Automated TV and Video Testing Reduces Broadcast Equipment Device Development Time and Costs

Traditional verification testing processes do not work well for TV equipment manufacturers. Bob Lamb from Cabot explained to me at the IPTV World show that device verification testing can require 20,000 to 30,000 tests to be performed taking 3 to 5 months. With new emerging system types in more countries, testing may need to be performed on more types of devices and systems. In addition to extra development time, tester fatigue can also result in incorrect results which either allow poor performance devices to pass through development and production or require additional testing to re-validate the performance. The Cabot automated testing solution can reduce testing time to less than 5% of what it takes a person to do manually do it. The automated testing system can perform 3,000 tests in 6 hours. A key to successful automated testing is the creation of a detailed and organized log of test results. The Cabot Robotester can be fully customized and has a well defined application program interface – API that allows test engineers and technicians to create unique tests using the Pyton programming language. For design and manufacturing companies, time to market can be critical and automated testing can reduce development time and cost.