Euro1080 was the first commercial broadcaster in Europe to broadcast full-time high-definition television (HDTV) content. It was founded by Gabriel Fehervari in 2004 and is owned by Alfacam, of which declared bankrupt in 2013.
The name originates from the 1080 lines of vertical resolution in the signal broadcast, which is 1080i50 - 1920 x 1080 at an interlaced frame rate of 50Hz. The signal uses Dolby Digital 5.1 sound.
The headquarters and studios are located in Belgium at the Eurocam Media Center. The parent company of Euro1080 is the Belgium-based Alfacam Group.
Euro1080 began broadcasting on 1 January 2004 from the Astra 1H satellite at 19.2° east and was free to air during its first few months. Thereafter, a €200 conditional access card was required to watch the flagship channel HD1.
In addition to HD1, whose content is primarily HDTV showcasing for regular users, a second channel was soon created, HD2 focusing on live and recorded HDTV broadcasts of special event for selected theatres. Euro1080 currently broadcasts HD1 and HD3 on the following satellite:
Eutelsat W3A at 7°E, 10.880MHz, DVB-S2, QPSK, Symbol rate 13.333Mbit/s, Vertical, FEC 4/5, MPEG4.
It is also possible to receive it from a growing number of cable operators.
Two channels have been temporarily removed recently:[when?]
HD2 (previously HDevents or Hde): broadcasts premium events in pay-per-view.
HD5 (timesharing with HD2): promotional channel, broadcasting a six-minute informative video about HDTV and what Euro1080 is, as well a brief glimpse of the previous day's footage.
A new channel was launched in 2008:
HD3: Culture with music. (HD1 then became a sports channel.)
In October 2005, HD1 and HD2 simulcast in both MPEG-4 and MPEG-2. This dual encoding lasted until 2007.
Telenet, the main cable operator in Flanders, confirmed as part of its launch announcement of "Telenet Digital TV" on 16 June 2005 that it would sell HDTV set-top-boxes from June 2006.
Since July 2005, the cable operator Integan has broadcast HDTV in the outskirts of the city of Antwerp, in partnership with Euro1080.
On 1 October 2006 Euro1080 started a new digital culture channel named EXQI. The first target audience was the Flemish and Dutch market, but the channel has expansion plans to more than 10 channels for the major European countries.
On 7 January 2007 Euro1080 switched to MPEG-4 AVC for its satellite broadcasts. MPEG-2 broadcasts for HD1 were switched off on 1 January 2008.
Digital television (DTV) is the transmission of television signals using digital encoding, in contrast to the earlier analog television technology which used analog signals. At the time of its development it was considered an innovative advancement and represented the first significant evolution in television technology since color television in the 1950s. Modern digital television is transmitted in high-definition television (HDTV) with greater resolution than analog TV. It typically uses a widescreen aspect ratio in contrast to the narrower format (4:3) of analog TV. It makes more economical use of scarce radio spectrum space; it can transmit up to seven channels in the same bandwidth as a single analog channel, and provides many new features that analog television cannot. A transition from analog to digital broadcasting began around 2000. Different digital television broadcasting standards have been adopted in different parts of the world; below are the more widely used standards:
Digital Video Broadcasting (DVB) is a set of international open standards for digital television. DVB standards are maintained by the DVB Project, an international industry consortium, and are published by a Joint Technical Committee (JTC) of the European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI), European Committee for Electrotechnical Standardization (CENELEC) and European Broadcasting Union (EBU).
Advanced Television Systems Committee (ATSC) standards are an International set of standards for broadcast and digital television transmission over terrestrial, cable and satellite networks. It is largely a replacement for the analog NTSC standard and, like that standard, is used mostly in the United States, Mexico, Canada, South Korea and Trinidad & Tobago. Several former NTSC users, such as Japan, have not used ATSC during their digital television transition, because they adopted other systems such as ISDB developed by Japan, and DVB developed in Europe, for example.
A digital video recorder (DVR) is an electronic device that records video in a digital format to a disk drive, USB flash drive, SD memory card, SSD or other local or networked mass storage device. The term includes set-top boxes (STB) with direct to disk recording, portable media players and TV gateways with recording capability, and digital camcorders. Personal computers are often connected to video capture devices and used as DVRs; in such cases the application software used to record video is an integral part of the DVR. Many DVRs are classified as consumer electronic devices; such devices may alternatively be referred to as personal video recorders (PVRs), particularly in Canada. Similar small devices with built-in displays and SSD support may be used for professional film or video production, as these recorders often do not have the limitations that built-in recorders in cameras have, offering wider codec support, the removal of recording time limitations and higher bitrates.
Broadcasttelevision systems are the encoding or formatting systems for the transmission and reception of terrestrial television signals.
PALplus is an analogue television broadcasting system aimed to improve and enhance the PAL format by allowing 16:9 aspect ratio broadcasts, while remaining compatible with existing television receivers, defined by International Telecommunication Union (ITU) recommendation BT.1197-1. Introduced in 1993, it followed experiences with the HD-MAC and D2-MAC, hybrid analogue-digital widescreen formats that were incompatible with PAL receivers. It was developed at the University of Dortmund in Germany, in cooperation with German terrestrial broadcasters and European and Japanese manufacturers. The system had some adoption across Europe during the late 1990s and helped introduce widescreen TVs in the market, but never became mainstream.
Digital Video Broadcasting - Satellite - Second Generation (DVB-S2) is a digital television broadcast standard that has been designed as a successor for the popular DVB-S system. It was developed in 2003 by the Digital Video Broadcasting Project, an international industry consortium, and ratified by ETSI in March 2005. The standard is based on, and improves upon DVB-S and the electronic news-gathering system, used by mobile units for sending sounds and images from remote locations worldwide back to their home television stations.
1080p is a set of HDTV high-definition video modes characterized by 1,920 pixels displayed across the screen horizontally and 1,080 pixels down the screen vertically; the p stands for progressive scan, i.e. non-interlaced. The term usually assumes a widescreen aspect ratio of 16:9, implying a resolution of 2.1 megapixels. It is often marketed as Full HD or FHD, to contrast 1080p with 720p resolution screens. Although 1080p is sometimes referred to as 2K resolution, other sources differentiate between 1080p and (true) 2K resolution.
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DVB-T2 is an abbreviation for "Digital Video Broadcasting – Second Generation Terrestrial"; it is the extension of the television standard DVB-T, issued by the consortium DVB, devised for the broadcast transmission of digital terrestrial television. DVB has been standardized by ETSI.
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A free-to-air or FTA Receiver is a satellite television receiver designed to receive unencrypted broadcasts. Modern decoders are typically compliant with the MPEG-2/DVB-S and more recently the MPEG-4/DVB-S2 standard for digital television, while older FTA receivers relied on analog satellite transmissions which have declined rapidly in recent years.
Television in France was introduced in 1931, when the first experimental broadcasts began. Colour television was introduced in October 1967 on La Deuxième Chaîne.
Television in Belgium was introduced in 1953 and began with one channel each in Dutch and French. The country is heavily cabled, with 93% of households watching television through cable as of 2003.
High-definition television (HDTV) describes a television or video system which provides a substantially higher image resolution than the previous generation of technologies. The term has been used since at least 1933; in more recent times, it refers to the generation following standard-definition television (SDTV). It is currently the standard video format used in most broadcasts: terrestrial broadcast television, cable television, satellite television.
GS Group is the largest Russian developer and producer of set-top boxes for television. Since 1991 company has been conducting systematic research and development work and producing radio electronic equipment. Company products and technology concepts are used in satellite broadcasting projects NTV-PLUS, Tricolor TV, Platform HD etc. Total number of TV subscribers using set-top boxes produced by the Corporation in Russian Federation exceeds 7 million. In 2007 General Satellite became the main investor of the integral innovation project: "Technopolis GS: scientific and technological development territory", which is implemented in Gusev town, Kaliningrad Region. It was a major contractor for NTV-PLUS company in 90s in Russia.
The VTC Digital Television Network, also known as VTC Digital Television or Vietnam Digital Television Network is the Vietnamese television network currently owned by Radio the Voice of Vietnam (VOV). Launched on 19 August 2004, it is the second national television network in Vietnam, and the first television provider to broadcast via digital terrestrial network.
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