Amino's IPTV Set-Tops Selected for Alaska-Based MTA's HDTV Expansion

Cambridge, UK-based IPTV set-top box company, Amino Communications, announced last week that Alaska-based Matanuska Telephone Association (MTA) has selected two of its set-tops to expand its HDTV service. According to Amino, MTA will deploy its A130 MPEG-4 HD single-stream set-top and its A530 HD DVR (which is designed to support, among other things, push-VOD). MTA claims to operate over 60,000 lines across its 10,000-square-mile network area (serving Palmer, Eagle River and Wasilia) and offers broadband and wireless services in addition to IPTV. "At MTA we are making a significant investment to develop our IPTV service," Eric Anderson, MTA's director of engineering, construction and operations, said in a prepared statement. "Amino's HD set-top boxes with their cutting-edge features strengthen our market proposition, and their flexible and knowledgeable technical support team has already proved to be an asset. By selecting a specialist like Amino, we are looking forward to successfully delivering next-generation IPTV."
 
In other set-top box news: Geneva-based set-top box company, Advanced Digital Broadcast (ADB), has been named "TV Innovator of the Year," and the company's ADB-4820 HD "set-back box" named best set-top box technology, by IMS Research's TV Innovation Awards,. "We are delighted to receive this recognition," Tim Schermerhorn, SVP and general manager of ADB's Americas cable business unit, said in a prepared statement. "The ADB-4820C is a perfect example of how ADB's imaginative approach to engineering produces truly differentiating results for the cable industry. This product embeds our own best-in-class OCAP stack, is very fast and responsive, has high video and sound quality, and provides consumers with an unparalleled user experience. At the same time it is fitted with an impressive collection of installation and diagnostic tools that make it easier and faster for operators to set up--which is pretty much the philosophy of our entire US cable product line." According to ADB, the ADB-4820C box mounts to the back of a plasma or LCD television panel and uses the latest HDMI-CEC technology to enable a single remote to be used for both the TV and the box. It can be transformed into a DVR by connecting it to a USB hard disk, the company says, and meets low-energy consumption levels set by bodies such as Energy Star.