Below are the published ATSC standards for ATSC digital television service, issued by the Advanced Television Systems Committee.

In 2004, the main ATSC standard was amended to support Enhanced ATSC (A/112); this transmission mode is backwardly compatible with the original 8-Bit Vestigal Sideband modulation scheme, but provides much better error correction.

ATSC-M/H for mobile TV has been approved and added to some stations, though it is known that it uses MPEG-4 instead of MPEG-2 for encoding, and behaves as an MPEG-4-encoded subchannel, inheriting 8VSB from the remainder of the channel.

ATSC 3.0

Main article: ATSC 3.0

ATSC 3.0 is a non-backwards-compatible version of ATSC being developed (as of May 18, 2016) that uses OFDM instead of 8VSB and a much newer video codec (instead of ATSC 1 and 2's MPEG-2).

On March 28, 2016, the Bootstrap component of ATSC 3.0 (System Discovery and Signalling) was upgraded from candidate standard to finalized standard.[1]

On May 4, 2016, the Audio Codec component of ATSC 3.0 was elevated to candidate standard, with two finalists remaining: Dolby AC-4[2] and MPEG-H Audio Alliance format from Fraunhofer IIS, Qualcomm and Technicolor SA.[3] A third entry from DTS named DTS:X (a successor to DTS-HD) was withdrawn before the standard was upgraded to candidate status.[4]

On September 8, 2016, the Physical Layer Download (OFDM) component of ATSC 3.0 was upgraded from candidate standard to finalized standard.[5]

On October 5, 2016, the Link Layer Protocol Standard (A/330) was elevated from Candidate to final standard, along with the Audio Watermark Emission Standard (A/334) and Video Watermark Emission Standard (A/335). ATSC Technology Group 3 (TG3) members have also begun voting on elevating the following Candidate Standards to Proposed Standard status (the final step before becoming an approved standard): Service Announcement (A/322), Service Usage Reporting (A/333) and Captions and Subtitles (A/343). TG3 members also are voting to elevate Security (A/360) to Candidate Standard status, joining Schedule and Studio-to-Transmitter Link Standard (A/324), which was recently elevated.[6] On March 30, 2016, A/324 (Schedule and Studio-to-Transmitter Link) was upgraded from Proposed to Candidate Standard.

On January 3, 2017, ATSC announced the updated status of its standards, in time for its debut at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas.[7] As a result, this update, Captions and Subtitles (A/343) was upgraded from Candidate to Finalized Standard; Security (A-360), Lab Performance Test Plan (A-325) and Field Test Plan (A-326) were upgraded to Candidate Standard from "Under Consideration".

By March 7, 2017, ATSC announced a further update to the status of its standards, with the following as Finalized: A/321 (System Discovery and Signaling); A/322 Physical Layer Protocl (COFDM); A/326 (Field Test Plan [Recommended Practice]); A/330 (Link Layer Protocol); A/333 (Service Usage Reporting); A/334 (Audio Watermark Emission); A/335 (Video Watermark Emission); A/336 (Content Recovery in Redistribution Scenarios [ATSC 3.0 over Cable and Satellite]); A/342 Part 1 (Audio Common Elements); A/342 Part 2 (Audio: Dolby AC-4 System); A/342 Part 3 (Audio MPEG-H System); and A/343 (Captions and Subtitles). The following are Proposed Standards: A/325 (Lab Performance Test Plan [Recommended Practice]); A/332 (Service Announcement); A/338 (Companion Device); A/341 (Video - H.265/HEVC). The following are Candidate Standards: A/300 (ATSC 3.0 System); A/324 (Scheduler/Studio-to-Transmitter Link); A/331 (Signalling, Delivery, Sync Error Protection); A/337 (Application Signalling); A/344 (Interactive Content); A/360 (Security and Service Protection). The following is a Draft Standard: A/323 (Physical Layer Uplink/Downlink).[8]

Structure/ATSC 3.0 System Layers[9]
  1. Bootstrap: System Discovery and Signalling
  2. Physical Layer: Transmission (OFDM)
  3. Link Layer Protocols: IP, MMT
  4. Presentation: Audio and Video standards (to be determined), Ultra HD with High Definition and standard-definition multicast, Immersive Audio
  5. Applications: Screen is a web page
Finalized Standards
Proposed Standards
Candidate Standards
Draft Standards
Under Consideration - Working Drafts and Recommended Practices

References

  1. ^ "First Element of ATSC 3.0 Approved for Standard". 28 March 2016.
  2. ^ "Next generation audio with Dolby AC-4".
  3. ^ "ATSC A/342 Audio Elevated to Candidate Standard". 4 May 2016.
  4. ^ "Advanced Television Systems Committee Begins Review of ATSC 3.0 Audio System Proposals". 10 March 2015.
  5. ^ "ATSC 3.0 Physical Layer Standard Approved". 8 September 2016.
  6. ^ "ATSC Approves More 3.0 Components". 5 October 2016.
  7. ^ a b "ATSC 3.0 Getting the Spotlight at CES 2017 | TvTechnology". www.tvtechnology.com. Archived from the original on 2017-01-04.
  8. ^ Whitaker, Jerry (2017-08-19). "A 'Tipping Point' for ATSC 3.0 Standards Development". Archived from the original on 2017-08-19. Retrieved 2021-08-05.
  9. ^ "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2016-10-04. Retrieved 2016-05-18.((cite web)): CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  10. ^ "ATSC 3.0: What will the "standard" look like?". 3 August 2015.
  11. ^ "A/341, ATSC Candidate Standard: Video - ATSC". atsc.org. Archived from the original on 2016-02-24.
  12. ^ "HPA 2016: ATSC 3.0 Update | TvTechnology". www.tvtechnology.com. Archived from the original on 2016-02-17.
  13. ^ "'Bootstrap' Proposed Standard TG3 Ballot Imminent; More ATSC 3.0 Candidate Standards in the Wings". February 2016.

External links

Digital television in North America
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