Original scientific paper
Planning the Migration of Digital Terrestrial Broadcasting in Croatia to DVB-T2 Standard
Domagoj Frank
; Director, HP Production LLC, Zagreb, Croatia; Direktor, HP Produkcija d.o.o., Zagreb, Hrvatska; M.Sc., Lecturer, Department of Multimedia, Design and Application, University North, Varaždin, Croatia; Predavač, Odjel Multimedija, dizajn i primjena, Sveučil
Emil Dumić
; Ph.D., Department of Wireless Communications, Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computing, University of Zagreb, Zagreb, Croatia; Zavod za radiokomunikacije, Fakultet elektrotehnike i računarstva, Sveučilište u Zagrebu, Zagreb, Hrvatska;
Abstract
On 31 December 2010 analogue television in Croatia was completely switched off and was replaced by DVB-T television standard. Because of that, it became possible to provide more TV programs with higher quality and it freed up the frequency band for first digital dividend, which is now used for LTE mobile broadband services. Nowadays, newer and more advanced standard DVBT2, which is extension of DVB-T, is being implemented in many countries. In Croatia DVB-T2 is used for terrestrial pay TV platform. DVB-T2 offers significantly higher network capacity in the same frequency band which enables more television programs, easier migration to HD services and possibility to free up additional frequencies for second digital dividend. Second dividend frequencies are fitted for covering broad rural areas with wireless broadband services that can reduce the digital gap. Such benefits will have a positive impact on economic sustainability of traditional broadcasting media in a competitive digital economy.
In this paper we give an overview and analysis of digitalisation process in Croatia in terms of technology and regulation, costs and benefits for the state budget and media campaign with lessons learned, in order to enumerate motivation factors for further migration to the DVB-T2 standard. With the help of simulation, a practical example of useful bit rate increase between the DVB-T and DVB-T2 systems is given. Predicted reduction of TV broadcasting costs, migration costs, need for government subsidy to buy new DVB-T2 receivers and other cost factors of the transition to DVB-T2 are discussed. This analysis is a basis for identifying key prerequisites, benefits, obstacles and stakeholders in migration to DVB-T2 and gives further areas that have to be researched in order to prepare the optimal plan for migration to DVB-T2 from technical, economic, market and social perspectives.
Keywords
Digital terrestrial television; migration to DVB-T2; media literacy; broadcasting media market; economic sustainability; digital gap; network capacity
Hrčak ID:
133860
URI
Publication date:
15.12.2014.
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