WDR, the affiliate of German public broadcaster ARD for federal state North-Rhine Westphalia, and transmitter network operator Media Broadcast prepare a joint trial to test the new digital terrestrial transmission system DVB-T/HEVC under live conditions in the urban area of Cologne and Bonn.
Transmissions will commence in August 2015 and provide practical experience regarding the planned nationwide DVB-T2 roll-out scheduled to commence in June 2016.
A working group was established on October 10, 2014 to accompany the preparation and execution of the trial in Cologne/Bonn. The members are representatives from WDR, Media Broadcast, ZDF, RTL, ProSiebenSat.1, the state chancellery of North-Rhine Westphalia and the federal state’s media authority LfM.
The WDR multiplex will carry unencrypted public TV channels while Media Broadcast will test a platform model with commercial channels on the second multiplex. Transmissions will be carried out from the transmitter sites Venusberg in Bonn (WDR) and Colonius in Cologne (Media Broadcast) in single frequency mode with an EIRP of 20kW each.
Parts of the trial are the distribution of HD channels and reception on different devices, both stationary and mobile, including hybrid models combining DVB-T2/HEVC with the internet.
The project in which hardware manufacturers will also participate will be interconnected with the DVB-T2/HEVC trials in other federal states. The first trial recently commenced in Berlin with another project being prepared in Munich.
