When visiting Toronto a couple weeks ago I noticed that the CBC Toronto Studio is within a stones throw of both the ACC and the Roger's Centre. Is there any talk of linking both facilities to the Studio so that events in either facility could be produced right in the Studio instead of in a trailer, allowing the HD Truck(s) to be used in other cities.

A similar situation occurs in Vancouver so it could also be done there.

Roger1818,
I'm aware of no such discussions. I doubt it would be practical. There are a lot of high bandwidth links between the truck and the venue. Extending them to the Broadcast Centre would be very expensive and you would still have to get another set of camera, mics, etc. Those items are travel with the mobile units.

Roger1818,
I'm aware of no such discussions. I doubt it would be practical. There are a lot of high bandwidth links between the truck and the venue. Extending them to the Broadcast Centre would be very expensive and you would still have to get another set of camera, mics, etc. Those items are travel with the mobile units.

I dont think bandwidth is really a problem, its not that expensive to put some fiber under the street. Its probally more the equipment required to do such a thing. That is a great idea however.

I heard someone saying that CBC is showing a record 9.5 hours of HD this week. But by my count that in addition to over 28 hours of widescreen, there is 11.5 this week (Schedule for September 25 - October 1, 2006 (http://www.cbc.ca/hdtv/schedule/CBC_HD_nextweek3.pdf)).

This consists of 2 hours of Canada Russsia 72 on Wednesday, another 2 hours on Thursday, 4 hours of Lord of the Rings on Saturday, 3.5 hours of CFL on Sunday.

If my recollection is correct, this beats the previous record of the 10 hours last spring (http://www.cbc.ca/hdtv/schedule/CBC_HD_nextweek4.pdf).

With the new season kicking into gear after Thanksgiving, I'm guessing that this record won't last long!

The 9.5 hours may have been for next week.

http://www.cbc.ca/hdtv/schedule/CBC_HD_nextweek1.pdf

Although 1/2 hour may be a Rick Mercer rerun.

Plus over 30 hours of WS.

I heard someone saying that CBC is showing a record 9.5 hours of HD this week. But by my count that in addition to over 28 hours of widescreen, there is 11.5 this week (Schedule for September 25 - October 1, 2006 (http://www.cbc.ca/hdtv/schedule/CBC_HD_nextweek3.pdf)).

This consists of 2 hours of Canada Russsia 72 on Wednesday, another 2 hours on Thursday, 4 hours of Lord of the Rings on Saturday, 3.5 hours of CFL on Sunday.

If my recollection is correct, this beats the previous record of the 10 hours last spring (http://www.cbc.ca/hdtv/schedule/CBC_HD_nextweek4.pdf).

With the new season kicking into gear after Thanksgiving, I'm guessing that this record won't last long!

I didn't add enough hours to CBC published schedule to account for the length of LOTR. Is it more like 3 or 4 hours?

If RMR and Airfarce are in HD that is a nice move. Based on some info I received, we should also be seeing extra rotations of this kind of content. I know I'm outnumbered here by people that think extra rotations of HD content shouldn't count when they are on other networks, but personally I think the more HD the better. And if we can record RMR in HD at an off hours time, that's a big improvement.

Hopefully Dragon Den will be HD as well. The format looks like it should be super easy to do in HD.

Good PQ and use of DD5.1 surround sound on Calgary/Toronto CFL game.

Good PQ and use of DD5.1 surround sound on Calgary/Toronto CFL game.

Good PQ, but I think the BC/Hamilton game earlier on TSN was better..

Yes the PQ on the Toronto-Calgary game looks pretty good. Not sharp like TSN but certainly quite watchable. Schedule shows the game as being on tomorrow, but still it is HD.

Yes the PQ on the Toronto-Calgary game looks pretty good.

Did those of you watching the game in HD notice sound problems when they cut between live footage and replays? I was watching the end of the game on CBOT-TV [4] (OTA analog) and the sound would often cut out for a second when they did the switch. It was really annoying. Marc, any ideas what was wrong?

I've looked over a number of recordings of the outbound signal. The audio appeared to be fine leaving the Broadcast Centre. There may be an issue with the fibre to Ottawa. We are doing some tests with the carrier.

I've looked over a number of recordings of the outbound signal. The audio appeared to be fine leaving the Broadcast Centre. There may be an issue with the fibre to Ottawa. We are doing some tests with the carrier.

Thanks for looking into this Marc. I don't have an ATSC tuner yet so I can't say if it occured on CBOT-DT or not but it was on the CBOT-TV OTA broadcast. As I said in my original post, it seemed to occur when they were cutting from live footage to replays (and back) about 70% of the time (maybe more when the cut to the replay than from the replay but it is hard to say for sure). I don't know why it would be limited to those occurances if the audio was fine leaving the Broadcast Centre (maybe the Bit Error Rate was too high to transmit the redraw and audio?), but that is what I noticed.

One thing the schedule doesn't show is late night movies. Occassionaly they have been WS or even HD.

See:

http://www.digitalhome.ca/forum/showpost.php?p=420985&postcount=121

&

http://www.digitalhome.ca/forum/showpost.php?p=421179&postcount=128

...although we still don't see that infomation...

The Ottawa fibre was taken off line, reset and tested. It appears to be stable. It's back in service.

The Ottawa fibre was taken off line, reset and tested. It appears to be stable. It's back in service.

Thanks Marc! Did the initial tests indicate that that was likely the problem?

Nothing conclusive was found.

So does the Ottawa CBC HD channel show Ottawa or Toronto programming???

So does the Ottawa CBC HD channel show Ottawa or Toronto programming???

The short answer is both.

Section 7 of the Broadcasting Decision CRTC 2005-526 (http://www.crtc.gc.ca/archive/ENG/Decisions/2005/db2005-526.htm) (CBOT Ottawa – Transitional digital television) says:

7. The CBC made a commitment to simulcast the current programming service of CBOT with the exception of up to 14 hours per week of supplementary programming that would not be duplicated on the analog service. The applicant further committed to ensure that all unduplicated, supplementary programming broadcast on the undertaking is broadcast in a wide screen high definition (HD) format, and that a minimum of 50% such programming is Canadian. Consistent with the applicant’s commitments, the Commission has imposed conditions of licence, set out in the appendix to this decision.

Thus for example if CBOT-TV is broadcasting a Sens game in SD, but the Leafs game is available in HD, CBC is permitted to broadcast the Leafs game in HD on CBOT-DT.

My question is what counts as supplementary programming? Obviously if they are showing a completely different program it would count, but what if it is the same program but in widescreen or HD? If the program is the same but they are using the Toronto commercials instead of the Ottawa commercials (does CBOT have the capability of inserting their own commercials on an HD program), would that count as supplementary?

If you want to be picky you could say that even if Ottawa commercials are being used, technically the program isn't exactly the same (especially if it isn't letterboxed on CBOT-TV) since the programs aren't the same pixel by pixel, but that doesn't seem to be the intent of the ruling. If this were the case the CRTC would be limiting CBOT to 14 hours of HD programming per week and that seems wrong.

The CBOT and CBOT-DT signals are specific to Ottawa; they are not just a split of the Toronto signal.

As roger1818 mentioned, you can have a situation where the SD and HD stations carry different hockey games. We have done this before.

As I understand the rules, the 14 hours refers to programs. Commercials within a program are considered to be part of the same show.