Europe goes HD
HDTV has been creeping into Europe for a while and some countries are already enjoying the delights of 720p and 1080i programming while we sit tight and anxiously wait for Sky, Telewest and the Beeb to start rolling out our high def signals. I’m going to dust off my long forgotten language skills (so please feel free to point out any errors) to round-up how the rest of Europe is doing in the transition to high definition telly and where the FIFA World Cup 2006 is going to be shown in the improved format. Then if the worst comes to the worst we'll know which plane to hop on to find a bar where the games will be shown in all their high def glory.
Germany is probably the furthest on in the development of HDTV and helped along no doubt by the approaching World Cup which, as you are no doubt well aware, they are hosting. Lucky viewers get a choice of HD Broadcasts on the Astra satellite including the subscription Premiere, on which all 64 World Cup matches are being shown, as well as the free-to-air Prosieben/Sat.1.
Our closest neighbour, France, was interestingly one of the last countries to take up digital terrestrial TV but this hasn’t held back the progress of high definition. Main TV networks M6 and TF1 began testing HD signals last year and satellite broadcaster TPS (Télévision Par Satellite), similar to Britain's Sky, looks set to push out HD packages this month.
Spain’s Digital+ satellite service carried out HD trials in June last year but I can’t find any indication of plans to roll it out full time yet. That is coupled with a channel line up that doesn’t look like it will boast the World Cup in HD which is a bit unfortunate. I expect that Digital+’s Real Madrid and Barca channels will be looking to go HD at some point though.
It looks like cable is the delivery means of choice in The Netherlands and Samsung has been hyping a special receiver in line with the World Cup HD transmissions that will be available from Dutch cable companies Essent Kabelcom and Casema. Another recent partnership between Philips and cable company UPC will also mean more HDTV options sometime later in the year.
In Sweden, HD satellite transmissions have already been tested and broadcaster SVT did announce back in September that the World Cup would be show in high definition. Also quite intriguing is Sweden’s progress towards IP HDTV which is possible due to the vastly improved broadband internet services available over there, some of which make our 8 Meg connections look achingly slow.
Also don’t forget Belgium’s Euro1080 channel which is probably one of the longest running HD providers in Europe . It is available to most of northern Europe on the Astra satellite but you will need to buy Conditional Access Card to view it. Unfortunately it isn’t showing the World Cup but there are going to be Winter Olympics from Torino shown in March.
Isn't it great to know that, when Sky starts its HD service, it looks to be the most comprehensive in Europe, further enhanced by the BBC trial?
Posted by: Mark Heath | February 21, 2006 5:22 PM