rELLLnr t,ELE FEATURE :,BROREICRST PROJECT SPECIAL CORIPETITIO 091 REVIEW BIDS SUBS

ROGER BUNNEY, 35 GRAYLING MEAD, FISHLAKE, ROMSEY, HANTS 5051 7RU Satellite TV News

Satellite zapping football fans have Digital delays are small rack mounting units with easily experienced the year of their lives with adjustable time delay constants. That's what the ESPN lip World Cup football across the satellite sync test was about. belt, both analogue and digital continuing More sabre rattling in the Yugoslavian region once more on from through June into July - perhaps with conflict along the Albanian border, sufficient to engineer diluting the usual June offerings of warning flights by NATO jets over the nearby towns to show Wimbledon tennis and providing for many, their committment to use force to prevent further Albanian signals from the new Intelsat 801 @ 31.5°W. intrusion, pictures of the jets over -flying a local tciwn were If you're not a sports fan then there's been plenty to check carried - once more on Intelsat K- June 15 from the Athens, out though, for example the Rolling Stones 1st stop on their Greece bureau of Reuters. 'Bridges to Babylon' European tour at the Zeppelin Field, Roy Carman (Sandown, I°W) and others watched Sky Nuremberg, Germany, evening of June 13th. Intelsat K carried News and the BBC in action June 16/17/18th ex Boston, USA an evening live broadcast from the concert venue showing the and then back in the UK when Louise Woodward was released final preparations and promotional recordings taking place. and departed the 'States for home. Sky made extensive use of The latter recordings were played out into a live 45 minute PAS -3R @ 43°W for much of the evening and the following programme that detailed the backgrounds to the group, the morning with live reports on the hour, the return found the European tour and included two live numbers from the concert. BBC using Telecom 2D @ 5°W 111.606GHzV) for the Louise UK Unusual that the Intelsat K feed carried details that the return coverage. concert offering would be distributed across Europe via An interesting feed (PAS -3R, June 9, 12.705GHz H via New Eutelsat II F2@ 10°E - 11.633GHz horizontal, audio 6.6/7.2MHz. England Satellite) was seen prior to the Woodward return in An interesting programme and of course in traditional which a US lawyer commented on perceived irregularities analogue! with the Woodward fighting fund, a received but forged And another concert venue but less than wonderful invoice, personal use of the UK fighting fund money, etc. This weatherwise was Glastonbury and Monday morning 29th June was aired apparently via Sky News. found the UKI-149 SNG GMTV SNG unit offering a live report on Bradford, and SWM reader John Womersley says that Intelsat K from the Somerset festival site, shots of muddy tents, following a mention on the free -to -air horse racing for muddy event goers and more mud. The presenter commented Scandinavia via Sirius 5°E bird the pictures were lost in that June '98 wasn't the wettest encryption and now a CAM is required to resolve the digital June (yet!) on record as only 4in signals (CAM = Conditional Access Module). John also had fallen up to the 29th - June answered a query 'where is the Sainsbury supermarket stores '97 held a 100 year record for video feed carried', it's now digital on Eutelsat II F3 @ 16°E but SATELLITE precipitation. encrypted (more CAMS needed) at 11.128GHz horizontal. EONS GMTV is usually found on And a tip for digital box user/readers - Associated Press TV Intelsat K in the early UK on 13°E digital can be resolved now that PIDS are mornings with live feeds back to required...12.549GHz Hor/5632/3/4/ (v512/a650/f8190). the breakfast show studio, July Sports - tennis, football, gold, motorsport and for Dean 6/7th and our stalwart crew Rogers, an exciting month in Abbeywood, SE2! There was 2 387 231 aboard UKI-76 are found on the life other than football - including live golf - Womens 1 6968722 roadside at Drumcree, NI, caught European Tour, Evian Masters ex France carried on Telecom up in the Orangemens' march 2C, 3°E for Canal+ and Eurosport, golf too from the UK with confusion, the 7th and the SNG the live British Amateur Championships from Muirfield carried truck was trapped within the again on Telecom 2C for the BBC for motorsport the FIA immediate area as the deadlock World Rally Championships live from Greece in clear PAL via resulted in local road blocks. Eutelsat II F4 @ 7°E - but it was mainly World Cup football that Fig. 1: The UK SISLINK company offer OB uplinking Backtracking to World Cup dominated the sporting sky... from any remote site in Europe. Seen on Intelsat K football, the USA outgoing feed Both John Locker (Wirral) and Roy Carman (1°W) 21.5*W. June 27th via 21.5°W found the commented on the fantastic pictures from space with a recent ABC-ESPN engineer clapping his MIR/Challenger docking mission. John accessed the weak hands with an overlaid caption direct feed ex MIR to Altair -2@ 16°E - 10.1830GHz which was 'Lip Sync Test'. Problems cross strapped onto Intelsat 705 @ 18°W in C -Band (4GHz) for obviously that day en -route, to onwards transmission West to NASA. Meanwhile Roy picked minimise vision/picture sync up the return feed ex NASA Eastbound via Intelsat K. disturbance or loss the video path In last month's column I reported on sightings of the new usually passes through frame Nilesat bird @ 7°W. John caught a sight of the new THOR-3 stores at various points back to satellite coming up from the West and on test transmissions the distant studio centre. at 11.800GHz vertical June 18th and 11.727GHz vert. By now Each frame store 'loses' a the satellite will have located at 1°W for service into picture frame which on a Scandinavia. complicated circuit might have I've no idea how the Worldnet feed of the VOA -TV was three or four frame stores. This received by the target audience evening of June 26th, both results in the sound arriving early, the Serbian offering at 2100 and the 2130hrs Bosnian i.e. before the picture - to re -sync programmes were of the most appalling quality, severe signal the base band components it's fluctuation and the picture quality itself was over -exposed, necessary to insert audio delay to audio too was absent. Fig. Went caption for the American ESPN sporting match up the picture and sound The signal was carried via Eutelsat II F2 @ 10°E, network on Intelsat K once more. 11.153GHz horizontal - unless the dreadful technical standards

78 Short Wave Magazine, September 1998