They could put so much in HD. Just sad
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Thatâs extremely odd considering theyâre all essentially running with the same amount of null packets. There must be a reason for this?
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Is there a financial incentive?
I reckon theyâve found a way to use VASTâs bandwidth management when they convert from DVB-S2 to DVB-T. The quality has not taken a hit on any of the services at all. Easily as crisp as VAST.
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Well presumably those are just the bits that are on the satellite? Their limitation would be how much their portion of the VAST transponder is, rather than what theyâd want to do?
WIN should obviously drop Nine SD to flip Gem to HD or improve the bitrates of both Gem/Go, but otherwise Iâd assume it would be cost prohibitive to get more capacity on VAST to give more? Given the limitations there, it would be a no brainer to just share the WDT channels between WIN and Sevenâs mux and save costs.
Is that a typo for GOLD instead of TVSN on WINâs mux? edit - looked at the TS links - wow? Thatâs weird.
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Yep, looks that way. Iâm trying to get my satellite tuner working with TSReader so we can compare.
I was surprised Seven was able to upgrade 4 SDâs to HD on VAST without sacrificing anything, which makes me wonder how full the WA transponder really isâŚ
I logged them before TVSN was switched off. Was expecting GOLD to arrive too, but we ended up with the slide on 84 like everyone else.
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In theory - thereâs ~53Mbps split between the different WA services, so WIN - 13Mbps, WDT - 12Mbps, Seven without Seven HD - 10Mbps.
If each Seven HD is 3.1Mbps each (the 2.77Mbps video, 256kbps audio, and rounding up for some subtitles etc), thatâs an additional 9.3Mbps - for a total of 44.3/53.
I wonder if the answer is an uplink capacity charge not the fullness of it?
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Managed to get a satellite scan with new terrestrial scans for comparison.
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Whatâs Mt Wellington FM coverage like in Bicheno? I was there years ago and recall no signal for 100.9 and 101.7
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Could the null packets be utilised for increased error correction?
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I was in Bicheno in April and the local TV relay (which I think was fed off air from Mt Wellington at a distance of 140 km!) did pixelate occasionally. And where I was staying was only a few hundred metres from the relay site, so I donât think the piexlation occurred from there. The hill that the relay site is on the southern edge of town so that blocks most FM radios into town.
Hobart FM radio signals werenât consistently good until down near Triabunna.
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The WA broadcasters donât get a full terrestrial allocation of bandwidth on the satellite - they have to share a single transponder (about 50Mbps as @Moe points out)
My understanding (@WAtvVideos might correct me) is that they have limited capacity to do anything beyond shift what is fed from the satellite to terrestrial
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Ah so they split 7mate as well - I assume thatâs a unique SSW feed and a âthe restâ, while 7 itself has a SSW, GTW feed and then a combined VEW/WAW?
They could switch the transmitters into a more robust error correcting mode, which might improve fringe coverage - but SBS/ABC would be in the standard mode, so youâd still be missing channels if youâre in such a reception zone. I think anyone struggling to receive the over the air coverage just would have gone to VAST, rather than spend on a big antenna - in WA you have no incentive to make sure you get OTA coverage.
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The split is just for WAW. I recall a GWN engineer telling me it was so North-West advertisers could get prominence specifically during AFL broadcasts. If Seven hasnât removed it then there must still be a business case for it.
Iâm not sure what equipment they use at each site now but I assume itâs a lot more streamlined than what they had, so they could be limited to just one transponder. Previously, they were able to cherry pick services from multiple transponders if needed as the same equipment is used in Remote Central & Eastern sites. In those sites, SCA needs to grab 7mate Central from a 2nd transponder. I think now, picking from a single transponder plays a big part in the bandwidth efficiency weâre seeing.
Limited capacity on the satellite transponder itself is my determination after witnessing symptoms which were similar to what I saw on terrestrial, particularly around the Great Affiliation Swap era. But now that Seven has managed to increase their bitrate with no issues, I could be wrong. Looking at the stats, theyâre now getting SDâs as low as 0.80 Mbps with no noticable loss in quality. Encoding could have improved.
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I got around to doing some rescanning today subsequent to the changes to the shopping channels. It was interesting to see the signals received using just the main Brisbane antenna that is Band III only and directed west to Mt Coot-tha. The signals ends up being split to 8 outlets. In addition to the VHF stations from Brisbane all their Sunshine Coast relays came in strong despite being 90 off beam. Also tuned in was 9 Gold Coast that seems to be just above the signal threshold and I hadnât had tuned in before. It is the only Gold Coast/Nth Sunshine Coast signal that is not co-channelled with all the other frequencies shared. The software on the computer is not as sophisticated as that on PVRs etc (that only tune the strongest station) so I end up with multiple stations on the EPG that are the same.
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Shocking. You wonât have any luck auto scanning, but you can just hear the signals.
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But then thatâs to be expected when itâs behind a hill and 140 km away as the crow flies.
1,270m of height (plus antenna height) ainât gonna help there.
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Bad planning by ACMA, as itâs still part of the Hobart RA1.
Bicheno really needs a local translator of Chilli NE/7SD.
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Agree.
Reception of 7SD/Chili from the St Maryâs relay was patchy, but somewhat listenable, way better than the practically non existent Hobart signals.
Would be much better to move Bicheno to Scottsdale and add in relays for those as you suggested.
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With WIN combining the 7 and 10 signals onto one transmitter in Mt Gambier and Loxton, the ACMA radcom database still has the full suite of transmitters for both areas listed. Which ones have been decommissioned?
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