[opendtv] Re: Technology years
- From: "Bob Miller" <robmxa@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: opendtv@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Fri, 19 Jan 2007 11:23:02 -0500
We were in Europe working with Nokia and Pace and others in 1999. They
all were very interested in building receivers for the US and did make
prototypes for us and others. Most were shy about saying anything
publicly though since they were members of the CEA and there was
intense pressure from the CEA to keep quiet. The DVB group could not
actively promote DVB-T since many of their members were in the CEA and
would not allow it.
The interest in the US market using DVB-T was intense. We were in
meetings in Europe where as many as fifty people paid rapt attention
to the possibility and asked the simple question, "why is the US
proceeding with 8-VSB and how soon will the abandon it?".
We assured them that it was only a matter of education in Congress.
Later we assured them that the hearings and test of 2000 would clear
the air. We assumed a fair test. Only two companies from Europe dared
to show their interest, Nokia and Pace. Pace with a witness at the
hearings and Nokia with a letter.
It is not only the full power broadcasters who might have been
interested in COFDM. LPTV stations do not have must carry and rely on
OTA. You will not find them promoting satellite subscriptions while a
cable company offers free rabbit ear antennas.
We planned on using LPTV stations with COFDM. The FCC told us that was
no problem and that rules to that affect would be ready by Christmas
1999. The Sinclair controversy closed that door very tight. We had
numerous LPTV stations that with the help of companies like R&S,
Nokia, Pace and others would have been on the air within months of any
FCC OK.
The reality of COFDM in the marketplace in the US with access to all
the receivers that we would have been showered with would have
radically changed the landscape.
The 8-VSB proponents knew this in spades and did everything they could
to make sure that COFDM never saw the light of day here. They made the
2000 test a fraud. They stopped our test in Toronto at Ryerson
Polytech where we had a Tanberg transmitter on the CN tower that could
be switched from COFDM to 8-VSB with the push of a button.
The FCC would not let the New York City owned PBS keep their digital
channel on the air to show DVB-T COFDM to the New York Fire Department
and Police Department members of which were actually waiting in our
office a few blocks North of Ground Zero in November of 2001. We had
just demonstrated it to the DoD. We had asked the FCC for an STA to do
this which was categorically denied. The DoD got the needed
permission.
LPTV stations are wringing their hands in fear of the future with
8-VSB. They would be enjoying success like that being experienced in
the UK or even more and full power broadcasters would have ore be
demanded the use of COFDM also by now if LPTV stations had been
allowed to use COFDM in 2001.
DVB-T COFDM if allowed in the US in 2001 would have changed the
landscape of OTA both here and in the rest of the world. HDTV would be
more prevalent here and elsewhere. I doubt if Japan would have gone
with ISDB-T.
The US would have more OTA digital receivers today than households.
Bob Miller
On 1/19/07, John Shutt <shuttj@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Bert,
That is the whole point, isn't it? DVB-T works with cheap tuners. DVB-T
works with cheap chipsets. You can't cripple the receiver using off the
shelf parts.
Pace, Nokia, and others were ready and willing to bring a 6MHz box to market
in the US as soon as the Sinclair petition to allow COFDM modulation was
approved by the FCC. They testified to that during the comment phase of the
Sinclair petition. I seem to recall that if the petition were approved by
July, Pace said they would have product on store shelves by Christmas.
The number of manufacturers in the DVB-T market would have given the US
market a much broader selection of STBs. The fact that DVB-T chipsets, that
worked and worked very well, were available by many manufacturers, products
for Europe appeared much sooner than here in the US, and if we had switched
8 years ago, we would have had them as well.
How do I assume this? Europe had the first DVB-T receivers integrated into
a USB thumbdrive sized package. It wasn't until three years later the first
ATSC ones appeared in our market. Europe had the first integrated portable
DVD player/DVB-T/PAL with 8" LCD screen. There still is no ATSC equivalent.
And finally, just look at the variety of receivers, STBs, and DVRs with
integrated tuners that are available for the Australian market, with around
12 million TVHHs. The variety is staggering!
You are a systems guy, Bert, and all you care about is maximizing bits per
Hz as an intellectual exercise. I am a broadcaster and I care about the
number of bits received.
John
----- Original Message -----
From: "Albert Manfredi" <bert22306@xxxxxxxxxxx>
> After 2003, it became obvious that whoever (plural) has been keeping
> 4th/5th gen stuff in short supply for so many years could just as easily
> have done that with COFDM. Or crippled US COFDM boxes with cheap tuners or
> other tricks.
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