ASTC 8VSB not a bad choice for Canada, as 95% of the househoulds get TV via cable -- where 256 QAM is the standard...

ASTC 8VSB not a bad choice for Canada, as 95% of the households get TV via
cable -- where 256 QAM is the standard ... and in the end this does not rule
out also using DVB-T at System-M bandwidths.

"Max Power" wrote in message
...
ASTC 8VSB not a bad choice for Canada, as 95% of the households get TV via
cable

Actually I think that's 95% use either cable or satellite (the area I live
in typical of Canadian rural areas, where distances are too long for cable).

On Sun, 4 Mar 2007, Dave Gower wrote:
"Max Power" wrote in message
...
ASTC 8VSB not a bad choice for Canada, as 95% of the households get TV via
cable
Actually I think that's 95% use either cable or satellite (the area I live
in typical of Canadian rural areas, where distances are too long for cable).

My experience in villages in Alaska and Canada's far north is that there
is usually a local low-power OTA rebroadcaster in town which people
augment with satellite. Only the larger settlements have cable.

DVB-T, being optimized for urban environments, would be insane in such
places. ATSC makes much more sense. However, I don't think that there is
any pressing need to get rid of analog in the far north other than the
supply of new TVs with NTSC tuners eventually drying up.

-- Mark --

http://panda.com/mrc
Democracy is two wolves and a sheep deciding what to eat for lunch.
Liberty is a well-armed sheep contesting the vote.

Mark Crispin wrote:
On Sun, 4 Mar 2007, Dave Gower wrote:
"Max Power" wrote in message
...
ASTC 8VSB not a bad choice for Canada, as 95% of the households get
TV via
cable
Actually I think that's 95% use either cable or satellite (the area I
live
in typical of Canadian rural areas, where distances are too long for
cable).

My experience in villages in Alaska and Canada's far north is that there
is usually a local low-power OTA rebroadcaster in town which people
augment with satellite. Only the larger settlements have cable.

DVB-T, being optimized for urban environments, would be insane in such
places. ATSC makes much more sense. However, I don't think that there
is any pressing need to get rid of analog in the far north other than
the supply of new TVs with NTSC tuners eventually drying up.

-- Mark --

DVB-T is not optimized for urban environments it is optimized for
reception in all RF environments.

8-VSB is not optimized for anything.

Bob Miller

On Sun, 4 Mar 2007, Bob Miller wrote:
DVB-T is not optimized for urban environments it is optimized for reception
in all RF environments.

DVB-T requires more power than 8-VSB to cover the same service area.

However, since Psycho Bob Miller only cares about reception in New York
City, the needs of remote rural/wilderness areas are of no concern to him.

8-VSB is not optimized for anything.

It is optimized to infuriate Psycho Bob Miller, the resident crackpot of
alt.tv.tech.hdtv.

-- Mark --

http://panda.com/mrc
Democracy is two wolves and a sheep deciding what to eat for lunch.
Liberty is a well-armed sheep contesting the vote.

On Sun, 4 Mar 2007 03:08:25 -0800, "Max Power"
wrote:

ASTC 8VSB not a bad choice for Canada, as 95% of the households get TV via
cable -- where 256 QAM is the standard ... and in the end this does not rule
out also using DVB-T at System-M bandwidths.

While a large percentage of the population of Canada live close to the
US border and thus might be able to receive broadcasts from the US
side of the border and thus the viewers could use the same STB for
local and foreign broadcast, what other benefits would there be for
using 8VSB ?

Paul

"Paul Keinanen" wrote:

While a large percentage of the population of Canada live close to the
US border and thus might be able to receive broadcasts from the US
side of the border and thus the viewers could use the same STB for
local and foreign broadcast, what other benefits would there be for
using 8VSB ?

That's a pretty big benefit.

Also, 8-VSB is good for long range at high spectral efficiency, as
others have mentioned. But honestly, it is the law of the land,
therefore it has to be used. There isn't a whole lot left to discuss, if
you live in North America.

Besides, while it took a few years to sort things out, many of the
multipath problems early 8-VSB receivers suffered from have been largely
conquered. So it's not like the old debate matters much anymore, except
to those who enjoy flogging dead horses.

Bert

On Tue, 6 Mar 2007, Paul Keinanen wrote:
While a large percentage of the population of Canada live close to the
US border and thus might be able to receive broadcasts from the US
side of the border and thus the viewers could use the same STB for
local and foreign broadcast, what other benefits would there be for
using 8VSB ?

OTA TV reception in rural areas, of which Canada (like the US, but unlike
Europe or Japan) has in abundance. The proferred solution of SFNs is not
viable due to the vast land area that has to be covered.

A single transmitting tower may need to cover an area with a 150km radius.

8-VSB requires much less energy to cover the same area as NTSC (as little
as 10%) and about half that needed by COFDM.

-- Mark --

http://staff.washington.edu/mrc
Science does not emerge from voting, party politics, or public debate.
Si vis pacem, para bellum.

Mark Crispin wrote:
On Tue, 6 Mar 2007, Paul Keinanen wrote:
While a large percentage of the population of Canada live close to the
US border and thus might be able to receive broadcasts from the US
side of the border and thus the viewers could use the same STB for
local and foreign broadcast, what other benefits would there be for
using 8VSB ?

OTA TV reception in rural areas, of which Canada (like the US, but
unlike Europe or Japan) has in abundance. The proferred solution of
SFNs is not viable due to the vast land area that has to be covered.

A single transmitting tower may need to cover an area with a 150km radius.

8-VSB requires much less energy to cover the same area as NTSC (as
little as 10%) and about half that needed by COFDM.

-- Mark --


8-VSB has no advantage as to coverage as has been noted by such
countries as Australia where there is a lot of country to cover.

They noted after doing the most extensive testing of DVB-T COFDM and
8-VSB that the coverage in the far field was the same for both while
DVB-T was far better than 8-VSB at the same power level everywhere in
the coverage area as too both dynamic and static multipath.

That is the coverage area was the same at the same power level but one
worked thru-out that coverage area and the other did not. Australia
abandoned 8-VSB soon after they tested. Taiwan followed later.
Argentina, like Taiwan dropped 8-VSB even after both had officially
chosen it. Argentina still has to chose a modulation. Most expect they
will follow Brazil to COFDM based ISDB-T.

8-VSB receivers have improved as to static multipath but very little for
dynamic multipath. And even with static multipath the latest 8-VSB
receivers are nowhere near the quality of first generation 1999 DVB-T
COFDM receivers.

SFN's and on channel repeaters are very important tools to have
especially where you have "vast land areas" like Australia, Russia and
China. They all chose OFDM based DTV modulations, TDS-OFDM and COFDM.

8-VSB has failed in the US where there is no more than 1.7% of
households use it after 9 years.

Other countries have 30 to 65% of households with OTA DTV receivers with
4 or less years of transitioning.

The US is NOT having a transition it is going to go over the digital
cliff in early 2009. The US is going to flash-cut to digital and will
find that VERY few are using OTA after.

They are going to tell everyone at the last minute.
They are going to have converters at the last minute.
They are going to fail at the last minute.

In terms of transition timing we are already at the last minute.

Bob Miller

On Mon, 5 Mar 2007 23:40:27 GMT, "Albert Manfredi"
wrote:

"Paul Keinanen" wrote:

While a large percentage of the population of Canada live close to the
US border and thus might be able to receive broadcasts from the US
side of the border and thus the viewers could use the same STB for
local and foreign broadcast, what other benefits would there be for
using 8VSB ?

That's a pretty big benefit.

Also, 8-VSB is good for long range at high spectral efficiency, as
others have mentioned. But honestly, it is the law of the land,
therefore it has to be used. There isn't a whole lot left to discuss, if
you live in North America.

I don't want to enter the discussion when Canada was transferred from
a British colony to a US colony :-).

Besides, while it took a few years to sort things out, many of the
multipath problems early 8-VSB receivers suffered from have been largely
conquered. So it's not like the old debate matters much anymore, except
to those who enjoy flogging dead horses.

The spectral efficiency in both ATSC and DVB-T is about 3 bits/s/Hz.

The reception distances claimed by many analog System-M/NTSC viewers
seems to be quite large compared to what is achievable by
System-B/D/G/H/I (PAL) viewers in Europe, even if we consider the
bandwidth difference 6/7/8 MHz.

No doubt, in the US plains the reception distances might be more
common, but in Europe, such plains are rare, perhaps Ukraine would
contain such plains.

Before doing comparisons between digital systems, the analog side
should first be normalised.

Paul