NRK to switch to new satellite on 1 June - high power mediumwave to close

**Analoguesat** · 25-05-2006

Norwegian public broadcaster NRK has announced that it will move all its radio and TV channels to the Thor 2 satellite at 1º West as of 1 June. The satellite will carry all of NRK's regional services as well as the national channels. Conax and Viasat NDS encryption will be used for the TV services. The existing NRK transmissions via Thor 3, transponder 32, will cease on 4 September 2006. The technical details are:

Satellite: Thor 2
Position: 1º West
Transponder: 11
Frequency: 11372 MHz
Polarisation: Vertical
Symbol rate: 24.5 Msym/sec
FEC: 7/8

As well as the move to Thor 2, NRK confirms that it will close the high power mediumwave transmitter at Kvitsøy on 1314 kHz. According to earlier reports, the transmitter will go silent on 1 July. It primarily serves the Norwegian fishing fleet, and carries the so-called Europakanal, a mix of P1 and P2 plus some regional programmmes. NRK says that many of the fishing boats now have satellite TV on board, and a new weather channel for the fishing fleet will launch on 20 June, providing a much better service. NRK's other mediumwave transmitters at Vigra and Røst, and the longwave transmitters at Ingøy and Finnmark, will remain in operation.

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**Hitchcock** · 25-05-2006

That's interesting news, especially for viewers/listeners in Iceland (which is also a Nordic country). The Thor 3 satellite has always been very hard to pick up in Iceland (anything from a 3 m dish and up and the best LNB money can buy absolutely essential for reception) and for many years the NRK channels could only be picked up on the Thor 3 satellite (unlike the Danish DR on Thor 2 for example, which can be picked up with just a 1 m dish in Iceland). I wonder if the commercial Norwegian channels (TV 2, TV Norge) will follow suit and also move to Thor 2.

Interestingly also, the mediumwave transmitter on 1314 kHz is by far the strongest overseas radio station you can pick up in Iceland (although only during the dark, which is why peak winter equates to almost 24 hrs but peak summer to almost 0 hrs). It will be sad tuning into 1314 kHz and not hearing any singing norsk any more.

**Analoguesat** · 28-05-2006

Here is some more info about the NRK move:

Satellite parameters:

Satellite: Thor 2

Position: 1º West

Transponder: 11

Downlink frequency: 11372 MHz

Downlink polarization: Vertical

Symbolrate: 24.5 Msym/sec

Forward Error Correction: 7/8

All TV services except NRK1 Tegnspråk will be Conax and Viasat NDS encrypted according to the Simulcrypt protocol.

All TV services will be statistically multiplexed, and national/regional switching is to be utilized by changing the video/audio PID references in the PMTs for the regional services. Video/Audio PID values is the same for all NRK1 services during national transmissions, while during regional transmissions, the Video/Audio PID values are unique for all services. The version_number in the PMT’s will be updated accordingly*, to enable an automatic switch in the satellite receivers.

* Ref: ISO/IEC 13818-1 / ITU-T H.222.0 paragraph 2.4.4.9 and Annex C.2 section iv.

Subtitles on the TV services will, from the start, be burned-in, but DVB Subtitles will be available at a later date.

For digital redistribution in cable networks, NRK assumes that all TV and Radio services will be transferred in its entirety and unchanged.

Full service on the new transponder is to take place 1 June 2006.

The NRK services for DTH on Thor 3, transponder 32 will cease 4 September 2006.

NRK will add infotext on the TV services on Thor 3 from 15 august.

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