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Auto-Mate Technical Data Sheet - Westwood One Network Peculiarities

One of our users complained that the Westwood network sends latching closures that remain latched for the duration of a break or legal i.d. This caused breaks to trigger over and over again. It is not entirely clear what happened during the legal i.d.

We corrected the problem with the breaks by adding an optional break relay lock-out. The system can be set to ignore additional relay closures sent by the satellite receiver for a user determined length of time.

However, we do not intend to alter the Legal I.D. closure to accomodate the protocol of this network. This is due to the fact that a user remedy is easily attained: To be compatible with the scheme of Westwood One, the user must MAKE ALL LEGAL I.D.'s sufficiently long enough to cover the entire duration of the legal i.d. latch. This will prevent an additional trigger of another legal i.d.

Competing Closures:

Another situation was that the network sends a break closure at the same time it sends a legal i.d. closure. This seems very odd to us. Our suggested solution is for the user to somehow prevent the break closure from reaching the Auto-Mate unit during this time frame. This can be accomplished with a time latched relay that is connected to an external relay which will disconnect around this time. The Auto-Mate can be used to send a closure on the PCL or PDISO card at some time previous to the top of the hour (i.e. :58 after) - using Output Closure Schedule option: From the main menu: <F8> Satelite Control Mode, <F10> Audio Switching Schedules, then <F2> Edit Output Closure Schedule. This relay latch can then be connected to a relay device on a timer which will prevent the Auto-Mate system from getting the break closure for a pre-defined number of minutes (until after the top of the hour closure is released).

The Auto-Mate is designed to override a Legal I.D. or any liner material and begin playing a break if a break closure is received during the playback of any liner material. The idea behind this was that we didn't want the system to miss any breaks and get out of sequence. It was thought that a network would never send a 'competing' closure. This programming was desinged to overcome errors received on a rare occasion and keep break playback in the proper sequence.

Audio Switching (Source 1 to Source 2):

If a user intends to switch to a secondary source at the top of the hour, this is generally not a problem. The user usually does the following:

Records a legal i.d. long enough to be completed just before 00:00 (top of hour). This is usually when the network on source 1 is silent. Then, the user has the system switch at either :59:59 or :00:00. This can become a critical timing issue if the legal i.d. must be recorded long enough to cover the entire latching duration from the network (on Westwood One).

Remember, even if the latch is set to take place at 00:00, if a legal i.d is still playing, the switch will be delayed until the legal i.d has finished playing. This usually presents no problems, although if the i.d. playing is too long and the network on source 1 has started its audio again, a momentary 'blip' of network 1 audio might be heard while the first bit of audio on network 2 is missed.

SUGGESTION: Make sure the output closures designed to be sent after the legal i.d are turned OFF. This will decrease the time it takes for a network switch to occur. Get there by going back to, from the Main Menu <F8> Satellite Control Options <F10> Set Relay Card Operations, <F3> Set Relay Card Operations. - Turn output closures after Legal I.D. to OFF (don't forget to save it).

SUGGESTION #2 (I really like this one!): Get your legal i.d. closure from a different source that doesn't remain latched, i.e. another receiver (network) or a timed relay output on Auto-Mate. It is best to get the closure from a source that can do your hourly clock update, though.

NOTE: If you do get the break closure at approximately the time the network switch is supposed to take place, the switch will be delayed until the 3 second time frame has elapsed (The point at which the system is 'HOLDING' - this is the normal prevention of an additional break trigger). However, the 'break lockout' is taking place, this does not prevent time switching.

FINALLY:

It is being determined whether the break override during liner or legal id play should be eliminated - as this will probably have limited usefulness. However it has been suggested that this be a user selectable ON/OFF option.

File: A:\John98\Westwod1