Russian telecomms operator Comstar-UTS has fully launched Stream-branded HDTV services in Moscow in the upgraded sections of the MGTS network.
It has also introduced a package offering broadband internet access at speeds of up to 20Mbps.
The Comstar-UTS HDTV package offers three channels – MelodyZen, Voom TV and Luxe TV – and costs R200 (USD $8) a month to receive.
On top of this, it is also offering a new HD VOD service, with movies costing R100 (USD $4) each.
The UK’s free-to-air satellite service Freesat has racked up 100,000 sales since its launch in May.
Freesat said high definition coverage of major sporting events over the summer played a key role in encouraging people to buy HD set-top boxes.
Co-owned by the BBC and ITV, Freesat offers a satellite alternative to the Freeview service on digital terrestrial television.
It is taking on competitor Sky by offering free TV channels, including some HD ones, once customers pay for a Freesat receiver.
There are now around 120 TV and radio channels and Freesat said that its early success was greatly boosted by BBC HD and ITV HD offering free HD coverage of Euro 2008, FA football, Wimbledon and the Olympic Games.
The service expects to have 200 channels available by the end of 2008 – including subscription-free high definition channels from the BBC and ITV- and 230 by early 2009, with around 30 channels added each month.
Freesat is promising a packed HD Christmas schedule and November will see the launch of Freesat+, the first digital television recorder (DTR), from Humax.
Earlier this month, ITV director of group development and strategy Carolyn Fairbairn replaced Tim Davie as chairman of the Freesat.
SIM2 has teamed up with the US’s Entertainment Experience, LLC to offer just-released movie blockbusters as part of a home-cinema package.
hdtv.biz-news.com spoke to the high-performance HD projector specialists to find out why they’ve launched what appears to be yet another HD format when the public is still wavering about Blu-ray.
SIM2 has announced it is starting a “better-than-blu” home-theater package.
The Italian firm has teamed up with Entertainment Experience, LLC to provide a hardware-software combination offering just-released movie blockbusters.
Customers will get sent movies that are stored on a hard drive in a DCI format accepted by Hollywood studios.
The HDD slots into a bespoke media server – a Digital Entertainment Center – and the movie can then be watched on SIM2’s top-selling C3X 1080 projector.
It might seem a strange decision to launch what appears to be yet another HD format when the public is still wavering about Blu-ray.
Especially when a huge contention with it is the high price of Blu-ray discs and players.
But Alan Roser, managing director of SIM2 UK, said the intention was neither to challenge blu-ray nor appeal to the mass-market.
“It’s not mainstream and it’s not intended as a replacement for Blu-ray,” he said.
So who will buy the home-theater package?
Roser said the high-end home theater delivery system was being aimed at its 3-chip DLC projectors rather than less expensive single-chip products.
He said home theaters of this type were often set up in a dedicated home cinema with a curved and acoustically transparent screen.
“We do not believe there is any value in this for budget projectors. This is really a high-end service – it take things up to the next stage.”
With SIM2’s C3X 1080 projector costing around USD $33,000 and US sales in the “low thousands”, it’s definitely a niche market.
But as the world’s smallest three-chip DLP projector, the C3X 1080HD projector is capable of imaging at up to 1920x1080p at 45 mbp/s.
To complete the package, customers need to buy a USD $10,000 media server and then pay USD $40 for each movie.
Major blockbusters will be available within a “short time” of their release – and before they are out on Blu-ray.
Digital Entertainment, LLC has said that the solution’s movie content ultimately will encompass more than 4000 major titles from multiple studio and distribution partners.
Commercial Digital-cinema Technologies In The Home
Roser said while Blu-ray was “absolutely stunning” for 95 per cent of consumers, those with the means to watch HD on giant wide screens had to have the very best – even if that meant a significant investment.
“The important thing is to get this wonderful technology within a wonderful platform,” he said.
Roser said the movies will be encoded in a DCI-like format that gives them a higher bitrate and better depth of colour than Blu-ray Disc.
The package will be available “soon” in the US and it will be rolled out to other markets once complications with international licence agreement schedules are resolved.
“It’s all a question of time. It’s all about the licensing and getting studios comfortable with content because they are concerned about piracy,” said Roser. “It’s also about keeping theater owners happy.”
As few people can afford to install this “better-than-blu” home-theater package, that shouldn’t be too difficult.
Wireless High Definition Special: In the second of our articles looking at the competing next generation wireless high definition TV systems hdtv.biz-news.com spoke to John LeMoncheck, president and CEO of SiBEAM, and a leading member of the WirelessHD (WiHD) consortium.
Before assuming his current role as president and CEO of SiBEAM in 2006, John LeMoncheck, was vice president of Silicon Image’s consumer electronics and PC/display business.
In that position, he led the company’s efforts to promote the worldwide adoption of HDMI.
Since joining SiBEAM, a high-speed wireless applications business, LeMoncheck has been at the forefront of its endeavors to develop WiHD technology it expects to transform the wireless landscape.
He said he had adopted a similar strategy with WiHD as he had done when he pulled together the HDMI standard, which now has almost a billion installed links worldwide.
“I called up my HDMI buddies and said let’s do this, but wirelessly,” he said.
WiHD replaces HDMI wires with radio links and is designed to handle HDTV video streams between AV equipment.
LeMoncheck said the need for wireless connections was becoming essential as more HDTV manufacturers produced super-thin panels for hanging on walls.
He said WiHD had enough bandwidth – more than 4 Gbits/s – to ensure “perfect, lossless uncompressed video”.
Picture Delays Avoided
This meant there were no memory, compression or latency issues – essentially delays which can cause sluggishness in gaming or even when changing of channel.
Coupled with this, the technology had a low rate back channel which enabled activities such as pictures to be moved around while still satisfying the “big pipe” to the display.
LeMoncheck said SiBeam had taken the decision to change the fundamental frequency it worked with to 60 GHz.
He said they had done this rather than adopting the “apple polishing tricks” of rival wireless technologies, which he said suffered from an “obvious loss of quality”.
However, he said one factor that had limited the 60 GHz technology’s mass appeal was that it depended on a clear line of site between devices.
Beam-steer Fixes Broken Signal
This had been overcome by developing a technique to beam-steer the signal by bouncing it off walls.
He said the technology was now omni-directional – allowing it to detect all available devices – and then direct data to the receiver as a tight beam of energy with only micro-second delays if the beam was interfered with.
“If you walk in with a new device, it will get added to the network of devices,” he said. “To the user it feels like an omni-directional radio – you don’t have to position it to make sure it works.”
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As well as SiBEAM, members of the WirelessHD consortium include industry leaders such as Intel, LG, Matsushita, NEC, Samsung, Sony and Toshiba.
But it was also important to have the confidence of Hollywood and last month WiHD announced that a content protection scheme for the transmission of wireless high definition content had been released by the Digital Transmission Licensing Administrator and approved by major film studios.
High Cost Factor
Another problem encountered in the WiHD technology was the high cost of transceiver circuits.
This has been tackled by using a radio frequency (RF) integrated circuit (IC) manufactured with complementary metal-oxide semiconductor (CMOS) technology.
GaAs technology is commonly used in millimeter-wave transceiver circuits, making it hard to lower costs.
The use of general-purpose CMOS technology is expected to lower costs to about the level of the costs of wireless LAN.
SiBEAM is the key driver in chipping the CMOS RF transceiver and in January this year it announced the world’s first WiHD chipset.
LeMoncheck said this was very small and simple to integrate.
He said if it was possible for manufacturers to add the chip solution to, for instance HDTVs, for the same cost as a 10m cable then it was a “no-brainer”.
“It’s a strategic gain for them as they are gaining from the cable dollars that they would not have got before,” he said.
Potential Uses Are Vast
LeMoncheck said future uses, once a single chip solution was perfected, would allow it to be put, for instance, on the back of a camcorder.
He said the PC world was also very interested in wireless docking giving access to displays, printers and so on.
“There are a lot of different devices that this can go into,” he said. “That’s our other key advantage – we are capable of working with data.”
He said an iPod could synchronise effortlessly between devices, transferring a whole DVD file in five seconds.
“That’s why we are working with the IEEE and looking at personal area networking,” he said.
The WiHD consortium has entered into contracts with about 40 firms for the use of its technology and the first equipment compliant with WiHD is likely to appear in early 2009.
Casio has unveiled a two-inch LCD that brings the arrival of HD video on mobile devices a large step closer.
With a resolution of 960×540 the company is rightfully excited that its latest offering gives its sharpest display yet.
By contrast, LCD screens on PMPs usually come with a screen resolution of 800×480.
The size and resolution of the new screens makes them ideal for use on future cell phones, digital cameras, and portable media players.
The display uses a new Hyper Amorphous Silicon TFT LCD with an extremely small pixel structure and 15.5 micron dot pitch.
The output is a full quarter that of 1080p HD and results in an extremely dense 546 pixels per inch, giving the final image its excellent quality.
Casio said that despite the advances in resolution images still carry a complete 16.7 million colors and have a 160-degree viewing arc from any direction.
No information has been released on when the new two-inch LCD will start shipping.
AT&T is to continue growing its high-definition channel line-up in the US with the help of increasingly efficient MPEG-4 compression.
The telco’s U-verse TV service currently delivers MPEG-4 video in the range of 6 to 8 Megabits per second.
The use of improved video compression will allow that to be reduced to 5 Mbps, with the expectation that further improvements are likely.
Earlier this month, AT&T launched Total Home DVR, initially in San Francisco, which lets U-verse TV deliver five simultaneous HD streams: two live and three from the DVR.
John Donovan, AT&T’s CTO, said efficiency gains would allow it to support more simultaneous IPTV streams, upping the live HD streams to three and the recorded HD streams to four in 2009.
MPEG-4 equipment is allowing IPTV service providers some help against their cable TV competitors, who mostly use MPEG-2 compression.
Speaking at an investment conference, Donovan noted that video now exceeds 40 per cent of AT&T’s total IP backbone traffic whereas three years ago it was negligible.
“If you download one HD video movie, it’s the equivalent of 35,000 rich-content web pages, or 2,000 songs,” he said. “So it’s very, very dramatic.”
The growth in broadband data is driving the telco’s content-distribution network services, which replicate Internet content.
AT&T will invest $70 million this year tripling CDN storage and server capacity, according to Donovan.
It has been described by Vincent Laforet, one of the world’s top professional photographers, as having the “potential to change our industry”.
Nikon was the first to announce a DSLR capable of recording high def video in the form of the D90, which can capture full-motion video at up to 720p resolution and at 24 frames-per-second (fps).
Now Canon’s latest offering has gone even further.
The soon-to-be-launched Canon EOS 5D Mark II DSLR can record full 1080p video clips at 30 (fps).
According to Laforet the camera, which is expected to retail for USD $2,799.99, performs better than many USD $100,000-plus video cameras.
The EOS 5D Mark II, which can also record standard definition video, has a 3” Live View LCD.
Up to 4GB of video can be recorded per clip or up to 30 minutes of footage, despending on what comes first.
Video is recorded in the .mov format using an MPEG-4 video compression, and linear PCM sound without compression.
An external stereo mic can be connected, or you can simply use the built-in monaural mic.
Video can be played using HDMI on a wide-screen TV.
New York-based Laforet, who Canon allowed 72-hours to try out a prototype of the camera, said of his experience: “The time I did have with a prototype of the Canon EOS 5D MKII will possibly change the path of my career as well as the photography industry to some degree.”
He said the “game changer” .jpg)
of a camera produces the best stills in low light that he has ever seen.
“What you can see with you eye in the worst light – such as sodium-vapor street lights at 3 am in Brooklyn – this camera can capture it with ease,” he said. “It produces the best video in low light that I’ve ever seen – at 1080p.”
Laforet was allowed to try out the camera on condition he produced a video and stills completely independently from Canon USA.
Despite having never shot a film before he made a video with less than 12 hours of pre-production with a USD $5,000 budget – which included USD $2,000 for a one hour helicopter flight over the city.
The short film was shot over two nights with two models, three assistants, a co-director, one editor, and one makeup artist.
Laforet said a top commercial film editor who regularly edits RED camera footage, and who saw the raw footage from the 5D MKII, said it was “far superior to the RED camera” in terms of low light performance.
The EOS 5D Mark II digital SLR will be available at the end of November in a body-only configuration for an ESP of USD $2,799.99; or in a kit with Canon’s EF 24-105mm f/4L IS USM zoom lens for USD $3,649.99.
Please let us know what you make of the footage. Is the EOS 5D Mark II a game changer?
Catalan public broadcaster TV3 has halted its HDTV transmissions via digital terrestrial.
The broadcasts were the first of their type in Spain.
The decision to end the HD broadcasts was taken to allow Valenciano channel Canal9 to have access to bandwidth as part of an agreement between both the governments of Catalunya and Valencia.
TV3 HD was regarded as the prime HDTV over DTT project in Spain since its launch in April 2007.
Another public broadcaster, Aragón TV, is continuing its HD transmissions.
After a 20-year gap, General Electric is returning to television-set making in partnership with a Taiwanese company to launch GE-branded high definition TV sets.
The joint venture between GE and Tatung Co – to be called General Displays & Technologies (GDT) – intends to produce two million HDTV sets annually, or 1 per cent of the 200 million units sold world-wide, when it begins production in 2009.
The companies expect to capture approximately 5-10 per cent of the estimated USD $200 billion global TV-set market.
GE made cathode-ray-tube television sets from 1939 until 1987.
Peter Weedfald, president of GDT North America and global chief marketing officer for the joint venture, said it intends to be a "premium brand" that will be "very competitive with current leadership brands."
The company will be based in Chino, California, and will produce some sets in Mexico.
The company will stick solely to LCD technologies due to the power consumption benefits and the technology’s ability to deliver innovative new designs, such as thinner form factors.
One model in the initial line will offer LED backlighting, but more are expected in subsequent offerings.
GDT’s plans also include a Blu-ray Disc player with BD-Live capability.
Since 2004, GE looked at 10 potential partners before choosing Tatung. The decision was based on Tatung’s leadering position in Taiwan and in display technology.
"It’s a small bet for GE," says Marc Bertino, vice president of trademark licensing at GE. "It’s just an easy way to get into a high-growth market with a great partner."
Tatung has invested USD $16.1 million for a 51 per cent stake in the venture.
Founded in 1918, the company is Taiwan’s oldest home-appliance maker and also makes computer, communications, consumer-electronics and solar-energy products.
hdtv.biz-news.com spoke to Mark Horchler, corporate marketing director with video compression provider ATEME, about its plans to deliver video of Blu-ray quality and beyond.
The Blu-ray Disc Association doesn’t take kindly to satellite and cable providers claiming their products deliver high definition picture and sound “equal” to that delivered by Blu-ray Disc.
The trade body recently described just such assertions of equality as irresponsible and misleading to the consumer.
Yet if the noises coming out of video compression provider ATEME are anything to go by, the BDA might have to get used to it.
ATEME is a leading provider of MPEG-4 AVC / H.264 video compression technology.
Its offline and streaming encoders power numerous high-end digital video applications, including mobile TV, Video on Demand (VOD) and IPTV.
These solutions support both standard and HD content, deployed across any platform – from mobile to Ultra HD.
Mark Horchler, corporate marketing director with ATEME, said there was room for continued improvement with H.264.
He said the 3rd generation of the codec had just been released and was 25 per cent more efficient.
“I think we are reaching near Blu-ray quality,” he said. “I have not made a set by set comparison but we are there.”
Horchler said image quality was continually improving and the company was experimenting with Ultra High Definition video.
“That’s the future of high definition,” he said. “H.264 will take us to Blu-ray quality and beyond. Blu-ray is largely based on H.264 technology.”
France, where ATEME was founded in 1991 and has its head office at Bièvres near Paris, is a strong market for the company.
It recently announced that its H.264 encoding solutions were now serving over one million French IPTV customers in HD.
This was as a result of major French broadcasters using the encoders to provide HD video over low bitrates.
IPTV has reached mass market status in France, largely because of its strong ADSL subscriber base of over 15 million customers, value for money offered by triple play services and healthy competition amongst ISPs.
By the end of this year, France is expected to have up to six million IPTV subscribers, with a quarter having access to HD channels such as France 2 and M6 that use ATEME’s H.264 encoders.
“France is a leading market for IPTV and is miles ahead of any other country in Europe, if not the world,” said Horchler.
However, he said that while there was a lack of HD content in some markets, it was only a matter of time before that changed.
“The potential for HDTV is huge. We are only at the beginning,” he said.
“As more and more people adopt HD equipment, flat-screen TVs and so on, there will be a snowball effect. People will ask for more HD content.”
Every market is different
While IPTV is particularly strong in France, Horchler said that in other countries the infrastructure favored cable or satellite.
In the US, where the cable market uses MPEG-2, he said there was a strong argument for using H.264 and he believed cable providers would start adopting it.
“Our solutions carry over all these platforms,” he said.
Another area where ATEME saw potential for H.264 was the mobile market, something that fitted well with its partnership agreement with Adobe.
Horchler said the codec could adapt to various sizes and shapes of media device and had a scaleability that allowed the same video to be broadcast on HDTV or a mobile phone, for instance.
This was a feature that would fit well with the live broadcast of sporting events.
The internet offers immense possibilities for video and Horchler said he was confident that H.264 would be able to adapt to new opportunities as they emerged.
He said there were many interesting applications, such as bundling video with advertising services, that were just beginning to take shape.
“We are in that space. We work with Adobe Flash and this is compatible with 90 per cent of PCs out there,” he said. “I am sure by next year there will be some crazy idea for a business.
“But the codec will adapt to the business model. It’s so flexible.”