I guess it's because ASEAN countries have reached a consensus to adopt DVB-T standard.

Source: http://www.bernama.com/bernama/v7/bu/newsm....php?id=1052405

MMU, Eastool To Help Malaysia Switch To Digital TV

CYBERJAYA, July 9 (Bernama) -- The Multimedia University (MMU) will conduct a joint research with a Malaysian R&D-based Eastool Solution Sdn Bhd (Eastool) to facilitate a faster and smoother Malaysian Digital Terrestrial TV Broadcasting (DTTB) switch-over.

To facilitate the work, a memorandum of understanding (MoU) between MMU and Eastool was inked here Wednesday.

MMU was represented by its deputy dean of Faculty of Engineering and Technology, Associate Prof Dr Lim Heng Siong, and Eastool, by its managing director Lim Seng Swee.

The research covers areas related to standards, technology, field reception issues, as well as improvements in telecommunications, wireless propagation, antenna design and power electronics.

Dr Lim (MMU) told Bernama that the implementation of DTTB would enable Malaysian broadcasters to move to fully digital platform, allowing them to offer even more TV and radio channels as compared to what was offered by the current analogue system.

"The broadcasting industry is very valuable, worth billions of ringgit and switching over to digital would mean both users and broadcasters could benefit due to having more viewing choices and lower operational costs," he said.

Meanwhile, Lim of Eastool, which has 20 years experience in developing and manufacturing broadcast equipment and components, said MMU would benefit by getting industrial updated and applying knowledge specifically in research and development.

According to him, under the Government's DTTB plans, Malaysia would have a digital multimedia hub and network of high, medium and low powered digital TV transmitters nationwide.

Initially, these will have the technical capability to carry up to 45 standard definition (SD) or 15 high definition (HD) digital television channels and the migration will involve government-owned, as well as private Malaysian TV stations, namely TV1, TV2, TV3, NTV7,8TV,TV9, TV Alhijrah and Bernama TV.

"The switch over will involve installation of new and upgraded equipment, not only for broadcasters and infrastructure owners, but also for consumers," he added.

-- BERNAMA

Yes, according to earlier news reports, digitised FTA channels will be made available on Astro platform. In other words, Astro subscribers can choose not to buy a separate set-top box.

Hmm I'm not sure about this.

MyTV to offer services a year earlier than planned

Source: http://www.themalaysianinsider.com/busines...er-than-planned

MyTV Broadcasting Sdn Bhd will be launching its five core services for the digital terrestrial television (DTT) switchover in the second quarter of next year instead of after the analogue switch off in 2016, as originally intended.

The five services are TV and radio (both accessible via DTT broadcast), connected services, transaction commerce and soft services (accessible via broadband or 4G LTE).

MyTV chief commercial officer Haniza Ros Nasaruddin said the five services for the DTT project would be the key drivers of the company’s revenue.

“The five are a combination of the traditional revenue that’s now being applied in any other mature market and our own business model, which we are generating not just for MyTV but for content players to actually earn more on top of advertising revenue,” she said in an interview with The Edge Financial Daily.

“When it comes to the participation of viewers, there are some methods that we are going to introduce. The more it’s used, the more income will be generated,” she added.

MyTV chief operating officer Mohamed Redzwan Yahya said apart from advertising revenue, the company had worked out a number of other ways to collaborate with its subscribers.

“We offer subscriber management systems because we know who the owners of the set top boxes (STB) are, so we can work together with, say, a pay TV operator and go on a revenue share basis,” he said.

“We also have what we call a playout centre for new operators who do not want to invest in building a TV station but have content. This may be in line with broadcasters who want to go on retail, meaning they only want to transmit for a few hours a day,” said Redzwan.

MyTV cannot charge incumbent broadcasters like TV1, TV2, and TV3 for their services during the two year simulcast period — when both analogue and digital broadcasting services will be simultaneously available.

But new operators and content providers who have expressed interest in MyTV will not enjoy the same exemption.

“I can only say that the capacity we have may not be enough,” Redzwan said when asked who are the potential new parties that will subscribe to MyTV’s services.

MyTV is a special purpose vehicle set up by Puncak Semangat Sdn Bhd to build and operate the infrastructure and network facilities for the DTT project. Puncak Semangat is wholly-owned by the Al-Bukhary group, which in turn is controlled by tycoon Tan Sri Syed Mokhtar Al-Bukhary.
MyTV’s shareholders are Altel Holdings Sdn Bhd, Tan Sri Zainol Anwar and Datuk Abdullah Kadir Bacha.

The DTT project is part of a digital switchover initiative, in which analogue free-to-air broadcasting services will be replaced by digital transmission.

The initial migration to digital will be for government-owned and private stations, namely TV1, TV2, TV3, ntv7, 8TV, TV9, TV Al-Hijrah and Bernama TV.

Puncak Semangat was awarded the contract in April, beating REDtone Network Sdn Bhd and i-Media Broadcasting Solutions Sdn Bhd, which had initially raised eyebrows as many did not see Puncak Semangat as having the expertise to carry out the large-scale project.

To that, Redzwan said he was proud the core team responsible for the project was local.

“We know that other operators in Southeast Asia are looking at us and how we implement this. So there is that added pressure to prove that we can do it,” he said.

At the time of writing, MyTV was in the midst of finalising 16 or 17 tender packages for different components of the project, which would be opened for bidding possibly as early as the end of this month. – The Edge Financial Daily, August 18, 2014.

Source: http://www.theedgemalaysia.com/index.php?o...07119&Itemid=79

MCMC to optimise 700MHz spectrum usage

KUALA LUMPUR: The Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC) is looking at ways to optimise the use of the 700MHz spectrum band for Long-Term Evolution (LTE) services, said its chairman Datuk Sharil Tarmizi.

Spectrum is the range of radio frequencies that enables wireless communication.

“Spectrum is a finite resource. Once it’s finished, we can’t create more. But we can continuously optimise the use of the spectrum by utilising new technologies and improving spectrum modulation techniques,” he told The Edge Financial Daily in an interview yesterday.

Sharil cited the frequencies used by television broadcasters, where the current system of having one broadcast channel on one frequency can be consolidated to 12 to 15 standard definition (SD) broadcast channels on one frequency, thanks to the utilisation of new digital technology.

“The entire television space occupies the 470MHz to 742MHz frequencies. With digital TV coming onstream in the first quarter next year, this means that the frequencies used will be reduced to 470MHz to 698MHz.

“With that it will free up the 698 Mhz to 742 MHz spectrum, which can be allocated for LTE services. However, this can only happen after the analogue switch-off,” he said.

Earlier at a media briefing to unveil the Industry Performance Report 2013 yesterday, Sharil said the regulator will review the 900MHz and 1800MHz spectrums awarded to various mobile players in the country to strengthen their service quality.

“We are looking at variety of option including auction, ‘beauty contest’, allocation or any combination of that. We will only make the decision after consulting all players.

“Should we choose to implement spectrum refarming, the aim is to allow telcos to provide better and quality service to consumers,” he said. Spectrum refarming is the process of reclaiming assigned spectrum to reapportion it to applicants.

The revision is to address the network congestion issue faced by telecommunications companies (telcos) and prepare them to tap into other value-added services such as mobile TV.

On the building of some 1,000 new towers to improve and increase the reach into rural parts of Malaysia, Sharil said MCMC is in the process of finalising the first round of tenders.

“We’ve run the first tender for 400 towers and we’re finalising that. We’ve got two more rounds of 300 towers each to go, but these will be all over the country and mostly in rural areas,” he said.
Sharil: We are going to rebalance the spectrum of all mobile operators. Photo by Chu Juck Seng

“We’ve also employed a tender for an undersea cable system connecting Sabah, Sarawak and Peninsular Malaysia and also a tender for 1Malaysia Internet centres for underserved groups in the city ... and we hope to get at least half of these projects completed by the end of the year,” he added.

According to MCMC’s Industry Performance Report 2013, about 42% or 18 million out of the 43 million mobile subscribers are 3G users, resulting in intermittent service interruptions.

Sharil said one of the solutions to address this is to refarm the spectrum.

For instance, a telco can do a spectrum refarming on its 1800MHz spectrum to provide 3G or 4G services. As such, telcos will be able to ease the congestion in their networks by diverting it to other spectrums instead of relying on 2100MHz or 2.6GHz primarily used for 3G and 4G services.

Meanwhile, MCMC is planning to narrow the gap of spectrum awarded to the big players and small players in the mobile telecommunication industry.

“We are going to rebalance the spectrum of all mobile operators,” Sharil said, adding that this was due to mobile players getting different spectrum allocations from the government.

“In a meeting last year, we decided to award 100MHz out of 2.6GHz spectrum to telcos which have more than 10 million subscribers, while awarding 50MHz to smaller players whose subscriber base is between 3 million and 5 million,” he said.

“Hence, the first thing that we need to do is to rebalance the spectrum awarded to all players,” he said.

This article first appeared in The Edge Financial Daily, on September 12, 2014.

I can't access the article too, but I found this one.


This post has been edited by leetan33: Sep 19 2014, 12:50 PM

Oh wow, TV3 in HD?
Yes, I agree with you that the logo should be transparent or smaller.

Let's look at some of the HD snapshots from other countries. Most of the channels feature small logo.

http://www.thesundaily.my/news/1220149

KUALA LUMPUR: The Digital Terrestrial Television Broadcast (DTTB) is expected to be completed and implemented by 2017.

Multimedia and Communications Minister Datuk Seri Ahmad Shabery Cheek said the project, which switches analog broadcasting to digital, is at the stage of building and preparation of infrastructure.

Speaking at the Dewan Rakyat today, he said the tender to build the infrastructure has been issued, and work has been carried out in East Malaysia before proceeding to the north of the peninsula and Klang Valley.

"Once the infrastructure is completed up north and in East Malaysia, the ministry will carry out a transition exercise where both analog and digital broadcasting will be done at the same time," he said in response to an oral question by Jeff Ooi Chuan Aun (DAP-Jelutong).

Ooi, in a supplementary question, asked Ahmad Shabery why the ministry was late in implementing the digital broadcast, which was supposed to begin in 2012, adding that the ministry was behind schedule in the implementation.

Ahmad Shabery agreed with Ooi, but added that the ministry had faced similar problems like other neighbouring countries like Thailand and Indonesia in implementing the system.

"These countries took time to start their digital and close their analog broadcasting," he said.

http://www.thesundaily.my/news/1231352

KUALA LUMPUR: MYTV Broadcasting Sdn Bhd has signed a RM1.06 billion framework agreement with Telekom Malaysia Bhd ™ for the provision of infrastructure and network facilities for digital terrestrial television (DTT) services in Malaysia.

Under the framework agreement, TM will provide MYTV with DTT services for a period of 15 years with an annual contract value of RM70.47 million.

The deal will see TM providing MYTV with infrastructure and network services including terrestrial distribution network services, satellite distribution network services, broadcast contribution network services, station facilities and infrastructure services as well as operation and maintenance services.

The agreement also entails TM developing a terrestrial distribution network to connect MYTV's digital multimedia broadcasting hub to all 37 main transmitter sites, 10 regional hubs and two earth stations via a nationwide STM-1 ring network.

TM will also provide MYTV with the fibre broadcast network and system that will allow MYTV to deliver high quality picture and an improved overall quality of digital viewing experience.

"There are about 35 substations to be used for transmission towers, MYTV will rent from us. Besides infrastructure, we also provide operations and maintenance services," TM managing director Tan Sri Zamzamzairani Mohd Isa told reporters at the signing ceremony yesterday.

MYTV group CEO Nik Abdul Aziz Nik Yaacob said the DTT services will be available mid-2015 with an initial 30 channels in the first phase.

"We have identified at least for the next three years we will be spending slightly over RM1 billion to prepare the infrastructure. We are looking at various options for financing," he said, adding that there will be a number of gap filler towers that still need to be built.

On the cost of the set-top boxes (STB) required to enjoy the DTT services, he said it is finalising the price, which will be affordable and not burden the rakyat.

"We estimate total TV household about 6.8 million. On our commitment to the government, MYTV will give two million STBs to the needy folk. The rest we are in discussion with the government for the rest of the distribution. As far as the price is concerned, we hope to make some announcement by first or second quarter next year," said DTT deputy project director Mohamed Redzwan Yahya.

He said MYTV is at the tail end of tenders for its infrastructure packages and are in the midst of evaluation the tenders.

"We expect to make awards by end of the year. That should give us time to rollout and meet our commitments to the government by then," he said.

The DTT services will be rolled out in two phases. The first phase which will start in Kelantan, Terengganu and Pahang by mid-2015 aims to cover 85% of the population while the second phase aims to target 98% of the population nationwide by mid-2016.

http://www.freemalaysiatoday.com/category/...adcast-in-2015/

KUALA LUMPUR: Consumer TV, the first digital television station with its concept of providing consumer information and education, will begin its 24-hour broadcast at shopping complexes and other public areas nationwide on January 9, next year.

Its chief executive officer, Azmi Mohd Noor said the station would disseminate information on consumer activities through various entertainment and advertising programmes.

He said Consumer TV, with its theme of “Consumer Information Media”, would be presented in two languages, beginning with topics on consumerism at 7am until 11am followed by the consumer guide segment from 11am to 3pm.

“The consumer product segment which markets quality products will be from 3pm to 7pm and the consumer destination segment which discusses tourist spots in the country will be from 8pm to midnight. From midnight to 6am, we will screen a programme with local celebrities.”

“We will insert shopping guides and consumer complaint tips in the morning to provide information to viewers on the channels for complaints and tips on smart shopping,” he said.

Azmi said the station would also provide information on the Goods and Services Tax (GST) through advertisements.

“Considering that many people do not understand the GST which will be implemented from April, 2015, we think it is necessary to provide as much information on it to the public,” he said.

He added that the station, which began operating in September, could be viewed through the website www.tvpengguna.com and the smartphone application, TV Pengguna.

The channel can also be viewed at government offices and public transport areas such as the LRT and buses stations in the Klang Valley.

With its slogan of “Semuanya Untung” (Everybody Gains), the privately owned station has the cooperation and support of the Domestic Trade, Cooperatives and Consumerism Ministry in providing information and advertising.

- BERNAMA

Official promotional clip



Qash-M

https://www.facebook.com/mytvbroadcasting

yes

http://www.thesundaily.my/news/1231352
Yes, TM cables.

HDTV that has in-built DVB-T2 tuners won't need a set-top box. Astro subscribers need not to purchase another set-top box too.

I think they conducted trial transmission in KV before.

I haven't tested. My HDTV doesn't have DVB-T2 tuner.
RTM and Media Prime channels are already broadcasted digitally in full SD on HyppTV. The PQ is superb.

1Malaysia TV can be watched online too.

No, SD 4:3

http://www.themalaymailonline.com/tech-gad...r-mytv-and-dttv

The article is rather lengthy, so for those who're interested to read the full story, you can visit the link above.

Key points:
1. MyTV plans to introduce 30 channels initially, followed by another 30 channels over the next two years. By the end of 2019, it will have a total 80 channels on its platform, according to the company.
2. Currently, MyTV is talking to many content owners, business owners and brands, to try and convince them to launch their own channels on its platform.