows Media Niagara SCX Pro is included with GoStreamTM, GoStream Plus, Niagara® Pro and Niagara 7224 systems, while Niagara SCX Standard is included on all other Niagara Streaming Media encoding Container Formats systems. You can also purchase Niagara SCX Standard or Niagara SCX Pro separately, for creating • 3GPP your own customized solutions. • 3GPP2 Niagara SCX Remote Encoder Management and Monitoring Software Encoder Management Configurationtio Niagara SCX provides you full access to view and set encoding parameters, to start and stop the encoding process, and to receive notifications of identified error conditions. With this powerful encoder management tool, you can monitor and control up to 50 encoders from a single interface running on a client PC. The following scenario clearly demonstrates what Niagara SCX can accomplish for you. In a data center running 15 encoding systems, each connected to different content sources using one or more capture channel in each system, Niagara SCX provides the ability to monitor the encoding status of each channel on each streaming system. In this scenario, Niagara SCX, combined with Osprey SimulStream®, can also capture from the same source on each channel at different resolutions or compression formats. For example, each source is captured at 3 different bitrates: QCIF at 148 kbps, CIF at 250 kbps, and CIF at 350 kbps. All are managed and controlled by Niagara SCX! Niagara SCX Client Interface and Cropping Tools Control Management Functionality Only Niagara SCX provides the crucial control management functions required when you manage one or many stream- ing media encoding arrays — Access, Monitor, Control, Configure, Aggregate, and Secure. Convenient, Local and Remote Access When you manage any array of devices, convenient access to the devices is the foremost consideration — on-site and off-site. You often find an array of encoders located in a server room with several PCs. These server rooms are typically loud from the hum of servers, and do not provide an ideal long-term working environment. Niagara SCX gives you the ability to access the encoders from one or more remote locations via an IP connection, and moves the management controls from an inhospitable Niagara SCX Encoder nested view allows you to easily see all encoders on the network and their current status. environment to an ideal environment. Real-Time Any-Time Monitoring Monitoring provides you the confidence the systems are operating within the expected parameters. It provides you the ability to react and to apply remedies when a system fails to function properly. Niagara SCX provides two categorical sets of components for monitoring: • System Health o CPU performance o Network status and activity • Ingest through Distribution o Ingesting point o Audio and video qualimetrics, which include hue, saturation, gamma, and audio levels o Encoding statistics, which include stream packets and bytes delivered/dropped, stream bit rate, and frame per second (fps) Niagara SCX encoder statistics window provides real-time monitoring of encode, system health and connected clients. ViewCast Niagara SCX Complete Encoder Control Niagara SCX is flexible, particularly in applications involving live broadcasting when on-the-fly changes and tweaks are often required. Niagara SCX excels in providing the required controls to ensure the best streaming video quality. Niagara SCX controls allow you to feel as if you were physically located next to the encoding system. Basic functions of the encoder such as start and stop are included, but Niagara SCX also provides you controls for: • System CODEC and profile selection o Windows Media, RealVideo, Flash, MPEG-4 (SCX PRO only) and AVI • Modification of capture resolution and attributes • Ability to adjust video pre-processing filters such as de-interlacing Using Niagara SCX, you can set all audio and video properties of each encoder • Adjustment of video resolution through scaling while minimizing CPU load on an individual basis. • Branding and protecting of video content through logo watermarking • Enabling/Disabling/Configuring Osprey SimulStream Quickly and Easily Configured Niagara SCX lets you pre-configure or re-configure the system quickly and efficiently. This is crucial for live, spontaneous events when a portable encoder is taken on location by broadcast teams skilled in event productions. Although skilled in event productions, these teams may not be up-to-speed on the technicalities of encoder setup and configuration. Niagara SCX allows the user to pre-configure Niagara streaming media appliances. Then, all the on-site user needs to do is press the “start” button on the front panel of the system. This is an appliance solution! At the device driver level, Niagara SCX configures the video pre-processing, scaling, and cropping for each encoding session. Other configuration settings include de-interlacing options, VBI data extraction (used in the United States for Closed Captioning or International use for teletext and other bits of data), gamma controls, color space conversion, and basic video format settings. Niagara SCX also has a Web Interface which is used to configure the programmable EZStream® buttons on select Niagara Encoding Appliances. Manage and Aggregate The typical CODEC array operator manages several different systems, each with different settings and, in most cases, running different encoding engines. It is critically important the user experiences a single, unified interface which can only be provided using Niagara SCX. Without Niagara SCX, managing so many different devices becomes completely unmanageable. The Niagara SCX Interface provides configuration settings for items such as de-interlace and closed captioning. Access with Security Niagara SCX provides security for the system and components through conven- tional local area network (LAN) security measures. The encoding systems reside behind an enterprise firewall, while the user, with an Internet connection, running Niagara SCX can reside anywhere in the world. Standard Virtual Private Network (VPN) methods allow secure user access to the LAN where the encoders safely reside. This is possible because Niagara SCX uses a server/client architecture — the SCX server software resides on the encoding system, while the SCX client software resides on any connected device running Microsoft® Windows® device. The Niagara SCX Web Interface logs pre-defined encoder events and can be configured to send alert e-mail messages when critical system warnings occur. The Leading Global Provider of High-Quality ViewCast Audio and Video Communications Products Niagara SCX Software Niagara SCX Remote Control and Monitoring Software Comparison Chart Niagara SCX Standard Niagara SCX Pro AVI (file only) Flash (v6) (file only) RealVideo (v9, v10) Windows Media (v7, v8, v9) Video CODEC MPEG-4, Part 2 (H.263) MPEG-4, Part 10 (H.264) AVI (file only) Flash (v6) (file only) RealAudio® Windows Media Audio CODEC MP2 Fall 2007 MP3 Fall 2007 AAC AMR-NB AMR-WB Fall 2007 3GPP Output Format Containers 3GPP2 Video Preview A/V Decode View Monitoring & CODEC Statistics Reporting Visual Encoder Active View System Health Event Logging (Web I/O) Appliance HW Email Alert of Critical Events (Web I/O) Appliance HW NTSC (M/M-J) PAL (B/D/G/H/I) SECAM (B/D/G/H/K/K1/L/L1) Video Input Brightness, Contrast, Saturation,