Field trials of an MPEG2 distributed single frequency network

The digital terrestrial television standard approved by the European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI) is based upon the work of the Digital Video Broadcasting group (DVB). This standard using coded orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (COFDM) facilitates the establishment of single frequency networks (SFN). The first MPEG2 distributed SFN was established by RTE and other partners of the European Commission sponsored project VALIDATE (Verification and Launch of Integrated Digital Advanced Television in Europe) in Ireland. This paper describes the network established and details some of the measurements performed. Two co-channel UHF transmitters were synchronised using the MPEG2 megaframe identification packet (MIP). A 155 Mbit/sec STM-1 microwave link system was used for signal distribution.