IP: Brazilian story getting cleaned up

[Dave Farber <farber@cis.upenn.edu>]

>From: Janos_Gereben <janos@netcom.com>
>Subject: Brazilian story getting cleaned up
>To: farber@cis.upenn.edu
>Date: Mon, 29 May 2000 22:18:49 -0700 (PDT)
>
>Brazil favors Japanese digital TV standard
>Janos Gereben - the451.com
>
>[Tests place Japan ahead of American and European competitors in a country
>where only 20 percent of the population owns a TV.]
>
>Anatel, Brazil's federal communications agency, has just received the
>result of tests that compared the three major globally competing
>digital-television standards. Japan's system received the top
>recommendation in this country of 150m people with 30m TV sets. The low
>ratio of saturation indicates the importance of future TV technology in
>Brazil if a "leapfrog model" becomes the tool to catch up with
>technologically more advanced countries. (The U.S. population of 273m and
>Japan's 127m have close to 100 percent TV ownership. The American
>switchover to digital TV has a deadline of 2006, with a projected 6bn
>income to the government in licenses.)
>
>The three tested standards were Japan's ISDB (Integrated Services Digital
>Broadcasting), ATSC (Advanced Television System Committee) from the U.S.,
>and DVB (Digital Video Broadcasting) from Europe. Renato Cruz, of Brazil's
>National Telecommunications Magazine, told the451.com that ISDB gave
>"better results" over COFDM (Coded Orthogonal Frequency Division
>Multiplexing) modulation, which is expected to serve as the basis of
>service there.
>
>Recommendations from the Set/Abert Group favoring the Japanese model will
>be subject to public consultations between the government, the industry and
>the general public before a final decision is made by September, after
>consultation with Argentina, which is coordinating its DTV plans with
>Brazil. Two other members of the regional group, Uruguay and Paraguay, are
>not choosing their digital TV standard yet. Brazilian regulators said final
>decisions depend on economic issues as well as on technical considerations.
>The Set/Abert Group, making the recommendation, consists of television
>engineers and members of the Brazilian Radio and Television Association.
>
>According to Cruz, there is opposition in Brazil to the ISDB standard
>because it's commercially still unproven. Also, in the SET/Abert tests, the
>European DVB results were very close to the Japanese system's performance.
>
>Although public discussion seldom differentiates between HDTV and DTV, they
>are distinct. High-definition TV works in the analog mode as well - the
>Japanese have been broadcasting in that format - but digital HDTV has many
>advantages and is to be used by the Japanese despite their headstart in the
>other format. DTV allows full exploitation of the capabilities of HDTV, but
>it can also be used to carry multiple channels of conventional video and
>assorted digital signals.
>
>The Japanese digital TV model was developed by NHK, the Japan Broadcasting
>Corporation, beginning in 1968, proposed as a worldwide standard in 1983,
>and then vetoed by the U.S. and Europe in 1986. A year later, work began in
>the U.S., leading to FCC adoption in 1996 of ATSC. The European platform,
>DVB, is from the same time period; it was adopted by Australia as well in
>1998.
>
>Regular broadcasting of HDTV programs began in Japan in 1989, based on
>NHK's hybrid analog-digital Hi-Vision format, which is just moving to full
>digital broadcasting this year. Programs have been processed digitally, and
>then broadcast in an analog mode, creating a situation in which sets were
>very expensive and technology fell behind others going to the full digital
>broadcasting system.
>
>One of the leading digital models, the Digital Terrestrial Television
>Broadcasting (DTTB) system uses advanced digital techniques to convert
>analog to digital signals, which are then compressed, along with other
>signals, before being broadcast from a transmitter. With digital
>transmission, sound and pictures are processed electronically and converted
>into binary digits. This code is then transmitted as a bit stream and the
>receiver converts the digital transmissions back to graphics, text, and
>sound.
>
>HDTV, enabled by digital TV, offers approximately twice the vertical and
>horizontal resolution of a PAL signal, providing a picture close to 35mm
>film and a sound quality approaching that of a compact disc. It is
>particularly suited to large-screen television display, with an aspect
>ratio of 16:9 (1.78 to 1) and at least 1,000 lines making up the picture.
>Currently, the U.S. National Television Standards Committee, or NTSC,
>standard has a 4:3 aspect ratio (1.33 to 1) and 525 lines.)
>
>DTTB systems can accommodate 6, 7 and 8 MHz channel spacing, with minimal
>or no apparent cost disadvantage. Australia uses 7 MHz channel spacing for
>analog services, the USA uses 6 MHz, and Europe usually uses 8 MHz.