[opendtv] Re: Mortgage stuff
- From: Albert Manfredi <albert.e.manfredi@xxxxxxxxxx>
- To: <opendtv@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Sun, 16 Mar 2008 19:50:39 -0400
Craig Birkmaier wrote:
> One could argue that the U.S. missed a huge opportunity to
> develop a system that could offer both SDTV and HDTV
> options, rather than requiring consumers to pay for both.
Way back when, in the mid-1990s, I suggested that either decimating receivers,
or just plain SD-output-only receivers that take in the entire HD signal, could
be built as cheaply as SD receivers could be built, for ATSC or for any other
DTT standard. You were free to disagree back then, and did. But now this has
actually occurred. We have seen the announced price of one of these bare bones
SD-only receivers at $39, and others at $60. We have seen how built-in
receivers now create negligible additional price, like in sub-$100 CRT SDTVs.
> And as you mentioned, Dr. Schreiber and many people in
> the computer industry argued for a layered system in the
> U.S. so that people with smaller displays could buy cheap SD
> receivers, while those who wanted HD could use the
> augmentation layer. THIS DID NOT REQUIRE SIMULCASTING,
That's a whole other discussion. DVB-T did not go that route, so bringing it up
is pointless. My objection to Schreiber's idea was that he accepted the fact
that not everyone in the market would be able to receive HD - only those close
enough to the transmitter. Which means, he was contemplating use of HM, which
takes a huge bite out of spectral efficiency, and provides HD for only a select
few. To me, that's a non-starter. That scheme would allow perhaps one HD
channel per 6 MHz multiplex, no multicasts. Or if any multicasts, they too
would only be available to those with high SNR. Yes, transmitter power could be
lower. But that whole topic is irrelevant to this discussion.
> Australia, like the U.S. has a very high percentage of homes
> that subscribe to multichannel services.
No. Last I saw written, recently, is 75 percent of households use OTA
exclusively (analog and digital combined). We even discussed that when Dale
went there on vacation.
> You cannot have it both ways. IF Australia is saddled with
> SDTV for the future, we are equally saddled with the current
> ATSC standard because of the FCC receiver mandates.
We have HD and SD, without the simulcast penalty. And we both use MPEG-2
compression for HD, so that is not a discriminator here. And in practice,
MPEG-2 compresssion is quite good compared with the newer competition, so even
that isn't a big factor if you wanted to argue on the European approach to OTA
HDTV.
> But more important, there are no compelling arguments for
> the position that ALL TV programming must be in HDTV.
No one ever suggested that, although I did say on many occasions that the only
reason NOT TO transmit HD is so you can fit in more multicasts. And as
virtually all new TV sets are now HD, you can see where that trend will be.
> Hard drive have nothing to do with this; they just enable
> caching,
> The important aspect of using programmable
> microprocessors
Hard drives have everything to do with upgradeability of equipment. That's
where you install the upgraded software in typical Internet hosts. Flash memory
may do for this too. Where do you think the programs that run on the
microprocessors are stored? How do you think these programs are updated, or new
ones added? The microprocessor itself is not the issue here.
Some years ago, there was a category of diskless workstations that were quite
popular. They were cheaper than PCs, but obviously limited in upgradeability,
just as DTT receivers are today. And yet, they were Internet appliances. Go
figure.
> There is ONE BIG DIFFERENCE. Millions and millions of
> purpose built devices that cannot be upgraded, that must
> be replaced. Perhaps next time we will consider extensibility
> in the standard that replaces ATSC.
Please read RFC 791 and RFC 1122. These are the standard for IP and the
requirements for IPv4 hosts. Show me in these if there's anything in IP that
mandates any amount of "extensibility" in the implementation of hardware.
And conversely, the ATSC has come up with A/97, which is a very straightforward
extension to A/90. The purpose of A/97 is exactly to provide for a standard way
of transmitting incremental upgrades to DTT receivers. Or, of course, the
manufactuers can simply do this on the web, as Philips does with its DVDRs.
So, the ATSC or DVB-T standards are not the issue here. The issue is only the
type of CE appliance TVs are, as opposed to what is expected of a computer.
Bert
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