The satellite sector has spared no efforts to enhance reliability of its services, and advancements in network remote monitoring tools are providing more benefits for operators and service providers.
Satellite networks remain viable around the globe for several reasons. From a physical point of view, satellite networks have fewer potential points of failure than their terrestrial equivalent. The latter are vulnerable to adverse local conditions such as fires, minor accidents and power outages as well as natural disasters such as extreme weather conditions and earthquakes. Satellite networks, on the other hand, are made up of fewer elements, significantly reducing the likelihood of network outages. Another factor that contributes to the overall performance of satellite services is its ingrained culture of reliability. Given the fact that it is next to impossible to carry out repairs in outer space, the satellite industry traditionally has built-in redundancy at almost every level. Most satellite operators, for example, are able to rely on in-orbit spares.
All of this means that satellite networks provide unmatched reliability, typically assuring 99.95 percent network availability or more. This result, however, should not lead to complacency; not least because outside satellite circles, unfounded prejudices against satellite services and their performance still persist. In other words, network reliability is crucial to the wider acceptance of satellite as a deliverer of high availability networks. Historically, the satellite sector has enlisted the help of a range of tools to monitor network performance. Traditional tools, however, have only been dedicated to a limited part of the problem: the radiofrequency (RF) satellite devices such as antenna controllers, spectrum analyzers, satellite modems, etc. A major challenge in today’s satellite deployments is the mix of RF satellite devices and Internet Protocol (IP) networking gear, all critical elements for a functioning network. Companies are moving to address the new reality, providing satellite operators with sophisticated tools to increase their view of satellite and network gear at remote sites as well as automated network management tools which improve problem identification and resolution times and reduce manpower needs.
View to a Network
What are the tools employed to improve satellite network management, and how do they work in practical terms? More importantly, how does a network management tool help to increase uptime? The answer is simple, though it is one that belies highly sophisticated technology: The information these systems are handling is growing in terms of volume and sophistication. In fact, network monitoring technology has improved significantly throughout recent years. Traditional tools interrogating a point-to-point VSAT link might give you half-a-dozen different statistics on basic performance metrics. Modern tools, however, provide a wider array of data and the tools to store and interpret it.
“A fair amount of increasing uptime is related to a better understanding of the network and how it is configured,” says Richard Deasington, iDirect’s director vertical marketing. “With the combination of iDirect’s traditional iVantage network management system and the recently acquired SatManage tool, for example, the number of parameters under control in a network has gone up significantly. In addition, the system allows you to store years of data for around 40 different parameters for each remote. Providing historical data is also key to this solution. “You can also make a large number of rapid interrogations of the data, and this opens a wealth of opportunities. If you ask yourself why a particular remote is not working well, historical data might give you an invaluable insight into the problem and often even provide you with the answer to what is wrong,” Deasington says.
This is, of course, an industry-wide trend, with demand for these types of solutions coming from all market segments. “The commercial realities of our customer base have caused traditional monitor and control solutions to integrate with upstream and downstream systems,” says Richard Purgason, COO of Crystal Solutions. In doing so, repetitive operations are eliminated with resultant improvements in quality and operational continuity. “Specifically, Crystal integrates with automation systems and trafficking systems to deliver more complete packaged solutions,” says Purgason.
The number of tools on the market to increase an operator’s view of a satellite and network gear at remote sites is remarkable, and this has greatly benefited operators. “Tools like ASC Signal’s Next Generation Controller (NGC) have brought significant improvements to operator’s views of satellite gear at remote sites,” says Fred Vinezeano, global product line manager, ASC Signal Corp. “As an example, the NGC provides visibility and control into essentially every Earth station subsystem connected to it and then interfaces seamlessly with a single Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) link to any monitor and control system. This provides for both significantly simplified interconnectivity and improved granularity into what the monitor and control system, and thus the network operator, can see without having to write and connect multiple interfaces to each subsystem.” The network control package that ASC provides to broadcast networks such as ABC and NBC gives control of every antenna and receive chain components within the network — more than 200 locations for each network.
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