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Answer To An Interesting Question…

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Eyes Of A Generation.com

Answer To An Interesting Question…

A while back, someone asked me how the signals from NBC’s many studios around NYC got back to 30 Rockefeller Plaza. Microwave or coaxial cable?

Turns out it was usually coaxial cable. The one exception was NBC’s Uptown Studio at 106th Street. Most of the other theaters, like the Hudson and Ziegfeld were low rise buildings near Broadway and didn’t have clear paths so they were all coax. The Uptown though was 11 stories and did have a clear path.

The Uptown had dual capacity and relied mostly on the coax, but since so much programing was coming from there, the engineers felt that it would be good to have a microwave back up, just in case.

CBS and ABC also used coaxial cable to link their many remote studios back to master control. Thanks to Gady Reinhold at CBS for the answer.



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5 responses to “Answer To An Interesting Question…”

  1. Chris Clementson

    I belive NBC had a microwave shot from the Brooklyn studios.

  2. Jay Shennum

    Did they have broadcast microwave when this picture was taken?

  3. Bob-Mary Delaforce

    And today it’s fibre optics that link stations with the cable company head end! Technology changes but the plan remains the same.

  4. Marc Thorner

    Still a Studio up on 106th!

  5. John Holt

    The Bell system quickly developed a balanced coax for video that was then run to all major venues through central offices and then to a central control room often called the radio/TV control room. From there they had lines to all TV studios and network locations. We (I worked for Michigan Bell from 1970-1972) used microwave for places it wad impossible to put cable. We had a round glass room on the roof of the Bell building with two Raytheon microwave receivers from the early ’50s modified later to pass color. For the Hudson’s Thanksgiving Day parade we had to bounce the signal off of he side of the Penobscot Building to reach the Bell building. The local Bell company operated the Radio/TV control room which often also had mobile telephone (forerunner to cell phones of today) and ship to shore radio. This room then passed video and program (the name for audio circuits) to or from AT&T to local stations or network venues.

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