Date: 26th July 2010

Videotron employs Sentry digital monitoring system to enhance viewing experience

Videotron has selected the Sentry digital content monitoring solution, a part of Tektronix's acquisition of Mixed Signals Inc for delivering superior viewing experience for Videotron subscribers.

"Videotron has a well-deserved reputation in the industry for both technical excellence and for its unswerving commitment to quality," said Eric Conley,Vice President, Video Network Monitoring, Tektronix. "With the addition of Videotron, we continue to see the same rapid shift toward the Mixed Signals family of products from Tektronix in Canada that we have seen in the U.S., where nine of the 10 largest operators extensively use Tektronix monitoring solutions."

Videotron chose the Tektronix Sentry solution because of its ability to monitor their video quality and application carousels flawlessly, identifying and diagnosing service-affecting errors before they reach the subscriber. Sentry utilizes technology, like its deep packet inspection, to continually check the flow of the video programs through a network and spot problems at the IP and MPEG layers thus leaving no video or audio error undetected. The tru2way monitoring capabilities of Sentry simplifies data delivery to set-top boxes.

"We chose the Tektronix Sentry offering to ensure continued delivery of programming with the exceptional picture and sound quality our subscribers have come to expect from Videotron," said Alain Boissonnault, Senior Director of Digital Video Development for Videotron. "As we expand our offerings with more HD programming and other advanced services, the chances for video and audio errors to occur grows, but with Sentry, we will be able to comprehensively monitor our content to catch and rectify errors quickly and with minimum fuss."

With its testing complete, Videotron will begin its initial deployments of Sentry in its master headend in Montreal this summer. Sentry will be used to monitor programs as they are aggregated at the headend and prior to distribution to markets served by the master headend. In this manner, Videotron will be able to identify video and audio errors that are already within the programming as it is received at the headend, as well as errors that are introduced when the programming is groomed, multiplexed, rate shaped and otherwise processed before being delivered to subscribers.