ESPN, which is launching its ESPN 3D network on DirecTV and Comcast with coverage of Friday's World Cup opener between South Africa and Mexico, says it's using Erricsson's new CExH42 MPEG-4 encoders to backhaul the expected heavy traffic from South Africa. ESPN says it's seen a 25 percent bitrate reduction using MPEG-4 compared to MPEG-2.
Bill Lamb, VP of transmission and transport for ESPN told Broadcast & Cable, "We're able to do quality feeds at 30 megabits per second, and we'll increase it to 40 once we get out there and fine-tune the pipe. When we get back to the States, we'll definitely use higher rates."
Broadcast & Cable reports the ESPN's private network will be linked with temporary studios in South Africa via a 622-Mbps pipe.
For more:
- see this B&C report
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