News - Ofcom announces plan for high-definition Freeview channels

[HEXUS]

HD channels on Freeview are still on course for 2009, but certain regions may be left waiting until 2010.

Read more.

[nichomach]

One hopes that these new Freeview channels will be equally available on HD services supplied by Sky and VM.

[s_kinton]

Another long wait in store for most then!

I just hope that PC hardware manufacturers are quick to the market with freeview HD tuners, although I don't expect them to be anything less than overpriced when they do come!! I wonder what performance impact these DVB-T2 tuners will have on system performance. Hopefully, a simple tuner upgrade will be fine for my HTPC.

Switch over for me is 2011.....that might be enough time for MS to have implemented HD support in Windows 7 media centre, although I won't hold my breath. MediaPortal 2 will probably be my first choice when its released.

[Funkstar]

I can't imagine performance of DVB-T2 cards would be any different to DVB-T, but if there is a performance impact it's going to be far out weighed by the general increase in system performance over the next couple of years.

[Parm]

It's a wait until 2011 for me, so I'm eager to hear Ofcom's plans to bring the World Cup to everyone in HD. I don't watch a lot of TV, but I'll be hooked during that tournament.

[Tidus]

If you have to buy a freeview HD box people could just get freesat and have the HD channels now.

[Parm]

If you have to buy a freeview HD box people could just get freesat and have the HD channels now.

Only if they have a satelite dish, though. The advantage of Freeview HD is that'll it'll come down through a TV aerial.

Freesat would be my choice mind you, it has a whole lot more channels on offer.

[wjharing]

It sounds all nice etc, but FresView has four main issues for me, concerning HD.

- only 720p, which is the major concern when having a 1080i/p TV
- other than BBC HD, no other channel for another year...
- max of 3-5 channels to be expected
- still need to buy new hardware