Lightware’s latest engineering concept is the UBEX optical scaling extender. UBEX is a high bandwidth, long distance, uncompressed audio-video signal transmission system, which is a revolutionary product (and solution) in the professional audio-video segment: there is no any other company on the market that could serve the clients with Ethernet/IP based, uncompressed, 4K 60Hz 4:4:4 AV transmission system with low or even zero latency distribution.
The design features a new, optical configuration, which allows 4K UHD@60Hz 4:4:4 uncompressed signal extension with latency-free multistreaming. In case of the final version of UBEX the video compression level of the signal can be freely set by the user. Using visually lossless compression, UBEX is able to extend two UHD signals over a single 10 Gbps Ethernet port. This results in a massive cost saving on the required Ethernet switch side, as with UBEX only half the router size is required compared to the needs of other 10 Gbps IP based architectures.
One of the prime advantages of this new architecture is scalability. The maximum reachable distance can be adjusted to vary between 400 m and 100 km, depending on the type of optical modules installed in the device and the signal properties. UBEX has a bandwidth of up to 40 Gbps as the user’s application requires, the number of fibers required for the transfer depends on the link speed and the optical modules used: for 10 Gbps one or two fibers, for 20 Gbps two or four fibers, for 40 Gbps four or eight fibers are needed. Transceiver operation mode is also available.
UBEX can work both in a complex network with the use of a standard Ethernet switch, and it can also work in a point-to-point setup, as a traditional optical extender pair. The extender also features audio, Gigabit Ethernet connections per link, and optionally full speed USB 2.0 USB HID, RS-232 and IR connectors.
In order to make easier the usage and maximize the applicability of UBEX product in big systems a controller was developed for users. This Matrix Management Unit is required to control and supervise a virtual matrix, which can be created by connecting UBEX units as input and output endpoints to an Ethernet switch acting as crosspoint.
Typical applications for UBEX include large office building environments, yacht and other high-end residential systems, rental and staging environments.
