In broadcast facilities and television studios, a central apparatus room (CAR, pronounced "C-A-R"), central machine room, or central equipment room (CER), or central technical area (CTA), or rack room is where shared equipment common to all technical areas is located. Some broadcast facilities have several of these rooms. It should be air-conditioned, however low-noise specifications such as acoustical treatments are optional.[1] Equipment is connected either directly with an attached foldout monitor, keyboard and mouse or remotely via KVM switch, SSH, VNC, RS-232 or remote desktop.
These rooms contain broadcast and broadcast IT mission critical gear necessary to broadcast and television operations. CARs usually house audio routers, video routers, video servers, compressors and multiplexers that utilize broadcast automation systems with broadcast programming applications to playout television programs.
They contain broadcast and monitoring equipment, through which all the operations are monitored by the transmission engineer, without disturbing the studio recordings. CER may also house analog and digital TV transmission systems, satellite up-link systems, digital processing synchronizers, video patch panels, and audio patch panels, including video monitors.[2] [3]