Dialog TV: Going MPEG-4

NOTE: The switch to MPEG-4 is probably not going to happen so soon, but this article will remain here if anyone want to get a faint idea of what may be planned.

Dialog Satellite Television is planning to add a wide range of new channels within the next few months using MPEG-4 encoding technology. MPEG-4 offers lower bitrates and better quality, which means that any digital broadcaster can broadcast even more channels than before within the same limited space.

Lets have a look at what MPEG-4 can change for current and future customers of Dialog TV.

Solving the Transponder Issue
Dialog has only three transponders at the moment, with one more on its way. Each of the current transponders can fit in around 18 channels (except the third transponder, which has 19) with acceptable quality using MPEG-2 encoding. This results in a total of 55 channels, which is the channel count on Dialog. Once Dialog gets a transponder, addition of channels can be done fast. But the problem is that transponders are expensive, and satellites are fast running out of them.

So the best solution is to fit as many channels as possible to the existing transponders. This can be done even now with MPEG-4. But ultimately each channel will have less bandwidth to call its own, and the overall quality will suffer.

This is where the new MPEG-4 comes in. Using MPEG-4, the current channel number of 18 per transponder can be doubled to 36 channels. Yet there will not be a loss of quality because of the magic of MPEG-4. The quality may even be better than before.

This means that Dialog can avoid having to purchase more transponders, but still introduce more new channels.

Being a MPEG-4 decoder does not mean that the decoder is immediately MPEG-2 compatible. This depends completely on the hardware and software. But since MPEG-4 decoder processors are quite powerful, it is likely that MPEG-2 can also be decoded quite easily after a system software upgrade.

The Current Plans
Please note that these are subject to change. Visit the Dialog TV Forum for the latest information.

Dialog now plans to introduce a fourth transponder with 35 channels, using MPEG-4 encoding. This will surely be a great treat for the customers.

But using MPEG-4 will need customers to purchase new decoders, and so far Dialog does not sound like they will give them out free. According to the current information, those who want access to the new channels can purchase the new decoder. The new MPEG-4 decoder will cost around LKR 6000+++.

The new decoder will be backward compatible with MPEG-2, as channels on the existing three transponders will not be upgraded to MPEG-4 immediately.

Certain sources suggest that Dialog TV will use the same decoder as the Indian DTH service Sun Direct. Sun Direct too broadcasts using MPEG-4, and uses the same Irdeto encryption technology, so this is quite possible.

There is also a possibility that MPEG-4 decoding will be enabled through some sort of software upgrade for existing decoders, but it depends completely on whether the hardware will be powerful enough to decode the power hungry MPEG-4.

Customers will have to watch and wait till Dialog launches their new transponder with new technology. Unfortunately, the new channels being in MPEG-4 means that existing customers cannot watch the test transmissions. Lets be patient, shall we...