DVB-T2 | Digital Radio Network Planning

More and more countries broadcast today digital radio on their DVB-T/-T2 DTT network. So far, I've seen 58 countries do it, but there are probably more countries, I have no knowledge of. #Digitalradio #DVBT2

It makes good sense as DVB-T2 is not only suitable for TV. It is also highly suitable to broadcast digital radio. On the other hand, consumer behavior is not the same for radio as for television. Therefore, it would be useful, if radios is broadcasting in their own PLP on a DVB-T2 network.

Although DVB-T2 primarily targets static and portable reception, it also incorporates time interleaving in order to benefit from time diversity in mobile scenarios. Time interleaving in DVB-T2 can be configured on a service basis and can provide interleaving durations ranging from milliseconds up to several seconds. 

It also allows different trade-offs in terms of time diversity, latency and power saving by means of inter-frame interleaving, sub-slicing and frame hopping.

DVB-T2 also introduces the concept of physical layer pipes (PLPs) to enable service specific robustness. By means of multiple PLPs it is possible to accommodate multiple use cases, i.e. static, portable and mobile, in the same frequency channel.

The radios should therefore have their own PLP, so this radio PLP can get longer time interleaving, which radically improves the robustness against impulsive noise and interference, and others DVB-T2 parameters as PLP Type 2 (Multiple sub-slices per T2 frames), which increasing time diversity and then providing better robustness for mobile services and therefore more easy to receive on a portable radio.

In addition a mobile device will consume less power, as the PLP capacity for radios is very small.

Choosing the right DVB-T2 parameter is a trade-off between capacity and whether the signal is to be received via a roof top antenna (fixed) at a height of 10 meters, handheld device (portable) or in a vehicle (car, bus or even by bike) at a height of 1 1/2 meters.

Many African countries (opposed the Asian countries) selected some DVB-T2 parameter, which provides a lot of capacity, but only for fixed roof top antenna reception, and which is now obsolete in my opinion.

However encoder has in the meantime become much better, why eg. 20 TV channels today fill significantly less than it did in the past, when the DTT network in Africa was planned. And here we are still talking about the old video codec H.264 and not the new HEVC, where each TV channel fills even less in capacity.

This gives the different countries' regulator completely new opportunities to select other and more suitable DVB-T2 parameters , where the signal becomes more robust and thus provides a greater geographical coverage, in addition to allowing consumers to more easily receive the signal on their mobile device or in cars.

I have recently come up with some suggestions for others DVB-T2 for a national DTT network with 20 SD TV channels and 20 digital radios on a national DTT network with a very long Guard Interval of 448 μs: 

With the same Guard Interval and the new encoders performance, now it's technically possible to choose FFT 16K | 64QAM instead of FFT 32K | 256 QAM and still have space for 20 SD TV channels besides radio.

Below you can see how capacity is distributed on the 2 PLPs, where the radio PLP has get other and more suitable DVB-T2 PLP parameter, which takes into account a consumer's way of listening to the radio.