Abstract: A fault-tolerant router includes first and second router matrix card. The first and second router matrix cards receive a common set of 4n parity encoded input digital audio data streams and respectively generates therefrom, first and second sets of M output digital audio streams. As the first and second sets of data streams propagate along the first and second router matrix cards, respectively, one or more health bits are set whenever an error or other type of fault condition is detected. First and second parity check circuits are configured to detect parity errors and/or assess the relative health of the first and second sets of data streams and one of the two sets of data streams is selected as the output of the fault-tolerant router based upon either the parity error analysis, health analysis or both.

Abstract: A system having N access channels, M individual disk storage arrays, a commutator for connecting each of the access channels to each of the storage arrays; and a control unit for causing the commutator to connect each of the access channels to each of the storage arrays. The disk storage arrays are capable of storing contiguous segments of a data block. In the case of movies, each segment includes, for example, a few seconds of each relevant movie. The commutator connects the access channels to the disk storage arrays in a manner whereby each of the access channels has access to all of the data. The system is such that each access channel can receive data at the maximum system bandwidth. In addition, data can be written into the storage arrays by one access channel, while another of the access channels is receiving data, both at the maximum system bandwidth.