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Internationalization of the Japanese Digital Terrestrial Television Broadcasting System, ISDB-T from Development of the Transmission System to Its Adoption in Brazil

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Internationalization of the Japanese Digital Terrestrial Television Broadcasting System, ISDB-T from Development of the Transmission System to Its Adoption in Brazil Internationalization of the Japanese Digital Terrestrial Television Broadcasting System, ISDB-T From development of the transmission system to its adoption in Brazil On June 29, 2006, the Brazilian government announced that it had chosen to use a digital terrestrial television broadcasting system based on Japanese Integrated Services Digital Broadcasting - Terrestrial (ISDB-T). This is the first time that the ISDB-T system had been chosen for Digital Terrestrial Television outside of Japan. The Brazilian government cited several reasons for choosing ISDB-T, including technical superiority, system flexibility, and promotional activities. This paper describes the development and standardization of ISDB-T in Japan and in ITU-R, as well as activities to promote the system internationally. We had thought that a multipath-proof technique would be necessary, from experience with terrestrial digital transmissions such as TELETEXT and FM multiplex broadcasting. Hence, we began studying orthogonal frequency division multiplex (OFDM) at the end of 1980's. This effort led to BST-OFDM (Band Segmented Transmission - OFDM), which is a major feature of ISDB-T. Since 1997, NHK Labs. and DTV-Lab. Co. had been studying a transmission system for digital terrestrial television broadcasting (DTTB). We jointly proposed the transmission system as a DTTB system to ARIB. The system was approved as the Japanese DTTB system in May, 1999. NHK Labs has also been working on setting international standards in ITU-R. Since 1992, we have contributed documents for DTTB to ITU-R. ISDB-T was approved as an ITU-R recommended system for DTTB in 2000. The Digital Broadcasting Experts Group (DiBEG) was established in 1997 as an organization for international promotion of ISDB-T. Japan and Brazil have deepened their relationship over the course of time, Brazil carried out tests comparing three different DTTB systems in 2000, and they fairly evaluated the systems. Brazil recognized technical excellence and system flexibility of ISDB-T, and it eventually adopted an ISDB-T based system as its DTTB standard. 1. Introduction overseas, its expansion to over 32.3 million installed On June 29, 2006, the government of Brazil announced receivers (as of Feb., 2008), and its steady progress toward that it would adopt a system based on the Japanese the goal of complete digitalization of Japanese television system, ISDB-T, as the country's digital terrestrial in 2011. television broadcasting system. This was the first time the Japanese system was used as the basis for a system outside of Japan. Brazil planned to begin digital 2. Development of the ISDB-T system terrestrial broadcasting in December of 2007 and is 2.1 TELETEXT and FM multiplexing broadcasting currently introducing the latest technology and NHK Science and Technical Research Laboratories proceeding with preparations. (NHK STRL) carried out research and development from There are three international standards for digital the 1970's into the mid-1980's on how to multiplex text terrestrial broadcasting system: ATSC proposed by the with television broadcasts so that analog television could USA, DVB-T in Europe, and ISDB-T in Japan; and there be viewed with subtitles. These systems were forerunners was fierce competition among the three leading up to to digital broadcasting, with text information sent as Brazil's decision. There are various possible reasons that digital 0's and 1's. At this time, researchers noticed that the Japanese system was chosen, but the most important although the digital signal was robust with respect to were probably the technical advantages and promotional noise, it was weak with respect to certain types of efforts. distortion such as ghost interference. In this article we will look back over the domestic Then, from the mid-1980's, they began researching development of this digital terrestrial broadcasting system transmission system, called FM multiplexing in Japan, its internationalization and promotional efforts broadcasting, which sent text, graphics and traffic 2 Broadcast Technology no.33, Winter 2008 C NHK STRL Feature information by multiplexing a digital signal over the FM- and geographical features, impulse noise from radio stereo base-band signal. This resulted in the automobiles, and fading distortion from fluctuations in broadcast system that is currently used for traffic the received signal level. Even though digital information system (VICS) in car-navigation products. broadcasting is robust with respect to noise, the Over half of all FM radios were portable or in experience gained in research and development of automobiles, and these mobile radios naturally needed to TELETEXT and FM multiplexing broadcasting made it be capable of receiving the FM multiplexing clear that new technology tolerant to these types of broadcasting. However, mobile-receiver antennas have distortion would be needed for digital terrestrial low antenna gain compared with fixed home receivers, broadcasting. OFDM research began as one possible such and other issues including significant fading distortion technology. made it very difficult for them to receive the multiplexed The principles of OFDM had been known since the signal. 1960's, but it had not yet been implemented practically. Both TELETEXT and FM multiplexing broadcasting use Prompted by the use of OFDM for Digital Audio transmission techniques which multiplex a digital signal Broadcasting (DAB) in Europe in the 1980's, STRL began over an analog broadcast signal, and the development of real research into OFDM. Although OFDM is susceptible ISDB-T was built on the experience of developing these to non-linear distortion, it is robust against multi-path technologies. distortion, and because the modulation method allows relay broadcasting on the same frequency, it also 2.2 Integrated Services Digital Broadcasting (ISDB) contributes to efficient use of bandwidth. Furthermore, Proposal when combined with time interleaving, it is excellent for STRL published a document outlining the Integrated portable and mobile reception, making it an excellent Services Digital Broadcasting (ISDB) concept as a vision modulation technique overall. for digital broadcasting from the 80's forward. ISDB So, computational simulations were begun in the late provides high quality, performance, flexibility and 1980's, prototype specifications were written starting in extensibility in a broadcasting service by transmitting 1990, and development of prototype OFDM devices video, sound and other data as a digital signal in a began. A prototype DQPSK-OFDM device was built first unified format. It also attempts to create a common (Figure 1), followed by multi-level OFDM prototypes service across different media, whether satellite, cable or including 16QAM-OFDM and 64QAM-OFDM, as the terrestrial transmission. rounds of testing progressed. In the 1990's, new, high-performance encoding Research into multi-level OFDM, like 64QAM, was technologies for video and sound were being developed needed for transmission of High Definition TV programs around the world created new possibilities. What began in the 6 MHz band. Also at the time, related experiments as an attempt to add new functionality by multiplexing a digital signal with a predominantly video and sound analog signal grew into genuine ISDB research: broadcasting a fully-digital, integrated signal. Since the development of TELETEXT broadcasting, designs for data communications had become standardized based on the seven-layer Open Systems Interconnection (OSI) model established by the International Standards Organization (ISO). Following Figure 1: The first OFDM Modem for digital this trend, research progressed toward the unification of terrestrial broadcasting in Japan (1992) standards common across all media, such as encoding methods, and standardizing characteristics that differ across transport media, such as the physical layer, on a per-medium basis. 2.3 The beginning of digital terrestrial broadcasting research Research of a digital terrestrial broadcasting system at STRL began in the latter half of the 80's. In contrast to satellite or cable transmission, digital terrestrial signals are affected by various types of distortion, including Figure 2: Early mobile reception multi-path distortion due to reflections from buildings experiments (1993) Broadcast Technology no.33, Winter 2008 C NHK STRL 3 on clock regeneration, frequency synchronization, frame problem (Figure 3). This technology broadcasts a wide- synchronization, interference with analog broadcasts and band signal by splitting it into several narrower bands for Single Frequency Network (SFN) were done to determine transmission. However, new technology soon made it the most promising transmission method. possible to change the channel of an analog broadcast Then, in 1993, STRL received the first license for an (analog-to-analog conversion) and thus secure the experimental station using OFDM modulator in Japan, bandwidth needed for digital terrestrial broadcasting, so installed a transmitting antenna on the STRL roof and the need to split up the digital signal for transmission began open-air field test with fixed and mobile receivers diminished. Instead, a modulation method was adopted (Figure 2). with a digital signal transmitted in the 6 MHz band, dividing the signal into several segments, and allowing 2.4 BST-OFDM Research the modulation method to be configured separately for Analog terrestrial broadcasting in Japan is a general, each segment. This resulted in ISDB-T,
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