46zilzal
11-02-2007, 11:33 AM
It is amazing all the electronics required to keep the simulcasts signals going per day. Once captured from the satellite feed, each signal has to go through a decoder (much like the digital cable on our televisions) in order to become unscrambled. Several large companies (Scientific Games Network of Las Vegas is one of the largest) handle the bulk of them but there are proprietary decoders too: NYRA has it's own GOLD decoder box which is easy to spot amidst all the others. Once captured and de-scrambled, the signal is assigned an open channel and then sent out to the betting floor. So that the fans know where to go for each, there is a set schedule of assignments to specific channels WHEN AVAILABLE.
Every day there are little problems: weather screwing up reception on one satellite so you have to re-direct to another, running out of open channels (this is especially true with the overlap time between the end of east coast schedules and the onset of midwest and west signal days), but is comes out. Since many, but not all of our betting pools, are co-mingled, each goes through a betting HUB and our signals have to mesh with theirs to get accurate totals and odds. There are about 30 Autotote decoders humming away all the time at this task. Given the multitude of inputs, the summations are surprisingly fast. This is why we see big changes in the odds board AFTER the field has broken (much akin to the Wall Street ticker on a big trading day). If you have a popular signal taken by many outlets, all that last minute wagering gets dumped on the last click and it can be huge.
Every day there are little problems: weather screwing up reception on one satellite so you have to re-direct to another, running out of open channels (this is especially true with the overlap time between the end of east coast schedules and the onset of midwest and west signal days), but is comes out. Since many, but not all of our betting pools, are co-mingled, each goes through a betting HUB and our signals have to mesh with theirs to get accurate totals and odds. There are about 30 Autotote decoders humming away all the time at this task. Given the multitude of inputs, the summations are surprisingly fast. This is why we see big changes in the odds board AFTER the field has broken (much akin to the Wall Street ticker on a big trading day). If you have a popular signal taken by many outlets, all that last minute wagering gets dumped on the last click and it can be huge.