Cobalt Digital Makes Substantial Upgrades to Lineup of Encoders, Decoders

Cobalt’s broadcast-grade 9992 encoder and decoder family are industry standard openGear card modules that already provide professional-grade support for compressed audio and video with resolution up to 4K. Cobalt is now adding Dolby AC-4, Dolby E, built-in Frame Sync and SRT support to this product line.

Cobalt’s 9992-ENC is a software-defined encoder expandable up to four channels and upgradable with HEVC video encoding technology for a dramatic compression efficiency improvement over previous video compression standards, while also supporting existing MPEG-2 and MPEG-4 AVC.

Cobalt’s 9992-DEC is a software-defined multi-standard decoder that supports MPEG-2, AVC (H.264) and HEVC (H.265) and offers a full complement of audio decoding capabilities.

Built-in Frame Synchronizer
The 9992-ENC series now includes a built-in frame synchronizer that ensures the encoder keeps on running, either with a flat field or the last good frame, even If the input video goes away. This eliminates downstream glitches due to input signal issues, such as unsynchronized video switches. This feature is provided at no additional cost through a firmware upgrade.

The 9992-DEC series is adding support for Dolby AC-4 decoding and pass-through. If there are multiple presentations, the user can select which one to decode; if there is an associated channel, the user can determine how it mixes the main presentation. The 9992-DEC offers an ideal choice for monitoring as it includes a Dolby AC-4 metadata display.

The 9992-DEC series is also adding support for Dolby-E decoding. The card can take a Dolby‑E stream, simultaneously decode all programs, and output them as SDI embedded channels. A metadata display is also provided. These two implementations will be available soon.

9992-ENC and DEC now offer SRT Support
Cobalt has added full SRT (Secure Reliable Transport) support to the 9992-ENC and 9992-DEC devices, and also to previous compression product versions. The devices already have full RIST Simple and Main Profile support; SRT is provided for backward compatibility with legacy devices still using the protocol.

Reliable Internet Stream Transport
Cobalt’s implementation of RIST Main Profile now includes full support for certificate-based authentication. If you have a reporter in the field who will send a live feed to the studio, you know for sure when the feed arrives that it is coming from that reporter and not an impostor. Cobalt products make it easy to generate and manage your own security certificates.