Development of the ATSC Digital Television Standard

In 1987, the United States Federal Communications Commission established the Advisory Committee on Advanced Television Service to advise the FCC on technical and public policy issues regarding advanced television. The Advisory Committee consisted of 25 leaders of the television industry, with Richard E. Wiley, a former chairman of the FCC, chosen as its chair with hundreds of industry volunteers serving on numerous Advisory Committee subcommittees.

Initially, 23 different systems were proposed to the Advisory Committee. These systems ranged from "Improved" systems which worked within the parameters of the NTSC system to improve the quality of the video; to "Enhanced" systems which added additional information to the signal to provide an improved wide-screen picture; and finally to "High-Definition Television (HDTV)" systems which were completely new systems with substantially higher resolution, a wider picture aspect ratio and improved sound.

In the midst of this competitive process, a fundamental technological advance occurred when in May of 1990, General Instrument proposed the first all-digital high-definition television system. Within seven months, three additional all-digital HDTV systems had been proposed. By 1991 the number of competing system proposals had been reduced to six, including the four all-digital HDTV systems. The Advisory Committee developed extensive test procedures to evaluate the performance of the proposed systems, and required the proponents to provide fully implemented real-time operating hardware for the testing phase of the process. From July 1991 to October 1992 the six systems were tested by three independent and neutral laboratories working together, following the detailed test procedures prescribed by the Advisory Committee.

The Advanced Television Test Center, funded by the broadcasting and consumer electronics industries, conducted transmission performance testing and subjective tests using expert viewers. Cable Television Laboratories, a research and development consortium of cable television system operators, conducted an extensive series of cable transmission tests as well. The Advanced Television Evaluation Laboratory within the Canadian Communications Research Centre conducted subject assessment tests using non-expert viewers.

In February 1993, a Special Panel of the Advisory Committee convened to review the results of the testing process, and, if possible, to choose a new transmission standard for terrestrial broadcast television to be recommended by the Advisory Committee to the FCC. After a week of deliberations, the Special Panel determined that there would be no further consideration of analog technology, and that based upon analysis of transmission system performance, an all-digital approach was both feasible and desirable. Although all of the all-digital systems performed well, each of them had one or more deficiencies that required further improvement.

The Special Panel recommended that the proponents of the four all-digital systems be authorized to implement certain modifications they had proposed, and that supplemental tests of these improvements be conducted. The Advisory Committee adopted this recommendation of the Special Panel, but also expressed its willingness to entertain a proposal by the remaining proponents for a single system that incorporated the best elements of the four all-digital systems.