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Old 8th Mar 2011, 8:54 pm   #1
jhalphen
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Default Analogue TV Closedown in Paris Region

Hello to All,

Yesterday, Monday March 7th 2011 at midnight (UTC +1:00) all french TV transmitters went off the air in Paris and the surrounding ile-de-France area, ending 76 years of analogue television transmissions. Dear SECAM L, rest in peace.

During the night, Broadcast TV engineers and transmitter suppliers were busy connecting the DVB-T exciters to the converted analogue and new digital transmitters.

Service started up today, Tuesday March 8th at 08:00 AM with the 6 legacy ex-analogue OTA channels, then around lunch time all 19 FTA channels progressively came online + 4 "Bonus" channels allocated by the government to thank the early partner DVB-T companies who opened the service in April 2005. Total as of tonight: 23 Free to air channels.

A re-scan of DVB-T tuners was necessary because of multiplex channel allocation frequency shifts once the analogue service had closed. 12 million households in the Paris area were concerned.

The new UHF spectrum includes 23 x DVT-T SD 625/50 UHF channels broadcast in MPEG-2 plus 4x HD channels, 1080i/50 broadcast in MPEG-4.

All VHF Band I & III TV transmissions are terminated. Band III is to be reassigned to digital radio (T-DMB) and (video) services to mobile phones.

DVB-T and analogue SECAM L have coexisted in Paris since 2005. with the digital channel frequently co-channel sited alongside the SECAM transmission, the DVB-T signal was broadcast at a - 15dB power level to avoid interference. With the switch-off of analogue a considerable power increase of DVB-T will take place, the 23 transmitters on the Eiffel Tower being increased from 15KW EIRP to 50KW EIRP.

Final analogue switch-off for the entire country is planned for november 2011.

Except for a small ceremony at the Eiffel Tower last night, no special event was planned.

Photos courtesy of Bruno Piffret, Paris vintage TV collector.

Pix 01 is 10 min before shutdown, pix 02 terminates analogue transmissions showing TV presentation celebrity Jacqueline Joubert presenting the new B&W 819 line TV service in ...1950.

Bruno's vintage TV site: http://pagesperso-orange.fr/radio-piffret/

Best Regards

jhalphen
Paris/France

PS for ppp-Penguin: are there compromises/modifications to the transmitter when substituting a DVB-T exciter to the original analogue unit?
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Old 8th Mar 2011, 9:06 pm   #2
ppppenguin
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Default Re: Analogue TV Closedown in Paris Region

Quote:
Originally Posted by jhalphen View Post
PS for ppp-Penguin: are there compromises/modifications to the transmitter when substituting a DVB-T exciter to the original analogue unit?
I know very little about transmitters. That's really a question for Ray Cooper. My limited understanding is that the linearity requirements for COFDM are more stringent than for analogue. This is because non-linearity causes inter-symbol interference. Unless the power amplifier is designed for COFDM this means de-rating it.
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Old 8th Mar 2011, 9:18 pm   #3
John Robson
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Default Re: Analogue TV Closedown in Paris Region

All the old analogue equipment is being removed and replaced by new dedicated DVB equipment, that is everything inside the Tx building and new antenna on the masts. All the old equipment is being broken for spares or scrapped.
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Old 8th Mar 2011, 10:28 pm   #4
Ray Cooper
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Default Re: Analogue TV Closedown in Paris Region

Quote:
Originally Posted by ppppenguin View Post
...the linearity requirements for COFDM are more stringent than for analogue. This is because non-linearity causes inter-symbol interference. Unless the power amplifier is designed for COFDM this means de-rating it.
That about says it all. You'll certainly be in for replacing the drives/exciters in any case, since there are little grounds of similarity between the analogue and digital versions.

With regard to the power amplifiers: all power amplifiers are non-linear to some degree, but this has historically been compensated for by a degree of pre-correction in the drive stages. Paradoxically perhaps, the more modern the analogue equipment, the more non-linear it is likely to be... the modern God 'efficiency' dictated that all power amplifiers were operated closer to their limits that was usual in earlier gear, so PA linearity was quite poor and was compensated-for by what some folk (myself certainly included) considered an excessive degree of pre-correction at drive level.

Anyway: all ancient history now. Most analogue gear in service at the time of changeover would be time-expired in reliability terms, and would have little more than scrap value now. Example: the Sutton Coldfield analogue units were last replaced in 1985 if memory serves, so are now over 25 years old, which used to be the target figure that the Beeb used as an equipment lifetime target.
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Old 8th Mar 2011, 11:04 pm   #5
BGmidsUK
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Default Re: Analogue TV Closedown in Paris Region

The question has to be raised, why are bands I & III being abandoned?



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Old 11th Mar 2011, 11:56 am   #6
terrykc
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Default Re: Analogue TV Closedown in Paris Region

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Originally Posted by BGmidsUK View Post
The question has to be raised, why are bands I & III being abandoned?
There are three answers to that that spring to mind ...
  1. There is now deemed to be sufficient capacity for all future requirements using Bands IV & V
  2. The VHF bands can be sold off to the highest bidder, as in the UK
  3. Sporadic E will no longer be a problem in France!
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Old 11th Mar 2011, 9:42 pm   #7
jhalphen
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Default Re: Analogue TV Closedown in Paris Region

Hello to All,

to terrykc:

Thanks! for replying, i couldn't have said it better myself!

A RadioFil member posted the following link to the SECAM analogue transmitter shutdown. It was filmed with celebrities after a dinner/cocktail on the 1st floor of the Eiffel Tower.
It is obviously a re-enactment, because when compared with the true timing/sequence of transmitter shutdowns, nothing correlates.

http://www.satmag.fr/affichage_modul...3107&id_mod=50

Re-use of VHF/UHF frequencies: VHF Band II is supposed to be used by a future digital radio service.

In French radio circles it is believed that the very strange (Korean) T-DMB format supposedly adopted as the official French digital radio system will never see the light of day.

As the country is basically broke, if digital radio there ever is, it would be DAB or more likely, DAB+ - my bet is: nothing will happen, Internet radio has already won: 20.000 stations, 130 countries + and no expense.

On a personal note, i found 4 years ago in Switzerland a Philips Walkman-type DAB receiver which operated on both DAB bands, the most common 223MHZ VHF Band III frequencies (aka the UK) and the much rarer Band L (1500 MHz) adopted by France. I had fine reception in the Paris area for 4 years, then the experimental licenses were revoked in oct 2010 and the French airwaves are for now totally devoid of digital radio.

Best Regards

jhalphen
Paris/France
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Old 11th Mar 2011, 10:18 pm   #8
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Default Re: Analogue TV Closedown in Paris Region

In a similar vein, the US analog TV was shut down at the end of 2009, with only a small number of low power repeaters remaining.

The US Government handed out two $40 coupons to households that only used over the air reception, i.e. not cable, to purchase converter boxes so that people could continue to used their old TV's, these boxes were selling at around $60-70 at the time.

I now have several boxes and continue the use my old NTSC TV sets, which now have a great picture most of the time. The major problem with our DTV is: 1) they moved all the stations to UHF, and 2) lowered the EIRP; so that in some locations you can get very poor reception in inclement weather, and low flying aircraft.

The idea was the same as in Europe, sell of the old spectrum to the highest bidder.
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Old 15th Mar 2011, 1:02 pm   #9
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Default Re: Analogue TV Closedown in Paris Region

Anyone wanna buy a crystal set?
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