Standard-definition

television

SDTV resolution by nation; due to historical reasons,

different countries use either 480i or 576i as the
standard-definition picture format.
Standard-definition television (SDTV or
SD) is a television system which uses a
resolution that is not considered to be
either high or enhanced definition. SDTV
and high-definition television (HDTV) are
the two categories of display formats for
digital television (DTV) transmissions.

The two common SDTV signal types are

576i, with 576 interlaced lines of
resolution, derived from the European-
developed PAL and SECAM systems, and
480i based on the American NTSC system.
Common SDTV refresh rates are 25, 29.97
and 30 frames per second.[a] Both
systems use a 4:3 aspect ratio.
Standards that support digital SDTV
broadcast include DVB, ATSC, and ISDB.
The last two were originally developed for
HDTV, but are also used for their ability to
deliver multiple SD video and audio
streams via multiplexing. In North America,
digital SDTV is broadcast in the same 4:3
aspect ratio as NTSC signals, with
widescreen content being center cut.[1]
However, in other parts of the world that
used the PAL or SECAM color systems,
digital standard-definition television is now
usually shown with a 16:9 aspect ratio,
with the transition occurring between the
mid-1990s and mid-2000s depending on
region. Older programs with a 4:3 aspect
ratio are broadcast with a flag that
switches the display to 4:3.[b]

Digital SDTV eliminates the ghosting and

noisy images associated with analog
systems. However, if the reception has
interference or is poor, where the error
correction cannot compensate one will
encounter various other artifacts such as
image freezing, stuttering or dropouts from
missing intra-frames or blockiness from
missing macroblocks.[c]

Pixel aspect ratio

The table below summarizes pixel aspect
ratios for the scaling of various kinds of
SDTV video lines.

Video Display aspect Pixel aspect ratio After horizontal

Resolution
format ratio (DAR) (PAR) scaling

704×480
(horizont al blanking 640×480
480i 4:3 10:11
cropped)

720×480 (full frame) 654×480

704×480
(horizont al blanking 854×480
480i 16:9 40:33
cropped)

720×480 (full frame) 872×480

704×576
(horizont al blanking 768×576
576i 4:3 12:11
cropped)

720×576 (full frame) 786×576

704×576
(horizont al blanking 1024×576
576i 16:9 16:11
cropped)

720×576 (full frame) 1048×576

The pixel aspect ratio is always the same

for corresponding 720 and 704 pixel
resolutions because the center part of a
720-pixel-wide image is equal to the
corresponding 704-pixel-wide image. The
actual image (be it 4:3 or 16:9) is always
contained in the center 704 horizontal
pixels of the digital frame, regardless of
how many horizontal pixels (704 or 720)
are used. In case of digital video line
having 720 horizontal pixels, only the
center 704 pixels contain actual 4:3 or 16:9
image, and the 8-pixel-wide stripes from
either side are called nominal analogue
blanking for horizontal blanking and should
be discarded before displaying the image.
Nominal analogue blanking should not be
confused with overscan, as overscan
areas are part of the actual 4:3 or 16:9
image.
For SMPTE 259M-C compliance, a SDTV
broadcast image is scaled to 720 pixels
wide[d] for every 480 NTSC (or 576 PAL)
lines of the image with the amount of non-
proportional line scaling dependent on
either the display or pixel aspect ratio. The
display ratio for broadcast widescreen is
commonly 16:9,[e] the display ratio for a
traditional or letterboxed broadcast is
4:3.[f]

An SDTV image outside the constraints of

the SMPTE standards requires no non-
proportional scaling with 640 pixels[g] for
every line of the image. The display and
pixel aspect ratio is generally not required
with the line height defining the aspect. For
widescreen 16:9, 360 lines define a
widescreen image and for traditional 4:3,
480 lines define an image.

See also
Digital audio broadcasting
MPEG
SBTVD
Rec. 601 (aka CCIR 601)

Notes
a. 50 and 60 rates are sometimes used
as frame-doubled versions of 25 and
 30 rates to mitigate interlace
artifacts.
b. Some broadcasters prefer to reduce
the horizontal resolution by
anamorphically scaling the video into
a pillarbox.
c. The audio encoding is the last to
suffer loss due to the lower bandwidth
requirements.
d. Only 704 center pixels contain the
image and 16 pixels are reserved for
horizontal blanking. A number of
broadcasters fill the whole 720 frame.
e. Pixel aspect ratio of 40:33 for
anamorphic
 f. Pixel aspect ratio of 10:11
g. Defined by the adopted IBM VGA
standard

References
1. All-Digital Television Is Coming (And
Sooner Than You Think!)

External links
Programmer's Guide to Video Systems

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Last edited on 20 August 2019, at 17:18

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