Coding and transmission of HDTV at the STM-1 rate of SDH

An HDTV bit-rate-reduction codec that can encode an 1125-line/60 Hz HDTV signal at about 133 Mbit/s and transmit it at the STM-1 rate of 155.52 Mbit/s in the synchronous digital hierarchy (SDH) is presented. A hybrid DPCM/DCT coding scheme is employed, in which adaptive intrafield/interframe mode selection is performed only for low-frequency DCT coefficients. The codec hardware was implemented and transmission experiments were carried out for SDH transmission systems. From these experiments, it was confirmed that the codec can transmit HDTV at the STM-1 rate with picture quality that is satisfactory for HDTV distribution. Technical and operational feasibility was also confirmed.<>