Industry Canada puts moratorium on the use of television channel 51

[MonopolyBuster]

Originally Posted by HDTV101

The way I see it in the future (less then 10 years) they will go after 600MHz too pushing the TV channels lower, then they will go after 500MHz. The spectrum is to valuable a natural resource that it will be sold off in time to the Cell phone companies.

The other question you have to look at is ‘do we really need 51 channels for DTV?’ The answer is clearly no we do not. We have around digital 20+ OTA channels in the GTA… the amount of spectrum they also use could be cut in half, right now, if they were to switch over to MPEG-4, so in the future I’m sure they will be forced over to MPEG-4.

Another idea that comes to my mind when I think about all of this is… do we really need to be sending out Digital TV using one high power transmitter? What if we used a series on low power digital TV transmitters every few miles… the existing Cell phone towers could each be equipped with low power digital OTA ATSC transmitters forming their own cellular TV network. Since Digital TV already uses virtual channeling this would work very well allowing adjacent cells to use different RF channels. This would give great coverage to the end users… you would only need a small indoor antenna to receive the signal for a local cell tower. All you DTV channels would be coming from the one tower. This would also prevent Canadians from receiving American TV if they were also to switch to such a system… and we know our Government will like that idea.

The use of low power transmitters would also take care of any interference problems.

I’m sure in the next 20 years we’re going to see a big change in the way Digital TV is delivered OTA.

You might as well talk about the planets aligning. So stop that! We are not talking about what is reasonable, rather where can money be made.

Your logic makes too much sense and for that reason it will never work.

[HDTV101]

Just give it 5 years... you'll see

[someguy23475]

Originally Posted by Dave Loudin

There have been a few stations in the US that have tried what's called a Distributed TV Service. A DTS system is usually the original transmitter with on-channel repeaters in terrain-blocked areas. Interest in such operations has dropped to zero, and grand plans have gone unbuilt.

Distributed low-power transmitters will not be the solution.

A station in (I believe) Allentown, PA has been doing this for a few years now.

[insider22]

Channel 51 is left blank for the future creation of a guard band.

The lower parts of the 700 Mhz will be use for LTE stations with a very high sensitivity.

About the 500 Mhz and 600, dont worry IC have no plan to do like the FCC
. Canada should have plenty of spectrum for upcoming whitespace technologies ...

[Jase88]

insider22, The Canadian government tends to follow American RF policy....so we should be worried.

[ScaryBob]

I agree. IC has no plan because it does whatever the FCC does about 2-3 years later. If the FCC claws back more channels for data services, they will want those Canadian channels shut down within 200 miles of the Canada/US border. Since that's where 90% of Canadians live, it's a de facto claw back in Canada as well.

[Dave Loudin]

Originally Posted by someguy23475

A station in (I believe) Allentown, PA has been doing this (DTS) for a few years now.

That Allentown station was going to build 8 sites, but appears to only have two in operation. There is a station outside of Washington, DC that has an on-channel repeater, but it does not call the pairing a DTS operation.

[tvlurker]

The FCC can want want it wants, but he current agreement protects the stations up to channel 51. Unless there is something in it for the Canadian Government, don't assume IC will go along with the FCC. Protecting 700 MHz band for Canadian interests is probably what the channel 51 issue is about.

[ScaryBob]

The moratorium is a sign of the times and future trends. That is, giving personal communications priority over conventional TV. Canadians and Americans want mobile data. Big communications companies want to provide it. Governments make $billions from auctioning clawed back bandwidth. Besides, using contiguous packet networks for data is more efficient than using fixed broadcast frequencies for sparsely spaced TV stations. We should be doing what the UK is doing which is using centralized repeaters with densely packed TV stations to make TV broadcasting more space efficient. With ATSC, stations can be synchronized to reduce co-channel effects and pack the TV band into a smaller space. With today's technology, here is no reason why several station/network repeaters should be using more than one frequency allocation.

[tvlurker]

From what I've heard, ATSC DTS systems don't work as well as promised. And I think they were only ever designed to cover shaded terrain, so they don't work well out in the open.

[ScaryBob]

DTS can't be any worse than having dozens of repeaters on co-channels or adjacent channels to other, totally unrelated stations. That's the situation in Southern Ontario. Here, we have many overlapping network stations which interfere with other overlapping network stations. Even local stations are spread across the entire dial and geographical map. OTA reception is a nightmare and getting worse every year. IC has allowed that with a lot of idiotic channel allocations based on outdated science. The networks and CRTC have thrown a lot of bad business decisions and bureaucratic blunders to make it even worse. It's no wonder most Canadians just give up and pay outrageous prices for TV delivery.

[majortom]

why should anyone do anything like the UK? The UK is the UK.
The Geography of the entire UK is roughly twice the size of the state of Pennsylvania. So there isn't really much to cover.
Suspect it would be next to impossible for any government controlled entity to pull something like that off in a country the size of Canada or the US.

[roger1818]

I agree with majortom. The UK has a much greater population density, so just because it works for them doesn't mean it will work for us.

As for the idea of putting transmitters on all cell phone towers, that would be extremely expensive in both up up front equipment purchases and maintenance. Replacing the one central transmitter with three or maybe four lower powered transmitters might be feasible, but you would then loose rural reception.

A strategy to use low powered UHF transmitters in urban areas and high powered VHF transmitters in rural areas (likely using multicast services) would be necessary, but that would require redesigning the entire band plan from the ground up, which would be a costly exercise for both the government and the stations.

[ScaryBob]

It has essentially already been done in the GTA. All transmitters are on a central tower. Even more transmitters would be placed there except for the fact that archaic CTRC regulations prevent it. I am proposing that similar things be done in other cities. That is place all transmitters on a central tower to serve the city and region. It would not only save costs for broadcasters but also make it much easier for consumers since only a single antenna pointed at the closest tower would be required. Channel allocations could be modified in the longer term but that's going to happen anyway as more channels are clawed back and sold to communications companies. Population density and geography have nothing to do with it. If anything, the current system in Canada is counterproductive since it prevents the optimal placement of transmitters in the densest populated locations.

A strategy to use low powered UHF transmitters in urban areas and high powered VHF transmitters in rural areas

If you knew anything about ATSC you would know that high powered VHF stations are impractical due to atmospheric propagation in certain weather conditions. The best use for VHF is low powered local stations. Currently, IC is allocating VHF frequencies for use as low powered regional station, which is ridiculously impractical. (Many US stations have abandoned VHF-lo and obtained higher VHF-hi power permits for this very reason.) UHF is much more practical for high powered regional stations.

[roger1818]

Originally Posted by ScaryBob

It has essentially already been done in the GTA. All transmitters are on a central tower.

The argument is against using one centralized tower, but using several/many distributed towers instead.

If you knew anything about ATSC you would know that high powered VHF stations are impractical due to atmospheric propagation in certain weather conditions. The best use for VHF is low powered local stations.

But VHF (especially VHF-LO) is impractical for low powered stations since the noise floor is higher (and fluctuates more), so you need a stronger signal to receive an error free transmission. This is why so many people are having problems with VHF. It is especially apparent in both London and Ottawa where people are having troubles receiving a weak channel 6.

The problem of atmospheric propagation can be resolved by increasing the distance between transmitters on the same channel. My suggestion was to give each region one VHF channel to be shared by all stations to allow this increased spacing.