DATV an Introduction

By

ThomasDean,*

KB1JIJ

ATV

Amateur

Television

-

Methods

and

Applications

Digital

Amateur

Television-AnIntroduction

TomDean,KB

ll

lJ,

is

currentlyajuniorattheUnitedStatesMilitary AcademyatWestPoint.Tomhasbeen licensedsince

2002.

HisoperatinginterestsincludeHFcontesting

and

digitalmodes.He

is

activeintheA

cad

emy'samateurradioclub,W2KGY,wherehe

is

involvedinbuildingtheAcadem

y's

firstCubeSat.Tom

is

astudent

of

electrical engineering.Hisa

cad

emicinterestsincludesignalprocessing,software definedradio,andcomplexvariable methodsinpartialdifferentialequations. Inhiscolumn,Tomplans

to

explorenon traditionalmethodsandapplications

of

AmateurTelevision.Healsowants

to

helpshowthatbuildinganamateurtelevision station

is

notquiteasdifficultasitmight appear.Ithasbeenalong-standinggoal ofhis

to

haveaneasily-obtainabledigital amateurradiosetupthatwouldoperatein mannercomparabletocurrentanalog methodsinamateurtelevision.

-N

6CL

"e-mail:<Thomas.Deantisusma.edu»

MPEG-2

Stream

A

mateurTelevisionhasbeenonthe UHFbandsforquitesometime.In thepast,ithasbeenstandardprac ticetomatchthestandardforcommercial broadcastingoftelevisionontheamateur bands,makingoperatingATVeasily accessibletothetypicalham.Therecent mandatefromtheFCCthatallterrestrial broadcastsmustbedigitalraisesthepos sibilityofmakingdigitalamateurtelevi sion,orD-ATV,commonpractice.There aremanyadvantagestotransmittingdig italsignals.Theuseofcompressionallows fortheabilitytosendhigherresolution videosinthesamebandwidth.Addi tionally,forwarderrorcorrectionschemes allowforweakersignalstobereceived withlesserror.Unfortunately,transmit tingthedigitalsignalisaslightlymoredif ficulttaskthanstandardATV. Thisissue'scolumnprovidesan overview

of

digitaltelevisionemission standards,andpresentsseveraltheoreti calapproachesthatcouldbeusedtocre ateadigitaltelevisionstation.Therehas beennowidespreaduseofD-ATVother thanexperimentation,buthopefullyin thenearfuturethiswillbecomeas

com

monasATVistoday.

DigitalTelevision

and

the

ATSC

Thereareseveralpossiblewaysto encodeandmodulateadigitaltelevision signal.Cable-basedsystemstendtorely onamodulationtechniqueknownas64 levelQuadratureAmplitudeModulation (64-QAM).Alternatively,terrestrial broa

dca

ststationsrelyona

differ

entmodulationmethodthatissimilartothat usedbyanalogtelevision,8-level VestigialSideband(or8-VSB).Thistype ofemissionismoresuitedforterrestrial channels,andisthereforeusedinthe

Adva

ncedTelevisionSy

stemsCom

mittee(A

TSC)

standardwhichwas adoptedbytheFCC.Thestandardalso incorporatesaforward-error-correction schemewhichisoptimizedforaterres trialenvironment.IfaD

-ATV

stationusesacommonlyacceptedstandard,the

E---

Se

gment

SyncFieldSync

Figure

1.

Blockdiagramofan

ATSC

transmitter.

50.CO

VHF.

Winter2010

VisitOurWebSite

BinaryValueDCVoltage

RaisedCosineFilter

f

Pilot

~

-I

c;

6MHzVSBSignal

Carrier

000-7001-5010-3011-1

+

1.25VPilot

100+1101+3110+5111+7

f

Figure

2.

TheVSBmodulationprocess.

demodulation

of

thesignalbecomesmuchlikethe

demodula

tion

of

anATYsignal;thesignalmustbedown-convertedtoa standardbroadcastTYfrequencyandcanthenbedisplayedon anoff-the-

shelf

digitaltelevision.Forthisreason,Iwouldrec

ommend

theuse

of

ATSC

forany

D-ATY

projects.

Emis

si

onOverview

Avideosignalmustgothroughaseries

of

stepsbeforeitbecomesanATSCsignal.

The

signalmustfirstbedigitizedand compressedintoanMPEG-2stream.Thisstreamcancontain boththeaudioandvideosignalofthetransmission.

It

isnotuncommontofindcamerasthatwilloutputanMPEG-2stream,asthisisthesameformatadaptedbytheHOYstandardusedin mostcamcorders.Additionally,theremanycommercialboards availablethatwilldigitizeandcompressananalogvideosignal.

TheMPEG

-2streamisthentaken

through

forward

error

correction.

The

data

istypicallyfirst

randomizedl,

and

then

senttoa

Reed-Solomonencoder

followed

byan

interleaver

andaTrellis

Encoder-.There

are

options

withinthe

standard

toall

ow

additional

forward-errorcorrection

tobeadded,atthe

expen

se

of

videoquality,to

help

in

more

adversecondi

tions.

Synchronization

signals

are

then

in

sertedinto

thisstream.Thisseparatesthesignalintofields

and

segments.

The

purpo

se

of

thesynchronizationsignalsisto

help

the

receiver

lock

onto

thesignal.Attheheart

of

theA

TSC

standardliesthevestigialsideband modulation(YSB).Thismethod

of

modulationisverysimilartodouble-sidebandmodulation.In

order

tomodulateadigitalstreamintoYSB,threebitsatatimearemappedtoone

of

eightpossibleDCvoltages.AsmallDCvoltageisalsoaddedtoeach symbol,whichresultsinasmallpilotcarrierbeinggenerated inthefinalsignal.Thispilotsignalhelpsthereceivertolock onanddetecttheA

TSC

signal.Thissignalisthenmixedwith acarriertocreateadouble-sideband,suppressed-carriersignal. ThesignalisthenturnedintoaYSBsignalsimplybyrunningitthroughafilterwhichremovesmost

of

thelowersideband,leavingtheentire

upper

sidebandandaportion

of

thelowersideband.Thismodulationmethodisverysimilartotheana log

NTSC

standard,and,liketheanalogsignal,fitswitha6

MHz

channel.

ATSC

is

cap

able

of

providingupto19.39

Mbp

s

of

datainthischannel.

Figure

3.

TheAlteraDE2board.(Courtesy

of

Altera)

www.cq-v

hf.com

W

inter

2010.

COVHF

•53

-----------

---

-

_

._-----

Figure

4.

AnHFcarriergenera

ted

bytheDE2usingthevideoDAC

and

thecorrespondingFFT.

IWaveform

Matn

Menu

-

--

~

-

I

!

----

I-

i-

-

.s.

k-,/'

FFiSampl

e'"R

Bl

e'-

100MSa

l's

11

--'

Spa

n

liP

Center

I

Preset

III

More

FFT

.[

20

OMHz

10.0MHz

.....

PossibleApproachestoaD-ATVStation

Unfortunately,therearenotalarge number

of

commercialsystemsavailable thatcreatevideosignalsintheATSCfor mat.Whileitisfairlycommontoseean analogsignalbemodulatedintoRFtobe displayedontheTV,interchangeofdig italsignalsistypically

acco

mplishedusingnon-RFtechniquessuchHOMIor similarinterfaces.Thismakesitaslight lymoredifficultproblemtobeableto transmitdigitalvideo. Sincewearealreadydealingwithadig italsignal,itlendsitselfwelltobe processedviasoftware-definedradio.If youhavedealtwithSOR,youaremost likelyfamiliarwiththeUniversalSoft wareRadioPeripheral,orUSRP.This boardwasdevelopedwiththeintentionof demodulatingHDTVtelevisionsignals andhasdonesowithsomesuccess.The USRPisprogrammedthroughGnuRadio, whichlinkstogetherprocessingblocks

of

CcodeusingPythonscript.Creatingan

samples_out(9:0)

us

filter

piloUnsertU3

~ O

)

t - -

-

- - - 1

(C)ALOEC.Inc

I:::

,.

2260CorporateCircle

E:.L..

Henderson,

NY

89074

TIlt'DesignVerificationCamptllly

U2

SIgOJI

.

11(7

:O

sogn3

.0U(701

1+-

--

""

Sogn-

.S,"C(701

Field.

S;nc(7:O

)

field-!jen

U11

0<Al>J(9:O

)

fuI

Uate

(7:0)

D-

-;.-.-J

lut

Created:Title:

2/8/2009

ATSC

Transmitter

Page:

1/1

Figure

5.

DesigninganATSCtransmitter

for

theDE2boardusingactiveHDL.

5

4.

CO

VHF

•

Winter

2010

Visit

Our

WebSite

-

--

-

---

--

-

--

_.

_-

---

,---

------

---

-

.

--

---

--

-

Category:	How-To Guides/Manuals
Rating:
Upload Date:	12/15/2011
Copyright:	Attribution Non-commercial
Tags:	This document has no tags.

Documents

People