MPEG coding of TV and HDTV for an integrated satellite, cable and terrestrial broadcast system

In the German collaborative project "hierarchical digital television transmission-HDTVT" an integrated broadcast system for TV and HDTV over satellite, cable and terrestrial channels is going to be developed. Compatible TV/HDTV transmission for portable reception of TV and fixed reception of HDTV as well as "graceful degradation" lead to the choice of scalable source coding. Combined with the hierarchical approach of channel coding and modulation, bit rates of about 6 Mbit/s for TV and of about 24 Mbit/s for HDTV are available in a terrestrial 8 MHz channel. After a review of the system the results of subjective tests are presented.