ComReg Announces DTT Licences

Ganymede

ComReg has just announced that it plans to issue four DTT licences - one to RTÉ and three to the BCI. It expects to grant the licence to RTÉ next year in order to allow services to commence in 2008.

Interesting times ahead! (at last....).

See here:
http://www.comreg.ie/publications/response_to_consultation_-_licensing_digital_terrestrial_television.583.102846.p.html
http://www.comreg.ie/publications/license_for_digital_terrestrial_television.583.102850.p.html
http://www.comreg.ie/publications/technical_conditions_for_digital_terrestrial_television.583.102849.p.html

who is this

Thanks for the post. Now I can't wait to see how they'll finance rolling out DTT outside of the Dublin Region

I mean, they must have some plan on how to finance it (maybe pre-auction the spectrum freed up by analogue removal?)

Though I'm happy as long as they keep up Dublin broadcasts

Foggy43

Haven't we known this for a long time now?
Were they not offered before but no takers?

Ulsterman 1690

Will the BCI be operating the multiplexes themselves (IBA style) or will they have to franchise it out to a third part(y/ies) -assuming they can find any

Sponge Bob

I fell asleeep reading this latest fudge and woke in a cold clammy sweat with a horrible thought .

Imagine a Mux with only Tv3 Tv3+1 Tv3+2 TV3 that Lorraine chick 24, TV3Trevor24 on sports TV3HD and TV3 Rolling TV AM 24 in their 6 channel package.

The Horror :eek: The sheer Horror :eek: . Please run the muxes yeerselves BCI . :eek: Jeez I need a pint or 4 now :eek:

L1011

Hrm, this is vaguely sensible assuming the BCI operate the muxes themselves and dole the capacity out sensibly

DMC

I note that the following parts as listed on the last page of 07/90a - License for Digital Terrestrial Television - doesn't make it online...

PART II - List of transmitter sites
PART III – Licensed System - Digital Terrestrial Television System
PART IV – Licence Area - National Licence
PART V – Rollout
PART VI – Licensee’s Address

Bah. The good bits.

watty

DMC wrote: »

I note that the following parts as listed on the last page of 07/90a - License for Digital Terrestrial Television - doesn't make it online...

PART II - List of transmitter sites
PART III – Licensed System - Digital Terrestrial Television System
PART IV – Licence Area - National Licence
PART V – Rollout
PART VI – Licensee’s Address

Bah. The good bits.

These bits are fantasy since 2001

who is this

Just a thought, about how much would upgrades for rollout to the rest of the transmitters cost? Obviously millions, but how many?

Also, I really hope that commercial channels won't be permitted on DTT. By commercial, I mean ones which require a subscription. While it may generate a bit of money, to take the UK for an example, the spectrum for those subscription channels is used throughout the Freeview area, but what is effectively a negligible proportion of people actually subscribe to them (certainly not enough to make it justifiable).

BowWow

Article in today's Sunday Business Post.

http://www.sbpost.ie/post/pages/p/story.aspx-qqqt=MEDIA+AND+MARKETING-qqqs=mediaandmarketing-qqqid=28112-qqqx=1.asp

who is this

BowWow wrote: »

Article in today's Sunday Business Post.

http://www.sbpost.ie/post/pages/p/story.aspx-qqqt=MEDIA+AND+MARKETING-qqqs=mediaandmarketing-qqqid=28112-qqqx=1.asp

Sounds good. But here's hoping they don't do the unspeakable and choose MPEG2 over MPEG4

Ghost Train

BowWow wrote: »

Article in today's Sunday Business Post.

http://www.sbpost.ie/post/pages/p/story.aspx-qqqt=MEDIA+AND+MARKETING-qqqs=mediaandmarketing-qqqid=28112-qqqx=1.asp

very good article

watty

The only thing of susbstance was RTENL getting Transmission network quotes.

(Which they have done before).

Where does the money come from? This looks like Government spin.

Sponge Bob

Rte get a mux for themselves and tg4 , they have sufficient space on that for ( I think) rte1 and 2 and tg4 and tg4hd and rte1 hd and rte2hd if they roll out mpeg4 not mpeg2 .

They can then turn off the sd channels and bring in a news channel and some other stuff in future , sometime.

Some fo you may remember that tv3 object to paying rte for carriage across 30% of the state or so and will have this great opportunity to participate in the building of a new national network themselves , along with the bci

L1011

Not a hope in hell do they have "sufficient" space for that - thats two multiplexes worth at a push. 15Mbits is low for a HD channel, x2 = 1 mux.

who is this

Sponge Bob wrote: »

... rte2 and 2 and ...

Maybe its just me being stupid, but what's "2"?

byte

who is this wrote: »

Maybe its just me being stupid, but what's "2"?

I think he meant RTE1 and 2.

icdg

Ulsterman 1690 wrote: »

Will the BCI be operating the multiplexes themselves (IBA style) or will they have to franchise it out to a third part(y/ies) -assuming they can find any

I imagine the BCI will create a new type of contract - a multiplex operators contract or the like - and begin its usual process of inviting expressions of interest, business plans etc as is the case with ILR contracts. Whether they will award the three multiplexes to one operator or to three different operators is up to them.

I cannot see them operating the multiplexes themselves - it would bring the BCI into the market as a commercial player (ie they would be running the system, including, presumably any conditional access system and presumably earning carriage fees and subscription fees from it) which is totally at odds with the BCI's position as a regulatory body.

Sponge Bob

you can bang the 3 out in a single mux at 720p mpeg4 avc with 8mbits each and downconvert to SD on the stb for those with no hd.

L1011

The picture quality at that rate would be abysmal, even with AVC. Do not get confused in thinking that compression rates anywhere close to storage levels can be acheived on live gear - 8Mbits h264 HD broadcast is a legofest.

The bitrates on Sky HD are 12 (poor) to 18 (decent) Mbits, with 16 being the average.

Zaphod

RTÉ to be given digital TV licence


ComReg plans to issue RTÉ with a licence by the middle of next year to operate a digital terrestrial television (DTT) multiplex. Ciarán Hancock , Business Affairs Correspondent, reports.

The regulator will also issue three licences to the Broadcasting Commission of Ireland (BCI), which will be charged with holding a competition for other potential DTT operators.

ComReg said the licences would have 12-year terms and carry an annual fee of €114,000. A 50 per cent discount on that fee will apply until July 2012.

The BCI said it would hold a "stakeholder consultation" on November 22nd at the Westin Hotel in Dublin to help it formulate its policy for the issuing of the licences. Its policy is likely to be published in December or January.

The licences being issued by the BCI should attract significant interest. Liberty Global, the parent company of UPC Ireland, which owns NTL and Chorus, confirmed that it would apply for a licence but was critical of the process.

"We think this represents a huge over-allocation of spectrum to carry out DTT," said Shane O'Neill, Liberty Global's chief strategy officer. Mr O'Neill also said the licence fees being proposed were "way too low", especially compared to other markets.

DTT will replace the current analogue signals. It can carry more content and allow viewers to access additional content and to interact with programming.

Irish Times, Nov 10

watty

They plan to cut TV spectrum from 400Mhz down to less than 200MHz after analogue switch off.
Cable has about 400MHz to 600MHz of spectrum depending how good the cable is. As they reduce cable segment size with fibre to end of street, the cable system can support almost 700MHz.

I wouldn't take much notice of what UPC say.

watty

Sponge Bob wrote: »

you can bang the 3 out in a single mux at 720p mpeg4 avc with 8mbits each and downconvert to SD on the stb for those with no hd.

No-one will use 720p
1080i is much better and IDENTICAL bandwidth. No-one in europe is using 720p
8Mbps is fairly poor quality for HD, but possible. HD for the SAME quality (720p or 1080i makes no difference), needs 5 times the bitrate of SD.
Using MPEG4 allows you to half the bitrate compared with MPEG2.

Minimum wants to be 12Mbps or else you can actually get better quality on SD, (even upscaled!) at 4Mbps MPEG4. Why do HD when 1/2 the data rate SD will give a better quality upscaled picture with no artifacts?

watty

MYOB wrote: »

The picture quality at that rate would be abysmal, even with AVC. Do not get confused in thinking that compression rates anywhere close to storage levels can be acheived on live gear - 8Mbits h264 HD broadcast is a legofest.

The bitrates on Sky HD are 12 (poor) to 18 (decent) Mbits, with 16 being the average.

Yes 15Mbps HD (720p or 1080i) is similar to 3MBps SD MPEG4, in quality (amount of artifacts). Which is why upscaled 4Mbps SD is better quality than even 10Mbps HD!

Ganymede

watty wrote: »

No-one will use 720p
1080i is much better and IDENTICAL bandwidth. No-one in europe is using 720p

The EBU (European Broadcasting Union) has recommended that 720P should be adopted by European Broadcasters for programme transmission. 720P is much better than 1080i for modern progressive displays, which is what we're all buying nowadays. 1080i has an equivalent resolution in 'Progressive' terms of about 750 lines, so it's slightly sharper than 720P. However, it suffers from interlace artifacts which degrades the quality of the picture.

In other words, 1080i is better for static images, whereas 720P is better for moving images, which is what television is all about. It's about time that Interlace was finally put to bed....

watty

Not as simple as that,

The problem is compounded by poor de-interlacers

You can have a LOT of movement on i before it is a problem and the eye can't resolve detail in fast moving scenes. Cinema is still 24fps. 1080i is 50i not 25i, so is identical to 25p.

The equivalent progressive quality to 1080i is I'm afraid 1080p.

SD is 576 lines. It's fine for the 480line americans/japanese to go to 720, but for 576 line europe it's just too small an upgrade.

The broadcasters are all standardised on 1080i.

I dunno where you dug up the EBU 720p from.

Anyway the point is that 720p vs 1080i is the SAME bandwidth and EVEN on a progressive only set, a properly de-interlaced 1080i is higher subjective quality. On an Interlaced display, better still.

So from point of view of HD bandwidth on Terrestrial MUX it makes no difference to the problem of how many channels you can have. You need typically 15Mbps for EITHER mode.

Ganymede

watty wrote: »

The equivalent progressive quality to 1080i is I'm afraid 1080p.

SD is 576 lines. It's fine for the 480line americans/japanese to go to 720, but for 576 line europe it's just too small an upgrade.

The broadcasters are all standardised on 1080i.

I dunno where you dug up the EBU 720p from.

Because of incomplete cancellation of the fields (interline jitter), the actual vertical resolution of a 1080i picture is equal to 1080 X 0.7, or about 750 lines in progressive terms.

The EBU carried out a lot of tests of the various formats and have concluded that 720P is the preferred format. They carried out a public demonstration at IBC in Amsterdam last year.

Details can be found on this page under 'HTDV in Europe'- see item 308 by Hans Hoffman:
http://www.ebu.ch/en/technical/trev/trev_home.html

Item 300 on the same page also gives some background info.

I have seen both 720P and 1080i side by side and with identical content. The 720P always had the edge regarding picture quality.

The EBU recommendation on 720P can be found here:
http://www.ebu.ch/CMSimages/en/tec_text_r112-2004_tcm6-16462.pdf

JZF

More news today ?


http://www.dvb.org/about_dvb/dvb_worldwide/ireland/

Puggy

Have to agree with Watty, given the choice between 720p or 1080i I'd always choose 1080i even for stuff like Formula 1.

Spent two hours yesterday looking at Band of Brothers on DVD

a) with Scart (on RGB) getting SD at 25Hz
b) HD DVD internet download on PC with a dvi connector to TV getting 720p
c) hdmi connection at 1080i (upscaled SD DVD)

Have to say anyone who looked at it thought option c) was easily the best looking. In America 720 looks great cause they had crap broadcast quality. Over here its going to have to be 1080i.

watty

Ganymede wrote: »

Because of incomplete cancellation of the fields (interline jitter), the actual vertical resolution of a 1080i picture is equal to 1080 X 0.7, or about 750 lines in progressive terms.

I have seen both 720P and 1080i side by side and with identical content. The 720P always had the edge regarding picture quality.

The EBU recommendation on 720P can be found here:
http://www.ebu.ch/CMSimages/en/tec_text_r112-2004_tcm6-16462.pdf

Only with certain deinterlacers

What source spec of content.


720p content will look better on 720p than 1080i
1080i or p content will look better on 1080i than 720p

Since the broadcasters have invested in 1080i kit and there is no saving in bandwidth and even 1366x768 sets are being replaced by 1920x1080 native sets I'm not sure who the EBU are trying to convince of what. 720p is poorer on a 1080p display or 768p display than a 720p display.

The two best modes on a 1080p display are 1080i and 1080p, 720p resamples badly. A 1080p display will display 576line content sharper and less artifacts than a 720p or 768p display.

the 0.7 figure is out of context.


Assuming true native pixels and not stupid 1366 x 768 displays.

scath

Hiya guys I just finished the dissertaton the appendixes are huge. I should be able to put it up for download somewhere but I don't have an eircom account..
Send me an message and I'll forward it to ye. Not sure whee ICDG wiki is or what and I'd be happy to forward ye a copy..I know ye guys will be totally honest. Its the critical that one learns from. sure there's always things one can do better. I've passed a copy onto all the stakeholder for their consideration.They all inputed into it so it is very interesting but doesn't reveal anything sensitive.

Let me know. I'm presenting it to the supervisors on the 29th. I also suggested that here would be a good place for the stakeholders to get feedback as they go along..
Cheers, and thanks to whoever got doing that survey
S..

watty

Maybe put it up on ICDG wiki.
See what BYTE thinks.

BowWow

Article in today's Sunday Business Post.

http://www.sbpost.ie/post/pages/p/story.aspx-qqqt=IRELAND-qqqm=news-qqqid=29038-qqqx=1.asp

Sponge Bob

....and the BCI meet tomorrow to finalise details on the tech standards and the also on commercial mux licencing regime to go to tender in ( March I think)

John Dough

BowWow wrote: »

Article in today's Sunday Business Post.

http://www.sbpost.ie/post/pages/p/story.aspx-qqqt=IRELAND-qqqm=news-qqqid=29038-qqqx=1.asp

Link is dead m8.