Digital television radio
Encyclopedia
Digital-television radio, DTV radio, or DTR is an informal term which describes the music
channels that are provided with a digital television
service. In terms of price and musical variety, DTR falls somewhere between regular AM
or FM
radio
, and satellite radio
. However, because it is delivered through a digital signal, the actual sound quality is, in theory, equal to satellite radio.
DTR cannot be purchased as a service on its own. To obtain it, one must subscribe to a digital television service, typically satellite television
or digital cable
; in some places, digital terrestrial television
also carries it. DTR music channels are usually provided as part of the "basic" television subscription service or package.
, DirecTV
offers up to 84 channels of Sonic Tap
, and Dish Network
offers 95 channels, 65 provided by Sirius Satellite Radio
, and 30 to 60 (depending on type of subscription) from Muzak for residential subscribers.
Music Choice
offers nearly 50 channels, which all fit on a single ATSC
digital cable
TV channel through multiplexing
. This includes still TV graphics which are sent at a very low I-frame rate
to identify the station and song, and give more info about the artist
. This is about four times as many standard-rate SDTV channels as can normally fit on such a channel. It also differs from former cable radio
in that it can be watched on the TV, without having to be connected to an FM radio
with an external antenna
input. CRN Digital Talk Radio Networks offers seven channels, all broadcasting talk radio
.
In Canada
, Bell TV and Vidéotron
offer 45 channels provided by Galaxie, while Shaw Direct, Shaw Digital Cable and Rogers Digital Cable each offer 40 music channels: 20 provided by Max Trax, the other 20 provided by Galaxie
. In many markets, Rogers Cable
also provides digital cable feeds of most local AM and FM radio stations; Rogers no longer offers the older type of cable FM service formerly required by the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC). Persona offers 39 channels from Galaxie and Maxtrax.
In the United Kingdom
, digital television radio from satellite is received mainly by Sky Television
customers, as part of their satellite television service, however other equipment is available to receive many of the non subscription radio and TV channels free. , there were approximately 90 radio stations on the Sky Digital service. Around 40 channels are available on the digital terrestrial television
service, free of charge
using the Freeview service.
In Australia
, stations of federal-government-funded television networks ABC and SBS
broadcast multiple music channels alongside their digital TV services. These stations are non-commercial, each featuring specific types of music such as jazz
, blues
or classical, with the SBS channels featuring foreign and ethnic programming, which are not normally played on commercial radio.
Some cable and satellite television
providers also simulcast
local AM and FM radio station
s along with their DTR bundles.
In rare cases, digital TV broadcasters have included the audio of a commonly-owned
broadcast radio station
among their subchannel offerings (for instance, KCSM-TV
in San Mateo, California
broadcasts KCSM FM on its DT3 signal). WANN-LD in Atlanta
offers six radio stations owned by Clear Channel Communications
, in addition to ten TV channels. This type of service is known as DTV radio.
Non-broadcast content, subscription TV channels or datacasting
operations unrelated to the main TV programming are also permitted by the DTV standards but are less-commonly used. USDTV
was an over-the-air pay TV
service that used H.264 compression instead of standard MPEG-2
. Mobile DTV now uses MPEG-4
compression, which like H.264 yields a much lower bitrate
for the same video quality
.
s electricity
and reduces the lamp life of the backlight
), and uses television speaker
s which are fairly limited in sound quality
. Therefore, the recommended setup is to connect the audio outputs of the television set-top box
directly to a stereo
system. Set-top boxes typically have an extra set of audio outputs to facilitate this. Also, as a song is playing, additional information
such as the song title, artist and album typically appear on the television screen. In the case of U.S. direct-broadcast satellite companies, this is text displayed by the box itself, rather than graphics generated at the headend.
Music
Music is an art form whose medium is sound and silence. Its common elements are pitch , rhythm , dynamics, and the sonic qualities of timbre and texture...
channels that are provided with a digital television
Digital television
Digital television is the transmission of audio and video by digital signals, in contrast to the analog signals used by analog TV...
service. In terms of price and musical variety, DTR falls somewhere between regular AM
AM broadcasting
AM broadcasting is the process of radio broadcasting using amplitude modulation. AM was the first method of impressing sound on a radio signal and is still widely used today. Commercial and public AM broadcasting is carried out in the medium wave band world wide, and on long wave and short wave...
or FM
FM broadcasting
FM broadcasting is a broadcasting technology pioneered by Edwin Howard Armstrong which uses frequency modulation to provide high-fidelity sound over broadcast radio. The term "FM band" describes the "frequency band in which FM is used for broadcasting"...
radio
Radio
Radio is the transmission of signals through free space by modulation of electromagnetic waves with frequencies below those of visible light. Electromagnetic radiation travels by means of oscillating electromagnetic fields that pass through the air and the vacuum of space...
, and satellite radio
Satellite radio
Satellite radio is an analogue or digital radio signal that is relayed through one or more satellites and thus can be received in a much wider geographical area than terrestrial FM radio stations...
. However, because it is delivered through a digital signal, the actual sound quality is, in theory, equal to satellite radio.
DTR cannot be purchased as a service on its own. To obtain it, one must subscribe to a digital television service, typically satellite television
Satellite television
Satellite television is television programming delivered by the means of communications satellite and received by an outdoor antenna, usually a parabolic mirror generally referred to as a satellite dish, and as far as household usage is concerned, a satellite receiver either in the form of an...
or digital cable
Digital cable
Digital cable is a generic term for any type of cable television distribution using digital video compression or distribution. The technology was originally developed by Motorola.-Background:...
; in some places, digital terrestrial television
Digital terrestrial television
Digital terrestrial television is the technological evolution of broadcast television and advance from analog television, which broadcasts land-based signals...
also carries it. DTR music channels are usually provided as part of the "basic" television subscription service or package.
Number of channels
The number of music channels offered varies with each service provider. In the United StatesUnited States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
, DirecTV
DirecTV
DirecTV is an American direct broadcast satellite service provider and broadcaster based in El Segundo, California. Its satellite service, launched on June 17, 1994, transmits digital satellite television and audio to households in the United States, Latin America, and the Anglophone Caribbean. ...
offers up to 84 channels of Sonic Tap
DMX (music)
DMX is a "multi-sensory" branding agency based in Austin, Texas. DMX also provides music for cable and satellite television networks worldwide, including DirecTV.-History:...
, and Dish Network
Dish Network
Dish Network Corporation is the second largest pay TV provider in the United States, providing direct broadcast satellite service—including satellite television, audio programming, and interactive television services—to 14.337 million commercial and residential customers in the United States. Dish...
offers 95 channels, 65 provided by Sirius Satellite Radio
Sirius Satellite Radio
Sirius Satellite Radio is a satellite radio service operating in North America, owned by Sirius XM Radio.Headquartered in New York City, with smaller studios in Los Angeles and Memphis, Sirius was officially launched on July 1, 2002 and currently provides 69 streams of music and 65 streams of...
, and 30 to 60 (depending on type of subscription) from Muzak for residential subscribers.
Music Choice
Music Choice
Music Choice is a United States company that programs music and produces music-related content for digital cable, cell phones, and cable modem subscribers in the US. Music Choice programs dozens of audio music channels for digital cable subscribers, as well as programs and produces music-related...
offers nearly 50 channels, which all fit on a single ATSC
ATSC
ATSC standards are a set of standards developed by the Advanced Television Systems Committee for digital television transmission over terrestrial, cable, and satellite networks....
digital cable
Digital cable
Digital cable is a generic term for any type of cable television distribution using digital video compression or distribution. The technology was originally developed by Motorola.-Background:...
TV channel through multiplexing
Multiplexing
The multiplexed signal is transmitted over a communication channel, which may be a physical transmission medium. The multiplexing divides the capacity of the low-level communication channel into several higher-level logical channels, one for each message signal or data stream to be transferred...
. This includes still TV graphics which are sent at a very low I-frame rate
Frame rate
Frame rate is the frequency at which an imaging device produces unique consecutive images called frames. The term applies equally well to computer graphics, video cameras, film cameras, and motion capture systems...
to identify the station and song, and give more info about the artist
Musician
A musician is an artist who plays a musical instrument. It may or may not be the person's profession. Musicians can be classified by their roles in performing music and writing music.Also....* A person who makes music a profession....
. This is about four times as many standard-rate SDTV channels as can normally fit on such a channel. It also differs from former cable radio
Cable radio
Cable radio or cable FM is a concept similar to that of cable television, bringing radio signals into homes and businesses via coaxial cable. It is generally used as cable TV was in its early days when it was "community antenna television", to enhance the quality of terrestrial radio signals that...
in that it can be watched on the TV, without having to be connected to an FM radio
FM broadcasting
FM broadcasting is a broadcasting technology pioneered by Edwin Howard Armstrong which uses frequency modulation to provide high-fidelity sound over broadcast radio. The term "FM band" describes the "frequency band in which FM is used for broadcasting"...
with an external antenna
Antenna (radio)
An antenna is an electrical device which converts electric currents into radio waves, and vice versa. It is usually used with a radio transmitter or radio receiver...
input. CRN Digital Talk Radio Networks offers seven channels, all broadcasting talk radio
Talk radio
Talk radio is a radio format containing discussion about topical issues. Most shows are regularly hosted by a single individual, and often feature interviews with a number of different guests. Talk radio typically includes an element of listener participation, usually by broadcasting live...
.
In Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
, Bell TV and Vidéotron
Vidéotron
Vidéotron GP is a Canadian integrated telecommunications company active in cable television, interactive multimedia development, video on demand, cable telephony, wireless communication and Internet access services. Currently, the company primarily serves Quebec, as well as the francophone...
offer 45 channels provided by Galaxie, while Shaw Direct, Shaw Digital Cable and Rogers Digital Cable each offer 40 music channels: 20 provided by Max Trax, the other 20 provided by Galaxie
Galaxie
Galaxie is a Canadian multilingual digital pay television audio service owned by Stingray Digital.-Programming:Galaxie consists of 49 commercial-free music based audio channels, each devoted to a particular genre, distributed through digital television platforms. Each channel consists of a...
. In many markets, Rogers Cable
Rogers Cable
Rogers Cable Inc., a subsidiary of Rogers Communications Inc., is Canada's largest cable television service provider with about 2.25 million television customers, and over 930,000 Internet subscribers, in Manitoba, Southern & Eastern Ontario, New Brunswick and Newfoundland and Labrador.The...
also provides digital cable feeds of most local AM and FM radio stations; Rogers no longer offers the older type of cable FM service formerly required by the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC). Persona offers 39 channels from Galaxie and Maxtrax.
In the United Kingdom
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
, digital television radio from satellite is received mainly by Sky Television
British Sky Broadcasting
British Sky Broadcasting Group plc is a satellite broadcasting, broadband and telephony services company headquartered in London, United Kingdom, with operations in the United Kingdom and the Ireland....
customers, as part of their satellite television service, however other equipment is available to receive many of the non subscription radio and TV channels free. , there were approximately 90 radio stations on the Sky Digital service. Around 40 channels are available on the digital terrestrial television
Digital terrestrial television
Digital terrestrial television is the technological evolution of broadcast television and advance from analog television, which broadcasts land-based signals...
service, free of charge
Free-to-air
Free-to-air describes television and radio services broadcast in clear form, allowing any person with the appropriate receiving equipment to receive the signal and view or listen to the content without requiring a subscription or one-off fee...
using the Freeview service.
In Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
, stations of federal-government-funded television networks ABC and SBS
Special Broadcasting Service
The Special Broadcasting Service is a hybrid-funded Australian public broadcasting radio and television network. The stated purpose of SBS is "to provide multilingual and multicultural radio and television services that inform, educate and entertain all Australians and, in doing so, reflect...
broadcast multiple music channels alongside their digital TV services. These stations are non-commercial, each featuring specific types of music such as jazz
Jazz
Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...
, blues
Blues
Blues is the name given to both a musical form and a music genre that originated in African-American communities of primarily the "Deep South" of the United States at the end of the 19th century from spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts and chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads...
or classical, with the SBS channels featuring foreign and ethnic programming, which are not normally played on commercial radio.
Some cable and satellite television
Television
Television is a telecommunication medium for transmitting and receiving moving images that can be monochrome or colored, with accompanying sound...
providers also simulcast
Simulcast
Simulcast, shorthand for "simultaneous broadcast", refers to programs or events broadcast across more than one medium, or more than one service on the same medium, at the same time. For example, Absolute Radio is simulcast on both AM and on satellite radio, and the BBC's Prom concerts are often...
local AM and FM radio station
Radio station
Radio broadcasting is a one-way wireless transmission over radio waves intended to reach a wide audience. Stations can be linked in radio networks to broadcast a common radio format, either in broadcast syndication or simulcast or both...
s along with their DTR bundles.
In rare cases, digital TV broadcasters have included the audio of a commonly-owned
Duopoly (broadcasting)
In United States broadcast television and radio, duopoly is a term used to describe a single company which owns two or more stations in the same city or community....
broadcast radio station
Radio station
Radio broadcasting is a one-way wireless transmission over radio waves intended to reach a wide audience. Stations can be linked in radio networks to broadcast a common radio format, either in broadcast syndication or simulcast or both...
among their subchannel offerings (for instance, KCSM-TV
KCSM-TV
KCSM-TV, virtual channel 60, is an independent, non-commercial television station located in San Mateo, California, USA. Until 2009, KCSM-TV was a PBS member station...
in San Mateo, California
San Mateo, California
San Mateo is a city in San Mateo County, California, United States, in the San Francisco Bay Area. With a population of approximately 100,000 , it is one of the larger suburbs on the San Francisco Peninsula, located between Burlingame to the north, Foster City to the east, Belmont to the south,...
broadcasts KCSM FM on its DT3 signal). WANN-LD in Atlanta
Atlanta, Georgia
Atlanta is the capital and most populous city in the U.S. state of Georgia. According to the 2010 census, Atlanta's population is 420,003. Atlanta is the cultural and economic center of the Atlanta metropolitan area, which is home to 5,268,860 people and is the ninth largest metropolitan area in...
offers six radio stations owned by Clear Channel Communications
Clear Channel Communications
Clear Channel Communications, Inc. is an American media conglomerate company headquartered in San Antonio, Texas. It was founded in 1972 by Lowry Mays and Red McCombs, and was taken private by Bain Capital LLC and Thomas H. Lee Partners LP in a leveraged buyout in 2008...
, in addition to ten TV channels. This type of service is known as DTV radio.
Non-broadcast content, subscription TV channels or datacasting
Datacasting
Datacasting is the broadcasting of data over a wide area via radio waves. It most often refers to supplemental information sent by television stations along with digital television, but may also be applied to digital signals on analog TV or radio...
operations unrelated to the main TV programming are also permitted by the DTV standards but are less-commonly used. USDTV
USDTV
USDTV, an acronym for U.S. Digital Television, was an over-the-air, pay television service in the United States. Based in Draper, Utah near Salt Lake City, it was founded in 2003 and started service there in 2004...
was an over-the-air pay TV
Pay TV
Pay television, premium television, or premium channels refers to subscription-based television services, usually provided by both analog and digital cable and satellite, but also increasingly via digital terrestrial and internet television...
service that used H.264 compression instead of standard MPEG-2
MPEG-2
MPEG-2 is a standard for "the generic coding of moving pictures and associated audio information". It describes a combination of lossy video compression and lossy audio data compression methods which permit storage and transmission of movies using currently available storage media and transmission...
. Mobile DTV now uses MPEG-4
MPEG-4
MPEG-4 is a method of defining compression of audio and visual digital data. It was introduced in late 1998 and designated a standard for a group of audio and video coding formats and related technology agreed upon by the ISO/IEC Moving Picture Experts Group under the formal standard ISO/IEC...
compression, which like H.264 yields a much lower bitrate
Bitrate
In telecommunications and computing, bit rate is the number of bits that are conveyed or processed per unit of time....
for the same video quality
Video quality
Video quality is a characteristic of a video passed through a video transmission/processing system, a formal or informal measure of perceived video degradation...
.
Listening to DTR
One can listen to a DTR channel simply by entering the channel on one's television. However, this requires leaving the television on (which wasteWaste
Waste is unwanted or useless materials. In biology, waste is any of the many unwanted substances or toxins that are expelled from living organisms, metabolic waste; such as urea, sweat or feces. Litter is waste which has been disposed of improperly...
s electricity
Electricity
Electricity is a general term encompassing a variety of phenomena resulting from the presence and flow of electric charge. These include many easily recognizable phenomena, such as lightning, static electricity, and the flow of electrical current in an electrical wire...
and reduces the lamp life of the backlight
Backlight
A backlight is a form of illumination used in liquid crystal displays . As LCDs do not produce light themselves , they need illumination to produce a visible image...
), and uses television speaker
Loudspeaker
A loudspeaker is an electroacoustic transducer that produces sound in response to an electrical audio signal input. Non-electrical loudspeakers were developed as accessories to telephone systems, but electronic amplification by vacuum tube made loudspeakers more generally useful...
s which are fairly limited in sound quality
Sound quality
Sound quality is the quality of the audio output from various electronic devices. Sound quality can be defined as the degree of accuracy with which a device records or emits the original sound waves...
. Therefore, the recommended setup is to connect the audio outputs of the television set-top box
Set-top box
A set-top box or set-top unit is an information appliance device that generally contains a tuner and connects to a television set and an external source of signal, turning the signal into content which is then displayed on the television screen or other display device.-History:Before the...
directly to a stereo
Stereophonic sound
The term Stereophonic, commonly called stereo, sound refers to any method of sound reproduction in which an attempt is made to create an illusion of directionality and audible perspective...
system. Set-top boxes typically have an extra set of audio outputs to facilitate this. Also, as a song is playing, additional information
Program-associated data
Program Associated Data or Program Service Data is a concept related to broadcasting which consists of a number of different fields or streams which are displayed on many HD Radio & satellite radio receivers in order to describe the program being transmitted, including different information such...
such as the song title, artist and album typically appear on the television screen. In the case of U.S. direct-broadcast satellite companies, this is text displayed by the box itself, rather than graphics generated at the headend.