General Digital

Published May 8, 2013

As part of General Digital’s effort to be more socially responsible, we organized and hosted our first blood drive on Monday, May 6th.

Thanks to 32 willing donors—20 from GD and 12 from area businesses (though 5 were unable to donate)—the American Red Cross told us that “What we collected will help save the lives of 81 hospital patients who may need platelets while undergoing chemo therapy for cancer, red cells to fight sickle cell disease or plasma if burned or during surgery.”

We are thankful to everyone who participated and made it the success that it was.

Published April 23, 2013

Right on the heels of their return from their two-week tour of duty in California, Tenell and Brian hit the road again. This time they met up with Tyler Avery, General Digital’s Sales and Applications Engineer, and headed down to National Harbor, Maryland, for the 2013 Navy League Sea-Air-Space Exposition.

Tyler serves a key role as the bridge between the sales department and the engineering department. To better satisfy the requirements of his position, it was thought best that Tyler accompany Tenell and Brian in order to man the booth, as well as walk the trade show floor. We felt this would give him a better sense of how our products are often used, since many of our customers also display at Navy League. And so it did! With exhibits of land, sea, and aircraft all around, it was easy for him to see the need for our monitors and display enhancements, and how they are commonly used. “This…has been monumental to my experience and future here at General Digital,” Tyler stated. “It is definitely a great asset to have connections at other companies, and the sooner I can meet people, the more help I can be to General Digital. Simply being at the trade show has helped to transform how I view the position I hold and begin to mold it into its full potential.”

With a better booth location, our 3-man dream team was quite successful in engaging the crowds. Of course, location only played a part in their success. They brought along the trade show veterans: the 37-inch Titan; the 19-inch TwoView; the 15.4-inch Saber PanelMount Combat; and the 8.4-inch Barracuda. This time, though, new to Navy League, we displayed the 52-inch Titan Lite (the commercial-grade iteration of our standard ruggedized Titan large format LCD monitor) and the 21.5-inch SlimLine Micro with QuadView capability. Just imagine playing Sports Champions 2 for the PlayStation 3 with Move System on 52 inches of high definition LCD clarity. Exhibitors and attendees alike became large-screen legends in bowling, archery, boxing, and skiing, among other sports that General Digital’s booth hosted and boasted.

On the last day of the trade show, Tenell, Tyler, and Brian manned the booth in red, white, and blue martial arts uniforms, touting the phrase, “Design this innovative requires discipline this intense.” As expected, they turned quite a few heads and made memorable impressions. Tyler summed it up best: “There were multiple occasions where people came up to our booth for the sole fact that we were wearing [martial arts uniforms]…flipping Brian over my shoulder, like the ragdoll he is, was one of the highlights of the trip. It was a great way to start the last day, and the people watching were all very amused.”

And there you have it! Don’t miss our performance at Navy League Sea-Air-Space Expo 2014!

Photos of the 2013 Navy League Sea-Air-Space Exposition on Flickr
Photos of the 2013 Navy League Sea-Air-Space Exposition on Facebook

Published April 18, 2013

What do you do when you’ve returned from an awesome three-week road trip across western Europe? Some would probably say, “Rest,” while others might offer, “Get caught up with all the work that needs to be done.” What do General Digital’s unwearying wayfarers do? Why, we head for the west coast, of course!

That’s right, three weeks after their three-week blitz through Europe, Brian and yours truly (Tenell) headed out to California for their first ever California Road Trip. “Wait,” you query, “haven’t they been to California already? In fact, didn’t they go to California twice last year?” While that is correct, it should be noted that the other road trips were confined to southern California, specifically San Diego and Los Angeles.

This time around, we flew into San Diego on Monday, March 25th and flew out of Sacramento on Saturday, April 6th (before leaving the next day to drive down to Maryland for the Navy League Sea-Air-Space Expo; but that’s a story for another blog). Landing in San Diego, we hit the ground running. Visits with companies like OMNITEC Solutions, SPAWAR Systems Center, and BAE Systems, afforded us the opportunity to broaden their awareness of the many solutions that we can provide to the various programs that these companies serve. We love to hear statements like, “Wow, I didn’t realize you did all of that!”

Though it is always difficult to wave goodbye to sunny San Diego, the bright lights of Los Angeles drew us in like moths to a flame. With scheduled stops at more big-name companies such as United Technologies Aerospace Systems, Northrop Grumman, and L-3 Communications, there was very little time to frolic in the legendary Hollywood Hills (though we did manage to squeeze in a view from Mulholland Drive overlooking the Hollywood Bowl as the sun set). Maybe it has something to do with being in Tinseltown, or maybe it’s just the cool west coast vibe, but it felt like we were celebrities as we walked the halls of these venerable companies touting our wares.

The drive up the coast along Routes 1 and 101 was absolutely breathtaking. Sun, surf, and sand combined to form scenes so picturesque they looked like they’d been digitally manipulated (and being California, they just might have been). An overnight stay in Santa Cruz. Lunch in Santa Barbara. Dinner in Monterey. As the cloud cover increased, and fog engulfed us on the mountain road, we began the slow transition to a San Francisco state of mind. The majority of our California customers are in the south, which explains our frequent travels there; however, we do have quite a few customers in the San Francisco and Sacramento areas. We stopped in at Rogerson Kratos, Digital View, and Alpha Research and Technology, just to name a few, before catching a red-eye out of Sacramento.

California certainly treated us well. The weather was grand. The scenery was gripping. And the visits were great. From western Europe to the west coast, this year is shaping up to be one to remember!

Check out all of the photos on Flickr or Facebook and let us know how you like them.
2013 California Road Trip photos on Flickr
2013 California Road Trip photos on Facebook

Published March 26, 2013

We’re ready for our close-up!

Every day, General Digital builds world-class state-of-the-art flat screen LCD monitors, engineers bonding solutions in our Optical Bonding Laboratories, and provides expert safety-critical software testing and development in our Software Services Group. It’s not every day, however, that General Digital is featured on television.

Back in September of last year, we were approached by Multi-Media Productions, the producers of 21st Century Business Television. After reviewing our Web site, and watching our videos (which we encourage you to do, after reading this blog), 21st Century Business felt (rightly so) that we would be a great addition to their Industrial Computing series.

In late November, a cameraman (David Chmielewski) was dispatched to our facility in South Windsor, Connecticut, to gather footage for our upcoming broadcast debut. Everybody at General Digital caught TV Fever in the weeks leading up to the shoot; we even took a group picture to celebrate the event. Tenell Rhodes, Senior Vice President of General Digital Corporation, flew down to Boca Raton, Florida, to shoot the studio portion of our segment. With both portions shot and edited, we eagerly awaited notification of our air dates.

21st Century Business Television affords us airings on three different networks: Fox Business Network, CNBC, and Bloomberg International TV. The very first airing took place on Fox Business Network on Saturday, March 16th. We’re scheduled to appear on Bloomberg International TV on Sunday, April 7th–placing us in front of millions of people in countries all over Europe, the Middle East, and Africa.

We’re also scheduled to appear on CNBC. On the west coast (Pacific Time), the program will air at 11:30 PM the night of Wednesday, April 10. Early Thursday morning, the program will air at 12:30 AM Mountain Time, 1:30 AM Central Time, and 2:30 Eastern Time.

Having recently returned from our epic European Road Trip, the timing could not be better! Just in case your vacation along the French Riviera doesn’t coincide with our international airing, you can still see our segment by clicking on this link to our YouTube channel: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i81-uAHeEz8&feature=share&list=UUFM6OwJRuOEX_tgfNXd6olw

Be sure to follow us on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Google+ for our upcoming road trips. Who knows? We may be stopping in nearby! We’ll be sure to bring our Sharpies for all the autographs we’ll be handing out to all of our adoring fans.

Published March 14, 2013

There are road trips and then there are epic road trips. General Digital sent Tenell Rhodes and Brian Martin on what amounts to one epic road trip.

Armed with the task of examining and expanding our European market share, these resolute road runners drove nearly 4,700 miles, starting in Madrid, Spain, on February 12th and ending in Rome, Italy on March 3rd. As an engineering company, General Digital knows that the shortest distance between two points is a straight line; but as an innovating company, we know that sometimes you have to go outside the lines. That would certainly summarize the 2013 European Road Trip.

The inspiration for this trip was birthed back in October of last year, when General Digital exhibited at ATCA’s 57th Annual Conference and Exposition (October 1st-3rd, 2012) and was informed of an upcoming trade show in Madrid. Though we were reluctant to exhibit at the trade show, we were quite interested in attending the show and visiting as many of our European customers as we could.

But we weren’t going to cross the pond just to say “Hello;” we were also going to conduct some market research. We wanted to know what, if any, hindrances we face in the European marketplace. Would European businesses feel more comfortable buying from a sales representative based in Europe? Would they prefer it if General Digital had a European office? Stay tuned for the answers to these questions and more!

We landed in Madrid, Spain, and immediately got down to business. After a visit with Airbus Military, Tenell and Brian headed over to the World ATM Congress to walk the floor and get a feel for the trade show. Then, we met with DIP (Desarollo, Ingenieria, y Produccion) outside of Madrid before heading to the hotel to catch up on some much needed sleep. Our next stop was outside of Paris, an eleven-and-a-half-hour drive.

The next morning, the daring duo set out for Clermont-Ferrand, a small town two hours away from Paris, leaving a relatively short distance to drive the morning of our appointment with Zodiac Aircraft Systems. The meeting with Zodiac, though longer than expected, went well and afforded us the opportunity to have lunch in Paris. From there, we caught a train to cross the Chunnel (English Channel Tunnel) into England to meet with Rolls Royce, Ultra Electronics, L-3 Communications TRL, and Saab Seaeye over the next few days.

Crossing the English Channel back onto the mainland, we made our way to Antwerp, Belgium, to meet with Nijkerk. We discovered during many of these meetings that road trips allow us to dispel myths that often surround us. For instance, customers who buy only one type of product from us often think that what they buy is the only thing we produce.

These road trips give us the opportunity to show our customers and prospects our vast array of products and services. In addition, we know that many international companies are reluctant to order from American companies due to various trade regulations, which can complicate the purchasing process (such as ITAR; to be covered in an upcoming blog). Again, during these types of trips, because we are quite familiar with working with international companies, we’re able to correct common misconceptions about international trade.

Our meeting with Nijkerk having gone well, we made our way over to Germany for our next visit. Cassidian, an EADS company, has a location in Immenstaad, a city in southern Germany. If you follow us on Facebook, you will have noticed references to our visits to Aachen, Dusseldorf, Cologne, Weisbaden, Stuttgart, and Frankfurt on our way south. Covering western Germany in two days was quite the experience. Our final country to visit was Italy: where we traversed as far south as Rome and the surrounding area, reaching out to customers and prospects alike.

After a trip of this magnitude, you would think that Tenell and Brian would take a break and settle back into the swing of the things. But when has that ever been the case? It won’t be long before we head to the west coast, visiting our southern California customers, whom we haven’t seen since 2011, among other prospects in the Golden State. Well, they’d better rest up while they can…the road beckons!

View all of the photos from General Digital’s 2013 European Road Trip on Facebook or Flickr.

Published February 20, 2013

Congratulations to Pratt & Whitney and Bombardier!

At 11:59 AM this morning, Transport Canada issued the Type Certificate for the PW1500G engine models (including the PW1519G, PW1521G and PW1524G).

Our Software Services Group is proud to have been a part of the software testing phase of this project, and the team that certified the first GTF in the NGPF family.

This is aviation history in the making, as these engines run cleaner, quieter, and more efficiently than ever before.

Read the press release for the full details.

Published January 22, 2013

“We can rebuild him. We have the technology. We can make him better than he was. Better…stronger…faster.”

Okay, so those are the words from the popular 70’s television series, The Six Million Dollar Man. But they almost perfectly describe our Repair Department here at General Digital Corporation.

Sure, we make world-class, first-rate flat panel LCD monitors used in some of the harshest environments known to man. But those environments can be quite unforgiving. Though our monitors could arguably last forever in a boardroom, conditions are a lot different in the bowels of an aircraft carrier, or the dusty, arid expanse of the desert. That translates into the occasional return of monitors to our Repair Department.

Then there are the General Digital monitors that have been out in the field so long, they come back just because they’re homesick—needing various components replaced well in advance of failure to ensure proper and unfaltering performance. Even retrofits are welcome for servicing, where the units metamorphose from trailing edge equipment to leading edge technology.

Watch our video and you might agree…perhaps we should rename it the Resurrection Department.

Published November 28, 2012

You probably knew that General Digital builds some of the toughest flat panel LCD monitors available. It’s possible you even knew that our Optical Bonding Laboratories is “Clearly the Better Choice”. Maybe, just maybe, you knew that we’ve been providing superior software testing for over twenty years.

But did you know that a member of our “family” is an actual movie producer? You’ll want to tuck this in your folder marked “Things I’ve Learned Today”: Rafael Blanco, manager of General Digital Software Services, has produced not one, but two independent films. Along with his brother, Giovanny, and his brother’s wife, Sarah Thorp, “Raf” has produced Cornelius and The Last Intervention.

Giovanny serves as director and producer, while Sarah both writes and produces, and Raf functions in the roles of producer, production manager, and line producer. Wearing multiple hats, he concerns himself with expenses, scheduling of shoots, and the overall timing of when the film is shot.

Their first film, Cornelius, centers around the title character having spent seven years in an institution after the loss of his wife in a tragic accident. After his release, he seeks to reconnect with his son. Shot in July 2008, outside of Los Angeles, Cornelius took 18 days to shoot and cost about $35,000. Raf reveals that the idea for Cornelius echoes a traumatic experience in the life of his children’s mother.

By contrast, The Last Intervention, which premiered on August 30th, 2012, was shot in 11 days. At the cost of a meager $15,000, The Last Intervention was born from the need for an “idea that fits the budget.” The entire film was produced in 90 days; the plan all along was to complete the film before Giovanny’s 40th birthday.

Inspired by the reality TV shows that dominate the airwaves, The Last Intervention focuses on the disconnect between parents and their teenage children. Raf explains that often in immigrant families (in this case, the Dominican Republic), any aberrant behavior parents observe in teens is ascribed to drug use; so in The Last Intervention, the father contracts a film crew to follow his daughter and hires a therapist to conduct an intervention…and much hilarity ensues.

Having premiered in Hartford, Connecticut, the film has since bounded beyond borders:
- featured at the Crown Heights Film Festival in Brooklyn, NY (November 8th)
- featured at the Oaxaca FilmFest in Mexico (November 14)
- featured at the 6th Dominican Global Film Festival in the Dominican Republic (November 15th, 16th, and 18th)
- will be featured at the Hartford Flick Fest (December 7th and 8th)

Congratulations to Sarah, Giovanny and Raf on creating their second first-rate film!

P.S. Visit Facebook and like The Last Intervention page.

December 12, 2012

After the showing of The Last Intervention at The Wadsworth Atheneum and the newly opened Spotlight Theatre (both in Hartford, CT), the Hartford Flick Fest had this to post on its Facebook page: “Congratulations Blanco Brothers for winning Best CT Flick at the Hartford Flick Fest!!! Your movie was an absolute delight to everyone that watched it. Rafael was such a gracious film maker and conducted very insightful Q & A after both screenings. Thank you so much for entering and attending the Festival.” Way to go, Raf!

Published November 2, 2012

Having returned from the ATCA 57th Annual Conference & Exposition at National Harbor on October 3rd, it wasn’t long before we were hopping another flight to exhibit in Washington, D.C. from October 22–24 at AUSA’s Annual Meeting & Expo. Once again, we played games. Once again, we wore our track suits and gym suits (making us the envy of our neighboring exhibitors). And once again, we made some great contacts.

Our booth boasted an impressive array of monitors (if we do say so ourselves). The 37″ Titan—the most portable of our large format monitors (as much as “portable” can be attributed to a 50-pound mass of metal and glass)—turned heads as it displayed both blockbuster movies as well as Playstation 3 games in HD. We found many willing attendees of the trade show who couldn’t resist the lure of gaming on the large screen.

The 19″ TwoView (dual flip-up LCDs rack mount unit)—a road trip and trade show regular—was also a source of great interest for those stopping at our booth.

Our 15.4″ Saber PanelMount Combat Display Kit proves most engaging to the “techies” out there. As a ‘technology demonstrator,’ it effectively conveys our proficiency with display enhancement features: sunlight readable, night vision-goggle compatible, LCD heater, touch screen, EMI filter, and backlit buttons.

Of course, we can’t forget the Barracuda, the acclaimed show stopper. Submerged in a fully decorated fish tank and playing movies such as The Little Mermaid, Finding Nemo, Shark Tale, and the Spongebob Squarepants Movie, the environmentally sealed 8.4″ Barracuda continues to turn heads at every show.

Rounding out the bunch were two units that we also displayed at the ATCA trade show earlier in October. Our 12″ Saber Standalone was on hand, illustrating our ability to accommodate a wide variety of video inputs and sporting a slim enclosure with infrared touch screen capability. The 21.5″ SlimLine Micro boasted Quadview capability, allowing four separate video inputs to be displayed simultaneously. Designed to be installed in the ceilings of tactical military ground vehicles, the SlimLine Micro proves that customizing flat panel LCD monitors is our specialty.

Maximizing our time away from the office, we headed south the day after the show and met with key personnel at Global Technical Systems and stopped in at WR Systems. Friday brought us to Newport News Shipbuilding where we presented our wares and discussed current programs on which we are working, as well as future programs that may require our assistance.

Though this marks the end of our traveling season for the year, we’re already looking forward to visiting some of the contacts that we made while enjoying the beach at our booth. If you’d like to be one of the special few on our ”Who Will We Visit Next?” list, just contact us and we’ll let you know when we’ll be in the area!

Published October 19, 2012

Before we reveal the five questions that you need to ask yourself when choosing a video controller that best suits your LCD monitor and application, let’s start with question number zero: What is a video controller?

To answer that, you need to know more about the computer’s video card. The video card inside of a computer serves to generate images that are output through a video connector and video cable, and appear on the screen (display). Though we will not be exploring the intricacies of how the video card accomplishes this (for which you are thanking me, no doubt), it is important to recognize that a computer would be useless without the video card translating data into visual information.

Perhaps as part of its inclusion in the Witness Protection Program, the video card goes by a variety of names. However, the terms ‘video card,’ ‘graphics card’ and ‘graphics board’ are common industry accepted labels for the circuit board that controls video on your computer. For the purpose of this blog, we will stick with the term ‘video card.’ Some of the most common video card brands in use are ATI, NVIDIA, and EVGA, though there are plenty more available.

Now, back to the video controller. Internal to any LCD monitor is an LCD video controller that converts analog or digital video signals sent from the computer’s video card into the proper digital signals required to drive, or operate, the display (typically LVDS or TTL digital signals). The video controller, which is more formally referred to as an LCD panel interface board or LCD interface controller, goes by a variety of other names such as ‘LCD controller,’ ‘LCD video controller,’ ‘display controller,’ and even ‘display adapter.’ To keep it simple and consistent during this blog, we will just use ‘video controller’ (“Whew!,” you say as you wipe your brow).

It is the video controller that enables the LCD monitor to function as a direct replacement for the traditional CRT monitor (which also has a video controller). It provides intuitive operation of its controls and calibration through the use of push buttons and a series of on-screen menus.

So, what are the questions you need to ask yourself in choosing from the plethora of available video controllers?

1. What is the size of the display or monitor that will be used with the video controller? The diagonal measurement of the LCD viewing area is the first important factor to note.

2. What is the resolution of the display that will be used with the video controller? This is also called the ‘native resolution,’ which is the number of horizontal and vertical pixels on the display (e.g., 1920 x 1080).

3. Which specific video inputs will be needed (analog, digital, composite, etc.)? Will you only need analog RGB, or Sync-on-Green VGA and DVI-D, or HDMI, NTSC and RS-170? This is perhaps the most important question of all.

4. Are there any additional features needed (picture-in-picture, picture-by-picture, gamma correction, resolution scaling, image inversion, zoom, serial remote control, etc.)?

5. Are there any additional thermal or other environmental requirements? Though made of similar components serving similar purposes, video controllers are not created equally. They can be made to withstand high temperatures and humidity, severe vibrations and shock, and even strong magnetic fields such as those found in MRI (Magnetic Resonance Imaging) rooms.

Once you have determined the answers to these questions, you will have gathered the facts necessary to make an informed decision. If you need additional assistance not provided here, please feel welcome to contact us.

Next choice: power supplies! Check back soon for more information on how to select the right power supply for your application.