I can confirm this. I get both metro and regional SBS here in Sydney and the ads are different. Even the ABC, who don’t have ads seem to have a different feed for Sydney. For example, when the same promo ran for ABC NewsRadio, the Sydney feed had the AM frequency, whilst the regional feed didn’t have any frequencies listed. This was a while ago though - not sure if ABC still have a separate Sydney feed.
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But is it HEVC compliant read somewhere it needs to be for it to decode video?
I second this.
Also, the last time I checked, the entire feed for SBS NSW was half a second ahead of SBS Sydney.
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The codec used is irrelevant to the tuner. It’s your computer software that does the decoding (or video card, if you have GPU acceleration enabled and your GPU supports HEVC). Same applies to actual TVs – decoding of the HEVC is not related to the tuner itself.
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As always thanks tvcl
Sky Racing 1 is now showing in HD to clubs and venues via VAST platform. Hopefully they will upgrade the Foxtel feed soon.
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Although I doubt this would happen at all, I’d like Ten to be the first to bite the bullet and broadcast all their channels in HD. (TenHD remaining MPEG2 - possibly).
Any thoughts spectrum-wise if this would work?
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all MPEG4’s should work?
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yeah but then it goes back to ‘But not everyone has an mpeg4 stb/TV’
the WIN SCA affiliation swap would have been a good opportunity to kick off this country wide change, alas it didn’t happen
This would be the next perfect opportunity to kickstart it.
Of course, but as @xyz223 mentioned, not everyone does have MPEG4 TVs. So make the primary channel MPEG2 HD and broadcast the rest in MPEG4 as an initiative to get compatible equipment.
It’s going to have to happen sooner or later; we can’t stay with MPEG2 forever.
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All metro HD broadcasts are already MPEG4. Ten has enough spectrum to duplicate one of their multichannels in HD similar to what SBS did with Viceland. However, they can’t afford to drop the SD simulcasts without making the channels unavailable to a huge percentage of their audience; not a viable option for any commercial broadcaster. If MPEG 4 only was a viable option for a channel, Nine would be broadcasting Your Money that way.
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Very fair point 
Even a SBS-type situation would be a great start.
I think a ONE HD would be a great addition to their suite of channels especially for sports coverage. It could be a useful tool in future sports rights negotiations to be able to offer HD sports coverage for multichannel sport - whether it was niche sports or AFL in Sydney and Brisbane for example.
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100%. If Ten are serious about getting back into the sports game, then this makes total sense.
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It’s an MPEG4 channel
**converting Ten HD to MPEG2, as this would be the only MPEG2 service.
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Can’t wait forever. Meanwhile FTA continues to lose audience as SD is more and more unwatchable.
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that’s not the reason
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I’d argue that the quality of the content (too many “reality” programs in the cooking, renovation and dating/relationships/wedding genre) much moreso than the picture is a major reason why FTA TV is shedding viewers.
As for MPEG4, as much as doing a HD version of a multichannel in that format would probably be a gamble worth taking I doubt Ten will bother taking the plunge. You only have to look at Nine sticking with “Your Money” in MPEG2 and Seven switching 7Flix to MPEG2 after the demise of 4ME to see why aside from HD and RACING.COM, the major metro networks are mostly sticking with MPEG2 services for the time being.
But you scream at me, “Some of the regional affiliates run up to four MPEG4 channels!” - OK, but lets take a look at the three most common configurations in aggregated East Coast markets:
*Prime7 SD
*Prime7 HD
*7TWO
*7mate
*7Flix
*RACING.COM
*iShopTV
*WIN SD
*WIN HD
*One
*Eleven
*Sky News on WIN
*TVSN
*GOLD
*SCA Nine SD
*SCA Nine HD
*9Go!
*9Gem
*9Life
*Aspire TV
*SBN
By comparison, it’s five MPEG2 SD channels + one MPEG4 HD channel from Nine & Ten. Seven in metro markets has four MPEG2 SD channels with one MPEG4 channel in HD plus another MPEG4 service in SD.
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I think FreeTV, ABC, SBS and ACMA just need to decide that on, say, 1st July 2020 all free-to-air television will be MPEG-4, and that all free-to-air television will be DVB-T2 on, say, 1st July 2022. As has already been mentioned in this thread, the excuse that some viewers don’t have MPEG-4 televisions can’t go on forever.
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