by Brianna Crandall — November 12, 2014—RGB Spectrum, provider of control room solutions, recently announced its new Enterprise MCMS, a control room management system designed to extend monitoring and control around the globe. Combining extensive remote capabilities with superb image quality, sophisticated control arbitration tools, and a highly intuitive GUI, Enterprise MCMS sets a new industry standard for control room management solutions, claims the company.
Building on the features of its MultiPoint Control Room Management System (MCMS), RGB Spectrum’s new Enterprise MCMS is an innovative hardware and software platform that uses video to integrate disparate systems over Internet protocol or IP (local area network or wide area network: LAN/WAN) without requiring custom software.
With Enterprise MCMS, users can now consolidate control of various security subsystems including video management systems (VMS), legacy digital video recorders (DVRs), access control, life safety, building automation, geographic information system (GIS) and/or call boxes from multiple sites in hours rather than weeks or months.
Combining real-time display with multi-user (“keyboard, video and mouse”) KVM and extensive remote capabilities, Enterprise MCMS offers support for operators and system resources located anywhere in the world with 24/7 reliability. The secure, collaborative features of Enterprise MCMS make it ideal for use in mission-critical applications such as security operations centers (SOCs) and control rooms, says RGB Spectrum.
Video Desktop Adapter (VDA)
Enterprise MCMS uses RGB Spectrum’s innovative Video Desktop Adapter (VDA) technology to enable the consolidation of any source, any operator, and now, any place, under the control of one intuitive interface. This new control management system allows operators in multiple locations to share access to system resources, both local and remote.
Competitive remote desktop control systems typically employ either virtual network computing (VNC) compression technology that optimizes for text and graphics but not video transmission, or H.264 compression technology, that works well for video but not text, says the company. In contrast, VDA devices utilize a proprietary adaptive compression technology that reportedly provides excellent high-motion video as well as crystal-clear text and graphics transmission in near real-time. The VDA is highly secure, using AES-256 and NSA Suite B cryptography to ensure a high level of security over public networks, claims RGB Spectrum.
To support mobile operators, the system encodes and transmits video, keyboard and mouse signals from a control room to remote sites. This provides operators at remote sites with real-time access privileges and shared control over any part of the Enterprise MCMS system for which they are authorized. VDA devices also allow Enterprise MCMS to control computers anywhere in the world. Simply connect a remote PC, with up to four heads, to a VDA Encoder to allow signals to be decoded, monitored, and controlled by any MCMS operator, at any site, says the company.
Multi-site collaboration
Enterprise MCMS is designed to facilitate multi-site collaboration. A hierarchical system of permissions and priorities allows operators at any site to control resources, enabling operators worldwide to share control of equipment, leverage expertise, and work together collaboratively to make critical decisions.
To simplify operation and support a collaborative work environment, Enterprise MCMS’s highly-intuitive graphical user interface (GUI) offers a simple “drag-and-drop” method of placing computer or video sources on control station displays or video wall monitors. The contents of a video wall can be captured on a single screen as part of the GUI and displayed anywhere in the world. This GUI is the cornerstone of the integrated enterprise MCMS hardware/software system, making it easy for operators to access resources and share control.
The company demonstrated the capabilities of Enterprise MCMS at the recent ASIS International 2014 security show.
RGB Spectrum provides innovative solutions for the display, recording, and transmission of computer and video signals. Since its founding in 1987, RGB Spectrum has established itself as a leading designer and manufacturer of cutting-edge video/graphics processors and decision-support systems. Company offerings include multi-viewers, video wall processors, matrix switchers, codecs, recorders, and integrated solutions for control room management. RGB Spectrum says its products are preferred by major global organizations in industrial, security, medical, educational, commercial and military markets. RGB Spectrum is a privately held company based in Alameda, California.
