BBC to trial HD TV from mid-2006

[Bob Crabtree]

The BBC will trial broadcasts of high definition television in 2006, it announced today [Nov 8, 2005]

In the limited technical trials, it is planned to simulcast highlights of BBC ONE's peaktime schedule in high definition on satellite and cable, as available, from mid-2006. The BBC is in talks with the relevant operators about these plans. The BBC is also seeking to run a technical terrestrial trial in the London area at the same time. This would not affect reception of existing Freeview channels.

The BBC is considering collaboration with other broadcasters on the terrestrial trial. The purpose of the trials is to test delivery and reception of high definition broadcasts on the major television platforms.

Check it out.

[directhex]

my understanding is they'll try & get it onto freeview once the bandwidth is available - which should happen once analog is switched off

[menthel]

Well, they should hurry up and get everyone onto freeview so we can get hd freeview then!

[Stoo]

my understanding is they'll try & get it onto freeview once the bandwidth is available - which should happen once analog is switched off

Which is sheduled for between 2008 and 2012 at the moment.. by which time I'm sure there will be other broadcast methods available...

[Funkstar]

HD on freeview isn't going to be easy.

To start with no boxes support HD content or can output an HD signal, so if they are going to do it, you will need a new box. Because of this i would expect them to go with something like MPEG-4 or H.264 (is that the right one?) instead of MPEG2. I don't know what effect this will have on DVB-T decoder cards for PCs, we may need new ones of them too.

No-one (in the public) knows for sure what is happening with the bardwith when analog is shut off. We could get a bunch of new muxes for DTV, or we might just get a couple and the rest get sold off. Out of the ones we get there is no indication how they will be used, Freeview SD, Freeview HD, Pay TV, who knows?