Minister calls for rollout of new digital terrestrial services over the next 12 month

SPDUB

http://www.dcmnr.gov.ie/Press+Releases/Minister+Eamon+Ryan+launches+first+High-Definition+terrestrial+broadcast+of+an+Irish+sporting+event.htmI

“I would also encourage RTÉ, the BCI and ComReg to work together to roll-out Digital Terrestrial services over the next 12 months so that the citizens of Ireland can start to benefit from the digital age. The European Commission has proposed 2012 as the date by which switch-off of analogue TV should be completed across Europe. The reality is that Ireland will need a digital transmission system well in advance of this deadline. We want consumers to have a real choice in how they access Irish programmes and we want a new digital platform which can provide new channels and broadcasting services to every home in the country,” concluded Minister Ryan

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Which basically begs the question why the "trail" is ongoing for another 13 months if this is the Ministers attitude

ETA Sorry about creating this as a new topic due to an error on my part

watty

It's not really to do with BCI, Comreg and RTE. RTE would have done it in 1999 if the Govenment funded it. The issue is still funding, Not RTE willingness or Comreg/BCI licences.

lucernarian

He almost sounds as if he doesn't know what he's talking about. A bit laughable to ask RTÉ when no one's particularly sure if RTÉ will even have a networks section to operate.

They need to quickly sort out, for one way or another, what's going to happen to RTÉ Networks. I'd want a fully separate but state-owned company which would be funded to expand DTT to the relays. A commercial company could look after the main transmitters, if they were given a multiplex to do with as they will, to finance it.

Does anyone in this country even have an idea of how much it would cost to provide 4 multiplexes to every main transmitter, or to implement the plan shown at the bottom of this page??

Ulsterman 1690

Did RTE get government funding for
1) The introduction and rollout of the TV service
2) The 405/625 line duplication/switchover
3) The introduction and rollout of FM radio
4) The switch to colour TV
5) The setting up of RTE2
6) The rollout of TV and FM relay transposers in reception blackspots
7) The introduction of teletext
8) The introduction and rollout of NICAM
9) The Power increace on some border transmitters
10) Radio 2 and Lyric FM

Surely RTE were required to invest in the development of their services from existing funds

Why then should they get money from the government for the next stages in broadcasting developments mainly digital broadcasting and HDTV ?

Capt'n Midnight

Ulsterman 1690 wrote:

Why then should they get money from the government for the next stages in broadcasting developments mainly digital broadcasting and HDTV ?

Because the government would then sell off the unused frequencies to commercial users

L1011

for 1 and 2: Yes, as TE (RTE didn't exit yet!) had no money to speak of to begin with.

3-10: Some of them would have had some funding. Teletext was launched and is run on a commercial basis, and NICAM was to free up prime time space on the second transmitter network for FM3 (as it was used for stereo sound for RTE1 much of the time...). Lyric FM was basically just a 24 hour FM3 on a fourth tx network, which you could arguably say was funded by the rental from Radio Ireland and mobile firms on RTENL masts....

Ulsterman 1690

for 1 and 2: Yes, as TE (RTE didn't exit yet!) had no money to speak of to begin with.

Wasnt there a TV licence in Ireland for several (many ?) years before there was actually any TV (other than overspill from UK transmitters) Surely this is where the money for 1 and 2 came from ?

L1011

I'm not sure. I've got a few reference tomes on television in Ireland but I'm not in a particularly good mood to go digging through them right this instance - will check...

lucernarian

The UK broadcasters are getting govt. money for the remaining 1000 transmitters, aren't they?? And the govt. are financing it with the sale of some UHF spectrum IIRC.

Ulsterman 1690

What kind of uses are they expecting the spectrum to be put to post analouge switchoff ?

I have heard "mobile phones" mentioned a few times but surely any mobile phone allocations will have to pretty close to the existing 900/1800 MHz bands otherwise a whole new generation of handsets will be needed and manufacturers are unlikely to bother unless the allocations are pretty standard worldwide ?

SPDUB

Ulsterman 1690 wrote:

Did RTE get government funding for
1) The introduction and rollout of the TV service
2) The 405/625 line duplication/switchover
3) The introduction and rollout of FM radio
4) The switch to colour TV
5) The setting up of RTE2
6) The rollout of TV and FM relay transposers in reception blackspots
7) The introduction of teletext
8) The introduction and rollout of NICAM
9) The Power increace on some border transmitters
10) Radio 2 and Lyric FM

well even if RTE got no funding for any of these they only benefited one station and that was RTE

Now if RTE enabled only one mux on each transmitter then RTE could go ahead without Government money as per possibly all of the above since they would be only benrfitting themselves and possibly TV3

But if they are going to enable a full set of muxes on each transmitter if they fund it out of RTE money they should be able to rent out the muxes .

Of course even with everything being transparent to make sure there is no funny business the Government just doesn't want RTE to be connected in any way with the rollout

lucernarian

The uses of the spectrum will be a problem for whoever buys it. So long as the 112 MHz of spectrum fetches a high price, then OfCom will have done their part.

See here: http://www.ofcom.org.uk/media/news/2005/11/nr_20051117

watty

700 to 860 could be used world wide, existing GSM/3G use 4 bands, none are big enough for really good mobile broadband. USA is auctioning the spectrum.

Sponge Bob

1. Did he mention that he has a whopping €4m in the national development plan 2007 to 2013 for DTT rollout and that €2m of that has already been spent on trials in 2007 leaving a generous 50c per citizen in the kitty for 2008-2013. That should go far.

2. Is there any proposal to offset revenues accruing from the digital dividend ( reallocation of VHF bands 1 and 3 by auction post 2012) agains DTT rollout ....in advance would be a help ??? . Call this a soft kitty approach.

3. Has he any thoughts on the last BCI licencing round where TV3 were given a national licence and then refused to use the complete National TV Network as is. This cherrypicking must not be allowed with DTT . As well as a must carry there should be a "must be agreed to be carried and pay up" clause. Universal means Universal surely....unless one finds out that in Dublin english Universal means everyone in the Pale where the BCI mainly operates .

4. Has he commented on the need for extra transmitters to
provide adequate coverage in areas where band 3 is used, not a problem the Brits had in their rollout of DTT and of the number of aerials that need replacing ???

5. Is there any plan in place to allow the Brits to enjoy their digital dividend post 2012 without having Kippure Mt Leinster and Truskmore ( for starters) honking away across their dividended spectrum .

Good manners towards ones close neighbours should never be optional as a matter of national policy. It should be a given. Ministers are often relied upon to remind us of that .

6. Is there any plan in place to complete the analoge network rollout started in the late 1950s . We shall celebrate the start of TV rollout in 1959 in 2 years.??? We still cannot provide a terrestrial signal to all our citizens on analogue....is digital not a bit ambitious for us given our record ??

7. Has he ever heard of the Astra 2 satellite cluster and if so has he taken cognisance of its capabilities ????

Just a few thoughts :mad: .

and Does he know the country phrase heard on occasion within the pale and containing the words cart horse before ?????

Antenna

Sponge Bob wrote:

2. Is there any proposal to offset revenues accruing from the digital dividend ( reallocation of VHF bands 1 and 3 by auction post 2012)

Band 1 has already been completely discontinued for terrestrial TV in this country some years ago.
There were some suggestions Band 1 would be allocated to PMR (2 way radio used by businesses), but considering the massive decline in the useage of the spectrum above Band 1 (68-87MHz) by these users especially in the past decade (moved to mobile phones, ditching their use of 2 way radio) there is little point.

Sponge Bob

I know all about Band 1 since I used to watch Bilbao TV for years on it .....but its insignifcant compared to Band 3 anyway , 6 mhz as against 60mhz in band 3 and about 400mhz in the UHF band which will be much better utilised after DTT is rolled out .

As for VHF Band 3 , ISTR a proposal to use a bit of it for aviation given saturation of the aviation bands below it .

then theres always DAB / DAB+ / DAB-IP and DMB is there not ???? We ourselves cannot really have nationwide DAB until VHF Band 3 is freed up. We scrunch trials into the top end of it which is available.

http://www.ebu.ch/en/technical/trev/trev_311-dab_dmb.pdf

and

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_Audio_Broadcasting#Ireland

....and some of you may even remember when NATO showed up in Galway at one of the WRC preliminaries in February along with some of Eamonns civil servants I understand.

http://www.anacom.pt/streaming/NATO_Military_positions.pdf?categoryId=237722&contentId=466441&field=ATTACHED_FILE

http://www.ero.dk/C564DF97-BE17-4E4E-87A7-A6079CCDADA0.W5Doc?frames=no&

Maybe they should brief their minister in full before he opens his gob next time , eh

lucernarian

What are the possible uses of the Band I spectrum?? An extended FM band??

It's not that insignificant, doesn't it stretch from somewhere around 50 MHz to 87.5 MHz?

L1011

DTT is theorethically possible in Band I, but... its not much use as I've never seen a Band I capable DTT tuner! I think they're not even using it for ASTC stateside.

Sponge Bob

aviation IIRC , digital aviation band or something .

Sponge Bob

Should we not go UHF analogue first . We cannot replace VHF band 3 with DTT on UHF and we cannot have DAB nationally while VHF 3 is being used for telly .

SPDUB

Sponge Bob wrote:

1. Did he mention that he has a whopping €4m in the national development plan 2007 to 2013 for DTT rollout and that €2m of that has already been spent on trials in 2007 leaving a generous 50c per citizen in the kitty for 2008-2013. That should go far.

Politically that means nothing .At the time required the minister just goes to the Dail and files a supplemental budget .

In Government budgets you don't put in a sum of money that technically since there is trial ongoing may not be used .

Should we not go UHF analogue first . We cannot replace VHF band 3 with DTT on UHF

Why not.Surely the prospect of a number of extra channels would be a greater incentive for people to upgrade their aerials etc than just a better RTE,TV3 picture