Full-time HD on Swedish DTT

[BGonaSTICK]

Regular high definition transmissions have begun on the Swedish digital terrestrial television network. Transmission company Teracom began broadcasts in the Mälaren Valley on Saturday and will eventually extend to over one million households in Stockholm, Västerås, Uppsala and Södertälje. This represents about 27% of households, and although Teracom would like to extend this further, any expansion is bound to the available capacity.

The first channel to be available in the high definition format will be SVT HD. The public broadcaster has been operating its HD channel on the Canal Digital satellite platform since last June. In the next few months SVT plans to screen the community-singing event Allsång på Skansen, starting in June, and the World Athletics Championship in Osaka in August. Throughout the summer it is broadcasting the BBC documentary Planet Earth. SVT HD is broadcasting 24 hours a day and screen a promotional video when there is no actual programming.

Transmissions are in MPEG-4, 720p, and include Dolby 5.1 surround sound.