Laboratory Tests of Single Frequency Networks with ATSC on Commercial Receivers

This paper presents the results of laboratory tests simulating the reception in a Single Frequency Network (SFN) with ATSC on commercial receivers. The results of the commercial receivers are important because the viability of the SFNs with ATSC depends mainly of the performance of the receivers. Additionally, the basic implications of the results on the SFNs design are presented. Mexico officially adopted ATSC for Digital Terrestrial Television (DTT) service more than 10 years ago, but the analog transmissions stopped until December 31, 2015. The results of these tests can contribute to the planning of SFNs with ATSC. ATSC does not use OFDM modulation unlike others DTT systems. For this reason, the operation of a SFN with ATSC depends primarily on receiver equalizer capabilities. However, the performance of the receivers have improved over the years. The tests focus on the relationship between power and delay of the two signals received on the SFN, and the methodology includes the simulation of three reception environments: without multipath, outdoor reception and indoor reception.