Patent ID: 8072874

Claim:
A method comprising: generating a plurality of channel signals at a plurality of local collection facilities through a plurality of receiving circuit modules; encoding the plurality of channel signals into a plurality of encoded signals at the plurality of receiving circuit modules; communicating the plurality of encoded signals to a remote facility having a first signal processing system through a network, said remote facility having multiplexers; storing first configuration data for monitoring and controlling the plurality of receiving circuit modules and the multiplexers in a first compression system controller associated with the remote facility; generating a first output signal from the first signal processing system; providing an engineering signal processing system having an engineering compression system controller; communicating the first configuration data from the first compression system controller to the engineering compression system controller; configuring the engineering signal processing system with the first configuration data; routing the plurality of encoded signals to the engineering signal processing system; generating a second output signal at the engineering signal processing system from the plurality encoded signals; and discontinuing generating the first output signal.