SBTVD Forum Publishes Test Results For The New Open Digital TV Standard

After five months of laboratory and field tests of the TV 3.0 Project, the Forum of the Brazilian Terrestrial Digital TV System (SBTVD Forum), which works for the implementation and development of Digital TV in Brazil, shares the main results of the technologies to be be recommended for Phase 3 of the TV of the Future project.

According to Luiz Fausto, coordinator of the Technical Module of the SBTVD Forum, the TV 3.0 Project once again places Brazil at the forefront of Digital TV in the world. “Just as we did when specifying Brazil's first Digital TV system in 2007, we are working to develop the best Digital TV system for Brazil's future. The Phase 2 results were excellent, confirming that we are heading in the right direction.”

Check the results:

1. Physical Layer

• Perform additional tests. Condition for participation: Provide equipment with reuse-1, MIMO and channel-bonding support . Only the top 2 lab results go to field testing. The technology will only be selected at the end of the second round of testing if the rate in the reuse condition is sufficient, otherwise the reuse condition will need to be reviewed.

2. Transport Layer

• Adopt ROUTE/DASH technology as the basis of the TV 3.0 transport layer and adapt/extend it to support all project requirements and technologies to be adopted in the other layers;
• Retain optional HLS streaming support for the distribution of alternative content over the Internet.

3. Video Base Layer

• Adopt VVC for the main video (both over-the-air and over the Internet) and perform subjective video quality assessments to determine the bitrate required for real-time encoding at different resolutions (considering only base layer and in combination with layer enrichment);
• Evaluate the most suitable video encoding for second video transmission with a sign language interpreter;
• Maintain support for H.264 and H.265 video for the distribution of alternative content over the Internet.

4. Video Enhancement

• Adopt a combination of Dynamic Resolution Encoding and LCEVC.

5. HDR DM

• Adopt HDR10 as a base (format already supported on all HDR TVs), with optional support for Dolby Vision, HDR10+ and SL-HDR2 dynamic metadata (both over-the-air and over the Internet);
• Maintain optional HLG and SL-HDR1 support for alternative content delivery over the Internet.

6. VR Codec

• Adopt V3C for inclusion in TV 3.0 standards (support will not be mandatory on all receivers; focus on Internet content distribution and consumption on smartphones and HMDs).

7. EWBS Manager

• Adopt ATSC 3.0 AEA.

8. Audio

• Adopt MPEG-H Audio for over-the-air and Internet distribution;
• Keep the other audio formats currently supported in TV 2.5 for distribution of alternative content over the Internet (including optional AC-4 support).

9. Captions

• Adopt IMSC1 for over-the-air and Internet distribution;
• Retain optional support for WebVTT for the distribution of alternative content over the Internet.

10. Application Coding

• Adapt and extend the DTV Play, including the satisfactorily tested proposals (MPEG-H Audio, Guaraná and NCL 4.0) and considering including parts of the Advanced ISDB-T, DTNEL Application Coding and ATSC 3.0 proposals (depending on the result of their prototyping);
• Fill in the gaps of requirements that were not satisfactorily filled by the proposals received, when necessary.

Next steps
According to Luiz Cláudio da Silva Costa, president of the SBTVD Forum, the result of Phase 2 of the TV 3.0 Project is due to the successful partnership between the SBTVD Forum and the Ministry of Communications. “We will continue to count on the support of the Ministry of Communications throughout the next stages of this project, so that we can complete it together and deliver to the Brazilian population, once again, the best Digital TV system possible, maintaining its attributes as an access tool. free, universal and democratic access to information and entertainment, and as an important strategic factor for national integration and social cohesion.”

In Phase 3, the SBTVD Forum will carry out complementary tests for the selection of the physical layer technology, development of the necessary adaptations and extensions to the transport layer specification, subjective evaluation of the video encoding quality (determination of the necessary bitrate), development of adaptations and extensions for DTV Play for TV 3.0 Application Coding, elaboration of ABNT technical standards for TV 3.0, development of interoperability tests, demonstrations, among other activities.

TV 3.0 is scheduled for release in 2024.

The project
TV 3.0 is the new open TV system whose development is carried out by the SBTVD Forum, which will replace the current system. The new standard will bring numerous improvements to the viewer's experience, including: better sound and image quality, content segmented geographically and according to the viewer's profile, an even more transparent integration between open TV and the Internet - combining broadcasting and Internet.