The History of Advanced Television in the United States
Nov. 1987 The FCC creates an Advisory Committee on Advanced Television Service (ACATS)
to assist the agency in the establishment of a new video standards for the
United States.
Initially some 23 Advanced Television proposals are presented to the
committee all of which feature analog transmission.
Through proponent mergers and attrition this number is soon reduced to a
handful.
June 1988 A coalition of broadcasters form the Advanced Television Test Center (ATTC)
to perform unbiased testing of the various advanced television systems in
both the field and in laboratory conditions. The Center's funding is provided
by its membership.
March 1990 The FCC announces preference for simulcast broadcasting and challenges the
contenders to deliver HDTV in a single 6 MHz broadcast channel.
June 1990 One of the remaining proponents -- General Instrument Corporation modifies
its proposal to incorporate all-digital transmission.
Three of the four remaining HDTV systems quickly adopt this tecnological
advance with only Nippon Hoso Kyokai (NHK) retaining its original analog
transmission.
1991--92 All five systems are subjected to an exacting program of laboratory testing.
Feb. 1993 Advisory committee approves release of the report on testing and data
analysis on the five HDTV systems.
Based on these tests, the committee decides that the four digital systems
have spectrum utilization characteristics far superior to the NHK proposal
which is thereafter eliminated.
All four digital systems have technical short comings that require further
development.
The Advisory committee gives the proponents a critical choice, to undergo a
second (and expensive) round of testing focussing on technical improvements
that each system has proposed or to merge their efforts in a single unified
system.
May 1993 With support and encouragement for talks between the proponents by the
Advisory committee results in the formation of the Grand Alliance (GA).
The members of the GA are AT&T, General Instrument Corporation, Massachusetts
Institute of Technology (MIT), Philips Electronics North America Corporation,
David Sarnoff Research Center, Thomson Consumer Electronics, and Zenith
Electronics Corporation.
The Advisory committee establishes a ``Technical Subgroup'' and describes it
to work with the Alliance, optimize its proposal, and generate agreement on
specifications for a prototype system. Thereafter, the committee would
supervise the construction and testing of that system and -- if all went well
-- recommend it to the FCC.
After discussions between ``experts groups'' formed within the Technical
subgroup and the Alliance over a number of months, a modified (and
considerably enhanced) system proposal is developed.
Oct. 1993 The propopsal is approved for construction by the Advisory committee. However,
approval of one element, the modulation subsystem is deferred until early 1994.
March 1994 Tests conducted at the ATTC results in the selection of 8-VSB as the
transmission standard.
1994 The GA system is constructed. AT&T and General Instrument jointly build the
video encoder. Philips constructs the video decoder. Sarnoff and Thomoson
cooperate in building the transport subsystem, and Zenith builds the modulat-
ion subsystem.
March 1995 System integration of the full prototype implementing the GA HDTV standard is
completed. The system is delivered for testing to the FCC.
1995-96 Laboratory testing of the HDTV system is conducted at the ATTC in Alexandria,
Va., followed by field testing at Charlotte.
The proposed standard is submitted for final certification to the FCC.
The proposed HDTV standard is approved by the FCC-ACATS.
Congressional approval is given for the new GA-HDTV standard for the United
States.
A comments period is set aside by the FCC before officially adopting the new
standard.