High-definition television (HDTV) in the United States was introduced in 1998 and has since become increasingly popular and dominant in the television market. Hundreds of HD channels are available in millions of homes and businesses both terrestrially and via subscription services such as satellite, cable and IPTV. HDTV has quickly become the standard, with about 85% of all TVs used being HD as of 2018.[1][failed verification] In the US, the 720p and 1080i formats are used for linear channels, while 1080p is available on a limited basis, mainly for pay-per-view and video on demand content. Some networks have also began transmitting content at 1080p via ATSC 3.0 multiplex channels, with CBS and NBC affiliates being the main stations that transmit at 1080p.
On July 23, 1996, WRAL-TV (the then CBS affiliate in Raleigh, North Carolina; now affiliated with NBC) became the first television station in the United States to broadcast a digital television signal.[2]
tv 1080i vs 720p broadcast
Satellite television companies in the United States, such as Dish Network and DirecTV, started to carry HD programming in 2003. Satellite transmissions in the U.S. use various forms of PSK modulation. A separate tuner is required to receive HD satellite broadcasts.
Currently, HD programming is carried by all major television networks in nearly all DMAs, including ABC, CBS, NBC, FOX, PBS, The CW, MyNetworkTV and Telemundo; and on many independent stations. All but a select few of cable networks offer an HD broadcast to cable and satellite companies.
High-definition television (HD or HDTV) describes a television system which provides a substantially higher image resolution than the previous generation of technologies. The term has been used since 1936;[1] in more recent times, it refers to the generation following standard-definition television (SDTV), often abbreviated to HDTV or HD-TV. It is the current de facto standard video format used in most broadcasts: terrestrial broadcast television, cable television, satellite television and Blu-ray Discs.
When transmitted at two megapixels per frame, HDTV provides about five times as many pixels as SD (standard-definition television). The increased resolution provides for a clearer, more detailed picture. In addition, progressive scan and higher frame rates result in a picture with less flicker and better rendering of fast motion.[2] HDTV as is known today first started official broadcasting in 1989 in Japan, under the MUSE/Hi-Vision analog system.[3] HDTV was widely adopted worldwide in the late 2000s.[4]
Color broadcasts started at similar line counts, first with the US NTSC color system in 1953, which was compatible with the earlier monochrome systems and therefore had the same 525 lines per frame. European standards did not follow until the 1960s, when the PAL and SECAM color systems were added to the monochrome 625-line broadcasts.
Since the formal adoption of digital video broadcasting's (DVB) widescreen HDTV transmission modes in the mid to late 2000s; the 525-line NTSC (and PAL-M) systems, as well as the European 625-line PAL and SECAM systems, are now regarded as standard definition television systems.
In 1979, the Japanese public broadcaster NHK first developed consumer high-definition television with a 5:3 display aspect ratio.[8] The system, known as Hi-Vision or MUSE after its multiple sub-Nyquist sampling encoding (MUSE) for encoding the signal, required about twice the bandwidth of the existing NTSC system but provided about four times the resolution (1035i/1125 lines). In 1981, the MUSE system was demonstrated for the first time in the United States, using the same 5:3 aspect ratio as the Japanese system.[9] Upon visiting a demonstration of MUSE in Washington, US President Ronald Reagan was impressed and officially declared it "a matter of national interest" to introduce HDTV to the US.[10] NHK taped the 1984 Summer Olympics with a Hi-Vision camera, weighing 40 kg.[11]
The limited standardization of analog HDTV in the 1990s did not lead to global HDTV adoption as technical and economic constraints at the time did not permit HDTV to use bandwidths greater than normal television. Early HDTV commercial experiments, such as NHK's MUSE, required over four times the bandwidth of a standard-definition broadcast. Despite efforts made to reduce analog HDTV to about twice the bandwidth of SDTV, these television formats were still distributable only by satellite. In Europe too, the HD-MAC standard was considered not technically viable.[14][15]
In addition, recording and reproducing an HDTV signal was a significant technical challenge in the early years of HDTV (Sony HDVS). Japan remained the only country with successful public broadcasting of analog HDTV, with seven broadcasters sharing a single channel.[citation needed]
On February 23, 1994, a top broadcasting administrator in Japan admitted failure of its analog-based HDTV system, saying the U.S. digital format would be more likely a worldwide standard.[20] However this announcement drew angry protests from broadcasters and electronic companies who invested heavily into the analog system. As a result, he took back his statement the next day saying that the government will continue to promote Hi-Vision/MUSE.[21] That year NHK started development of digital television in an attempt to catch back up to America and Europe. This resulted in the ISDB format.[22] Japan started digital satellite and HDTV broadcasting in December 2000.[11]
Since 1972, International Telecommunication Union's radio telecommunications sector (ITU-R) had been working on creating a global recommendation for Analog HDTV. These recommendations, however, did not fit in the broadcasting bands which could reach home users. The standardization of MPEG-1 in 1993 led to the acceptance of recommendations ITU-R BT.709.[31] In anticipation of these standards, the Digital Video Broadcasting (DVB) organisation was formed. It was alliance of broadcasters, consumer electronics manufacturers and regulatory bodies. The DVB develops and agrees upon specifications which are formally standardised by ETSI.[32]
DVB created first the standard for DVB-S digital satellite TV, DVB-C digital cable TV and DVB-T digital terrestrial TV. These broadcasting systems can be used for both SDTV and HDTV. In the US the Grand Alliance proposed ATSC as the new standard for SDTV and HDTV. Both ATSC and DVB were based on the MPEG-2 standard, although DVB systems may also be used to transmit video using the newer and more efficient H.264/MPEG-4 AVC compression standards. Common for all DVB standards is the use of highly efficient modulation techniques for further reducing bandwidth, and foremost for reducing receiver-hardware and antenna requirements.[citation needed]
Initially the existing 5:3 aspect ratio had been the main candidate but, due to the influence of widescreen cinema, the aspect ratio 16:9 (1.78) eventually emerged as being a reasonable compromise between 5:3 (1.67) and the common 1.85 widescreen cinema format. An aspect ratio of 16:9 was duly agreed upon at the first meeting of the IWP11/6 working party at the BBC's Research and Development establishment in Kingswood Warren. The resulting ITU-R Recommendation ITU-R BT.709-2 ("Rec. 709") includes the 16:9 aspect ratio, a specified colorimetry, and the scan modes 1080i (1,080 actively interlaced lines of resolution) and 1080p (1,080 progressively scanned lines). The British Freeview HD trials used MBAFF, which contains both progressive and interlaced content in the same encoding.[citation needed]
It also includes the alternative 14401152 HDMAC scan format. (According to some reports, a mooted 750-line (720p) format (720 progressively scanned lines) was viewed by some at the ITU as an enhanced television format rather than a true HDTV format,[33] and so was not included, although 19201080i and 1280720p systems for a range of frame and field rates were defined by several US SMPTE standards.)[citation needed]
HDTV technology was introduced in the United States in the early 1990s and made official in 1993 by the Digital HDTV Grand Alliance, a group of television, electronic equipment, communications companies consisting of AT&T Bell Labs, General Instrument, Philips, Sarnoff, Thomson, Zenith and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Field testing of HDTV at 199 sites in the United States was completed August 14, 1994.[34] The first public HDTV broadcast in the United States occurred on July 23, 1996, when the Raleigh, North Carolina television station WRAL-HD began broadcasting from the existing tower of WRAL-TV southeast of Raleigh, winning a race to be first with the HD Model Station in Washington, D.C., which began broadcasting July 31, 1996 with the callsign WHD-TV, based out of the facilities of NBC owned and operated station WRC-TV.[35][36][37] The American Advanced Television Systems Committee (ATSC) HDTV system had its public launch on October 29, 1998, during the live coverage of astronaut John Glenn's return mission to space on board the Space Shuttle Discovery.[38] The signal was transmitted coast-to-coast, and was seen by the public in science centers, and other public theaters specially equipped to receive and display the broadcast.[38][39]
The first regular broadcasts started on January 1, 2004, when the Belgian company Euro1080 launched the HD1 channel with the traditional Vienna New Year's Concert. Test transmissions had been active since the IBC exhibition in September 2003, but the New Year's Day broadcast marked the official launch of the HD1 channel, and the official start of direct-to-home HDTV in Europe.[44]
Euro1080, a division of the former and now bankrupt Belgian TV services company Alfacam, broadcast HDTV channels to break the pan-European stalemate of "no HD broadcasts mean no HD TVs bought means no HD broadcasts ..." and kick-start HDTV interest in Europe.[45] The HD1 channel was initially free-to-air and mainly comprised sporting, dramatic, musical and other cultural events broadcast with a multi-lingual soundtrack on a rolling schedule of 4 or 5 hours per day.[citation needed] 2ff7e9595c
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