Satellite operator SES, together with its partners Harmonic and Broadcom Corporation, pioneer the first Ultra HD transmission in the new HEVC standard live from an ASTRA satellite at 19.2 degrees East. The HEVC standard features an up to 50% encoding efficiency improvement, compared to previous test broadcasts in MPEG-4 AVC (H.264).
“HEVC is the catalyst that will drive UltraHD television with its telepresence-like resolution to consumers.”
The end-to-end demonstration (presented at the SES Industry Days in Luxembourg) used Harmonic’s ProMedia Xpress and a HEVC decoder reference-design system based on Broadcom’s BCM7445 device for receiving HEVC encoded Ultra-HD television transmission. The signal was broadcast in DVB-S2 using a data rate of 20 Mbit/s.
The live demonstration for the first time broadcasts a full 3840x2160 pixel Ultra HD picture in HEVC, while previous demonstrations were either broadcast in H.264 or using 4 HD pictures in parallel.
Thomas Wrede, VP Reception Systems, SES, says: “...We are convinced that the HEVC standard will become the option of choice for TV operators broadcasting Ultra HD content and expect the industry to develop prototype Ultra HD receivers in the coming months...”
SES reaches 276 million homes worldwide and transmits more than 1400 HD TV channels – that’s 28% of all HD TV channels broadcast via satellite worldwide. For those analysts arguing that Ultra HD will fail due to lack of content, SES has just demonstrated the support of broadcasters to enable Ultra HD.
