Development of a prototype system for digital terrestrial HDTV

The Nordic HD-DIVINE (digital video narrowband emission) project has developed a prototype system for digital terrestrial HDTV, comprising an HDTV image codec, which compresses an HDTV signal down to 24 Mbit/s, and a radio modem based on the COFDM (coded orthogonal FDM) principle. The HDTV codec uses a very advanced method for the estimation and compression of motion vectors, and is optimised especially for the very low data transmission speed of 24 Mbit/s. The radio modem was developed especially to tolerate terrestrial channel reflections and PAL interference. With its prototype system, the HD-DIVINE project hopes to be the first to demonstrate digital terrestrial HDTV outside the USA, and the first in the world to use a modulation system based on COFDM in such a demonstration