Digital television in Spain
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[edit] Terrestrial
Spanish digital television market began in 1997, with the start of two competing pay per view platforms (Canal Satélite digital and Vía Digital). The merger of the former created Digital Plus in 2002.
The case of digital terrestrial television is very alike to the failure of ITV Digital in the United Kingdom. Digital terrestrial television was introduced in the country by the pay per view platform Quiero Television. In May 2002, state wide operators were required to start broadcasting in DVB-T. Yet, Quiero TV ceased transmissions in 2002 after a commercial failure . Unlike the UK, the three and half multiplexes left by the platform were not reassigned to other operators, and so 5 channels were squashed into a single multiplex.
On November 30, 2005, Digital Terrestrial Television was relaunched as a free service with 20 channels and 14 radio stations, along with 23 regional and local language channels in their respective areas. Currently about 80% of the population can receive DTT, and this figure is expected to reach 90% by 2008. The channels are broadcast simultaneously with the analog signal and each multiplex has a minimum of 4 channels each. Televisió de Catalunya - TVC is using spare bandwidth in its own digital multiplex to broadcast a test HD stream.
[edit] Cable
Digital cable is slowly replacing the aging analogue service of the major cable provider Ono. Telecable, a cable ISP operating in Asturias has begun trials for 100 mpbs services. A HDTV bouquet is planned to be launched after the end of the tests.
[edit] Satellite
Digital satellite services has existed since 1997 from Astra and Hispasat -satellites. The Digital+ pay platform has carried some HDTV tests on Astra in June 16, 2005. They consisted of some clips from Canal plus best known programs, such as "lo más +", "Las noticias del guiñol", "La hora wiki", and "código cine".
A high definition simulcast of Canal + (Canal + HD) will start in January ,29th 2008.
[edit] IPTV
During 2007 Telefónica ran trials of VDSL services up to 52 Mbit/s - However, the results were not as good as expected. For this reason, Telefónica will use FTTH for future IPTV services
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