DVB Scene eNews Issue 9

Issue 09, 23 February 2012

Ostankinskaya TV Tower in Moscow

Russia Readies for DVB-T2

At the recent CSTB broadcast industry exhibition and forum in Moscow, Deputy Director General of the Russian Television and Radiobroadcasting Network (RTRN), Viktor Pinchuk, announced that RTRN would begin a DVB-T2 network rollout in the second quarter of this year. It is believed that the five major Russian cities that will initially be covered by the transmissions are St. Petersburg, Volgograd, Krasnodar, Kazan and Moscow.

Russia originally opted for DVB-T in 2003 and the digital transition was already underway in some regions. It began investigating the use of DVB-T2 in early 2011 and reports of trials continued through the year. It is now understood that there are ambitious plans for the widespread introduction of DVB-T2, including in all 12 regions of the first phase of the national plan and in 27 regions of the second phase that will migrate from DVB-T to DVB-T2 by early 2013.

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Indonesia Leap DVB-T2

Tifatul Sembiring, Indonesia's Minister for Communication and Information, has confirmed the report in the last issue of DVB SCENE eNews that the country has officially adopted DVB-T2 as the standard for digital terrestrial television broadcasting. The decision was based on studies and consultation with the broadcasting industry. The country had originally chosen DVB-T, however, it decided to leapfrog to DVB-T2 citing the benefits and improvements provided by the second generation standard.

Progress Report: South Africa

Dina Pule, Minister of Communications, South Africa recently announced that the government has finalized amendments to the 2008 Broadcasting Digital Migration Policy which will be published this month. The Digital Terrestrial Transmission (DTT) policy will fast-track the finalisation of the DTT Regulations by the Independent Communications Authority of South Africa (ICASA).

The Minister also announced that they have finalised the 'Set-Top-Box Manufacturing Sector Development Strategy' and the 'Scheme for Ownership Support Rollout Framework' and these are scheduled to be presented to Cabinet this month.

ICASA has published the DTT Regulations for public comment. Once this process is completed broadcasters will be able to apply for new digital channels. It is expected that the Regulations will be finalised by the end of March 2012.

It was also announced that Sentech, which is responsible for providing broadcasting signal distribution services, is making significant progress in the rollout of the DVB-T2 transmitters. It is anticipated that by March 2012 the digital signal will cover more than 60% of the population. A DTT education and awareness campaign is planned to be done in a phased manner to cover all provinces.

The Minister stated that they aim to achieve about 23,500 direct and indirect jobs through the manufacturing value chain, e.g., set-top boxes and receivers.

For further information click here.

Au Revoir Ed Wilson

Ed Wilson

Ed Wilson announced his retirement from the role of Secretary to the DVB Commercial Module (CM) at its recent 62nd meeting in London. The meeting was Ed's 62nd meeting without a gap and taken together with other commercial modules meetings over his 18 year involvement with DVB, Ed thinks the overall total would exceed the magic one hundred. These included the Cable and Satellite Commercial Module, the Terrestrial Commercial Module, and the Interactive Services Commercial Module before his role at the CM itself.

Marking the occasion, Graham Mills, Chairman, DVB Commercial Module paid this tribute: "On behalf of all members of the DVB Commercial Module, we would like to say a big 'Thank You' to Ed for all that he has done as Secretary to the CM over the years. The depth and breadth of his experience in the broadcast industry has been of tremendous value to the work of the CM. We would not have been able to achieve as much as we have without his attentive and committed support".

Ed will continue to take an deep interest in the DVB Project's work, both personally and from the perspective of his activities in DigiTAG which will continue for a while yet.

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A Fellowship And Farewell To Daniel Sauvet-Goichon

L-R: Ulirich Reimers, Chairman DVB TM, Daniel Sauvet-Goichon and Phil Laven, DVB Chairman

The DVB Technical Module (TM) bid farewell to its Vice Chairman Daniel Sauvet-Goichon. Daniel was elected Vice Chairman in the very first meeting of the Working Group on Digital Television Broadcasting (WGDTB) back in June 1992. The WGDTB was the precursor of the DVB Technical Module. The group held 8 meetings prior to the first meeting of the TM.

Daniel was not only the TM Vice Chairman but the DVB Special Rapporteur on frequency planning. After nearly 20 years in the TM and after 98 meetings he has now decided to retire from DVB. At a champagne reception and with the help of some historical photos, the Technical Module thanked him for his great co-operation, excellent support, and friendship over so many years.

Daniel was also awarded The Honorary Fellowship of the DVB Project, which aims to honour, on their retirement from active participation in the Project, significant individuals who have made sustained and substantial contributions to DVB over the years. An Honorary Fellow is asked to continue to support the DVB Project and, where appropriate, can be consulted for advice at the Chairman's request. It represents the highest honour that can be bestowed upon a participant in the work of the Project.

Tatarstan To Begin DVB-T2 Tests

According to press reports in the region, the Russian republic of Tatarstan is set to begin DVB-T2 test broadcasting in the capital, Kazan this year. Sources quote Marat Muratov, head of the National Agency for Press and Mass Communications.

It is expected that digital terrestrial TV would cover the entire territory of Tatarstan by 2014. The republic will broadcast the nationwide Russian multiplex of eight national channels, with one regional opt-out.

DVB-C2 At Cable Congress

Visitors to Cable Congress being held in Brussels from March 7 - 9 can see further evidence of the market introduction of DVB-C2. DVB Members ARRIS and Sony host a demonstration in conjunction with the German cable operator Kabel Deutschland. The live demonstration will show how the ARRIS D5 Universal Edge QAM has enabled Kabel Deutschland to cost-effectively implement QAM sharing at one of the lowest power consumption rates per channel in the industry. A Sony TV with integrated DVB-C2 tuner, one of the first television sets supporting the standard, will be used in this prototype demonstration shown at the ARRIS booth.

DVB-C2 uses the latest modulation and coding techniques to enable highly efficient use of cable networks, especially in cases where the downstream transmission capacity is already being used to its limit. DVB-C2 will initially be used by operators like Kabel Deutschland for the delivery of new services, such as VOD and HDTV.

Further information on Cable Congress can be found here.

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New Work Items

Work Ahead Road Sign

2012 is turning out to be a busy year for DVB. The Steering Board has just approved a long list of new Work Items for which technical specifications will be provided. These Work Items include IPTV in hybrid IPv4/IPv6 scenarios as well as content delivery over hybrid IPTV/OTT networks. Satellite has also become a hot topic again in DVB. In addition to Carrier ID there is now a Work Item on 'timeslicing for wideband transponders', which will be used, for example, for broadband via satellite.

The Commercial Module has begun discussion on a new specification for satellite contribution and high speed data links. This new activity is not intended to be a replacement for DVB-S2 but will potentially cover all other satellite services besides Direct to Home. In addition to these new Work Items the technical groups are already working on such items as Phase 2 of 3DTV, and a new version of the CI Plus interface specification. All these activities clearly demonstrate that DVB's work goes on as there are always new activities on the horizon in the world of broadcast standards.

Steering Board Document Approval

At the 70th DVB Steering Board meeting held in Geneva on 16 February, the Technical Module presented three documents for approval. The following documents were approved by the Steering Board:

IPTV handbook v1.5 - Transport of MPEG-2 TS Based DVB Services over IP Based Networks - A86
GEM Profile for Plano-Stereoscopic 3DTV - A159
Implementation guidelines for a second generation digital terrestrial television broadcasting system (DVB-T2) - A133

These documents are available for download by clicking here.

DVB At ABU Digital Broadcasting Symposium

At the forthcoming ABU Digital Broadcasting Symposium being held in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia from March 6 - 9, DVB will take part in a number of key events. These include a booth featuring a DVB-T2 technology demonstration. On hand will be DVB representatives and technology experts from DVB Member companies to answer queries and provide information on implementation of DVB standards including DVB-T2, the world's fastest growing DTT standard.

DVB, an official Workshop Sponsor, will host a DVB Workshop on "DVB-T to DVB-T2, Fundamentals to Planning", which will be presented by John Bigeni, DVB's SE Asia Representative and Gerard Faria, CTO of TeamCast. The Workshop will discuss the basic fundamentals of the underlying key technology of COFDM modulation and how this produces, in a controlled environment, a near perfect transmission. It will cover the similarities and differences between DVB-T and DVB-T2 and the key technologies that make this 2nd generation standard the most efficient transmission standard in the digital world today. The characteristics of DVB-T2 and how a service can be planned to achieve required payload or coverage objectives will be addressed. This will also include SFN networks. A series of other workshops include "DVB-T2 and its Implementation" hosted by T-Vips and "DVB-T2 / Interoperability Analysis between 4G and Digital Broadcast Network" by ATDI.

DVB technologies will also feature prominently in the official conference programme. John Bigeni will participate in the Opening Session giving the presentation "DVB-T2, the Green Standard". Gerard Faria will present "Mobile Multimedia using T2" and Janne T. Morstøl of T-Vips will speak on the topic of "Satellite Feeding of DVB-T2 Transmitters Through Deterministic Multiplexing". Laurent Roul of Enensys will bring the conference up to date on the "World's Largest DVB-T2 Deployment with Cross-Border Regionalisation".

Further information can be found here.

DVB World 2012 - Pre-conference Masterclass UHDTV And 3DTV: Battle Of The Giants?

The Pre-Conference Masterclass held each year at DVB World is always well attended and a great success. This year's offering is UHDTV and 3DTV: Battle of the Giants, which is being conducted by David Wood (EBU) and David Daniels (BSkyB). The DVB Project has led the world's standardisation of 3DTV delivery systems, and is in the process of developing a family of systems that will meet different sets of requirements. If you need to know what has been, is, and will be in 3DTV delivery standards, this workshop is for you.

At the same time, or possibly even more rapidly, the world standards body, the ITU has been moving forward with the UHDTV (Ultra High Definition) standards family, sometimes called the 4K and 8K systems. This workshop will take you through what has been decided, and what remains to be decided. The Masterclass is being held on Monday March 12 from 9:30 - 12:00.

For information on how to register for DVB World and the optional Masterclass click here.