Doc.

A/53E
27 December 2005
Amendment No. 1 dated 18 April 2006

ATSC Digital Television Standard (A/53)

Revision E, with Amendment No. 1

Advanced Television Systems Committee

1750 K Street, N.W.
Suite 1200
Washington, D.C. 20006
www.atsc.org
ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard 27 December 2005

The Advanced Television Systems Committee, Inc., is an international, non-profit organization

developing voluntary standards for digital television. The ATSC member organizations represent
the broadcast, broadcast equipment, motion picture, consumer electronics, computer, cable,
satellite, and semiconductor industries.
Specifically, ATSC is working to coordinate television standards among different
communications media focusing on digital television, interactive systems, and broadband
multimedia communications. ATSC is also developing digital television implementation
strategies and presenting educational seminars on the ATSC standards.
ATSC was formed in 1982 by the member organizations of the Joint Committee on
InterSociety Coordination (JCIC): the Electronic Industries Association (EIA), the Institute of
Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE), the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB), the
National Cable Television Association (NCTA), and the Society of Motion Picture and
Television Engineers (SMPTE). Currently, there are approximately 140 members representing
the broadcast, broadcast equipment, motion picture, consumer electronics, computer, cable,
satellite, and semiconductor industries.
ATSC Digital TV Standards include digital high definition television (HDTV), standard
definition television (SDTV), data broadcasting, multichannel surround-sound audio, and
satellite direct-to-home broadcasting.

Note: An editorial correction to Figure D5.10 was made with publication of Amendment No. 1 to
this document.

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Table of Contents
1. SCOPE AND DOCUMENTATION STRUCTURE.......................................................................................11
1.1 Documentation Structure 11

2. REFERENCES ...........................................................................................................................................11
2.1 Normative References 11
2.2 Informative References 11

3. DEFINITIONS .............................................................................................................................................11
3.1 Compliance Notation 12
3.2 Treatment of Syntactic Elements 12
3.3 Terms Employed 12
3.4 Symbols, Abbreviations, and Mathematical Operators 17
3.4.1 Arithmetic Operators 17
3.4.2 Logical Operators 18
3.4.3 Relational Operators 18
3.4.4 Bitwise Operators 19
3.4.5 Assignment 19
3.4.6 Mnemonics 19
3.4.7 Constants 19
3.4.8 Method of Describing Bit Stream Syntax 19
3.4.8.1 Definition of bytealigned Function 20
3.4.8.2 Definition of nextbits Function 20
3.4.8.3 Definition of next_start_code Function 20
4. SYSTEM OVERVIEW.................................................................................................................................21
4.1 System Block Diagram 21

ANNEX A: VIDEO SYSTEM CHARACTERISTICS (NORMATIVE).................................................25

1. SCOPE .......................................................................................................................................................25

2. REFERENCES ...........................................................................................................................................25
2.1 Normative References 25
2.2 Informative References 26

3. COMPLIANCE NOTATION ........................................................................................................................26

4. POSSIBLE VIDEO INPUTS........................................................................................................................26

5. SOURCE CODING SPECIFICATION.........................................................................................................26

5.1 Constraints with Respect to ISO/IEC 13818-2 Main Profile 27
5.1.1 Sequence Header Constraints 27
5.1.2 Compression Format Constraints 27
5.1.3 Sequence Extension Constraints 28

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5.1.4 Sequence Display Extension Constraints 28

5.1.5 Picture Header Constraints 29
5.1.6 Picture Coding Constraints 29
5.2 Bit Stream Specifications Beyond MPEG-2 29
5.2.1 Picture Extension and User Data Syntax 29
5.2.2 Picture User Data Syntax 30
5.2.3 ATSC Picture User Data Semantics 31
5.2.3.1 Captioning Data 31
5.2.3.2 Bar Data 32
5.2.4 Active Format Description Data 34
5.2.4.1 AFD Syntax 34
5.2.4.2 AFD Semantics 35
5.2.4.3 Recommended Receiver Response to AFD 36
5.2.5 Relationship Between Bar Data and AFD (Informative) 36

ANNEX B: AUDIO SYSTEM CHARACTERISTICS (NORMATIVE) ................................................37

1. SCOPE .......................................................................................................................................................37

2. NORMATIVE REFERENCES .....................................................................................................................37

3. COMPLIANCE NOTATION ........................................................................................................................37

4. SYSTEM OVERVIEW.................................................................................................................................37

5. SPECIFICATION ........................................................................................................................................38
5.1 Constraints With Respect to ATSC Standard A/52B 38
5.2 Sampling Frequency 39
5.3 Bit Rate 39
5.4 Audio Coding Modes 39
5.5 Dialogue Level 39
5.6 Dynamic Range Compression 39
5.7 STD Audio Buffer Size 39

6. MAIN AND ASSOCIATED SERVICES.......................................................................................................39

6.1 Summary of Service Types 40
6.2 Complete Main Audio Service (CM) 40
6.3 Main Audio Service, Music and Effects (ME) 40
6.4 Visually Impaired (VI) 41
6.5 Hearing Impaired (HI) 41
6.6 Dialogue (D) 41
6.7 Commentary (C) 42
6.8 Emergency (E) 42
6.9 Voice-Over (V0) 42

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7. AUDIO ENCODER INTERFACES..............................................................................................................43

7.1 Audio Encoder Input Characteristics 43
7.2 Audio Encoder Output Characteristics 43

ANNEX C: SERVICE MULTIPLEX AND TRANSPORT CHARACTERISTICS (NORMATIVE) ......44

1. SCOPE .......................................................................................................................................................44

2. NORMATIVE REFERENCES .....................................................................................................................44

2.1 Normative References 44
2.2 Informative References 44

3. COMPLIANCE NOTATION ........................................................................................................................44

4. SYSTEM OVERVIEW.................................................................................................................................45

5. SPECIFICATION ........................................................................................................................................46
5.1 MPEG-2 Systems Standard 46
5.1.1 Video T-STD 46
5.1.2 Audio T-STD 46
5.2 Identification of MPEG-2 Private Ranges 46
5.2.1 MPEG-2 Registration Descriptor 46
5.2.1.1 Program Identifier 46
5.2.1.2 Audio Elementary Stream Identifier 47
5.2.1.3 Other Program Element Identifiers 47
5.3 Audio Constraints 47
5.4 Constraints on PSI 47
5.5 PES Constraints 48
5.5.1 Video PES Constraints 49
5.5.2 Audio PES Constraints 49
5.6 Services and Features 49
5.6.1 System Information and Program Guide 49
5.6.1.1 System Information and Program Guide PID 49
5.6.1.2 System Information and Program Guide STD Model 50
5.6.2 Specification of ATSC Private Data 50
5.7 Assignment of Identifiers 50
5.7.1 Audio Stream Type 50
5.7.2 Video Stream Type 50
5.7.3 Descriptors 50
5.7.3.1 AC-3 Audio Descriptor 50
5.7.3.2 Program Smoothing Buffer Descriptor 51
5.7.3.3 ISO-639 Language Descriptor 51
5.7.3.4 ATSC Private Information Descriptor 52
5.7.4 PID Value Assignments 53

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5.8 Extensions to the MPEG-2 Systems Specification 53

5.8.1 Scrambling Control 53
6. FEATURES OF 13818-1 NOT SUPPORTED BY THIS STANDARD.........................................................53
6.1 Program Streams 53
6.2 Still Pictures 54
6.3 Multiple Video Elementary Streams 54

7. TRANSPORT SUBSYSTEM INTERFACES AND BIT RATES ..................................................................54

7.1 Transport Subsystem Input Characteristics 54
7.2 Transport Subsystem Output Characteristics 54

ANNEX D: RF/TRANSMISSION SYSTEM CHARACTERISTICS (NORMATIVE) ..........................55

1. SCOPE .......................................................................................................................................................55

2. REFERENCES ...........................................................................................................................................55
2.1 Normative References 55
2.2 Informative References 55

3. COMPLIANCE NOTATION ........................................................................................................................55

4. ABBREVIATIONS ......................................................................................................................................56

5. TRANSMISSION CHARACTERISTICS FOR TERRESTRIAL BROADCAST ...........................................56

5.1 Overview of Main Service 56
5.2 Overview of Main and Enhanced Service 57
5.3 Data Organization 58
5.4 Channel Error Protection 60
5.4.1 Main Service Data Error Detection and Correction Facility 60
5.4.1.1 Main Service Data Randomizer 60
5.4.1.2 Main Service Reed-Solomon Encoder 61
5.4.1.3 Main Service Interleaving 62
5.4.1.4 Main Service Trellis Coding 63
5.4.2 Main and Enhanced Service Data Error Detection and Correction Facilities 67
5.4.2.1 Enhanced Data Protection 67
5.4.2.1.1 E8-VSB Pre-Processor 68
5.4.2.2 Data Randomizer 71
5.4.2.3 Reed Solomon Encoder 71
5.4.2.4 Data Interleaver 71
5.4.2.5 E8-VSB Convolutional Coder 72
5.4.2.5.1 Enhanced Symbol Processor 72
5.4.2.5.2 Precode Bypass 73
5.4.2.6 Data Byte De-Interleaver 73
5.4.2.7 RS Byte Delete and De-Randomizer 74

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5.5 Synchronization 74
5.5.1 Data Segment Sync 74
5.5.2 Data Field Sync 74
5.5.2.1 Definition of the PN511 Sequence 75
5.5.2.2 Definition of the PN63 Sequence 75
5.5.2.3 VSB Mode Bits 76
5.5.2.4 Reserved 77
5.5.2.5 Precode 77
5.5.2.6 Enhancement Signaling 77
5.6 Enhanced Mode Data Rates 77
5.6.1 Enhanced Stream Rate Limits 78
5.7 Enhanced Mode Map Bits 82
5.7.1 Map to Frame Count to Frame Association 83
5.7.2 Generation of Length of 64 Kerdock Codeword 84
5.7.3 Encoding Procedure 85
5.8 Enhanced Data Packing Structure 85
5.8.1 Placement of Enhanced Mode Packets 86
5.8.2 Packing of Enhanced Mode Data Within Packets 87
5.8.3 E-8VSB Enhancement Signaling 88
5.9 Modulation 88
5.9.1 Bit-to-Symbol Mapping 88
5.9.2 Pilot Addition 88
5.9.3 8 VSB Modulation Method 88
6. TRANSMISSION CHARACTERISTICS FOR HIGH DATA RATE MODE..................................................88
6.1 Overview 88
6.2 Channel Error Protection and Synchronization 90
6.2.1 Data Randomizer 90
6.2.2 Reed-Solomon Encoder 90
6.2.3 Interleaving 90
6.2.4 Data Segment Sync 91
6.2.5 Data Field Sync 91
6.3 Modulation 91
6.3.1 Bit-to-Symbol Mapping 91
6.3.2 Pilot Addition 91
6.3.3 16 VSB Modulation Method 91

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ANNEX E: RECEIVER CHARACTERISTICS (INFORMATIVE) ......................................................92

ANNEX F: HISTORICAL BACKGROUND (INFORMATIVE) ..........................................................93

1. FOREWORD...............................................................................................................................................93

2. HISTORICAL BACKGROUND...................................................................................................................93
2.1 Advisory Committee on Advanced Television Service (ACATS) 94
2.2 Digital HDTV Grand Alliance (Grand Alliance) 94
2.3 Organization for Documenting the Digital Television Standard 95
2.4 Principles for Documenting the Digital Television Standard 95

ANNEX G: HIGH EFFICIENCY AUDIO SYSTEM CHARACTERISTICS (NORMATIVE) ................97

1. SCOPE .......................................................................................................................................................97

2. NORMATIVE REFERENCES .....................................................................................................................97

3. COMPLIANCE NOTATION ........................................................................................................................97

4. SYSTEM OVERVIEW.................................................................................................................................97

5. SPECIFICATION ........................................................................................................................................98
5.1 Constraints With Respect to ATSC Standard A/52B Annex E 98
5.2 Sampling Frequency 99
5.3 Frame Size 99
5.4 Audio Coding Modes 99
5.5 Dialogue Level 99
5.6 Dynamic Range Compression - Artistic 99
5.7 Dynamic Range Compression - Heavy 100

6. MAIN AND ASSOCIATED SERVICES.......................................................................................................100

6.1 Summary of Service Types 100
6.2 Complete Main Audio Service (CM) 100
6.3 Visually Impaired (VI) 101
6.4 Hearing Impaired (HI) 101
6.5 Commentary (C) 101

7. AUDIO ENCODER INTERFACES..............................................................................................................101

AMENDMENT NO. 1 .........................................................................................................................................102

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Index of Tables and Figures

Table 3.1 Next Start Code 21
Table A1 Standardized Video Input Formats 26
Table A2 Sequence Header Constraints 27
Table A3 Compression Format Constraints 28
Table A4 Sequence Extension Constraints 28
Table A5 Sequence Display Extension Constraints 29
Table A6 Picture Extension and User Data Syntax 30
Table A7 Picture User Data Syntax 30
Table A8 Captioning Data Syntax 31
Table A9 Bar Data Syntax 33
Table A10 Line Number Designation 33
Table A11 Active Format Description Syntax 35
Table A12 Active Format 36
Table B1 Audio Constraints 38
Table B2 Audio Service Types 40
Table C1 ATSC Private Information Descriptor 52
Table C2 Transport Scrambling Control Field 53
Table D5.1 Interleaving Sequence 65
Table D5.2 Byte to Symbol Conversion, Multiplexing of Trellis Encoders 66
Table D5.3 Steps vs. Map Address 79
Table D5.4a Segments and Payload vs. Step Number- one-half Rate 81
Table D5.4b Segments and Payload vs. Step Number- one-fourth Rate 82
Table D5.5 Map Change Sequence 84
Table D5.6 Enhanced Data Encapsulation 87
Table G1 Audio Constraints 99
Table G2 Audio Service Types 100

Figure 5.1 ITU-R digital terrestrial television broadcasting model. 22

Figure 5.2 High level view of encoding equipment. 23
Figure B1 Audio subsystem in the digital television system. 38
Figure C1 Sample organization of functionality in a transmitter-receiver pair for a single
program. 45
Figure D5.1 Main Service functional block diagram. 56
Figure D5.2 Main and Enhanced Service functional block diagram. 57
Figure D5.3 VSB data frame without extra field sync. 59
Figure D5.4 VSB channel occupancy (nominal). 60

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Figure D5.5 Randomizer polynomial. 61

Figure D5.6 Reed-Solomon (207,187) t=10 parity generator polynomial. 62
Figure D5.7 Convolutional interleaver (byte shift register illustration). 63
Figure D5.8 Main Service trellis encoder, precoder, and symbol mapper. 64
Figure D5.9 Trellis code interleaver. 65
Figure D5.10 Main and Enhanced Mux Packet Processor. 68
Figure D5.11 E8-VSB Pre-Processor. 71
Figure D5.12 E8-VSB convolutional coder (12-way interleave/de-interleave). 72
Figure D5.13 Enhanced Symbol Processor. 73
Figure D5.14 8-VSB data segment. 74
Figure D5.15 VSB data field sync. 75
Figure D5.16 Field sync PN sequence generators. 76
Figure D5.17 Nominal VSB system channel response (linear phase raised cosine Nyquist filter).
88
Figure D6.1 16-VSB data segment. 89
Figure D6.2 16-VSB transmitter. 90
Figure D6.3 16-VSB mapper. 90
Figure G1 Audio subsystem in the digital television system. 98

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ATSC Digital Television Standard

1. SCOPE AND DOCUMENTATION STRUCTURE

The Digital Television Standard describes the system characteristics of the U. S. advanced
television (ATV) system. The document and its normative annexes provide detailed specification
of the parameters of the system including the video encoder input scanning formats and the pre-
processing and compression parameters of the video encoder, the audio encoder input signal
format and the pre-processing and compression parameters of the audio encoder, the service
multiplex and transport layer characteristics and normative specifications, and the VSB
RF/Transmission subsystem.

1.1 Documentation Structure

The documentation of the Digital Television Standard consists of this document which provides
a general system overview, a list of reference documents, and sections relating to the system as a
whole. The system is modular in concept and the specifications for each of the modules are
provided in the appropriate annex.

2. REFERENCES

2.1 Normative References

Specific normative references can be found in each normative annex. In addition, the following
normative reference applies:
[1] IEEE/ASTM SI 10-2002, “Use of the International Systems of Units (SI): The Modern
Metric System”, Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, New York, N.Y.

2.2 Informative References

The Digital Television Standard is based on the ISO/IEC MPEG-2 Video Standard, the Digital
Audio Compression (AC-3) Standard, and the ISO/IEC MPEG-2 Systems Standard. Those
references are listed here for the convenience of the reader. In addition, a guide to the use of the
Digital Television Standard is listed.
[2] ATSC A/52B: “Digital Audio Compression (AC-3),” Advanced Television Systems
Committee, Washington, D.C., 14 June 2005.
[3] ATSC A/54A: “Guide to the Use of the ATSC Digital Television Standard,” Advanced
Television Systems Committee, Washington, D.C., 4 December 2003.
[4] ISO/IEC IS 13818-1:2000 (E), International Standard, Information technology – Generic
coding of moving pictures and associated audio information: systems.
[5] ISO/IEC IS 13818-2:2000 (E), International Standard, Information technology – Generic
coding of moving pictures and associated audio information, video.

3. DEFINITIONS
With respect to definition of terms, abbreviations, and units, the practice of the Institute of
Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) as outlined in the Institute’s published standards
shall be used [1]. Where an abbreviation is not covered by IEEE practice, or industry practice

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differs from IEEE practice, then the abbreviation in question will be described in Section 3.4 of
this document. Many of the definitions included therein are derived from definitions adopted by
MPEG.

3.1 Compliance Notation

As used in this document, “shall” denotes a mandatory provision of the standard. “Should”
denotes a provision that is recommended but not mandatory. “May” denotes a feature whose
presence does not preclude compliance, which may or may not be present at the option of the
implementor.

3.2 Treatment of Syntactic Elements

This document contains symbolic references to syntactic elements used in the audio, video, and
transport coding subsystems. These references are typographically distinguished by the use of a
different font (e.g., restricted), may contain the underscore character (e.g., sequence_end_code) and
may consist of character strings that are not English words (e.g., dynrng).

3.3 Terms Employed

For the purposes of the Digital Television Standard, the following definitions of terms apply:
ACATS – Advisory Committee on Advanced Television Service.
access unit – A coded representation of a presentation unit. In the case of audio, an access unit is
the coded representation of an audio frame. In the case of video, an access unit includes all
the coded data for a picture, and any stuffing that follows it, up to but not including the start
of the next access unit. If a picture is not preceded by a group_start_code or a
sequence_header_code, the access unit begins with a picture start code. If a picture is preceded
by a group_start_code and/or a sequence_header_code, the access unit begins with the first byte of
the first of these start codes. If it is the last picture preceding a sequence_end_code in the bit
stream all bytes between the last byte of the coded picture and the sequence_end_code
(including the sequence_end_code) belong to the access unit.
A/D – Analog to digital converter.
AES – Audio Engineering Society.
anchor frame – A video frame that is used for prediction. I-frames and P-frames are generally
used as anchor frames, but B-frames are never anchor frames.
ANSI: American National Standards Institute.
Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM) – A digital signal protocol for efficient transport of both
constant-rate and bursty information in broadband digital networks. The ATM digital stream
consists of fixed-length packets called “cells,” each containing 53 8-bit bytes—a 5-byte
header and a 48-byte information payload.
ATM – See asynchronous transfer mode.
ATV – The U. S. advanced television system.
bidirectional pictures or B-pictures or B-frames – Pictures that use both future and past
pictures as a reference. This technique is termed bidirectional prediction. B-pictures provide
the most compression. B-pictures do not propagate coding errors as they are never used as a
reference.

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bit rate – The rate at which the compressed bit stream is delivered from the channel to the input
of a decoder.
block – A block is an 8-by-8 array of pel values or DCT coefficients representing luminance or
chrominance information.
Bps – Bits per second.
byte-aligned – A bit in a coded bit stream is byte-aligned if its position is a multiple of 8-bits
from the first bit in the stream.
channel – A digital medium that stores or transports a digital television stream.
coded representation – A data element as represented in its encoded form.
compression – Reduction in the number of bits used to represent an item of data.
constant bit rate – Operation where the bit rate is constant from start to finish of the
compressed bit stream.
CRC – The cyclic redundancy check to verify the correctness of the data.
data element – An item of data as represented before encoding and after decoding.
DCT – See discrete cosine transform.
decoded stream – The decoded reconstruction of a compressed bit stream.
decoder – An embodiment of a decoding process.
decoding (process) – The process defined in the Digital Television Standard that reads an input
coded bit stream and outputs decoded pictures or audio samples.
decoding time-stamp (DTS) – A field that may be present in a PES packet header that indicates
the time that an access unit is decoded in the system target decoder.
discrete cosine transform – A mathematical transform that can be perfectly undone and which
is useful in image compression.
DTS – See decoding time-stamp.
editing – A process by which one or more compressed bit streams are manipulated to produce a
new compressed bit stream. Conforming edited bit streams are understood to meet the
requirements defined in the Digital Television Standard.
elementary stream (ES) –A generic term for one of the coded video, coded audio, or other
coded bit streams. One elementary stream is carried in a sequence of PES packets with one
and only one stream_id.
elementary stream clock reference (ESCR) – A time stamp in the PES stream from which
decoders of PES streams may derive timing.
encoder – An embodiment of an encoding process.
encoding (process) – A process that reads a stream of input pictures or audio samples and
produces a valid coded bit stream as defined in the Digital Television Standard.
entropy coding – Variable length lossless coding of the digital representation of a signal to
reduce redundancy.
entry point – Refers to a point in a coded bit stream after which a decoder can become properly
initialized and commence syntactically correct decoding. The first transmitted picture after
an entry point is either an I-picture or a P-picture. If the first transmitted picture is not an I-
picture, the decoder may produce one or more pictures during acquisition.

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ES – See elementary stream.

ESCR – See elementary stream clock reference.
event – An event is defined as a collection of elementary streams with a common time base, an
associated start time, and an associated end time.
field – For an interlaced video signal, a “field” is the assembly of alternate lines of a frame.
Therefore, an interlaced frame is composed of two fields, a top field and a bottom field.
forbidden – This term, when used in clauses defining the coded bit stream, indicates that the
value shall never be used. This is usually to avoid emulation of start codes.
frame – A frame contains lines of spatial information of a video signal. For progressive video,
these lines contain samples starting from one time instant and continuing through successive
lines to the bottom of the frame. For interlaced video a frame consists of two fields, a top
field and a bottom field. One of these fields will commence one field later than the other.
GOP – See group of pictures.
group of pictures (GOP) – A group of pictures consists of one or more pictures in sequence.
HDTV – See high definition television.
high definition television (HDTV) – High definition television has a resolution of
approximately twice that of conventional television in both the horizontal (H) and vertical
(V) dimensions and a picture aspect ratio (H × V) of 16:9. ITU-R Recommendation 1125
further defines “HDTV quality” as the delivery of a television picture which is subjectively
identical with the interlaced HDTV studio standard.
high level – A range of allowed picture parameters defined by the MPEG-2 video coding
specification which corresponds to high definition television.
Huffman coding – A type of source coding that uses codes of different lengths to represent
symbols which have unequal likelihood of occurrence.
IEC – International Electrotechnical Commission.
intra-coded pictures or I-pictures or I-frames – Pictures that are coded using information
present only in the picture itself and not depending on information from other pictures.
I-pictures provide a mechanism for random access into the compressed video data. I-pictures
employ transform coding of the pel blocks and provide only moderate compression.
ISO – International Organization for Standardization.
ITU – International Telecommunication Union.
layer – One of the levels in the data hierarchy of the video and system specification.
level – A range of allowed picture parameters and combinations of picture parameters.
macroblock – In the advanced television system, a macroblock consists of four blocks of
luminance and one each Cr and Cb block.
main level – A range of allowed picture parameters defined by the MPEG-2 video coding
specification with maximum resolution equivalent to ITU-R Recommendation 601.
main profile – A subset of the syntax of the MPEG-2 video coding specification that is expected
to be supported over a large range of applications.
Mbps – 1,000,000 bits per second.

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motion vector – A pair of numbers which represent the vertical and horizontal displacement of a
region of a reference picture for prediction.
MP@HL – Main profile at high level.
MP@ML – Main profile at main level.
MPEG – Refers to standards developed by the ISO/IEC JTC1/SC29 WG11, Moving Picture
Experts Group. MPEG may also refer to the Group.
MPEG-2 – Refers to ISO/IEC standards 13818-1 (systems), 13818-2 (video), 13818-3 (Audio),
13818-4 (Compliance).
pack – A pack consists of a pack header followed by zero or more packets. It is a layer in the
system coding syntax.
packet data – Contiguous bytes of data from an elementary data stream present in the packet.
packet identifier (PID) – A unique integer value used to associate elementary streams of a
program in a single or multi-program transport stream.
packet – A packet consists of a header followed by a number of contiguous bytes from an
elementary data stream. It is a layer in the system coding syntax.
padding – A method to adjust the average length of an audio frame in time to the duration of the
corresponding PCM samples, by continuously adding a slot to the audio frame.
payload – Payload refers to the bytes which follow the header byte in a packet. For example, the
payload of a transport stream packet includes the PES_packet_header and its
PES_packet_data_bytes or pointer_field and PSI sections, or private data. A PES_packet_payload,
however, consists only of PES_packet_data_bytes. The transport stream packet header and
adaptation fields are not payload.
PCR – See program clock reference.
pel – See pixel.
PES packet header – The leading fields in a PES packet up to but not including the
PES_packet_data_byte fields where the stream is not a padding stream. In the case of a padding
stream, the PES packet header is defined as the leading fields in a PES packet up to but not
including the padding_byte fields.
PES packet – The data structure used to carry elementary stream data. It consists of a packet
header followed by PES packet payload.
PES stream – A PES stream consists of PES packets, all of whose payloads consist of data from
a single elementary stream, and all of which have the same stream_id.
PES – An abbreviation for packetized elementary stream.
picture – Source, coded, or reconstructed image data. A source or reconstructed picture consists
of three rectangular matrices representing the luminance and two chrominance signals.
PID – See packet identifier.
pixel – “Picture element” or “pel.” A pixel is a digital sample of the color intensity values of a
picture at a single point.
PMT – Program Map Table. The collection of all the TS_program_map_section()s.
predicted pictures or P-pictures or P-frames – Pictures that are coded with respect to the
nearest previous I or P-picture. This technique is termed forward prediction. P-pictures

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provide more compression than I-pictures and serve as a reference for future P-pictures or B-
pictures. P-pictures can propagate coding errors when P-pictures (or B-pictures) are
predicted from prior P-pictures where the prediction is flawed.
presentation time-stamp (PTS) – A field that may be present in a PES packet header that
indicates the time that a presentation unit is presented in the system target decoder.
presentation unit (PU) – A decoded audio access unit or a decoded picture.
profile – A defined subset of the syntax specified in the MPEG-2 video coding specification
program clock reference (PCR) – A time stamp in the transport stream from which decoder
timing is derived.
program element – A generic term for one of the elementary streams or other data streams that
may be included in the program.
program specific information (PSI) – PSI consists of normative data which is necessary for the
demultiplexing of transport streams and the successful regeneration of programs.
program – A program is a collection of program elements. Program elements may be
elementary streams. Program elements need not have any defined time base; those that do
have a common time base and are intended for synchronized presentation.
PSI – See program specific information.
PTS – See presentation time-stamp.
PU – See presentation unit.
quantizer – A processing step which intentionally reduces the precision of DCT coefficients.
random access – The process of beginning to read and decode the coded bit stream at an
arbitrary point.
reserved – This term, when used in clauses defining the coded bit stream, indicates that the
value may be used in the future for Digital Television Standard extensions. Unless otherwise
specified within this Standard, all reserved bits shall be set to “1”.
SCR – See system clock reference.
scrambling – The alteration of the characteristics of a video, audio, or coded data stream in
order to prevent unauthorized reception of the information in a clear form. This alteration is a
specified process under the control of a conditional access system.
SDTV – See standard definition television.
slice – A series of consecutive macroblocks.
SMPTE – Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers.
source stream – A single, non-multiplexed stream of samples before compression coding.
splicing – The concatenation performed on the system level or two different elementary streams.
It is understood that the resulting stream must conform totally to the Digital Television
Standard.
standard definition television (SDTV) – This term is used to signify a digital television system
in which the quality is approximately equivalent to that of NTSC. This equivalent quality
may be achieved from pictures sourced at the 4:2:2 level of ITU-R Recommendation 601 and
subjected to processing as part of the bit rate compression. The results should be such that
when judged across a representative sample of program material, subjective equivalence with

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard 27 December 2005

NTSC is achieved. Also called standard digital television. See also conventional definition
television and ITU-R Recommendation 1125.
start codes – 32-bit codes embedded in the coded bit stream that are unique. They are used for
several purposes including identifying some of the layers in the coding syntax. Start codes
consist of a 24 bit prefix (0x000001) and an 8 bit stream_id.
STD input buffer – A first-in, first-out buffer at the input of a system target decoder for storage
of compressed data from elementary streams before decoding.
STD – See system target decoder.
still picture – A coded still picture consists of a video sequence containing exactly one coded
picture which is intra-coded. This picture has an associated PTS and the presentation time of
succeeding pictures, if any, is later than that of the still picture by at least two picture
periods.
system clock reference (SCR) – A time stamp in the program stream from which decoder
timing is derived.
system header – The system header is a data structure that carries information summarizing the
system characteristics of the Digital Television Standard multiplexed bit stream.
system target decoder (STD) – A hypothetical reference model of a decoding process used to
describe the semantics of the Digital Television Standard multiplexed bit stream.
time-stamp – A term that indicates the time of a specific action such as the arrival of a byte or
the presentation of a presentation unit.
transport stream packet header – The leading fields in a Transport Stream packet up to and
including the continuity_counter field.
variable bit rate – Operation where the bit rate varies with time during the decoding of a
compressed bit stream.
VBV – See video buffering verifier.
video buffering verifier (VBV) – A hypothetical decoder that is conceptually connected to the
output of an encoder. Its purpose is to provide a constraint on the variability of the data rate
that an encoder can produce.
video sequence – A video sequence is represented by a sequence header, one or more groups of
pictures, and an end_of_sequence code in the data stream.
8 VSB – Vestigial sideband modulation with 8 discrete amplitude levels.
16 VSB – Vestigial sideband modulation with 16 discrete amplitude levels.

3.4 Symbols, Abbreviations, and Mathematical Operators

The symbols, abbreviations, and mathematical operators used to describe the Digital Television
Standard are those adopted for use in describing MPEG-2 and are similar to those used in the
“C” programming language. However, integer division with truncation and rounding are
specifically defined. The bitwise operators are defined assuming two’s-complement
representation of integers. Numbering and counting loops generally begin from 0.
3.4.1 Arithmetic Operators
+ Addition.

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard 27 December 2005

– Subtraction (as a binary operator) or negation (as a unary operator).

++ Increment.
-- Decrement.
* or × Multiplication.
^ Power.
/ Integer division with truncation of the result toward 0. For example, 7/4 and –7/–4 are
truncated to 1 and –7/4 and 7/–4 are truncated to –1.
// Integer division with rounding to the nearest integer. Half-integer values are rounded
away from 0 unless otherwise specified. For example 3//2 is rounded to 2, and –3//2
is rounded to –2.
DIV Integer division with truncation of the result towards –∞.
% Modulus operator. Defined only for positive numbers.
Sign( ) Sign(x) =1 x>0
=0 x == 0
= –1 x < 0
NINT ( ) Nearest integer operator. Returns the nearest integer value to the real-valued
argument. Half-integer values are rounded away from 0.
sin Sine.
cos Cosine.
exp Exponential.
√ Square root.
log10 Logarithm to base ten.
loge Logarithm to base e.
3.4.2 Logical Operators
|| Logical OR.
&& Logical AND.
! Logical NOT.
3.4.3 Relational Operators
> Greater than.
≥ Greater than or equal to.
< Less than.
≤ Less than or equal to.
== Equal to.
!= Not equal to.
max [,...,] The maximum value in the argument list.
min [,...,] The minimum value in the argument list.

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard 27 December 2005

3.4.4 Bitwise Operators

& AND.
| OR.
>> Shift right with sign extension.
>> Shift left with 0 fill.
3.4.5 Assignment
= Assignment operator.
3.4.6 Mnemonics
The following mnemonics are defined to describe the different data types used in the coded bit
stream.

bslbf Bit string, left bit first, where “left” is the order in which bit strings are written in the Standard. Bit
strings are written as a string of 1s and 0s within single quote marks, e.g. ‘1000 0001’. Blanks within
a bit string are for ease of reading and have no significance.
uimsbf Unsigned integer, most significant bit first.

The byte order of multi-byte words is most significant byte first.

3.4.7 Constants
π 3.14159265359...
e 2.71828182845...
3.4.8 Method of Describing Bit Stream Syntax
Each data item in the coded bit stream described below is in bold type. It is described by its
name, its length in bits, and a mnemonic for its type and order of transmission.
The action caused by a decoded data element in a bit stream depends on the value of that data
element and on data elements previously decoded. The decoding of the data elements and
definition of the state variables used in their decoding are described in the clauses containing the
semantic description of the syntax. The following constructs are used to express the conditions
when data elements are present, and are in normal type.
Note this syntax uses the “C” code convention that a variable or expression evaluating to a
non-zero value is equivalent to a condition that is true.

while ( condition ) { If the condition is true, then the group of data elements occurs next in the data stream.
data_element This repeats until the condition is not true.
...
}
do { The data element always occurs at least once. The data element is repeated until the
data_element condition is not true.
...}
while ( condition )
if ( condition) { If the condition is true, then the first group of data elements occurs next in the data
data_element stream.
...
}

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard 27 December 2005

else { If the condition is not true, then the second group of data elements occurs next in the
data_element data stream.
...
}
for (i = 0;i<n;i++) { The group of data elements occurs n times. Conditional constructs within the group of
data_element data elements may depend on the value of the loop control variable i, which is set to
... zero for the first occurrence, incremented to 1 for the second occurrence, and so forth.
}

As noted, the group of data elements may contain nested conditional constructs. For
compactness, the {} are omitted when only one data element follows.

data_element [ ] data_element [ ] is an array of data. The number of data elements is indicated by the
context.
data_element [n] data_element [n] is the n+1th element of an array of data.
data_element [m] [n] data_element [m] [n] is the m+1,n+1 th element of a two-dimensional array of data.
data_element [l] [m] [n] data_element [l] [m] [n] is the l+1,m+1,n+1 th element of a three-dimensional array of
data.
data_element [m..n] data_element [m..n] is the inclusive range of bits between bit m and bit n in the
data_element.

Decoders must include a means to look for start codes and sync bytes (transport stream) in
order to begin decoding correctly, and to identify errors, erasures or insertions while decoding.
The methods to identify these situations, and the actions to be taken, are not standardized.
3.4.8.1 Definition of bytealigned Function
The function bytealigned( ) returns 1 if the current position is on a byte boundary; that is, the next
bit in the bit stream is the first bit in a byte. Otherwise it returns 0.
3.4.8.2 Definition of nextbits Function
The function nextbits( ) permits comparison of a bit string with the next bits to be decoded in the
bit stream.
3.4.8.3 Definition of next_start_code Function
The next_start_code( ) function removes any zero bit and zero byte stuffing and locates the next
start code.
This function checks whether the current position is byte-aligned. If it is not, 0 stuffing bits
are present. After that any number of 0 bytes may be present before the start-code. Therefore
start-codes are always byte-aligned and may be preceded by any number of 0 stuffing bits.

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard 27 December 2005

Table 3.1 Next Start Code

Syntax No. of Bits Format
next_start_code(){
while(!bytealigned())
zero_bit 1 ‘0’
while(nextbits()!=‘0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0001’)
zero_byte 8 ‘00000000’
}

4. SYSTEM OVERVIEW
The Digital Television Standard describes a system designed to transmit high quality video and
audio and ancillary data over a single 6 MHz channel. The system can deliver reliably about 19
Mbps of throughput in a 6 MHz terrestrial broadcasting channel and about 38 Mbps of
throughput in a 6 MHz cable television channel. This means that encoding a video source whose
resolution can be five times that of conventional television (NTSC) resolution requires a bit rate
reduction by a factor of 50 or higher. To achieve this bit rate reduction, the system is designed to
be efficient in utilizing available channel capacity by exploiting complex video and audio
compression technology.
The objective is to maximize the information passed through the data channel by minimizing
the amount of data required to represent the video image sequence and its associated audio. The
objective is to represent the video, audio, and data sources with as few bits as possible while
preserving the level of quality required for the given application.
Although the RF/transmission subsystems described in this Standard are designed
specifically for terrestrial and cable applications, the objective is that the video, audio, and
service multiplex/transport subsystems be useful in other applications.

4.1 System Block Diagram

A basic block diagram representation of the system is shown in Figure 5.1. According to this
model, the digital television system can be seen to consist of three subsystems.1
• Source coding and compression
• Service multiplex and transport
• RF/transmission

1
ITU-R Document TG11/3-2, “Outline of Work for Task Group 11/3, Digital Terrestrial
Television Broadcasting,” June 30, 1992.

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard 27 December 2005

Service Multiplex and Transport RF/Transmission System

Video Subsystem

Video
Video Source Coding
and Compression
Channel
Transport
Audio Subsystem Coding

Audio
Service Multiplex
Audio Source Coding
and Compression

Modulation
Ancillary Data

Control Data

Receiver Characteristics

Figure 5.1 ITU-R digital terrestrial television broadcasting model.

“Source coding and compression” refers to the bit rate reduction methods, also known as data
compression, appropriate for application to the video, audio, and ancillary digital data streams.
The term “ancillary data” includes control data, conditional access control data, and data
associated with the program audio and video services, such as closed captioning. “Ancillary
data” can also refer to independent program services. The purpose of the coder is to minimize
the number of bits needed to represent the audio and video information. The digital television
system employs the MPEG-2 video stream syntax for the coding of video and the Digital Audio
Compression (AC-3) Standard for the coding of audio.
“Service multiplex and transport” refers to the means of dividing the digital data stream into
“packets” of information, the means of uniquely identifying each packet or packet type, and the
appropriate methods of multiplexing video data stream packets, audio data stream packets, and
ancillary data stream packets into a single data stream. In developing the transport mechanism,
interoperability among digital media, such as terrestrial broadcasting, cable distribution, satellite
distribution, recording media, and computer interfaces, was a prime consideration. The digital
television system employs the MPEG-2 transport stream syntax for the packetization and
multiplexing of video, audio, and data signals for digital broadcasting systems (ISO/IEC 13818-
1) [3]. The MPEG-2 transport stream syntax was developed for applications where channel
bandwidth or recording media capacity is limited and the requirement for an efficient transport
mechanism is paramount. It was designed also to facilitate interoperability with the ATM
transport mechanism.
“RF/transmission” refers to channel coding and modulation. The channel coder takes the data
bit stream and adds additional information that can be used by the receiver to reconstruct the

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard 27 December 2005

data from the received signal which, due to transmission impairments, may not accurately
represent the transmitted signal. The modulation (or physical layer) uses the digital data stream
information to modulate the transmitted signal. The modulation subsystem offers two modes: a
terrestrial broadcast mode (8 VSB), and a high data rate mode (16 VSB).
Figure 5.2 illustrates a high level view of encoding equipment. This view is not intended to
be complete, but is used to illustrate the relationship of various clock frequencies within the
encoder. There are two domains within the encoder where a set of frequencies are related, the
source coding domain and the channel coding domain.

f27 MHz Program Clock

Reference
33 9 program_clock_reference_base
Frequency program_clock_reference_extension
Divider
Network Adaptation
Header
fv fa Encoder

Video In
Video fTP FEC and fsym RF Out
A/D Transport VSB
Encoder Encoder Sync
Modulator
Insertion

Audio In
Audio
A/D Encoder

Figure 5.2 High level view of encoding equipment.

The source coding domain, represented schematically by the video, audio, and transport
encoders, uses a family of frequencies which are based on a 27 MHz clock (f27MHz). This clock is
used to generate a 42-bit sample of the frequency which is partitioned into two parts defined by
the MPEG-2 specification. These are the 33-bit program_clock_reference_base and the 9-bit
program_clock_reference_extension. The former is equivalent to a sample of a 90 kHz clock which is
locked in frequency to the 27 MHz clock, and is used by the audio and video source encoders
when encoding the presentation time stamp (PTS) and the decode time stamp (DTS). The audio
and video sampling clocks, fa and fv respectively, must be frequency-locked to the 27 MHz clock.
This can be expressed as the requirement that there exist two pairs of integers, (na, ma) and (nv,
mv), such that:
na
fa = × 27 MHz
ma

and
nv
fv = × 27 MHz
mv

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard 27 December 2005

The channel coding domain is represented by the FEC/Sync Insertion subsystem and the
VSB modulator. The relevant frequencies in this domain are the VSB symbol frequency (fsym)and
the frequency of the transport stream (fTP) which is the frequency of transmission of the encoded
transport stream. These two frequencies must be locked, having the relation:
188 312
ftp = 2 × f
208 313 sym
The signals in the two domains are not required to be frequency-locked to each other, and in
many implementations will operate asynchronously. In such systems, the frequency drift can
necessitate the occasional insertion or deletion of a null packet from within the transport stream,
thereby accommodating the frequency disparity.
The annexes that follow consider the characteristics of the subsystems necessary to
accommodate the services envisioned.

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard, Annex A 27 December 2005

Annex A:
Video System Characteristics (Normative)

1. SCOPE
This annex describes the characteristics of the video subsystem of the Digital Television
Standard. The input formats and bit stream characteristics are described in separate sections.2

2. REFERENCES

2.1 Normative References

The following documents contain provisions which, through reference in this text, constitute
provisions of this standard. At the time of publication, the editions indicated were valid. All
standards are subject to revision, and parties to agreement based on this standard are encouraged
to investigate the possibility of applying the most recent editions of the documents listed below.
[A1] CEA-708-B: “Digital Television (DTV) Closed Captioning,” Consumer Electronics
Association.
[A2] ISO/IEC IS 13818-1:2000 (E), International Standard, Information technology – Generic
coding of moving pictures and associated audio information: systems.
[A3] ISO/IEC IS 13818-2:2000 (E), International Standard, Information technology – Generic
coding of moving pictures and associated audio information: video.
[A4] SMPTE 125M (1995): Standard for Television—Component Video Signal 4:2:2, Bit-
Parallel Digital Interface, Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers, White
Plains, N.Y.
[A5] SMPTE 170M (2004): Standard for Television—Composite Analog Video Signal, NTSC
for Studio Applications, Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers, White
Plains, N.Y.
[A6] SMPTE 267M (1995): Standard for Television—Bit-Parallel Digital Interface,
Component Video Signal 4:2:2 16 x 9 Aspect Ratio, Society of Motion Picture and
Television Engineers, White Plains, N.Y.
[A7] SMPTE 274M (2005): Standard for Television—1920 x 1080 Scanning and Analog and
Parallel Digital Interfaces for Multiple Picture Rates, Society of Motion Picture and
Television Engineers, White Plains, N.Y.
[A8] SMPTE 293M (2003): Standard for Television—720 x 483 Active Line at 59.94-Hz
Progressive Scan Production, Digital Representation, Society of Motion Picture and
Television Engineers, White Plains, N.Y.

2
Note that there is a coordinated effort underway among ATSC, CEA, and SMPTE to revise and
clarify standards related to delivering closed captions, AFD, and bar data so that each
describes the aspects of the system for which they are primarily responsible without overlap.
This effort is expected to result in revisions of those sections in the ATSC Standards.

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard, Annex A 27 December 2005

[A9] SMPTE 296M (2001): Standard for Television—1280 x 720 Progressive Image Sample
Structure, Analog and Digital Representation and Analog Interface, Society of Motion
Picture and Television Engineers, White Plains, N.Y.
[A10] ETSI TS 101 154 V1.7.1, Digital Video Broadcasting (DVB): Implementation
Guidelines for the use of MPEG-2 Systems, Video and Audio in Satellite, Cable and
Terrestrial Broadcasting Applications, Annex B, June 2005.

2.2 Informative References

[A11] Digital Receiver Implementation Guidelines and Recommended Receiver Reaction to
Aspect Ratio Signaling in Digital Video Broadcasting, Issue 1.2.1, February 2001,
Digital TV Group.
[A12] ITU-R BT.601-5 (1994): Encoding Parameters of Digital Television for Studios.
[A13] ITU-R BT. 709-5 (2002): Parameter values for the HDTV Standards for Production and
International Programme Exchange.
[A14] ANSI/SCTE 21 2001 (formerly DVS 053): Standard for Carriage of NTSC VBI Data in
Cable Digital Transport Streams, Society of Cable Telecommunications Engineers.
[A15] CEA-CEB-10-A: “EIA-708-B Implementation Guidance,” December 2002, Consumer
Electronics Association.

3. COMPLIANCE NOTATION
As used in this document, “shall” denotes a mandatory provision of the standard. “Should”
denotes a provision that is recommended but not mandatory. “May” denotes a feature whose
presence does not preclude compliance, that may or may not be present at the option of the
implementor.

4. POSSIBLE VIDEO INPUTS

While not required by this standard, there are certain television production standards, shown in
Table A1, that define video formats that relate to compression formats specified by this standard.

Table A1 Standardized Video Input Formats

Video Standard Active Lines Active Samples/ Line
SMPTE 274M [A7] 1080 1920
SMPTE 296M [A9] 720 1280
ITU-R BT.601-5 [A12] 483 720

The compression formats may be derived from one or more appropriate video input formats.
It may be anticipated that additional video production standards will be developed in the future
that extend the number of possible input formats.

5. SOURCE CODING SPECIFICATION

The DTV video compression algorithm shall conform to the Main Profile syntax of ISO/IEC
13818-2 [A3]. The allowable parameters shall be bounded by the upper limits specified for the

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard, Annex A 27 December 2005

Main Profile at High Level.3 Additionally, all bit streams shall meet the constraints and
specifications described in Sections 5.1 and 5.2.

5.1 Constraints with Respect to ISO/IEC 13818-2 Main Profile

The following tables list the allowed values for each of the ISO/IEC 13818-2 [A3] syntactic
elements which are restricted beyond the limits imposed by MP@HL.
In these tables conventional numbers denote decimal values, numbers preceded by 0x are to
be interpreted as hexadecimal values and numbers within single quotes (e.g., ‘10010100’) are to
be interpreted as a string of binary digits.
5.1.1 Sequence Header Constraints
Table A2 identifies parameters in the sequence header of a bit stream that shall be constrained by
the video subsystem and lists the allowed values for each.

Table A2 Sequence Header Constraints

Sequence Header Syntactic Element Allowed Value
horizontal_size_value see Table A3
vertical_size_value see Table A3
aspect_ratio_information see Table A3
frame_rate_code see Table A3
bit_rate_value (≤ 19.4 Mbps) ≤ 48500
bit_rate_value (≤ 38.8 Mbps) ≤ 97000
vbv_buffer_size_value ≤ 488

The allowable values for the field bit_rate_value are application-dependent. In the primary
application of terrestrial broadcast, this field shall correspond to a bit rate which is less than or
equal to 19.4 Mbps. In the high data rate mode, the corresponding bit rate is less than or equal to
38.8 Mbps.
5.1.2 Compression Format Constraints
Table A3 lists the allowed compression formats.

3
See ISO/IEC 13818-2 [A3], Section 8 for more information regarding profiles and levels.

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard, Annex A 27 December 2005

Table A3 Compression Format Constraints

vertical_size_value horizontal_size_value aspect_ratio_information frame_rate_code progressive_sequence
1,2,4,5 ‘1’
10804 1920 1,3
4,5 ‘0’
720 1280 1,3 1,2,4,5,7,8 ‘1’
1,2,4,5,7,8 ‘1’
704 2,3
4,5 ‘0’
480
1,2,4,5,7,8 ‘1’
640 1,2
4,5 ‘0’
Legend for MPEG-2 coded values:
aspect_ratio_information: 1 = square samples, 2 = 4:3 display aspect ratio, 3 = 16:9 display aspect ratio
frame_rate_code: 1 = 23.976 Hz, 2 = 24 Hz, 4 = 29.97 Hz, 5 = 30 Hz, 7 = 59.94 Hz, 8 = 60 Hz
progressive_sequence: ‘0’ = interlaced scan, ‘1’ = progressive scan

5.1.3 Sequence Extension Constraints

Table A4 identifies parameters in the sequence extension part of a bit stream that shall be
constrained by the video subsystem and lists the allowed values for each. A sequence_extension
structure is required to be present after every sequence_header structure.

Table A4 Sequence Extension Constraints

Sequence Extension Syntactic Element Allowed Values
progressive_sequence see Table A3
profile_and_level_indication see Note
chroma_format ‘01’
horizontal_size_extension ‘00’
vertical_size_extension ‘00’
bit_rate_extension ‘0000 0000 0000’
vbv_buffer_size_extension ‘0000 0000’
frame_rate_extension_n ‘00’
frame_rate_extension_d ‘0000 0’

Note: The profile_and_level_indication field shall indicate the lowest profile and level defined in
ISO/IEC 13818-2 [A3], Section 8, that is consistent with the parameters of the video elementary
stream.
5.1.4 Sequence Display Extension Constraints
Table A5 identifies parameters in the sequence display extension part of a bit stream that shall be
constrained by the video subsystem and lists the allowed values for each.

4
Note that 1088 lines are actually coded in order to satisfy the MPEG-2 requirement that the
coded vertical size be a multiple of 16 (progressive scan) or 32 (interlaced scan). The bottom
8 lines are black, per MPEG rules.

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard, Annex A 27 December 2005

Table A5 Sequence Display Extension Constraints

Sequence Display Extension Syntactic Element Allowed Values
video_format ‘000’

The values for color_primaries, transfer_characteristics, and matrix_coefficients shall be explicitly

indicated in the sequence_display_extension. While all values for color_primaries, transfer_characteristics,
and matrix_coefficients defined in Tables 6-7, 6-8, and 6-9 of ISO/IEC 13818-2 [A3] are allowed in
the transmitted bit stream, it is noted that those of ITU-R BT.709 [A13] and SMPTE 170M [A5]
are the most likely to be in common use.
Note: Some previously-encoded legacy material may not have the colorimetry (i.e.,
color_primaries, transfer_characteristics, and matrix_coefficients) explicitly indicated in the
sequence_display_extension, in which case the colorimetry is most likely ITU-R BT.709 [A13] for
all formats except those formats with vertical_size_value = 480, which are most likely to have
colorimetry according to SMPTE 170M [A5].
5.1.5 Picture Header Constraints
In all cases other than when vbv_delay has the value 0xFFFF, the value of vbv_delay shall be
constrained as follows:
vbv_delay ≤ 45000

5.1.6 Picture Coding Constraints

frame_pred_frame_dct shall be '1' if progressive_frame is '1'

5.2 Bit Stream Specifications Beyond MPEG-2

This section covers the extension and user data part of the video syntax. These data are inserted
at the sequence, GOP, and picture level. The syntax used for the insertion of closed captioning5
in picture user data is described.
5.2.1 Picture Extension and User Data Syntax
The picture user data shall be constructed per [A3]. Table A6 is provided to show the syntax that
is required for picture extension and user data.

5
Implementers should note that CEA-708-B [A1] describes the semantics for closed captions.
Additional information on implementation of captions may be found in CEA-CEB-10-A
[A15].

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard, Annex A 27 December 2005

Table A6 Picture Extension and User Data Syntax

Value No. of Bits Format
extension_and_user_data(2) {
while ((nextbits() == extension_start_code ) ||
(nextbits() == user_data_start_code)) {
if (nextbits() == extension_start_code)
extension_data(2)
if (nextbits() == user_data_start_code)
user_data()
}
}

5.2.2 Picture User Data Syntax

Table A7 describes the picture user data syntax which shall be used.

Table A7 Picture User Data Syntax6

Syntax No. of Bits Format
user_data() {
user_data_start_code 32 bslbf
ATSC_identifier 32 bslbf
user_data_type_code 8 uimsbf
if (user_data_type_code == ‘0x03’)
cc_data()
else if (user_data_type_code == ‘0x06’)
bar_data()
else {
while (nextbits() != ‘0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0001’)
ATSC_reserved_user_data 8
}
next_start_code()
}

In accordance with the bit stream syntax in Table A6, more than one picture user data
construct may follow any given picture header. However, no more than one picture user data
construct using the same user_data_type_code shall follow any given picture header.
Note that picture user data with a 32-bit field following user_data_start_code having a value
other than ATSC_identifier may be present in an ATSC-compliant video bit stream. As an example,
the afd_identifier (value 0x44544731) is defined for use in ATSC video Elementary Streams (see
Section 5.2.4). Receiving devices are expected to process this field and use it to determine the
syntax and semantics of the user data construct to follow.

6
Shaded cells in this table indicate syntactic and semantic additions to the ISO/IEC 13818-2
[A3] Standard. Note: user_data_type_code values 0x04 and 0x05 are assigned in ANSI/SCTE
21 2001 [A14].

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard, Annex A 27 December 2005

Receiving devices are expected to silently discard any unrecognized video user data
encountered in the video bit stream. For example, if an unrecognized 32-bit identifier is seen
following the user_data_start_code, or an unrecognized 8-bit user_data_type_code is seen following
the ATSC_identifier, data should be discarded until another start code is seen.
5.2.3 ATSC Picture User Data Semantics
user_data_start_code – This is set to 0x0000 01B2.
ATSC_identifier – This is a 32 bit code that indicates that the video user data conforms to this
specification. The value ATSC_identifier shall be 0x4741 3934.
user_data_type_code – An 8-bit value that identifies the type of ATSC user data to follow. Value
0x03 indicates cc_data(), value 0x06 indicates bar_data(), and other values are either in use in
other standards or are reserved for future use.
cc_data() – A data structure defined in Table A8.
bar_data() – A data structure indicating the sizes of letterbox or pillarbox areas within the coded
video frame .
ATSC_reserved_user_data – Reserved for use by ATSC or used by other standards.

5.2.3.1 Captioning Data

Table A8 describes the syntax of captioning data.

Table A8 Captioning Data Syntax

Syntax No. of Bits Format
cc_data() {
reserved 1 ’1’
process_cc_data_flag 1 bslbf
additional_data_flag 1 bslbf
cc_count 5 uimsbf
reserved 8 ‘1111 1111’
for (i=0 ; i < cc_count ; i++) {
marker_bits 5 ‘1111 1’
cc_valid 1 bslbf
cc_type 2 bslbf
cc_data_1 8 bslbf
cc_data_2 8 bslbf
}
marker_bits 8 ‘1111 1111’
if (additional_data_flag) {
while (nextbits() != ‘0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0001’) {
additional_cc_data
}
}
}

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard, Annex A 27 December 2005

process_cc_data_flag – This flag is set to indicate whether it is necessary to process the cc_data. If it
is set to ‘1’, the cc_data has to be parsed and its meaning has to be processed. When it is set to
‘0’, the cc_data can be discarded.
additional_data_flag – This flag is set to ‘1’ to indicate the presence of additional user data.
cc_count: This 5-bit integer indicates the number of closed caption constructs following this field.
It can have values 0 through 31. The value of cc_count shall be set according to the frame rate
and coded picture structure (field or frame) such that a fixed bandwidth of 9600 bits per
second is maintained for the closed caption payload data. Sixteen (16) bits of closed caption
payload data are carried in each pair of the fields cc_data_1 and cc_data_2.
cc_valid – This flag is set to ‘1’ to indicate that the two closed caption data bytes that follow are
valid. If set to ‘0’ the two data bytes are invalid, as defined in CEA-708-B [A1].
cc_type – Denotes the type of the two closed caption data bytes that follow, as defined in CEA-
708-B [A1].
cc_data_1 – The first byte of a closed caption data pair as defined in CEA-708-B [A1].
cc_data_2 – The second byte of a closed caption data pair as defined in CEA-708-B [A1].
additional_cc_data – Reserved for future ATSC definition.

5.2.3.2 Bar Data

Table A9 describes the syntax of bar data. Bar data should be included in video user data
whenever the rectangular picture area containing useful information does not extend to the full
height or width of the coded frame7.
When present, bar data shall be carried in the picture user data of the video Elementary
Stream. After each sequence start (and repeat sequence start), the bar data shall be signalled.
After introduction, bar data shall remain in effect until the next sequence start. Within a
sequence, bar data shall remain in effect until a picture contains new bar data or a picture
contains AFD data without bar data. At the start of a sequence, unless AFD data is present
specifying otherwise, the absence of bar data shall indicate that the rectangular picture area
containing useful information extends to the full height and width of the coded frame.

7
In other words, the video is letterboxed (bars above and/or below video) or pillarboxed (bars
left and/or right of video).

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard, Annex A 27 December 2005

Table A9 Bar Data Syntax

Syntax No. of Bits Format
bar_data() {
top_bar_flag 1 bslbf
bottom_bar_flag 1 bslbf
left_bar_flag 1 bslbf
right_bar_flag 1 bslbf
reserved 4 ‘1111’
if (top_bar_flag == ‘1’) {
marker_bits 2 ‘11’
line_number_end_of_top_bar 14 uimsbf
}
if (bottom_bar_flag == ‘1’) {
marker_bits 2 ‘11’
line_number_start_of_bottom_bar 14 uimsbf
}
if (left_bar_flag == ‘1’) {
marker_bits 2 ‘11’
pixel_number_end_of_left_bar 14 uimsbf
}
if (right_bar_flag == ‘1’) {
marker_bits 2 ‘11’
pixel_number_start_of_right_bar 14 uimsbf
}
marker_bits 8 ‘1111 1111’
while (nextbits() != ‘0000 0000 0000 0000 0000 0001’) {
additional_bar_data
}
}

Designation of line numbers for line_number_end_of_top_bar and line_number_start_of_bottom_bar is

video format-dependent and shall conform to the applicable standard indicated in Table A10.

Table A10 Line Number Designation

Video Format Applicable Standard
480 Interlaced (analog) SMPTE 170M [A5]
480 Interlaced 4:3 (digital) SMPTE 125M [A4]
480 Interlaced 16:9 (digital) SMPTE 267M [A6]
480 Progressive SMPTE 293M [A8]
720 Progressive SMPTE 296M [A9]
1080 Interlaced SMPTE 274M [A7]
1080 Progressive SMPTE 274M [A7]

top_bar_flag – This flag shall indicate, when set, that the top bar data is present.

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard, Annex A 27 December 2005

bottom_bar_flag – This flag shall indicate, when set, that the bottom bar data is present.
left_bar_flag – This flag shall indicate, when set, that the left bar data is present.
right_bar_flag – This flag shall indicate, when set, that the right bar data is present.
line_number_end_of_top_bar – A 14-bit unsigned integer value representing the last line of a
horizontal letterbox bar area at the top of the reconstructed frame. Designation of line
numbers shall be as defined in Table A10.
line_number_start_of_bottom_bar – A 14-bit unsigned integer value representing the first line of a
horizontal letterbox bar area at the bottom of the reconstructed frame. Designation of line
numbers shall be as defined in Table A10.
pixel_number_end_of_left_bar – A 14-bit unsigned integer value representing the last horizontal
luminance sample of a vertical pillarbar area at the left side of the reconstructed frame.
Pixels shall be numbered from zero, starting with the leftmost pixel.
pixel_number_start_of_right_bar – A 14-bit unsigned integer value representing the first horizontal
luminance sample of a vertical pillarbar area at the right side of the reconstructed frame.
Pixels shall be numbered from zero, starting with the leftmost pixel.
additional_bar_data – Reserved for future ATSC definition.

5.2.4 Active Format Description Data

Active Format Description (AFD) should be included in video user data whenever the
rectangular picture area containing useful information does not extend to the full height or width
of the coded frame. AFD data may also be included in user data when the rectangular picture
area containing useful information extends to the full height and width of the coded frame.
When present, the AFD shall be carried, using the syntax and semantics defined in [A10], in
the user data of the video Elementary Stream. After each sequence start (and repeat sequence
start) the default aspect ratio of the area of interest shall be that signalled by the sequence header
and sequence display extension parameters. After introduction, an AFD shall remain in effect
until the next sequence start or until another AFD is introduced. Receivers should interpret the
absence of AFD in a sequence start to mean the active format is the same as the coded frame,
corresponding to AFD value ‘1000’ (see Table A12).
Note: The AFD syntax as shown here is identical to that specified in ETSI TS 101
154 V1.7.1 [A10], and is reprinted here with permission. Semantic differences are
documented below

5.2.4.1 AFD Syntax

Table A11 shows the syntax defined in [A10] which is provided for the convenience of the
reader.

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard, Annex A 27 December 2005

Table A11 Active Format Description Syntax

Syntax No. of Bits Format
user_data_start_code 32 bslbf
afd_identifier 32 bslbf
zero 1 ’0’
active_format_flag 1 bslbf
reserved 6 ’00 0001’
if (active_format_flag == ‘1’) {
reserved 4 ‘1111’
active_format 4 bslbf
}

5.2.4.2 AFD Semantics

afd_identifier – A 32-bit field that identifies that the syntax of the user data is Active Format
Description. Its value is 0x44544731.
active_format_flag – A 1 bit flag. A value of ‘1’ indicates that an active format is described in this
data structure.
active_format – A 4 bit field describing the “area of interest” in terms of its aspect ratio within the
coded frame as defined in ISO/IEC 13818-2 [A3].
The active_format is used by the decoder in conjunction with the “source aspect ratio.” The
source aspect ratio is derived from the “display aspect ratio” (DAR) signaled in the
aspect_ratio_information, the horizontal_size, vertical_size, and display_horizontal_size and display_vertical_size
if present (see ISO/IEC 13818-2 [A3]):
• If sequence_display_extension() is not present, source aspect ratio = DAR
• If sequence_display_extension() is present, source aspect ratio =
display_horizontal_size vertical_size
DAR × ×
display_vertical_size horizontal_size

The combination of source aspect ratio and active_format allows the decoder to identify
whether the “area of interest” is the whole of the frame (e.g. source aspect ratio 16:9, active_format
16:9 center), a letterbox within the frame (e.g. source aspect ratio 4:3, active_format 16:9 center),
or a “pillarbox” within the frame (e.g. source aspect ratio 16:9, active_format 4:3 center).
Table A12 defines the coding of the active_format field that shall be used.

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard, Annex A 27 December 2005

Table A12 Active Format

Description
active_format
4:3 coded frames 16:9 coded frames
‘0000’ – ‘0001’ Reserved Reserved
‘0010’ – ‘0100” Not recommended Not recommended
‘0101’ – ‘0111’ Reserved Reserved
‘1000’ 4:3 full frame image 16:9 full frame image
‘1001’ 4:3 full frame image 4:3 pillarbox image
‘1010’ 16:9 letterbox image 16:9 full frame image
‘1011’ 14:9 letterbox image 14:9 pillarbox image
‘1100’ Reserved Reserved
‘1101’ 4:3 full frame image, alternative 14:9 center 4:3 pillarbox image, alternative 14:9 center
‘1110’ 16:9 letterbox image, alternative 14:9 center 16:9 full frame image, alternative 14:9 center
‘1111’ 16:9 letterbox image, alternative 4:3 center 16:9 full frame image, alternative 4:3 center

Use of ‘0010’, ‘0011’, or ‘0100’ is not recommended. Illustrations of the various values of
may be found in ETSI TS 101 154 V1.7.1 Table B.3 [A10]. Users are strongly
active_format
encouraged to consult this reference.
5.2.4.3 Recommended Receiver Response to AFD
Receiving device designers are strongly encouraged to study the suite of Consumer Electronics
Association (CEA) bulletins which contain the most recent recommendations regarding the
processing of AFD.
5.2.5 Relationship Between Bar Data and AFD (Informative)
Any combination of Active Format Description and bar data may be present in video user data
(either, neither, or both). Note that AFD data may not always exactly match bar data because
AFD only deals with 4:3, 14:9, and 16:9 aspect ratios while bar data can accurately represent
nearly any aspect ratio.

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard, Annex B 27 December 2005

Annex B:
Audio System Characteristics (Normative)

1. SCOPE
This annex describes the audio system characteristics and normative specifications of the Digital
Television Standard.

2. NORMATIVE REFERENCES
The following documents contain provisions which in whole or part, through reference in this
text, constitute provisions of this standard. At the time of publication, the editions indicated were
valid. All standards are subject to revision and amendment, and parties to agreement based on
this standard are encouraged to investigate the possibility of applying the most recent editions of
the documents listed below.
[B1] AES3-2003, “AES Recommended practice for digital audio engineering—Serial
transmission format for two-channel linearly represented digital audio data,” (revision of
AES3-1992, including subsequent amendments).
[B2] ANSI S1.4-1983 (R 2001) with Amd.S1.4A-1995, “Specification for Sound Level
Meters.”
[B3] ATSC A/52B: “Digital Audio Compression (AC-3, E-AC-3),” Advanced Television
Systems Committee, Washington, D.C., 14 June 2005.

3. COMPLIANCE NOTATION
As used in this document, “shall” denotes a mandatory provision of the standard. “Should”
denotes a provision that is recommended but not mandatory. “May” denotes a feature whose
presence does not preclude compliance, that may or may not be present at the option of the
implementor.

4. SYSTEM OVERVIEW
As illustrated in Figure B1, the audio subsystem comprises the audio encoding/decoding
function and resides between the audio inputs/outputs and the transport subsystem. The audio
encoder(s) is (are) responsible for generating the audio elementary stream(s) which are encoded
representations of the baseband audio input signals. At the receiver, the audio subsystem is
responsible for decoding the audio elementary stream(s) back into baseband audio.

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard, Annex B 27 December 2005

Audio
Elementary Transport VSB RF
Stream(s) Packets Transmission

Audio Audio Transport Transmission

Source Encoder(s) Subsystem Subsystem

Specified
in this Channel
Annex

Receiver Receiver
Reconstructed Audio
Transport Transmission
Audio Decoder(s)
Subsystem Subsystem

Audio Transport VSB RF

Elementary Packets Reception
Stream(s)

Figure B1 Audio subsystem in the digital television system.

5. SPECIFICATION
This Section forms the normative specification of the audio system. The audio compression
system shall conform with the Digital Audio Compression (AC-3) Standard, subject to the
constraints outlined in this Section.

5.1 Constraints With Respect to ATSC Standard A/52B

The digital television audio coding system is based on the Digital Audio Compression (AC-3)
Standard specified in the body of ATSC Doc. A/52B (the non-normative annexes are not
included). Constraints on the system are shown in Table B1, which shows permitted values of
certain syntactical elements. These constraints are described in Sections 5.2–5.4. The receive
audio buffer is specified in Section 5.7.

Table B1 Audio Constraints

AC-3 Syntactical Comment Allowed value
Element
fscod Indicates sampling rate ‘00’ (indicates 48 kHz)
frmsizecod Main audio service or associated audio service containing all ≤ ’011110’ (indicates ≤
necessary program elements 448 kb/s)
frmsizecod Single channel associated service containing a single program ≤ ‘010000’ (indicates ≤
element 128 kbps)
frmsizecod Two channel dialogue associated service ≤ ‘010100’ (indicates ≤
192 kbps)
(frmsizecod) Combined bit rate of a main and an associated service intended to (total ≤ 576 kbps)
be simultaneously decoded
acmod Indicates number of channels ≥ ‘001’

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard, Annex B 27 December 2005

5.2 Sampling Frequency

The system conveys digital audio sampled at a frequency of 48 kHz, locked to the 27 MHz
system clock. The 48 kHz audio sampling clock is defined as:
48 kHz audio sample rate = ( 2 ÷1125 ) × ( 27 MHz system clock )
If analog signal inputs are employed, the A/D converters should sample at 48 kHz. If digital
inputs are employed, the input sampling rate shall be 48 kHz, or the audio encoder shall contain
sampling rate converters which convert the sampling rate to 48 kHz.

5.3 Bit Rate

A main audio service, or an associated audio service which is a complete service (containing all
necessary program elements) shall be encoded at a bit rate less than or equal to 448 kbps. A
single channel associated service containing a single program element shall be encoded at a bit
rate less than or equal to 128 kbps. A two channel associated service containing only dialogue
shall be encoded at a bit rate less than or equal to 192 kbps. The combined bit rate of a main
service and an associated service which are intended to be decoded simultaneously shall be less
than or equal to 576 kbps.

5.4 Audio Coding Modes

Audio services shall be encoded using any of the audio coding modes specified in A/52B [B3],
with the exception of the 1+1 mode. The value of acmod in the AC-3 bit stream shall have a value
in the range of 1–7, with the value 0 prohibited.

5.5 Dialogue Level

The value of the dialnorm parameter in the AC-3 elementary bit stream shall indicate the level of
average spoken dialogue within the encoded audio program. Dialogue level may be measured by
means of an “A” weighted integrated measurement (LAeq) (ANSI S1.4) [B2]. (Receivers use the
value of dialnorm to adjust the reproduced audio level so as to normalize the dialogue level.)

5.6 Dynamic Range Compression

Each encoded audio block may contain a dynamic range control word (dynrng) that is used by
decoders (by default) to alter the level of the reproduced audio. The control words allow the
decoded signal level to be increased or decreased by up to 24 dB. In general, elementary streams
may have dynamic range control words inserted or modified without affecting the encoded
audio. When it is necessary to alter the dynamic range of audio programs which are broadcast,
the dynamic range control word should be used.

5.7 STD Audio Buffer Size

The main audio buffer (BSn, see A/52B Annex A [B3]) shall be 2592 bytes.

6. MAIN AND ASSOCIATED SERVICES

An AC-3 elementary stream contains the encoded representation of a single audio service.
Multiple audio services are provided by multiple elementary streams. Each elementary stream is
conveyed by the transport multiplex with a unique PID. There are a number of audio service types

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard, Annex B 27 December 2005

which may (individually) be coded into each elementary stream. Each AC-3 elementary stream
is tagged as to its service type using the bsmod bit field. There are two types of main service and
six types of associated service. Each associated service may be tagged (in the AC-3 audio
descriptor in the transport PSI data) as being associated with one or more main audio services.
Each AC-3 elementary stream may also be tagged with a language code.
Associated services may contain complete program mixes, or may contain only a single
program element. Associated services which are complete mixes may be decoded and used as is.
They are identified by the full_svc bit in the AC-3 descriptor (see A/52B, Annex A [B3]).
Associated services which contain only a single program element are intended to be combined
with the program elements from a main audio service.
This section specifies the meaning and use of each type of service. In general, a complete
audio program (what is presented to the listener over the set of loudspeakers) may consist of a
main audio service, an associated audio service that is a complete mix, or a main audio service
combined with an associated audio service. The capability to simultaneously decode one main
service and one associated service is required in order to form a complete audio program in
certain service combinations described in this section. This capability may not exist in some
receivers.

6.1 Summary of Service Types

The audio service types are listed in Table B2.

Table B2 Audio Service Types

bsmod Type of Service
‘000’ (0) Main audio service: complete main (CM)
‘001’ (1) Main audio service: music and effects (ME)
‘010’ (2) Associated service: visually impaired (VI)
‘011’ (3) Associated service: hearing impaired (HI)
‘100’ (4) Associated service: dialogue (D)
‘101’ (5) Associated service: commentary (C)
‘110’ (6) Associated service: emergency (E)
‘111’ (7) Associated service: voice-over (VO)

6.2 Complete Main Audio Service (CM)

The CM type of main audio service contains a complete audio program (complete with dialogue,
music, and effects). This is the type of audio service normally provided. The CM service may
contain from 1 to 5.1 audio channels. The CM service may be further enhanced by means of the
VI, HI, C, E, or VO associated services described below. Audio in multiple languages may be
provided by supplying multiple CM services, each in a different language.

6.3 Main Audio Service, Music and Effects (ME)

The ME type of main audio service contains the music and effects of an audio program, but not
the dialogue for the program. The ME service may contain from 1 to 5.1 audio channels. The
primary program dialogue is missing and (if any exists) is supplied by simultaneously encoding

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard, Annex B 27 December 2005

a D associated service. Multiple D associated services in different languages may be associated

with a single ME service.

6.4 Visually Impaired (VI)

The VI associated service typically contains a narrative description of the visual program
content. In this case, the VI service shall be a single audio channel. The simultaneous
reproduction of both the VI associated service and the CM main audio service allows the
visually impaired user to enjoy the main multi-channel audio program, as well as to follow (by
ear) the on-screen activity.
The dynamic range control signal in this type of VI service is intended to be used by the
audio decoder to modify the level of the main audio program. Thus the level of the main audio
service will be under the control of the VI service provider, and the provider may signal the
decoder (by altering the dynamic range control words embedded in the VI audio elementary
stream) to reduce the level of the main audio service by up to 24 dB in order to assure that the
narrative description is intelligible.
Besides providing the VI service as a single narrative channel, the VI service may be
provided as a complete program mix containing music, effects, dialogue, and the narration. In
this case, the service may be coded using any number of channels (up to 5.1), and the dynamic
range control signal applies only to this service. The fact that the service is a complete mix shall
be indicated in the AC-3 descriptor (see A/52B, Annex A [B3]).

6.5 Hearing Impaired (HI)

The HI associated service typically contains only dialogue which is intended to be reproduced
simultaneously with the CM service. In this case, the HI service shall be a single audio channel.
This dialogue may have been processed for improved intelligibility by hearing impaired
listeners. Simultaneous reproduction of both the CM and HI services allows the hearing impaired
listener to hear a mix of the CM and HI services in order to emphasize the dialogue while still
providing some music and effects.
Besides providing the HI service as a single dialogue channel, the HI service may be
provided as a complete program mix containing music, effects, and dialogue with enhanced
intelligibility. In this case, the service may be coded using any number of channels (up to 5.1).
The fact that the service is a complete mix shall be indicated in the AC-3 descriptor (see A/52B,
Annex A [B3]).

6.6 Dialogue (D)

The D associated service contains program dialogue intended for use with an ME main audio
service. The language of the D service is indicated in the AC-3 bit stream, and in the audio
descriptor. A complete audio program is formed by simultaneously decoding the D service and
the ME service and mixing the D service into the center channel of the ME main service (with
which it is associated).
If the ME main audio service contains more than two audio channels, the D service shall be
monophonic (1/0 mode). If the main audio service contains two channels, the D service may also
contain two channels (2/0 mode). In this case, a complete audio program is formed by
simultaneously decoding the D service and the ME service, mixing the left channel of the ME

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard, Annex B 27 December 2005

service with the left channel of the D service, and mixing the right channel of the ME service
with the right channel of the D service. The result will be a two channel stereo signal containing
music, effects, and dialogue.
Audio in multiple languages may be provided by supplying multiple D services (each in a
different language) along with a single ME service. This is more efficient than providing
multiple CM services, but, in the case of more than two audio channels in the ME service,
requires that dialogue be restricted to the center channel.
Some receivers may not have the capability to simultaneously decode an ME and a D
service.

6.7 Commentary (C)

The commentary associated service is similar to the D service, except that instead of conveying
essential program dialogue, the C service conveys optional program commentary. The C service
may be a single audio channel containing only the commentary content. In this case,
simultaneous reproduction of a C service and a CM service will allow the listener to hear the
added program commentary.
The dynamic range control signal in the single channel C service is intended to be used by
the audio decoder to modify the level of the main audio program. Thus the level of the main
audio service will be under the control of the C service provider, and the provider may signal the
decoder (by altering the dynamic range control words embedded in the C audio elementary
stream) to reduce the level of the main audio service by up to 24 dB in order to assure that the
commentary is intelligible.
Besides providing the C service as a single commentary channel, the C service may be
provided as a complete program mix containing music, effects, dialogue, and the commentary. In
this case the service may be provided using any number of channels (up to 5.1). The fact that the
service is a complete mix shall be indicated in the AC-3 descriptor (see A/52B, Annex A [B3]).

6.8 Emergency (E)

The E associated service is intended to allow the insertion of emergency or high priority
announcements. The E service is always a single audio channel. An E service is given priority in
transport and in audio decoding. Whenever the E service is present, it will be delivered to the
audio decoder. Whenever the audio decoder receives an E type associated service, it will stop
reproducing any main service being received and only reproduce the E service out of the center
channel (or left and right channels if a center loudspeaker does not exist). The E service may
also be used for non-emergency applications. It may be used whenever the broadcaster wishes to
force all decoders to quit reproducing the main audio program and reproduce a higher priority
single audio channel.

6.9 Voice-Over (V0)

The VO associated service is a single channel service intended to be reproduced along with the
main audio service in the receiver. It allows typical voice-overs to be added to an already
encoded audio elementary stream without requiring the audio to be decoded back to baseband
and then re-encoded. It is always a single audio channel. It has second priority (only the E
service has higher priority). It is intended to be simultaneously decoded and mixed into the

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard, Annex B 27 December 2005

center channel of the main audio service. The dynamic range control signal in the VO service is
intended to be used by the audio decoder to modify the level of the main audio program. Thus
the level of the main audio service may be controlled by the broadcaster, and the broadcaster
may signal the decoder (by altering the dynamic range control words embedded in the VO audio
elementary stream) to reduce the level of the main audio service by up to 24 dB during the
voice-over.
Some receivers may not have the capability to simultaneously decode and reproduce a voice-
over service along with a program audio service.

7. AUDIO ENCODER INTERFACES

7.1 Audio Encoder Input Characteristics

Audio signals which are input to the digital television system may be in analog or digital form.
Audio signals should have any dc offset removed before being encoded. If the audio encoder
does not include a dc blocking high-pass filter, the audio signals should be high-pass-filtered
before being applied to the encoder. In general, input signals should be quantized to at least 16-
bit resolution. The audio compression system can convey audio signals with up to 24-bit
resolution. Physical interfaces for the audio inputs to the encoder may be defined as voluntary
industry standards by the AES, SMPTE, or other standards organizations.

7.2 Audio Encoder Output Characteristics

Conceptually, the output of the audio encoder is an elementary stream which is formed into PES
packets within the transport subsystem. It is possible that systems will be implemented wherein
the formation of audio PES packets takes place within the audio encoder. In this case, the
output(s) of the audio encoder(s) would be PES packets. Physical interfaces for these outputs
(elementary streams and/or PES packets) may be defined as voluntary industry standards by
SMPTE or other standards organizations.

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard, Annex C 27 December 2005

Annex C:
Service Multiplex and Transport Subsystem Characteristics
(Normative)

1. SCOPE
This annex constitutes the normative specification for the transport subsystem of the Digital
Television Standard. The syntax and semantics of this specification conform to ISO/IEC 13818-
1 [C3], with additional constraints and conditions specified in this Standard. Within this context,
other ATSC Standards may further constrain and/or supplement the transport subsystem
specification.8

2. NORMATIVE REFERENCES
The following documents contain provisions which in whole or in part, through reference in this
text, constitute provisions of this Standard. At the time of publication, the editions indicated
were valid. For references not including a publication date, the most recent published version
shall apply. All standards are subject to revision and amendment, and parties to agreements
based on this Standard are encouraged to investigate the possibility of applying the most recent
editions of the documents listed below.

2.1 Normative References

[C1] ATSC A/52B: “Digital Audio Compression (AC-3, E-AC-3) Standard,” Advanced
Television Systems Committee, Washington, D.C., 14 June 2005.
[C2] ATSC A/65C: “Program and System Information Protocol for Terrestrial Broadcast and
Cable,” Advanced Television Systems Committee, Washington, D.C., 2 January 2006.
[C3] ISO/IEC IS 13818-1:2000 (E), International Standard, Information technology – Generic
coding of moving pictures and associated audio information: systems.

2.2 Informative References

[C4] ATSC A/90: “Data Broadcast Standard,” Advanced Television Systems Committee,
Washington, D.C., 26 July 2000.

3. COMPLIANCE NOTATION
As used in this document, “shall” denotes a mandatory provision of the standard. “Should”
denotes a provision that is recommended but not mandatory. “May” denotes a feature whose
presence does not preclude compliance that may or may not be present at the option of the
implementer. Note: this compliance notation applies only to this annex.

8
Note that there is a coordinated effort underway among ATSC, CEA, and SMPTE to revise and
clarify standards related to delivering closed captions, AFD, and bar data so that each
describes the aspects of the system for which they are primarily responsible without overlap.
This effort is expected to result in revisions of those sections in the ATSC Standards.

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard, Annex C 27 December 2005

4. SYSTEM OVERVIEW
The transport format and protocol for the Digital Television Standard is a compatible subset of
the MPEG-2 Systems specification defined in ISO/IEC 13818-1 [C3]. It is based on a fixed-
length packet transport stream approach which has been defined and optimized for digital
television delivery applications.
As illustrated in Figure C1, the transport subsystem resides between the application (e.g.,
audio or video) encoding and decoding functions and the transmission subsystem. The encoder’s
transport subsystem is responsible for formatting the coded elementary streams and multiplexing
the different components of the program for transmission. At the receiver, it is responsible for
recovering the elementary streams for the individual application decoders and for the
corresponding error signaling. The transport subsystem also incorporates other higher protocol
layer functionality related to synchronization of the receiver.

Transmitter
(video, audio, data, etc.)
Sources for encoding

packetization and
multiplexing
Application

Transport
Encoders

* Modu-
* lator
*
* Transport
Stream
elementary
streams, private
sections, or PES

Transmission
Clock

Format
Receiver
depacketization and
demultiplexing
Presentation

Application

Transport
Decoders

Demod-
*
* ulator
* Transport
*
elementary Stream with
streams, private error
sections, or PES signaling
with error
signaling

clock
control
Clock

Figure C1 Sample organization of functionality in a transmitter-receiver

pair for a single program.

One approach to describe the system multiplexing approach is to consider it as a combination

of multiplexing at two different layers. In the first layer, single program transport streams are
formed by multiplexing Transport Stream (TS) packets from one or more Packetized Elementary
Stream (PES) and/or private section (ISO/IEC 13818-1 [C3] Table 2-30) sources. In the second

45
ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard, Annex C 27 December 2005

layer, one or more single program transport streams are combined to form a service multiplex of
programs (also known as a multi-program transport stream in the MPEG-2 Systems standard,
and a Digital Television Standard multiplexed bit stream in this ATSC standard). Program
Specific Information (PSI), carried within TS packets, relates to the identification of programs
and the components of each program.
Not shown explicitly in Figure C1, but essential to the practical implementation of this
Standard, is a control system that manages the transfer and processing of the elementary streams
from the application encoders. The rules followed by this control system are not a part of this
Standard. The output of the control system implementation shall conform to the MPEG-2
Transport Stream coding as specified in ISO/IEC 13818-1 [C3] with the additional constraints
specified in this Standard.

5. SPECIFICATION
This section of the Standard describes the coding constraints that apply to the use of the MPEG-
2 systems specification in the digital television system.

5.1 MPEG-2 Systems Standard

The transport subsystem shall comply with the transport stream definition of the MPEG-2
Systems standard as specified in ISO/IEC 13818-1 [C3] and shall be further constrained as
specified herein.
5.1.1 Video T-STD
The video T-STD shall comply with Sections 2.4.2.2 and 2.4.2.3 of ISO/IEC 13818-1 [C3] and
shall follow the constraints for the level encoded in the video elementary stream.
5.1.2 Audio T-STD
The audio T-STD shall comply with Section 3.6 of Annex A of ATSC Standard A/52B [C1].

5.2 Identification of MPEG-2 Private Ranges

ATSC defines code points in the MPEG-2 user private range and may define code points private
to ATSC users within this range.
5.2.1 MPEG-2 Registration Descriptor
Under circumstances as defined below, this Standard uses the MPEG-2 Registration Descriptor
described in Section 2.6.8 and 2.6.9 of ISO/IEC 13818-1 [C3] to identify the contents of
programs and program elements to decoding equipment. No more than one MPEG-2
Registration Descriptor shall appear in any given descriptor loop.
5.2.1.1 Program Identifier
Programs that conform to ATSC standards may be identified by the use of an MPEG-2
Registration Descriptor (as defined in Section 2.6.8 and 2.6.9 of ISO/IEC 13818-1 [C3]). When
present for this purpose the MPEG-2 Registration Descriptor shall be placed in the descriptor
loop immediately following the program_info_length field of the TS_program_map_section() describing
this program, and the format_identifier field of this MPEG-2 Registration Descriptor shall have a
value 0x4741 3934 (“GA94” in ASCII).

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard, Annex C 27 December 2005

5.2.1.2 Audio Elementary Stream Identifier

The presence of audio elementary streams of stream_type 0x81 that conform to ATSC standards
may be indicated by use of an MPEG-2 Registration Descriptor (as defined in Section 2.6.8 and
2.6.9 of ISO/IEC 13818-1 [C3]). When present for this purpose, the MPEG-2 Registration
Descriptor shall be placed in the descriptor loop immediately following the ES_info_length field in
the TS_program_map_section() for each program element of stream_type 0x81 (AC-3 audio) and the
format_identifier field of the MPEG-2 Registration Descriptor shall have a value 0x4143 2D33
(“AC-3” in ASCII).
5.2.1.3 Other Program Element Identifiers
Any program element carrying content not described by an approved ATSC standard shall be
identified with an MPEG-2 Registration Descriptor (as defined in Section 2.6.8 and 2.6.9 of
ISO/IEC 13818-1 [C3]). The format_identifier field of the MPEG-2 Registration Descriptor shall be
registered with the SMPTE Registration Authority, LLC9. The descriptor shall be placed in the
descriptor loop immediately following the ES_info_length field in the TS_program_map_section() for
each such non-standard program element.
The presence of an MPEG-2 Registration Descriptor in any descriptor loop shall not affect
the meaning of any other descriptor(s) in the same descriptor loop. The ATSC Private
Information Descriptor (defined in Section 5.7.3.4) shall be the method to carry descriptor-based
information associated with a private entity.

5.3 Audio Constraints

If a program contains one or more audio components, at least one shall be a complete main audio
service (CM) as defined in Annex B.

5.4 Constraints on PSI

The program constituents for all programs are described in the PSI. There are the following
constraints on the PSI information:
• Transport Stream packets identified by a particular PMT_PID value shall be constrained to
carry only one program definition, as described by a single TS_program_map_section(). For
terrestrial broadcast applications, these TS packets shall be further constrained to carry
no other kind of PSI table.
• The Transport Stream shall be constructed such that the time interval between the byte
containing the last bit of the TS_program_map_section() containing television program
information and successive occurrences of the same TS_program_map_section() shall be less
than or equal to 400 milliseconds.
• The program numbers are associated with the corresponding PMT_PIDs in the Program
Association Table (PAT). The Transport Stream shall be constructed such that the time
interval between the byte containing the last bit of the program_association_section() and
successive occurrences of the program_association_section() shall be less than or equal to 100
milliseconds. However, when program_association_section()s, CA_section()s, and

9
The ISO/IEC-designated registration authority for the format_identifier is SMPTE Registration
Authority, LLC. See (http://www.smpte-ra.org/html).

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard, Annex C 27 December 2005

TS_program_map_section()s are approaching their maximum allowed sizes, the potential

exists to exceed the 80,000 bps rate specified in ISO/IEC 13818-1 [C3] Sec. 2.4.2.3. In
cases where the table section sizes are such that the 100 millisecond repetition rate of the
program_association_section() would cause the 80,000 bps maximum rate to be exceeded, the
time interval between the byte containing the last bit of the program_association_section()
may be increased but in no event shall exceed 140 milliseconds, so that under no
circumstances the limit of 80,000 bps is exceeded.
• When an Elementary Stream of stream_type 0x02 (MPEG-2 video) is present in the
Transport Stream, the data_stream_alignment_descriptor() (described in Section 2.6.10 of
ISO/IEC 13818-1 [C3]) shall be included in the descriptor loop immediately following
the ES_info_length field in the TS_program_map_section() describing that Elementary Stream.
The descriptor_tag value shall be set to 0x06, the descriptor_length value shall be set to 0x01,
and the alignment_type value shall be set to 0x02 (video access unit).
• Adaptation headers shall not occur in TS packets identified by a program_map_PID value
for purposes other than for signaling with the discontinuity_indicator that the version_number
(Section 2.4.4.9 of ISO/IEC 13818-1 [C3]) may be discontinuous.
• Adaptation headers shall not occur in TS packets identified by PID 0x0000 (the PAT
PID) for purposes other than for signaling with the discontinuity_indicator that the
version_number (Section 2.4.4.5 of ISO/IEC 13818-1 [C3]) may be discontinuous.
• This Standard does not define a Network Information Table (NIT) as specified in MPEG-
2 Systems. The use of program_number 0x0000 should be avoided as MPEG-2 Systems
reserves this value for the network_PID, which in turn is used to identify the TS packets of
a NIT.

5.5 PES Constraints

Packetized Elementary Stream syntax and semantics shall be used to encapsulate the audio and
video elementary stream information. The Packetized Elementary Stream syntax is used to
convey the Presentation Time-Stamp (PTS) and Decoding Time-Stamp (DTS) information
required for decoding audio and video information with synchronism. This section describes the
coding constraints on this MPEG-2 Systems layer.
Within the PES packet header, the following restrictions apply:
• PES_scrambling_control shall be coded as ‘00’.
• ESCR_flag shall be coded as ‘0’.
• ES_rate_flag shall be coded as ‘0’.
• PES_CRC_flag shall be coded as ‘0’.
Within the PES packet extension, the following restrictions apply.
• PES_private_data_flag shall be coded as ‘0’.
• pack_header_field_flag shall be coded as ‘0’.
• program_packet_sequence_counter_flag shall be coded as ‘0’.
• P-STD_buffer_flag shall be coded as ‘0’.

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard, Annex C 27 December 2005

5.5.1 Video PES Constraints

Each PES packet shall begin with a video access unit, as defined in Section 2.1.1 of ISO/IEC
13818-1 [C3], which shall be aligned with the PES packet header. The first byte of a PES packet
payload shall be the first byte of a video access unit. Each PES header shall contain a PTS.
Additionally, it shall contain a DTS as appropriate. For terrestrial broadcast, the PES packet shall
not contain more than one coded video frame, and shall be void of video picture data only when
transmitted in conjunction with the discontinuity_indicator to signal that the continuity_counter may be
discontinuous.
Within the PES packet header, the following restrictions apply:
• The PES_packet_length shall be coded as 0x0000
• data_alignment_indicator shall be coded as ‘1’
5.5.2 Audio PES Constraints
The audio decoder may be capable of simultaneously decoding more than one elementary stream
containing different program elements, and then combining the program elements into a
complete program. In this case, the audio decoder may sequentially decode audio frames (or
audio blocks) from each elementary stream and do the combining (mixing together) on a frame
or (block) basis. In order to have the audio from the two elementary streams reproduced in exact
sample synchronism, it is necessary for the original audio elementary stream encoders to have
encoded the two audio program elements frame synchronously; i.e., if audio program 1 has
sample 0 of frame n at time t0, then audio program 2 should also have frame n beginning with its
sample 0 at the identical time t0. If the encoding is done frame synchronously, then matching
audio frames should have identical values of PTS.
If PES packets from two audio services that are to be decoded simultaneously contain
identical values of PTS then the corresponding encoded audio frames contained in the PES
packets should be presented to the audio decoder for simultaneous synchronous decoding. If the
PTS values do not match (indicating that the audio encoding was not frame synchronous) then
the audio frames which are closest in time may be presented to the audio decoder for
simultaneous decoding. In this case, the two services may be reproduced out of sync by as much
as one-half of a frame time (which is often satisfactory, e.g., a voice-over does not require
precise timing).
The value of stream_id for AC-3 shall be ‘1011 1101’ (private_stream_1).

5.6 Services and Features

5.6.1 System Information and Program Guide

5.6.1.1 System Information and Program Guide PID
Transport Streams shall include system information and program guide data formatted according
to the structure and syntax described in ATSC Standard A/65C, “Program and System
Information Protocol for Terrestrial Broadcast and Cable” [C2]. System information and
program guide data shall be conveyed in Transport Stream packets of PID 0x1FFB, which shall
be reserved exclusively for this purpose. System information provides data necessary for
navigation among digital service offerings. The program guide database allows a receiver to
build an on-screen grid of program information for the various services that may be available.

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard, Annex C 27 December 2005

5.6.1.2 System Information and Program Guide STD Model

The STD model for program guide and system information is specified in ATSC Standard
A/65C [C2].
5.6.2 Specification of ATSC Private Data
Within the ATSC set of standards, private data may be transported by various means:
• Data services – Carriage of ATSC data services including system information shall be as
documented in applicable ATSC Standards. See for example the ATSC A/90 Data
Broadcast Standard [C4].
• Private program elements – The stream_type codes in the range 0xC4 to 0xFF shall be
available for stream types defined privately (not described by ATSC Standards). Such
privately-defined program elements are associated with an MPEG-2 Registration
Descriptor (see Section 5.2.1.3).
• Adaptation fields – Private data may be transmitted within the adaptation field of TS
packets (Sections 2.4.3.4 and 2.4.3.5 of ISO/IEC 13818-1 [C3]). Program elements that
include private data in the adaptation fields of their TS packets shall be associated with
an MPEG-2 Registration Descriptor (see Sec. 5.2.1).

5.7 Assignment of Identifiers

In this section, those identifiers and codes that shall have a fixed value are summarized. These
include PES Stream IDs and Descriptors. Stream_type codes for program element types managed
by the ATSC Code Points Registrar (currently assigned or available for future assignment) shall
be in the range 0x80 to 0xC3. Stream_type code 0x81 has already been assigned within the Digital
Television Standard (see Section 5.7.1). Descriptor_tag codes managed by the ATSC Code Points
Registrar (currently assigned or available for future assignment) shall be in the range 0x40 to
0xEF.
5.7.1 Audio Stream Type
The AC-3 audio stream_type shall have the value 0x81.
5.7.2 Video Stream Type
The stream_type value for the video program element shall have the value 0x02.
5.7.3 Descriptors
Unless explicitly stated to the contrary for a given descriptor, no more than one descriptor with a
given value of descriptor_tag shall appear in any descriptor loop.
5.7.3.1 AC-3 Audio Descriptor
When an Elementary Stream of stream_type 0x81 (AC-3 audio) is present in the digital television
transport stream, an AC-3 Audio Descriptor (AC-3_audio_stream_descriptor()) shall be included in the
descriptor loop immediately following the ES_info_length field in the TS_program_map_section()
describing that Elementary Stream. The syntax shall be as given in Table A2 of Annex A of
ATSC Standard A/52B [C1]. The following constraints shall apply to the AC-3 Audio
Descriptor:
1) The value of the descriptor_tag shall be 0x81.

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard, Annex C 27 December 2005

2) The 6-bit field for Bit Rate Code shall have a value in the range ‘000000’ through
‘001111’ or ‘100000’ through ‘101111’; i.e. signaling a bit rate less than or equal to 448
kbps.
3) The num_channels field shall have a value in the range 1 to 13.
4) The langcod field is a reserved field. Audio language shall be indicated using an ISO-639
Language Descriptor (see Sec. 5.7.3.3 below).
5) The descriptor shall identify the type of the audio service in the bsmod field, which shall
be the same as the bsmod field in the elementary stream associated with this descriptor.
6) The descriptor may optionally carry a 3-byte language code that is represented per ISO-
639. If this language code is present in the AC-3 Descriptor, it shall match the language
code carried in the ISO-639 Language Descriptor, if present. The descriptor may
terminate at one of two places:
a) if describing a main audio service for which no associated services are available,
immediately following full_svc; otherwise
b) immediately prior to textlen.
Effective 1 March 2008, audio language shall be indicated by including the optional ISO-639
Language bytes within the AC-3_audio_stream_descriptor(), at which point the use of the ISO-639
Language Descriptor to indicate language shall be optional, but recommended to support legacy
devices requiring the ISO-639_language_descriptor().
Informative note: receiving devices are expected to use the bsmod (bit stream
mode) field in the AC-3_audio_stream_descriptor() to determine the type of each audio
stream rather than the audio_type field in the ISO_639_language_descriptor().

5.7.3.2 Program Smoothing Buffer Descriptor

The TS_program_map_section() of each program shall contain a smoothing buffer descriptor
pertaining to that program in accordance with Section 2.6.30 of ISO/IEC 13818-1. During the
continuous existence of a program, the value of the elements of the smoothing buffer descriptor
shall not change.
The fields of the smoothing buffer descriptor shall meet the following constraints:
• The field sb_leak_rate shall be allowed to range up to the maximum transport rates
specified in Section 7.2.
• The field sb_size shall have a value less than or equal to 2048. The size of the smoothing
buffer is thus ≤ 2048 bytes.
5.7.3.3 ISO-639 Language Descriptor
In the ATSC Digital Television System, the ISO_639_language_descriptor() defined in ISO/IEC
13818-1 [C3] Section 2.6.18 shall be used to indicate the language of audio Elementary Stream
components.
Effective 1 March 2008, audio language shall be indicated by including the optional ISO-639
Language bytes within the AC-3_audio_stream_descriptor(), at which point the use of the ISO-639
Language Descriptor to indicate language shall be optional, but recommended to support legacy
devices requiring the ISO-639_language_descriptor().

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard, Annex C 27 December 2005

When used, the ISO_639_language_descriptor() shall be included in the descriptor loop

immediately following the ES_info_length field in the TS_program_map_section() for each Elementary
Stream of stream_type 0x81 (AC-3 audio) when the number of audio Elementary Streams in the
TS_program_map() having the same value of bit stream mode (bsmod in the AC-3 Audio Descriptor)
is two or more.
Informative note: As an example, consider an MPEG-2 program that includes two
audio ES components: a Complete Main (CM) audio track (bsmod = 0) and a
Visually Impaired (VI) audio track (bsmod = 2). Inclusion of the
ISO_639_language_descriptor() is optional for this program. If a second CM track
were to be added, however, it would then be necessary to include
ISO_639_language_descriptor()s in the TS_program_map_section().

The audio_type field in any ISO_639_language_descriptor() used in this Standard shall be set to
0x00 (meaning “undefined”).
An ISO_639_language_descriptor() may be present in the TS_program_map_section() in other
positions as well, for example to indicate the language or languages of a textual data service
program element.
5.7.3.4 ATSC Private Information Descriptor
The ATSC_private_information_descriptor() provides a method to carry and unambiguously label
private information. More than one ATSC_private_information_descriptor() may appear within a single
descriptor loop. Table C1 defines the bit-stream syntax of the ATSC_private_information_descriptor().

Table C1 ATSC Private Information Descriptor

Syntax No. of Bits Format
ATSC_private_information_descriptor() {
descriptor_tag 8 0xAD
descriptor_length 8 uimsbf
format_identifier 32 uimsbf
for (i = 0; i < N; i++) {
private_data_byte 8 bslbf
}
}

descriptor_tag – This 8-bit field is set to 0xAD.

descriptor_length – This 8-bit field specifies the number of bytes of the descriptor immediately
following the descriptor_length field.
format_identifier – The format_identifier is a 32-bit field as defined in ISO/IEC 13818-1 [C3], Section
2.6.9 for the registration_descriptor(). Only format_identifier values registered and recognized by the
SMPTE Registration Authority, LLC shall be used (see
http://www.smpte-ra.org/mpegreg.html). Its use in this descriptor shall scope and identify
only the private information contained within this descriptor.
private_data_byte – The syntax and semantics of this field is defined by the assignee of the
format_identifier value.

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard, Annex C 27 December 2005

5.7.4 PID Value Assignments

In order to avoid collisions with fixed PID values and ranges already established in this and
other international standards, transport_packet() PID field values are restricted as follows:
• TS packets identified with PID values in the range 0x1FF0 – 0x1FFE shall only be used
to transport data compliant with ATSC-recognized standards specifying fixed-value PID
assignments in that range. (Informative note: One such use is A/65 which requires the use
of 0x1FFB to identify packets containing certain tables defined in that Standard.)
• TS packets identified with PID values below 0x0030 shall only be used to transport data
compliant with ATSC-recognized standards specifying fixed-value PID assignments in
that range. (Informative note: One such use is ETS 300 468 which requires the use of
0x0011 to identify packets containing certain tables defined in that Standard.)

5.8 Extensions to the MPEG-2 Systems Specification

This Section covers extensions to the MPEG-2 Systems specification.
5.8.1 Scrambling Control
The scrambling control field within the packet header allows all states to exist in the digital
television system as defined in Table C2.

Table C2 Transport Scrambling Control Field

transport_scrambling_ Function
control
‘00’ packet payload not scrambled
‘01’ not scrambled; state may be used as a flag for private use defined by the service provider.
‘10’ packet payload scrambled with “even” key
‘11’ packet payload scrambled with “odd” key

Elementary Streams for which the transport_scrambling_control field does not exclusively have
the value of ‘00’ for the duration of the program must carry a CA_descriptor in accordance with
Section 2.6.16 of ISO/IEC 13818-1 [C3].
The implementation of a digital television delivery system that employs conditional access
will require the specification of additional data streams and system constraints.

6. FEATURES OF 13818-1 NOT SUPPORTED BY THIS STANDARD

The transport definition is based on the MPEG-2 Systems standard, ISO/IEC 13818-1; however,
it does not implement all parts of the standard. This section describes those elements which are
omitted from this Standard.

6.1 Program Streams

This Standard does not include those portions of ISO/IEC 13818-1 [C3] and Annex A of ATSC
Standard A/52B, which pertain exclusively to Program Stream specifications.

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard, Annex C 27 December 2005

6.2 Still Pictures

This Standard does not include those portions of ISO/IEC 13818-1 [C3] Transport Stream
specification which pertain to the Still Picture model.

6.3 Multiple Video Elementary Streams

MPEG-2 programs shall be constrained to carry at most one MPEG-2 video Elementary Stream
component.

7. TRANSPORT SUBSYSTEM INTERFACES AND BIT RATES

7.1 Transport Subsystem Input Characteristics

The MPEG-2 Systems standard defines system coding at two hierarchical layers: The packetized
elementary stream (PES) and the systems stream, either in Transport Stream or Program Stream
format (the ATSC only uses the Transport Stream format). Under this standard and by common
industry usage, private_section encapsulated data is a parallel layer to PES. Physical
implementations may include the PES packetizer within a video, audio, or other data encoder;
and a private_section encapsulator within a data encoder; and not as part of the transport subsystem.
Therefore, the inputs to the transport subsystem may be elementary streams, PES packets, or
private_section encapsulated data.

7.2 Transport Subsystem Output Characteristics

Conceptually, the output from the transport subsystem is a continuous MPEG-2 Transport
Stream as defined in this annex at a constant rate of Tr Mbps when transmitted in an 8 VSB
system and 2Tr when transmitted in a 16 VSB system where:
⎛ 188 ⎞⎛ 312 ⎞⎛ 684 ⎞
Tr = 2×⎜ ⎟⎜ ⎟⎜ ⎟× 4.5 =19.39... Mbps
⎝ 208 ⎠⎝ 313 ⎠⎝ 286 ⎠

The symbol rate Sr in Msymbols per second for the transmission subsystem (see Section 5 of
Annex D) is:
⎛ 684 ⎞
Sr =⎜ ⎟×4.5=10.76...Msymbols per second
⎝ 286 ⎠

Tr and Sr shall be locked to each other in frequency.

All Transport Streams conforming to this Standard shall conform to the ISO/IEC 13818-1
[C3] T-STD (Transport System Target Decoder) model.

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard, Annex D 27 December 2005

Annex D:
RF/Transmission System Characteristics (Normative)

1. SCOPE
This annex describes the characteristics of the RF/Transmission subsystem, which is referred to
as the VSB subsystem, of the Digital Television Standard. The VSB subsystem offers two major
modulation methods: a terrestrial broadcast method (8 VSB), and a high data rate method (16
VSB). These are described in separate sections of this document.
The 8-VSB modulation method is further defined by a set of required elements and various
combinations of optional elements. The set of required elements is called the Main mode. Main
service data is protected by the ‘Main’ Forward Error Correction (FEC) system and is sent using
mandatory training sequences.
The optional enhancements add additional forward error correction coding layers to the data
before sending the data via a constrained version of 8-VSB called Enhanced 8-VSB (E8-VSB).
Various coding rate options are defined, and the payload assignment between the Enhanced 8-
VSB and the Main Mode data is selectable at discretely defined values.
These Modes shall only be used in the defined combinations.
Accordingly, the 8 VSB transmission system offers optional sub-modes of operation that
trade-off data rate for performance. The optional modes facilitate receiver operation in certain
propagation conditions, with the degree of additional enhancements selected by the broadcaster
with an acceptance of a reduction in the payload of the Main Service. The optional modes are
designed to avoid impact on any remaining payload in the Main Service.

2. REFERENCES

2.1 Normative References

[D1] ISO/IEC IS 13818-1:1 2000 (E), International Standard: Information technology –
Generic coding of moving pictures and associated audio information: systems.

2.2 Informative References

[D2] ATSC A/110A: “Synchronization Standard for Distributed Transmission,” Advanced
Television Systems Committee, Washington, D.C., 14 July 2004.
[D3] SMPTE 310M (1998): “Synchronous Serial Interface for MPEG-2 Digital Transport
Stream, Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers, White Plains, N.Y.

3. COMPLIANCE NOTATION
As used in this document, “shall” denotes a mandatory provision of the standard. “Should”
denotes a provision that is recommended but not mandatory. “May” denotes a feature whose
presence does not preclude compliance that may or may not be present at the option of the
implementer.

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard, Annex D 27 December 2005

4. ABBREVIATIONS
FEC – forward error correction
MPEG – Moving Pictures Experts Group
MUX – multiplexer
PCR – Program Clock Reference
RS – Reed-Solomon (error correction coding)
VSB – vestigial sideband modulation

5. TRANSMISSION CHARACTERISTICS FOR TERRESTRIAL BROADCAST

The terrestrial broadcast mode (known as 8 VSB) delivers an MPEG-2 Transport Stream
(MPEG-2-TS) of up to 19.39 Mbps in a 6 MHz channel. Two optional modes use higher order
data coding, called Enhanced 8-VSB. Enhanced data modes allow the broadcaster to allocate a
portion of the base 19.39 Mbps data rate to Enhanced data transmission. Enhanced data is
designed to have higher immunity to certain channel impairments than the Main Service but
delivers data at a reduced information rate selected by the broadcaster from the specified options.

5.1 Overview of Main Service

See Figure D5.110 for the functional block diagram of the Main Service alone. Incoming data is
randomized and then processed for forward error correction (FEC) in the form of Reed-Solomon
(RS) coding (20 RS parity bytes are added to each MPEG-2 packet), one-sixth data field
interleaving and two-thirds rate trellis coding. The randomization and FEC processes are not
applied to the sync byte of the transport packet, which is represented in transmission by a Data
Segment Sync signal as described below. Following randomization and forward error correction
processing, the data packets are formatted into Data Frames for transmission and Data Segment
Sync and Data Field Sync are added.

O p tio n a l

D a ta R eed D a ta P re - RF
Random - S o lo m o n T r e llis SYNC P i lo t VSB
In t e r - e q u a liz e r Up-
iz e r Encoder Encoder MUX In s e r t io n M o d u la t o r
le a v e r F il t e r C o n v e rte r

S eg m en t S yn c

F ie ld S y n c

Figure D5.1 Main Service functional block diagram.

10
Note that the optional pre-equalizer and RF up-converter blocks are implementation dependent
and not addressed in this Annex.

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard, Annex D 27 December 2005

Optional

8-VSB
Optional Reed - Data Trellis Pre - RF
Data Solomon Inter- Pilot VSB Up-
coder equalizer
Randomizer Encoder leaver Insertion Modulator Converter
(12-way Filter
interleave) SYNC
MUX
Segment Sync
NOTE
MPEG DATA

Field Sync
SYNC

Field Sync
carried throughout
Map

SMPTE 310 Field

Decoder and Sync
Embedded Map Bits
Separator/Sync

SMPTE 310 Optional

Encoder with Data
Embedded Map & De-Randomizer
Field Timing Info

MPEG E8-VSB
streams Convolutional
coder Data R-S
Main and Enhanced Data RS Data (12-way Byte Bytes
Mux Packet Processor Randomizer Encoder Byte interleave / De - Delete
M/E Interleaver de-interleave) Interleaver
Bytes
Flag

Figure D5.2 Main and Enhanced Service functional block diagram.

5.2 Overview of Main and Enhanced Service

See Figure D5.2 for Enhanced mode alternative functional block diagrams of the 8 VSB
transmitter. Transmitting Enhanced 8-VSB (E8-VSB) requires processing as shown in Figure
D5.2, Figure D5.10, Figure D5.11, Figure D5.12, and Figure D5.13. The upper row of Figure
D5.2 consists of blocks that are common to the transmission of Enhanced streams (containing
both Enhanced and Main data) and to the transmission of Main-only streams. The lower two
rows contain blocks that are required for Enhanced transmission. Blocks in Figure D5.2 that are
optional but that may be used to facilitate particular implementations will be called out in the
following discussion.
MPEG-2 streams for Main and Enhanced processing are received at the input (lower left of
Figure D5.2). Appropriate buffering for intra-data-field multiplexing is inserted on both the
Main and the Enhanced MPEG-2 streams. Enhanced data is sent through the Main and Enhanced
Mux Packet Processor as shown. Details of this block are given in Section 5.4.2 1 Figure D5.10,
and Figure D5.11. Enhanced data shall be expanded by the ratio of 1:2 (for one-half rate coding)
or 1:4 (for one-quarter rate coding) to form place-holder bits for the Enhanced convolutional
coding and shall be formatted in MPEG-2 packets that shall be multiplexed with packets from
the Main MPEG-2 stream. The order of multiplexing is determined according to the placement
of Enhanced data segments in the transmitted data field (see Section 5.4.2.1.1 and 5.8 below).
All packets and an associated Main/Enhanced flag bit sequence (which indicates whether or
not a specific byte is from a Main Service packet) shall pass through a data randomizer, RS

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard, Annex D 27 December 2005

encoder, and byte interleaver that are identical to the ones used for Main-data-only transmission.
The data shall then be processed by an E8-VSB convolutional trellis coder, which shall have two
modes of operation for the Enhanced and Main data respectively, controlled by the
Main/Enhanced (M/E) flag.
The Enhanced convolutional processing, as specified below, shall result in replacement of
the placeholder bits in the expanded Enhanced stream packets (including the additional RS FEC
data). The symbols at the output of the E8-VSB convolutional coder shall be de-interleaved at
the 12:1 trellis level and then at the byte level. The output of this stage is groups of bytes with
appended erroneous RS coded parity bytes, due to changes in the symbol data produced by the
E8-VSB convolutional trellis coder. The erroneous RS coded parity bytes shall be deleted and
replaced by correct bytes generated by the following RS encoder (top row of Figure D5.2). A
data de-randomizer /randomizer pair may be inserted at this point to reformulate packets that are
transmitted by a SMPTE 310 link.
In case the upper and lower rows of processing in Figure D5.2 are physically separated (as
by a SMPTE 310 link [D3]), means will be required to transmit the map data and the field sync
timing across that link from the multiplexer (lower left of Figure D5.2) to the insertion mux
(upper row of Figure D5.2). One such method is covered in ATSC Standard A/110A [D2]. If the
SMPTE 310 link is used, then the embedded map and synchronization information is decoded
and is sent to the transmitter functional blocks as shown in the upper row of Figure D5.2. Data to
signal the placement of Enhanced data segments within the data field (“map data”) shall be
transmitted during the data field sync segment, as described below (see Section 5.7).

5.3 Data Organization

Figure D5.3 shows how the data are organized for transmission. Each Data Frame consists of
two Data Fields, each containing 313 Data Segments. The first Data Segment of each Data Field
is a unique synchronizing signal (Data Field Sync) and includes the training sequence used by
the equalizer in the receiver. The remaining 312 Data Segments each carry the equivalent of the
data from one 188-byte transport packet plus its associated RS-FEC overhead. The actual data in
each Data Segment comes from several transport packets because of data interleaving. In the
case of E8-VSB transmission, the Enhanced-coded 8-level symbols are dispersed among the
normal 8-level symbols due to additional interleaving of Enhanced coding. Each Data Segment
consists of 832 symbols. The first 4 symbols are transmitted in binary form and provide segment
synchronization. This Data Segment Sync signal also represents the sync byte of the 188-byte
MPEG-2-compatible transport packet11. The remaining 828 symbols of each Data Segment carry
data equivalent to the remaining 187 bytes of a transport packet and its associated RS-FEC
overhead. These 828 symbols are transmitted as 8-level signals and therefore carry three bits per
symbol. Thus, 828 x 3 = 2484 bits of data are carried in each Data Segment, which exactly
matches the requirement to send a protected transport packet:

11
Note that E8-VSB data includes additional RS coding and additional trellis coding. The packet
expansion by a ratio of 1:2 or 1:4 for Rate one-half or one-fourth respectively. Due to this
expansion, an MPEG-2 packet that is input to the enhanced stream extends over a non-integral
multiple of normal segments before being dispersed by interleaving. The Data Segment Sync is
MPEG-2 sync byte of the enhanced payload.

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard, Annex D 27 December 2005

187 data bytes + 20 RS parity bytes = 207 bytes

207 bytes x 8 bits/byte = 1656 bits

Two-thirds rate trellis coding requires 3/2 x 1656 bits = 2484 bits.
The exact symbol rate is given by Equation 1 below:
(1) Sr (MHz) = 4.5/286 x 684 = 10.76... MHz
The frequency of a Data Segment is given in Equation 2 below:
(2) fseg= Sr / 832 = 12.94... X 103 Data Segments/s.
The Data Frame rate is given by Equation (3) below:
(3) fframe = fseg/626 = 20.66 ... frames/s.
The symbol rate Sr and the transport rate Tr (see Section 7.2 of Annex C) shall be locked to each
other in frequency.

4 828 Symbols
Field Sync #1

S
313 e Data + FEC 24.2
Segments g ms
m
e
n
t
Field Sync #2
S
y
n
c
313 Data + FEC
24.2
Segments ms

Test Segment

1 Segment
= 77.3 us

Figure D5.3 VSB data frame without extra field sync.

The 8-level symbols combined with the binary Data Segment Sync and Data Field Sync
signals shall be used to suppressed-carrier modulate a single carrier. Before transmission,
however, most of the lower sideband shall be removed. The resulting spectrum is flat, except for
the band edges where a nominal square root raised cosine response results in 620 kHz transition
regions. The nominal VSB transmission spectrum is shown in Figure D5.4.
At the suppressed-carrier frequency, 310 kHz from the nominal lower band edge, a small
pilot shall be added to the signal.

59
ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard, Annex D 27 December 2005

1.
.7
P il o t
0
S u p p re s s e d
C a r r ie r
.3 1 5 .3 8 M H z .3 1

6 .0 M H z

Figure D5.4 VSB channel occupancy (nominal).

5.4 Channel Error Protection

Main channel error protection consists of a concatenated RS encoding, interleaving and 4-state
trellis encoding for the Main Service.
As an option, Enhanced modes may be employed. There are two modes available, with
choice of levels of error protection within each method defined. These Enhanced modes provide
methods to trade off data rate from the Main Service to facilitate reception. For a particular mode
choice, the data rate assigned to the mode is variable in pre-defined steps.
There is a set of methods for adding additional forward error correction coding layers to the
data before sending the data via a constrained version of 8-VSB. This method is called Enhanced
8-VSB. Various coding rate options are defined, and the payload assignment between the
Enhanced 8-VSB data and the Main data is selectable at defined values.
The Main Service channel error protection is specified first, followed by the Enhanced mode.
5.4.1 Main Service Data Error Detection and Correction Facility
5.4.1.1 Main Service Data Randomizer
A data randomizer shall be used on all input data (including an Enhanced stream if present) to
randomize the data payload. The data randomizer XORs all the incoming data bytes with a 16-bit
maximum length pseudo random binary sequence (PRBS) which is initialized at the beginning of
the Data Field. The PRBS is generated in a 16-bit shift register that has 9 feedback taps. Eight of
the shift register outputs are selected as the fixed randomizing byte, where each bit from this
byte is used to individually XOR the corresponding input data bit. The data bits are XORed
MSB to MSB ... LSB to LSB.
The randomizer generator polynomial is as follows:
G(16) = X16 + X13 + X12 + X11 + X7 + X6 + X3 + X + 1
The initialization (pre-load) to F180 hex (load to 1) occurs during the Data Segment Sync
interval prior to the first Data Segment.
The randomizer generator polynomial and initialization is shown in Figure D5.5.

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard, Annex D 27 December 2005

Generator Polynominal G (16) = X16+X13+X12+X11+X7+X6+X3+X+1

The initalization (pre load) occurs during the field sync interval
Initalization to F180 hex (Load to 1)
X16 X15 X14 X13 X9 X8

X + X2 X3 + X4 X5 X6 + X7 + X8 X9 X10 X11 + X12 + X13 + X14 X15 X16

D0 D1 D2 D3 D4 D5 D6 D7

The generator is shifted with the Byte Clock and one 8 bit Byte
of data is extracted per cycle.

Figure D5.5 Randomizer polynomial.

5.4.1.2 Main Service Reed-Solomon Encoder

The randomizer output is the input for the RS Encoder. The RS code used in the VSB
transmission subsystem shall be a t = l0 (207,187) code. The RS data block size is 187 bytes,
with 20 RS parity bytes added for error correction. A total RS block size of 207 bytes is
transmitted per Data Segment.
In creating bytes from the serial bit stream, the MSB shall be the first serial bit. The 20 RS
parity bytes shall be sent at the end of the Data Segment. The parity generator polynomial and
the primitive field generator polynomial are shown in Figure D5.6.

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard, Annex D 27 December 2005

i = 2t- 1

i=0

Figure D5.6 Reed-Solomon (207,187) t=10 parity generator polynomial.

5.4.1.3 Main Service Interleaving

The interleaver employed in the VSB transmission system shall be a 52 data segment
(intersegment) convolutional byte interleaver. Interleaving is provided to a depth of about one-
sixth of a data field (4 ms deep). Only data bytes (including the RS parity bytes) shall be
interleaved. The interleaver shall be synchronized to the first data byte of the data field.
Intrasegment interleaving is also performed for the benefit of the trellis coding process. The
convolutional interleaver is shown in Figure D5.7.

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard, Annex D 27 December 2005

1
M(=4Bytes)
2

From 2M To
3
Reed-Solomon Pre-Coder and
Encoder Trellis Encoder

(B-2)M
51
(B-1)M
(B=)52

M=4, B=52, N=208, R-S Block =207, BXM=N

Figure D5.7 Convolutional interleaver (byte shift register illustration).

5.4.1.4 Main Service Trellis Coding

The 8 VSB transmission sub-system shall employ a two-thirds rate (R=2/3) trellis code (with one
unencoded bit which is precoded). That is, one input bit is encoded into two output bits using a
one-half rate convolutional code while the other input bit is precoded. The signaling waveform
used with the trellis code is an 8-level (3 bit) one-dimensional constellation. The transmitted
signal is referred to as 8 VSB. A 4-state trellis encoder shall be used.
Trellis code intrasegment interleaving shall be used. This uses twelve identical trellis
encoders and precoders operating on interleaved data symbols. The code interleaving is
accomplished by encoding symbols (0, 12, 24, 36 ...) as one group, symbols (1, 13, 25, 37, ...) as
a second group, symbols (2, 14, 26, 38, ...) as a third group, and so on for a total of 12 groups.
In creating serial bits from parallel bytes, the MSB shall be sent out first: (7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1,
0). The MSB is precoded (7, 5, 3, 1) and the LSB is feedback convolutional encoded (6, 4, 2, 0).
Standard 4-state optimal Ungerboeck codes shall be used for the encoding. The trellis code
utilizes the 4-state feedback encoder shown in Figure D5.8. Also shown is the precoder and the
symbol mapper. The trellis code and precoder intrasegment interleaver is shown in Figure D5.9
which feeds the mapper detailed in Figure D5.8. Referring to Figure D5.9, data bytes are fed
from the byte interleaver to the trellis coder and precoder, and they are processed as whole bytes
by each of the twelve encoders. Each byte produces four symbols from a single encoder.

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Interference Filter
Pre-coder Trellis Encoder 8-Level Symbol Mapper

X2 Y2 Z2 MAP
+
Z2 Z1 Z0 R
000 -7
D 001 -5
010 -3 R
X1 Y1 Z1 011 -1
100 +1
Z0 101 +3
D + D 110 +5
111 +7

(D = 12 Symbols Delay)

Figure D5.8 Main Service trellis encoder, precoder, and symbol mapper.

The output multiplexer shown (as the right circle) in Figure D5.9 shall advance by four
symbols on each segment boundary. However, the state of the trellis encoder shall not be
advanced. The data coming out of the multiplexer shall follow normal ordering from encoder 0
through 11 for the first segment of the frame, but on the second segment the order changes and
symbols are read from encoders 4 through 11, and then 0 through 3. The third segment reads
from encoder 8 through 11 and then 0 through 7. This three-segment pattern shall repeat through
the 312 Data Segments of the frame. Table D5.1 shows the interleaving sequence for the first
three Data Segments of the frame.

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard, Annex D 27 December 2005

Pre-Coder
& Trellis
Encoder
#0

Pre-Coder
& Trellis
Encoder
#1 Pre-Coded & Trellis Encoded
Data Out
Interleaved Pre-Coder
To Mapper
Data & Trellis

In Encoder
#2

Pre-Coder
& Trellis
Encoder
#9

Pre-Coder
& Trellis
Encoder
#10

Pre-Coder
& Trellis
Encoder
#11

Figure D5.9 Trellis code interleaver.

After the Data Segment Sync is inserted, the ordering of the data symbols is such that
symbols from each encoder occur at a spacing of twelve symbols.

Table D5.1 Interleaving Sequence

Segment Block 0 Block 1 ... Block 68
0 D0 D1 D2 ... D11 D0 D1 D2 ... D11 ... D0 D1 D2 ... D11
1 D4 D5 D6 ... D3 D4 D5 D6 ... D3 ... D4 D5 D6 ... D3
2 D8 D9 D10 ... D7 D8 D9 D10 ... D7 ... D8 D9 D10 ... D7

A complete conversion of parallel bytes to serial bits needs 828 bytes to produce 6624 bits.
Data symbols are created from 2 bits sent in MSB order, so a complete conversion operation
yields 3312 data symbols, which corresponds to 4 segments of 828 data symbols. 3312 data
symbols divided by 12 trellis encoders gives 276 symbols per trellis encoder. 276 symbols
divided by 4 symbols per byte gives 69 bytes per trellis encoder.
The conversion starts with the first segment of the field and proceeds with groups of 4
segments until the end of the field. 312 segments per field divided by 4 gives 78 conversion
operations per field.

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Allowing for segment sync the input to 4 encoders is skipped but the encoders cycle with no
input. The input is held until the next multiplex cycle and then fed to the correct encoder.
Table D5.2 details the byte to symbol conversion and the associated multiplexing of the
trellis encoders. Segment 0 is the first segment of the field. The pattern repeats every 12
segments; segments 5 through 11 are not shown.

Table D5.2 Byte to Symbol Conversion, Multiplexing of Trellis Encoders

Symbol Segment 0 Segment 1 Segment 2 Segment 3 Segment 4
Trellis Byte Bits Trellis Byte Bits Trellis Byte Bits Trellis Byte Bits Trellis Byte Bits
0 0 0 7,6 4 208 5,4 8 412 3,2 0 616 1,0 4 828 7,6
1 1 1 7,6 5 209 5,4 9 413 3,2 1 617 1,0 5 829 7,6
2 2 2 7,6 6 210 5,4 10 414 3,2 2 618 1,0 6 830 7,6
3 3 3 7,6 7 211 5,4 11 415 3,2 3 619 1,0 ... ... ...
4 4 4 7,6 8 212 5,4 0 416 3,2 4 620 1,0 ... ... ...
5 5 5 7,6 9 213 5,4 1 417 3,2 5 621 1,0 ... ... ...
6 6 6 7,6 10 214 5,4 2 418 3,2 6 622 1,0 ... ... ...
7 7 7 7,6 11 215 5,4 3 419 3,2 7 623 1,0 ... ... ...
8 8 8 7,6 0 204 5,4 4 408 3,2 8 612 1,0 ... ... ...
9 9 9 7,6 1 205 5,4 5 409 3,2 9 613 1,0 ... ... ...
10 10 10 7,6 2 206 5,4 6 410 3,2 10 614 1,0 ... ... ...
11 11 11 7,6 3 207 5,4 7 411 3,2 11 615 1,0 ... ... ...
12 0 0 5,4 4 208 3,2 8 412 1,0 0 624 7,6 ... ... ...
13 1 1 5,4 5 209 3,2 9 413 1,0 1 625 7,6 ... ... ...
... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ...
19 7 7 5,4 11 215 3,2 3 419 1,0 7 631 7,6 ... ... ...
20 8 8 5,4 0 204 3,2 4 408 1,0 8 632 7,6 ... ... ...
21 9 9 5,4 1 205 3,2 5 409 1,0 9 633 7,6 ... ... ...
22 10 10 5,4 2 206 3,2 6 410 1,0 10 634 7,6 ... ... ...
23 11 11 5,4 3 207 3,2 7 411 1,0 11 635 7,6 ... ... ...
24 0 0 3,2 4 208 1,0 8 420 7,6 0 624 5,4 ... ... ...
25 1 1 3,2 5 209 1,0 9 421 7,6 1 625 5,4 ... ... ...
... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ...
31 7 7 3,2 11 215 1,0 3 427 7,6 ... ... ... ... ... ...
32 8 8 3,2 0 204 1,0 4 428 7,6 ... ... ... ... ... ...
33 9 9 3,2 1 205 1,0 5 429 7,6 ... ... ... ... ... ...
34 10 10 3,2 2 206 1,0 6 430 7,6 ... ... ... ... ... ...
35 11 11 3,2 3 207 1,0 7 431 7,6 ... ... ... ... ... ...
36 0 0 1,0 4 216 7,6 8 420 5,4 ... ... ... ... ... ...
37 1 1 1,0 5 217 7,6 9 421 5,4 ... ... ... ... ... ...
... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ...
47 11 11 1,0 3 227 7,6 ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ...
48 0 12 7,6 4 216 5,4 ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ...
49 1 13 7,6 5 217 5,4 ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ...
... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ...
95 11 23 1,0 ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ...

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96 0 24 7,6 ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ...
97 1 25 7,6 ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ...
... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ...
767 11 191 1,0 ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ...
768 0 192 7,6 ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ...
769 1 193 7,6 ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ...
... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ...
815 11 203 1,0 3 419 7,6 7 623 5,4 11 827 3,2 ... ... ...
816 0 204 7,6 4 408 5,4 8 612 3,2 0 816 1,0 ... ... ...
817 1 205 7,6 5 409 5,4 9 613 3,2 1 817 1,0 ... ... ...
... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ...
827 11 215 7,6 3 419 5,4 7 623 3,2 11 827 1,0 ... ... ...

5.4.2 Main and Enhanced Service Data Error Detection and Correction Facilities
When Enhanced Services are enabled (see Figure D5.2), the processing steps for both Main
Service data and Enhanced Service data are somewhat different than for Main Service data
alone. The requirements for the RF transmission system with Enhanced data capability are
specified herein.
5.4.2.1 Enhanced Data Protection
Enhanced data is protected by a concatenated FEC comprised by an additional FEC (applied to
the Enhanced Service) and by the Main FEC. Enhanced channel error protection uses an
additional interleaver (Enhanced interleaver), an additional Reed Solomon encoding scheme
(Enhanced RS encoding), an additional convolutional interleaver (Enhanced convolutional
interleaver), and an additional 4-state convolutional encoder (Enhanced convolutional encoder).
The Enhanced data and Enhanced RS parity bytes are encapsulated within the transport level
payload portion of an MPEG-2 Packet. The Enhanced 4-state convolutional encoder is
concatenated and synchronized with the Main trellis 4-state encoding to produce an effective 16-
state trellis encoder for the Enhanced data. Enhanced FEC offers two encoding modes defined as
one-half rate and one-quarter rate E8-VSB modes. The following sections establish requirements
for each functional block of the Enhanced FEC shown in Figure D5. 2
The input to the preprocessor shall be 188-byte MPEG-2 packets.
The data intended to be encoded by the Main and Enhanced FEC is split into a maximum of
three parallel streams. Each stream is associated with a Main, an Enhanced one-half rate, or an
Enhanced one-quarter rate FEC mode status.
Appropriate buffering is inserted in both the Main and the Enhanced MPEG-2 streams, and
Enhanced data is sent through the E8-VSB Pre-Processor. Enhanced data shall be Reed Solomon
encoded, and each byte shall be expanded by the ratio of 1:2 (for one-half rate coding) or 1:4 (for
one-quarter rate coding) to form place-holder bits for the 4-state Enhanced convolutional coding.
The expanded bytes shall be formatted in MPEG-2 compliant packets, which shall be
multiplexed with packets from the Main MPEG-2 stream (Main Service).

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard, Annex D 27 December 2005

Normal 188-Byte
MPEG MUX
Packet Uncoded
Buffer MPEG
Data MPEG
Inserts Packets
188-Byte Enhanced Enhanced
Enhanced (RS Encoded)
Packets into
½ Rate MPEG MPEG Compatible
the MPEG M/E
Packet Packets
Multiplex at Byte
Buffer Uncoded E8-VSB Defined Flag
MPEG Pre-Processor Locations in
Enhanced Data Each VSB
¼ Rate MPEG 4/184
M/E Field
Packet
Buffer Byte
Flag

Enhanced ½ Rate and

Enhanced ¼ Rate Packets
Enhanced Rate
Number Per VSB Field

Figure D5.10 Main and Enhanced Mux Packet Processor.

5.4.2.1.1 E8-VSB Pre-Processor

5.4.2.1.1.1 164-Byte Packet Converter

The data intended to be encoded with either the one-half rate Enhanced FEC or the one-quarter
rate Enhanced FEC shall be processed by the packet converter, which shall organize the 188-
byte MPEG-2 data input into 164-byte packets.
5.4.2.1.1.2 Enhanced One-Half Rate and One-Quarter Rate Packet Multiplexer
The payload of the Enhanced data, comprised of one-half rate and one-quarter rate 164-byte
packets to be transmitted in a VSB field, is specified by the E-VSB map and is constant for a
group of sixteen VSB frames (see Section 5.7).
The one-half rate and one-quarter rate 164-byte packets corresponding to the Enhanced
payload carried by a VSB frame are packed in a buffer prior to being sent to the RS encoder. The
maximum number of 164-byte packets allowed for the Enhanced one-half rate mode is 156. The
maximum number of 164-byte packets allowed for the Enhanced one-quarter rate mode is 78.
The maximum buffer depth shall be 156.
Placement of the one-half rate and one-quarter rate 164-byte packets shall occur at specific
locations in the multiplexing buffer. The location of the Enhanced 164-byte packet in the
Enhanced multiplexer buffer shall be defined as follows:
• When the 10th bit of the 12-bit payload of the E-VSB map (starting from the leftmost bit)
is set to ‘1’, the 164-byte packets will alternate between one-half rate and one-quarter
rate packets until the number of Enhanced 164-byte packets intended to be carried by the
8-VSB field is reached. The first Enhanced packet processed by the RS encoder shall be
the first one-half rate packet (if one-half rate packets are present) incoming to the buffer
multiplexer.
• When the 10th bit is set to ‘0’, the one-half rate and the one-fourth rate 164-byte packets
shall be grouped together. The buffer shall be segmented into two parts. The first part of

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard, Annex D 27 December 2005

the buffer shall contain, consecutively, all of the one-half rate 164-byte packets, and the
second part of the buffer shall contain, consecutively, all of the one-fourth rate 164-byte
packets. The first packet processed by the RS encoder shall be the first one-half rate
packet (if one-half rate packets are present) incoming to the buffer multiplexer.
Each PCR [D1] shall be adjusted to accommodate the actual MPEG-2 Transport Stream
packet [D1] delivery time.
Additionally, the Enhanced multiplexer buffer shall carry an H/Q flag, which shall identify
the nature of each 164-byte packet. This H/Q flag shall have two states: “H” for one-half rate and
“Q” for one-fourth rate.
5.4.2.1.1.3 Enhanced RS
The first function after the segment multiplexer shall be an encoding of the 164-byte packets of
data to be sent via this enhanced means by an RS encoder with parameters t = 10 (184,164). The
Primitive Field Generating Polynomial shall be the same as that specified in Figure D5.6, which
is also used for the Main RS encoder. The RS encoder will pass through the H/Q flag generated
by the previous block and shall extend it to the parity bytes generated by the RS encoder.
5.4.2.1.1.4 Enhanced Data Interleaver
The interleaver is mainly intended to provide additional protection against burst noise and bursty
errors produced by channel degradations. The Enhanced RS encoder shall be followed by an
Enhanced data interleaver that shall perform a convolutional byte interleave with parameters
B=46, M=4, N=184. The Enhanced interleaver shall make multiple complete revolutions per
data field for all Enhanced data code rates. It shall start at the top (zero delay) row in the same
manner as the Main byte interleaver. The interleaver for all mix percentages of Enhanced data
shall introduce a constant delay to an MPEG-2 transport stream. The conceptual structure may
be seen in Figure D5.7. The data interleaver shall carry the H/Q flag generated during the
operation of buffer multiplexing of the 164-byte packets. The H/Q flag shall remain in time
synchronization with each byte it describes.
5.4.2.1.1.5 Enhanced Bytes Expansion and Addition of MPEG-2 Header
Each byte associated with the Enhanced one-half rate FEC mode is expanded into two bytes. The
expansion of the one-half rate byte is as specified below.

Original Enhanced Byte Expanded Enhanced Byte Expanded Byte Number

(E7,E6,E5,E4,E3,E2,E1,E0)
(R7,R6,R5,R4,R3,R2,R1,R0) (R7,X,R6,X,R5,X,R4,X) 1
(R3,X,R2,X,R1,X,R0,X) 0

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ATSC A/53E Digital Television Standard, Annex D 27 December 2005

Each byte associated with the Enhanced one-fourth rate FEC mode is expanded into four
bytes. The expansion of the one-fourth rate byte is as specified below.

Original Enhanced Byte Expanded Enhanced Byte Expanded Byte Number

(E7,E6,E5,E4,E3,E2,E1,E0)
(R7,R6,R5,R4,R3,R2,R1,R0) (R7,X,R7,X,R6,X,R6,X) 3
(R5,X,R5,X,R4,X,R4,X) 2
(R3,X,R3,X,R2,X,R2,X) 1
(R1,X,R1,X,R0,X,R0,X) 0

The bits R7 through R0 of the original one-half rate and one-fourth rate bytes are
respectively mapped into two and four Enhanced bytes. The bits E7 through E0 are bit positions
in the subsequently expanded byte. The “X” in the expanded bytes denotes a placeholder and
may be coded by 0.
For the rate one-half, the expanded byte number “0” shall represent the LSB byte and the
byte number “1” shall represent the MSB byte. For the rate one-fourth, the expanded byte
number “0” shall represent the LSB byte of the 4 bytes word, and the expanded byte number “3”
shall represent the MSB byte. For both the one-half rate and one-fourth rate the original byte
replacement shall start with the MSB byte of respectively the two and four expanded bytes.
The expanded bytes are formatted into 184-byte segments. Each reconstructed 184-byte
segment packet may consist of both one-half rate and one-fourth rate expanded Enhanced bytes.
For the purpose for maintaining strict backward compatibility for existing receivers, 188-
byte packets that contain Enhanced encoded data are composed of a 0x47 Sync byte, followed by
3 bytes as defined by [D1] that contain the null packet designation (PID = 0x1FFF), and the 184-
byte enhanced segment
The encapsulated Enhanced RS encoding (184,164) in the E8-VSB Pre-Processor reduces the
effective payload of these packets by an additional 20 bytes to 164.
After the introduction of the header bytes, the H/Q flag carried through the previous blocks is
dropped. Another flag, called the M/E flag, is used and shall be in the Enhanced state when
Enhanced bytes are clocked out of the E8-VSB Pre-Processor and shall be in the Main state
when the 4-byte MPEG-2 header is clocked out of the E8-VSB Pre-Processor.

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188-byte
MPEG 188-
Packets MPEG byte
Packet MPEG
164-byte Packets
Add
Converter Expand each 4-byte
Enhanced
M byte of the MPEG
Reed Enhanced 184 byte RS
188-byte U Solomon Data Headers
Block of To each
MPEG X (184, 164) Interleaver Robust Data 4/184
MPEG 184 byte
Packets H/Q Encoder H/Q into 2 or 4 RS
Packet Segment Byte bytes
164-byte Block M/E
Flag Flag Byte
Converter
Flag

Enhanced ½ rate and

Enhanced ¼ rate
Packets Number per
VSB Field

Figure D5.11 E8-VSB Pre-Processor.

5.4.2.2 Data Randomizer

The data byte processing shall be per Section 5.4.1.1, and the M/E flag shall not be modified and
shall remain in time synchronization with each byte it describes. The value shall change state on
byte boundaries when the associated byte belongs to a different class of bytes. The M/E flag
shall be in the Main state when the bytes correspond to either the Main MPEG-2 packets or to
the 4-byte header of the Enhanced MPEG-2 compliant packets. The M/E flag shall be in the
Enhanced state when the bytes correspond to the payload of the reconstructed Enhanced MPEG-
2 packets.
5.4.2.3 Reed Solomon Encoder
All bytes output from the data randomizer shall be sent to the RS encoder. The data byte
processing shall be as specified in Section5.4.1.2, and the M/E flag shall be maintained as
Enhanced for the 184 Enhanced bytes and shall be set to Main for all other bytes. All RS parity
bytes are Main mode bytes and shall have their flags associated to their Main states.
5.4.2.4 Data Interleaver
The output of the Reed-Solomon Encoder, including both Main Service data and robust data,
shall be interleaved by a convolutional data byte interleaver. This data interleaver shall have the
same parameters as a Main-Service-only interleaver, as specified in Section 5.4.1.3. In addition,
the Main/Enhanced (M/E) control signal from the Reed-Solomon Encoder (which changes state
on byte boundaries) shall be interleaved using the same parameters as the data, so that the output
M/E control signal shall correctly indicate the M/E type of each data byte output from the
interleaver.

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5.4.2.5 E8-VSB Convolutional Coder

The E8-VSB convolutional coder is comprised of a symbol interleaver, an Enhanced symbol
processor, and a symbol de-interleaver. The symbol interleaver corresponds to the 12-way
Trellis code interleaving described in Section 5.4.1.4. The M/E flag shall also go through the
same interleaving as the symbol interleaver. The symbol de-interleaver shall be the inverse of the
earlier described symbol interleaver, with the exception of the M/E flag, which is not passed
through.

2-bit 2-bit
nibbles nibbles
(x1, (x1',
Bytes x2) x2')
From To ATSC
12-way Enhanced Bytes
ATSC 12-way Data Byte
Symbol Symbol
Data Byte Symbol De- De-
Interleaver Processor
Interleaver M/E Interleaver interleaver
M/E
Byte Byte
flag flag

Figure D5.12 E8-VSB convolutional coder (12-way interleave/de-

interleave).

5.4.2.5.1 Enhanced Symbol Processor

For reference, in the Main transmission mode, each of the 12 parallel trellis encoders receive and
encode a byte of data from the Main interleaver in the following order: (7,6,5,4,3,2,1,0), where 7
is the MSB and 0 is the LSB.
The Enhanced symbol Processor contains the convolutional encoder with a 4-state feedback.
The convolutional encoder process the incoming bytes by group of 2-bit nibbles. The
convolutional code is the same as that for the normal trellis encoder, as illustrated in Figure
D5.9. Referring to Figure D5.13, for all Enhanced transmission modes, the M/E flag selects the
Enhanced input (“E”) to the illustrated lower three muxes to perform convolutional encoding of
the X2 bit to produce the X2’ bit. For the Main mode of transmission, the control line selects the
Main input (“N”) of the muxes to hold the convolutional encoder in its current state and to
derive the X1’ bit directly from the X1 bit.
For normal bytes the four groups of 2-bit nibbles associated with one of the 12-convolutional
encoders are passed through, and the states of the encoder are updated. For Enhanced bytes, bits
in positions E7, E5, E3, and E1 are encoded by the systematic convolutional encoder. Bits in
positions E6, E4, E2, and E0 are not processed. Placeholder of the four groups of 2-bit nibbles
are replaced with the encoded X1’ bit.

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M/E

E D
M
M U X2'
+ X +
X2

X2 D

2 - bit
nibbles M/E M/E M/E

X1 E E E
M D + M D M X1'
M U M U U
X X M X

X1

Figure D5.13 Enhanced Symbol Processor.

5.4.2.5.2 Precode Bypass

The upper portion of Figure D5.13 illustrates the operation of the Precoder Bypass in the
Enhanced symbol processor. The function of the Precoder Bypass is to produce a systematic
trellis code for the Enhanced data (when the Enhanced convolutional encoder is concatenated
with the normal trellis encoder), where Z2 is the information bit, Z1 is the output of the
Enhanced convolutional encoder and derived from X1’.
For all robust transmission modes, the M/E flag selects the “E” input to the uppermost mux.
The resulting X2’ bit shown is then the derivative of the X2 bit. Upon subsequent Interference
Filter Precoding, as depicted in Figure D5.8, the resulting Z2 bit produced is identical to the X2
bit in Figure D5.13. For the Main mode of transmission, the “M” input to the uppermost mux is
selected, and the X2 bit is integrated and subsequently differentiated, therefore making the X2’
bit identical to the X2 bit. Upon subsequent Interference Filter Precoding, the Y2 bit is achieved
for the Main mode of transmission.
The normally encoded RS parity bytes of the Enhanced packets can introduce a phase
inversion that produces an inverted systematic trellis code for the Enhanced data. Appropriate
decoding of the Enhanced data depends on the Enhanced data trellis decoder’s capability to
decode either phase.
5.4.2.6 Data Byte De-Interleaver
The data byte de-interleaver is the inverse function of the Main convolutional interleaver.

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5.4.2.7 RS Byte Delete and De-Randomizer

The RS parity bytes are removed and a de-randomizer, which is the inverse function of the Main
randomizer, is applied to each byte of the 188-byte segment.

5.5 Synchronization
This section defines synchronization for data segments and fields.
5.5.1 Data Segment Sync
The encoded trellis data shall be passed through a multiplexer that inserts the various
synchronization signals (Data Segment Sync and Data Field Sync).
A two-level (binary) 4-symbol Data Segment Sync shall be inserted into the 8-level digital
data stream at the beginning of each Data Segment. (The MPEG-2 sync byte shall be replaced by
Data Segment Sync.) The Data Segment Sync embedded in random data is illustrated in Figure
D5.14.
A complete segment shall consist of 832 symbols: 4 symbols for Data Segment Sync, and
828 data plus parity symbols. The Data Segment Sync is binary (2-level). The same sync pattern
occurs regularly at 77.3 μs intervals, and is the only signal repeating at this rate. Unlike the data,
the four symbols for Data Segment Sync are not Reed-Solomon or trellis encoded, nor are they
interleaved. The Data Segment Sync pattern shall be a ‘1001’ pattern, as shown in Figure D5.14.
Data Data
Segment Data + FEC Segment
+7
SYNC SYNC
+5
+3
+1
-1
-3
-5
-7
828 Symbols
Levels 4 207 Bytes 4
Before Symbols Symbols
Pilot
Data Segment
Addition 832 Symbols
(Pilot=1.25) 208 Bytes

Figure D5.14 8-VSB data segment.

5.5.2 Data Field Sync

The data are not only divided into Data Segments, but also into Data Fields, each consisting of
313 segments. Each Data Field (24.2 ms) shall start with one complete Data Segment of Data
Field Sync, as shown in Figure D5.15. Each symbol represents one bit of data (2-level). The
arrangement of the 832 symbols in this segment are defined below. Refer to Figure D5.15 for the
placement of these components during the data field sync. The sync in Figure D5.15 is the same
as the Data Segment Sync and is defined as ‘1001’.

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Precode *

832 Symbols
+7
+5
+3
+1
PN511 PN63 PN63 PN63 VSB Reserved **
-1 mode
-3
-5
-7 Sync
12
sym
63 63 63 24 bols
Levels 4 511 104
before sym sym sym sym
symbols symbols bols bols bols bols symbols
addition
of pilot
(Pilot=1.25)
* For trellis coded terrestrial 8 VSB, the last 12 symbols of the previous segments are duplicated in the last
12 reserved symbols of the field synch.
** For enhanced data transmission, the last 10 of the reserved symbols before the 12 precode symbols are
defined. The other 82 symbols may be defined for each enhancement, as needed.

Figure D5.15 VSB data field sync.

5.5.2.1 Definition of the PN511 Sequence

This pseudo-random sequence is defined as X9 + X7 + X6 + X4 + X3 + X + 1 with a pre-load value
of ‘010000000’. The sequence is:

‘0000 0001 0111 1111 1100 1010 1010 1110 0110 0110 1000 1000 1001 1110 0001 1101
0111 1101 0011 0101 0011 1011 0011 1010 0100 0101 1000 1111 0010 0001 0100 0111
1100 1111 0101 0001 0100 1100 0011 0001 0000 0100 0011 1111 0000 0101 0100 0000
1100 1111 1110 1110 1010 1001 0110 0110 0011 0111 0111 1011 0100 1010 0100 1110
0111 0001 0111 0100 0011 0100 1111 1011 0001 0101 1011 1100 1101 1010 1110 1101
1001 0110 1101 1100 1001 0010 1110 0011 1001 0111 1010 0011 0101 1000 0100 1101
1111 0001 0010 1011 1100 0110 0101 0000 1000 1100 0001 1110 1111 1101 0110 1010
1100 1001 1001 0001 1101 1100 0010 1101 0000 0110 1100 0000 1001 0000 0001 110’

5.5.2.2 Definition of the PN63 Sequence

This pseudo-random sequence is repeated three times. It is defined as X6 + X + 1 with a pre-load
value of ‘100111’. The middle PN63 is inverted on every other Data Field Sync. The sequence
is:

‘1110 0100 1011 0111 0110 0110 1010 1111 1100 0001 0000 1100 0101 0011 1101 000’

The generators for the PN63 and PN511 sequences are shown in Figure D5.16.

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X or
+

1 0 0 1 1 1 Output

Shift
63 PN Sequence, X6+X+1
Preload ‘100111’

X or X or X or X or X or
+ + + + +

0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 Output

Shift
511 PN Sequence,
X9+X7+X6+X4+X3+X+1
Preload ‘010000000’

Figure D5.16 Field sync PN sequence generators.

5.5.2.3 VSB Mode Bits

These 24 bits determine the VSB mode for the data in the frame. The first two bytes are
reserved. The fill pattern for these two bytes shall be ‘0000 1111 0000 1111’ when 8 VSB is not
signaled. The next byte is defined as:

P A B C P A B C

where P is the even parity bit, the MSB of the byte, and A, B, C are the actual mode bits.

P A B C
0 0 0 0 Reserved
1 0 0 1 Reserved
1 0 1 0 Reserved
0 0 1 1 Reserved
1 1 0 0 16 VSB
0 1 0 1 8 VSB*
0 1 1 0 Reserved
1 1 1 1 Reserved

* In the 8 VSB mode, the preceding bits are defined as:

0 0 0 0 P A B C P A B C 1 1 1 1

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5.5.2.4 Reserved
In the 8-VSB mode, 92 symbols of the last 104 symbols shall be reserved, and they shall be
followed by the 12 symbols defined below. To maintain a longer period with a flat spectrum, it is
recommended that these 92 symbols be filled with a continuation of the PN63 sequence when
only 8-VSB is present.
When one or more enhanced data transmission methods are used, the previously reserved
symbols (including the 12 precode symbols used for 8-VSB and E8-VSB) shall be numbered
from 1 to 104, in the order transmitted. The 12 precode symbols shall be preceded by 10 symbols
that shall be used to signal the presence of an enhancement or enhancements, as defined below.
The use of some or all of the remaining 82 symbols shall be defined by each enhancement.
5.5.2.5 Precode
In the 8 VSB mode, the last 12 symbols of the segment shall correspond to the last 12 symbols
of the previous segment. All sequences are pre-loaded before the beginning of the Data Field
Sync.
Like the Data Segment Sync, the Data Field Sync is not Reed-Solomon or trellis encoded,
nor is it interleaved.
5.5.2.6 Enhancement Signaling
Symbols 85 through 92 shall be used for indication of specific future enhancements. If no
enhancements are present, they may be set equal to –5 on odd data fields (positive PN63 in the
preceding structure). If one or more enhancements are present, all symbols except those
signaling one or more enhancements shall be set to ‘–5’ (positive PN63). The particular symbol
that shall be used to signal each enhancement by setting its value to ‘+5’ (positive PN63) is
specified hereinafter for each.
Symbols 83 and 84 are reserved for signaling future alternative definitions of symbols
numbered 85 through 92 and shall be set to ‘–5’ (positive PN63) unless such alternative
definitions are signaled as defined hereinafter.
On even data fields (negative PN63), the polarities of symbols 83 through 92 shall be
inverted from those in the odd data field.

5.6 Enhanced Mode Data Rates

The Enhanced mix signaling in the data field sync provides 9 bits for selection of the mixture of
Main, one-half rate and one-fourth rate data (512 choices). The tables for rate selection are
formulated to provide denser packing at lower Enhanced data rates, to allow use of the minimum
Enhanced data required by an application.
The amount of Main, one-half rate and one-fourth rate data present in a data frame shall be
as indicated for that frame using one of the values from Table D5.3 which in turn references
Tables D5.4a, and D5.4b.
Table D5.3, “Steps Numbers vs. Map Address,” indicates an ordinal “Step Number” for each
of the one-half rate and one-fourth rate data, corresponding to each 9-bit map address, with each
bit labeled with a letter from “A” to “I”. The three most significant bits (IHG) are shown in the
top row and the six least significant bits (FEDCBA) of the map address are shown in the left
column. The “Step Numbers” for the one-half rate data and one-fourth rate data corresponding to

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each 9-bit address are found at the intersection of the three-bit column address and the 6-bit row
address.
Table D5.4a, “Rate Segments and Payload vs. Step Number – one-half Rate”, indicates the
number of data segments used by one-half rate data which shall be used for a given step number
(which is referenced from Table D5.3).
Table D5.4b, “Rate Segments and Payload vs. Step Number – one-fourth Rate”, indicates the
number of data segments used by one-fourth rate data which shall be used for a given step
number (which is referenced from Table D5.3).
Tables D5.4a and D5.4b also include informative columns. These columns show the
approximate percent of segments allocated for Enhanced data, the payload of the Main data for
the case when the Enhanced data consists of exclusively one-half rate or one-fourth rate data,
and the payload of the Enhanced one-fourth or one-half rate data (respectively) for a given step
number.
5.6.1 Enhanced Stream Rate Limits
Limits have been defined for the maximum bitrate in the Enhanced (E-VSB) service.
At all times, the quality of video in the main stream shall be equal to or better than the
equivalent program in the Enhanced stream. In the event that the programming is different in the
main and Enhanced streams, a higher resolution format is deemed to be higher quality.
Additionally, during premium programming times, the maximum bitrate in the enhanced (E-
VSB) stream shall be 3 Mbps out of the total 19.4 Mbps channel capacity.
Of the map addresses 0d to 511d (notated as IHGFEDCBA in binary in Table D5.3) the
decimal values of the only map addresses that shall be used when the 3 Mbps limit applies are:
0-70,72-77, 80-84, 88-90, 128-132, 136-139, 144-147, 152-154, 160-162, 168, 169, and 176.

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Table D5.3 Steps vs. Map Address

IHGÆ 000 001 010 011 100 101 110 111
FEDCBA ½ ¼ ½ ¼ ½ ¼ ½ ¼ ½ ¼ ½ ¼ ½ ¼ ½ ¼
Step No. Step No. Step No. Step No. Step No. Step No. Step No. Step No.
000000 0 0 0 8 8 0 8 8 0 17 17 0 0 25 0 29
000001 1 0 1 8 9 0 9 8 1 16 16 1 1 24 1 28
000010 2 0 2 8 10 0 10 8 2 17 17 2 2 25 3 29
000011 3 0 3 8 11 0 11 8 3 16 16 3 3 24 4 28
000100 4 0 4 8 12 0 12 8 4 17 17 4 4 25 6 29
000101 5 0 5 8 13 0 13 8 5 16 16 5 5 24 7 28
000110 6 0 6 8 14 0 14 8 6 17 17 6 6 25 9 29
000111 7 0 7 8 15 0 15 8 7 16 16 7 7 24 10 28
001000 0 1 0 9 8 1 8 9 8 17 17 8 8 25 12 28
001001 1 1 1 9 9 1 9 9 9 16 16 9 9 24 0 31
001010 2 1 2 9 10 1 10 9 10 17 17 10 10 25 2 30
001011 3 1 3 9 11 1 11 9 11 16 16 11 11 24 5 30
001100 4 1 4 9 12 1 12 9 12 17 17 12 12 25 16 17
001101 5 1 5 9 13 1 13 9 13 16 16 13 13 24 17 18
001110 6 1 6 9 14 1 14 9 14 17 17 14 14 25 16 19
001111 7 1 7 9 15 1 15 9 15 16 16 15 15 24 17 20
010000 0 2 0 10 8 2 8 10 0 19 19 0 0 27 16 21
010001 1 2 1 10 9 2 9 10 1 18 18 1 1 26 17 22
010010 2 2 2 10 10 2 10 10 2 19 19 2 2 27 16 23
010011 3 2 3 10 11 2 11 10 3 18 18 3 3 26 17 24
010100 4 2 4 10 12 2 12 10 4 19 19 4 4 27 16 25
010101 5 2 5 10 13 2 13 10 5 18 18 5 5 26 16 26
010110 6 2 6 10 14 2 14 10 6 19 19 6 6 27 18 19
010111 7 2 7 10 15 2 15 10 7 18 18 7 7 26 19 20
011000 0 3 0 11 8 3 8 11 8 19 19 8 8 27 18 21
011001 1 3 1 11 9 3 9 11 9 18 18 9 9 26 19 22
011010 2 3 2 11 10 3 10 11 10 19 19 10 10 27 18 23
011011 3 3 3 11 11 3 11 11 11 18 18 11 11 26 19 24
011100 4 3 4 11 12 3 12 11 12 19 19 12 12 27 18 25
011101 5 3 5 11 13 3 13 11 13 18 18 13 13 26 20 21
011110 6 3 6 11 14 3 14 11 14 19 19 14 14 27 21 22
011111 7 3 7 11 15 3 15 11 15 18 18 15 15 26 20 23
100000 0 4 0 12 8 4 8 12 0 21 21 0 25 0 29 0
100001 1 4 1 12 9 4 9 12 1 20 20 1 24 1 28 1
100010 2 4 2 12 10 4 10 12 2 21 21 2 25 2 29 3
100011 3 4 3 12 11 4 11 12 3 20 20 3 24 3 28 4
100100 4 4 4 12 12 4 12 12 4 21 21 4 25 4 29 6
100101 5 4 5 12 13 4 13 12 5 20 20 5 24 5 28 7
100110 6 4 6 12 14 4 14 12 6 21 21 6 25 6 29 9
100111 7 4 7 12 15 4 15 12 7 20 20 7 24 7 28 10

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101000 0 5 0 13 8 5 8 13 8 21 21 8 25 8 28 12
101001 1 5 1 13 9 5 9 13 9 20 20 9 24 9 31 0
101010 2 5 2 13 10 5 10 13 10 21 21 10 25 10 30 2
101011 3 5 3 13 11 5 11 13 11 20 20 11 24 11 30 5
101100 4 5 4 13 12 5 12 13 12 21 21 12 25 12 17 16
101101 5 5 5 13 13 5 13 13 13 20 20 13 24 13 18 17
101110 6 5 6 13 14 5 14 13 14 21 21 14 25 14 19 16
101111 7 5 7 13 15 5 15 13 15 20 20 15 24 15 20 17
110000 0 6 0 14 8 6 8 14 0 23 23 0 27 0 21 16
110001 1 6 1 14 9 6 9 14 1 22 22 1 26 1 22 17
110010 2 6 2 14 10 6 10 14 2 23 23 2 27 2 23 16
110011 3 6 3 14 11 6 11 14 3 22 22 3 26 3 24 17
110100 4 6 4 14 12 6 12 14 4 23 23 4 27 4 25 16
110101 5 6 5 14 13 6 13 14 5 22 22 5 26 5 26 16
110110 6 6 6 14 14 6 14 14 6 23 23 6 27 6 19 18
110111 7 6 7 14 15 6 15 14 7 22 22 7 26 7 20 19
111000 0 7 0 15 8 7 8 15 8 23 23 8 27 8 21 18
111001 1 7 1 15 9 7 9 15 9 22 22 9 26 9 22 19
111010 2 7 2 15 10 7 10 15 10 23 23 10 27 10 23 18
111011 3 7 3 15 11 7 11 15 11 22 22 11 26 11 24 19
111100 4 7 4 15 12 7 12 15 12 23 23 12 27 12 25 18
111101 5 7 5 15 13 7 13 15 13 22 22 13 26 13 21 20
111110 6 7 6 15 14 7 14 15 14 23 23 14 27 14 22 21
111111 7 7 7 15 15 7 15 15 15 22 22 15 26 15 23 20

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Table D5.4a Segments and Payload vs. Step Number- one-half Rate
Step Segments Percent of Segments Allocated for Main Data Rate (Mbps) ½ rate (Mbps)
# Used Enhanced (informative) (informative) (informative)
0 0 0 19.3927 0.0000
1 2 0.64 19.2683 0.0542
2 4 1.28 19.144 0.1084
3 6 1.92 19.0197 0.1627
4 8 2.56 18.8954 0.2169
5 12 3.85 18.6468 0.3253
6 16 5.13 18.3982 0.4338
7 20 6.41 18.1495 0.5422
8 24 7.69 17.9009 0.6507
9 28 8.97 17.6523 0.7591
10 32 10.26 17.4037 0.8675
11 40 12.82 16.9064 1.0844
12 48 15.38 16.4092 1.3013
13 56 17.95 15.9119 1.5182
14 64 20.51 15.4147 1.7351
15 72 23.08 14.9174 1.9520
16 80 25.64 14.4202 2.1688
17 88 28.21 13.9229 2.3857
18 96 30.77 13.4257 2.6026
19 112 35.9 12.4312 3.0364
20 128 41.03 11.4367 3.4702
21 144 46.15 10.4422 3.9039
22 160 51.28 9.4477 4.3377
23 176 56.41 8.4532 4.7715
24 192 61.54 7.4587 5.2052
25 208 67.95 6.2156 5.6390
26 224 73.08 5.2211 6.0728
27 240 76.92 4.4752 6.5065
28 256 82.05 3.4807 6.9403
29 272 87.18 2.4862 7.3741
30 288 92.31 1.4917 7.8078
31 312 100 0 8.4585

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Table D5.4b Segments and Payload vs. Step Number- one-fourth Rate
Step Segments Percent of Segments Allocated for Main Data Rate (Mbps) ¼ Rate (Mbps)
# Used Enhanced (informative) (informative) (informative)
0 0 0.00 19.3927 0.0000
1 4 1.28 19.1440 0.0542
2 8 2.56 18.8954 0.1084
3 12 3.85 18.6468 0.1627
4 16 5.13 18.3982 0.2169
5 20 6.41 18.1495 0.2711
6 24 7.69 17.9009 0.3253
7 28 8.97 17.6523 0.3795
8 32 10.26 17.4037 0.4338
9 36 11.54 17.1550 0.4880
10 40 12.82 16.9064 0.5422
11 44 14.10 16.6578 0.5964
12 52 16.67 16.1605 0.7049
13 60 19.23 15.6633 0.8133
14 68 21.79 15.1661 0.9218
15 76 24.36 14.6688 1.0302
16 84 26.92 14.1716 1.1386
17 92 29.49 13.6743 1.2471
18 100 32.05 13.1771 1.3555
19 116 37.18 12.1826 1.5724
20 132 42.31 11.1881 1.7893
21 148 47.44 10.1936 2.0062
22 164 52.56 9.1991 2.2231
23 180 57.69 8.2046 2.4400
24 196 62.82 7.2101 2.6568
25 212 67.95 6.2156 2.8737
26 228 73.08 5.2211 3.0906
27 244 78.21 4.2266 3.3075
28 260 83.33 3.2321 3.5244
29 276 88.46 2.2376 3.7413
30 292 93.59 1.2431 3.9581
31 312 100.00 0.0000 4.2292

5.7 Enhanced Mode Map Bits

The signaling of the optional modes shall be done using the following bit assignments:
• The 64 two-level symbols in the data field sync immediately following the VSB mode
bits shall be used to transmit the E8-VSB Enhanced segment locations during an
Enhanced transmission.
• The map data shall indicate one of an allowed selection of possible Enhanced data mixes
and segment arrangements, by means of an algorithm or look-up table. The data shall
include a frame count indicating the next data frame at which the map will change.

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• The map data shall be coded with a Kerdock (64, 12) code.
• The polarity of the Kerdock code word shall be inverted on even (negative PN63) data
fields.
• The twelve-bit payload shall contain the current map or the next map.
• In the odd (positive PN63) field, the leftmost 10 bits shall indicate the current map and
the rightmost 2 bits shall be the high order bits of the frame count.
• In the even (negative PN63) field the leftmost 10 bits shall indicate the next map and the
rightmost 2 bits shall be the low order bits of the frame count.
• Within each frame count bit pair, the higher order bit shall be leftmost.
5.7.1 Map to Frame Count to Frame Association
The map shall change at a maximum frequency of once per 16 data frames.
A data frame shall be defined as an odd (positive PN63) data field followed by an even
(negative PN63) data field.
The frame count shall be decremented linearly from 15 to 0 in the frames preceding a map
change.
Current map data shall point one frame ahead, i.e., to the second frame following a particular
transmission of the current map data.
Next map data shall point 16 frames ahead, i.e. to the 17th frame following a particular
transmission of the current map data.
An unchanging map shall be indicated by making the current map and next map equal and
holding the frame count at 15 (‘1111’).
An example of the sequence of map bits during a change is given in the Table D5.5. In this
example, the map is changed from map A, which has persisted for some time, to map B, which
then persists for some time into the future.

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Table D5.5 Map Change Sequence

Frame Number Frame Count Map Data Map Used
Current Map Next Map
-3 15 A A A
-2 15 A A A
-1 15 A B A
0 15 A B A
1 14 A B A
2 13 A B A
3 12 A B A
4 11 A B A
5 10 A B A
6 9 A B A
7 8 A B A
8 7 A B A
9 6 A B A
10 5 A B A
11 4 A B A
12 3 A B A
13 2 A B A
14 1 A B A
15 0 B B A
16 15 B B B
17 15 B B B
18 15 B B B

5.7.2 Generation of Length of 64 Kerdock Codeword

The generator polynomial for the 64-bit Kerdock code word shall be
25
g ( X ) = ∑ gi X i
i=0

where each gi is an element of the row vector

g = {1 1 1 2 0 1 2 2 0 1 0 3 0 3 1 3 3 0 1 3 2 1 2 2 1 3}
with g0 starting from the left.
The generator matrix shall be the following 6 x 32 matrix,

gα g0 g1 … g25 0 0 0 0 0
gα 0 g0 g1 … g25 0 0 0 0
gen_matrix = gα 0 0 g0 g1 … g25 0 0 0
gα 0 0 0 g0 g1 … g25 00
gα 0 0 0 0 g0 g1 … g25 0
gα 0 0 0 0 0 g0 g1 … g25

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25
where g α =− ∑ gi mod 4 = 1.
i=0

The resulting codeword shall be transmitted leftmost bit first.

5.7.3 Encoding Procedure
The 12 bit word to be encoded must first be transformed to the Z4 domain word word_z4 by
using the following mapping from bit pairs to modulo 4 digits.
‘00’ → 0
‘01’ → 1
‘11’ → 2
‘10’ → 3
After mapping to the Z4 domain the word to be encoded is multiplied by the generator matrix.
codeword_z4 = [word_z4 x gen_matrix]
where word_z4 and codeword_z4 are row vectors.
Arithmetic operations are modulo 4.
The codeword is then converted back to binary using the following mapping.
0 → ‘00’
1 → ‘01’
2 → ‘11’
3 → ‘10’
Example:
Word to be encoded = ‘0 0 0 1 1 1 1 0 0 0 0 1.’
Convert word to Z4 domain.
word_z4 = 0 1 2 3 0 1
Multiply word_z4 by the generator matrix.
codeword_z4 = [word_z4 x gen_matrix]
= 30132300132000213102302230103313
Convert codeword into binary.
codeword = ‘1000011011100000011011000000110110010011100011111000010010100110’

5.8 Enhanced Data Packing Structure

There are two options for distributing the Enhanced packets within the normal packets. Option 1
defines a distribution of the Enhanced packets, in packet number index, which are multiples of 4
segments. Option 2 defines a uniform distribution of the Enhanced packets within the normal
packet frame. Option 1 optimizes carrier to noise ratio performance. Option 2 optimizes
performance in the presence of dynamic multipath.

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The 10th bit of the 12-bit E-VSB map shall decide which packing structure is to be used in the
VSB frame. When the bit is set to ‘0’, the packing shall refer to and be per packing option 1
defined below. When the bit is set to ‘1’, the packing shall refer to and be per packing option 2
defined below.
5.8.1 Placement of Enhanced Mode Packets
Let 2P be the total number of Enhanced packets transmitted in a VSB frame, where 0<=P<= 156.
Let the index s of the Enhanced packets inserted in the normal VSB frame be an interger
between 0 and 311, Inclusive.

Option 1
The set EMAP of E8-VSB segment positions s shall be:

For 0<= P <= 39

EMAP = {s | s = 4i, i = 0,1,…,2P-1}, ( 0 <= s <= 311)

For 40<= P <= 78

EMAP = {s | s = 4i, i = 0,1,…,77} U {s | s = 4i+2, i = 0,1,…,2P-79}

For 79<= P <= 117

EMAP = {s | s = 4i, i = 0,1,…,77}
U {s | s = 4i+2, i = 0,1,…,77}
U {s | s = 4i+1, i = 0,1,…,2P-157}

For 118<= P <= 156 :

EMAP = {s | s = 4i, i = 0,1,…,77}
U {s | s = 4i+2, i = 0,1,…,77}
U {s | s = 4i+1, i = 0,1,…,77}
U {s | s = 4i+3, i = 0,1,…,2P-235}

Where U is the union of sets, and {s | s =…criteria…} is the set of segment positions s that meet
the stated criteria.

Option 2
The index s shall be calculated by the following algorithm written in pseudo-code.

M=round(156/P);

for k=0:2P-1
s=k*M;
if (s>=312)
s=mod(s, 312)+1;
end if
end for

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The function round() means “round up to the next integer value.” The function mod() represents
the operation modulo. For example, in case of P=6, the segment positions are given by s=(0, 26,
52, 78, 104, 130,156 , 182, 208, 234, 260, 286).
5.8.2 Packing of Enhanced Mode Data Within Packets
The Enhanced Reed-Solomon encoding block shall be 184 bytes long, of which 20 bytes are
parity. Refer to Table D5. 2.
For the case of a one-half rate Enhanced code, the Enhanced coder outputs 2 bits for each
input bit, and Enhanced mode data shall be packed as one Enhanced Reed-Solomon block to a
pair of data segments (1 bit per symbol).
For the case of a one-fourth rate Enhanced code, the Enhanced coder outputs 4 bits for each
input bit, and Enhanced mode data shall be packed as one Enhanced Reed-Solomon block for
every 4 data segments (one-half bit per symbol).
The packing of Enhanced mode Reed-Solomon blocks into data segments is shown in Table
D5.6.
Note: All below are shown conceptually pre-interleave; the interleaving process
will disperse the data in the transmitted output).

Table D5.6 Enhanced Data Encapsulation

For ½ Rate Outer Code
tx hdr E8-VSB data Main RS parity
(12 symbols) (736 symbols) (80 symbols)
3 bytes Payload 92 bytes 20 Bytes
tx hdr E8-VSB data E8-VSB RS parity Main RS parity
(12 symbols) (576 symbols) (160 symbols) (80 symbols)
3 bytes Payload 72 bytes 20 bytes 20 bytes
tx hdr E8-VSB data Main RS parity
(12 symbols) (736 symbols) (80 symbols)
3 bytes Payload 92 bytes 20 bytes
tx hdr E8-VSB data E8-VSB RS parity Main RS parity
(12 symbols) (576 symbols) (160 symbols) (80 symbols)
3 bytes Payload 72 bytes 20 bytes 20 bytes
2 bits/symbol 1 bit/symbol 2 bits/symbol
For ¼ Rate Outer Code
tx hdr E8-VSB data Main RS parity
(12 symbols) (736 symbols) (80 symbols)
3 bytes Payload 46 bytes 20 bytes
tx hdr E8-VSB data Main RS parity
(12 symbols) (736 symbols) (80 symbols)
3 bytes Payload 46 bytes 20 bytes
tx hdr E8-VSB data Main RS parity
(12 symbols) (736 symbols) (80 symbols)
3 bytes Payload 46 bytes 20 bytes
tx hdr E8-VSB data E8-VSB RS parity Main RS parity
(12 symbols) (416 symbols) (320 symbols) (80 symbols)
3 bytes Payload 26 bytes 20 bytes 20 bytes
2 bits/symbol 0.5 bit/symbol 2 bits/symbol

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5.8.3 E-8VSB Enhancement Signaling

On odd data fields (positive PN63), the presence of E8VSB shall be signaled by setting symbol
92 to level ‘+5’.

5.9 Modulation

5.9.1 Bit-to-Symbol Mapping

Figure D5.8 shows the mapping of the outputs of the trellis decoder to the nominal signal levels
of (–7, –5, –3, –1, 1, 3, 5, 7). As shown in Figure D5.14, the nominal levels of Data Segment
Sync and Data Field Sync are –5 and +5. The value of 1.25 is added to all these nominal levels
after the bit-to-symbol mapping function for the purpose of creating a small pilot carrier.
5.9.2 Pilot Addition
A small in-phase pilot shall be added to the data signal. The frequency of the pilot shall be the
same as the suppressed-carrier frequency as shown in Figure D5.4. This may be generated in the
following manner. A small (digital) DC level (1.25) shall be added to every symbol (data and
sync) of the digital baseband data plus sync signal (±l, ±3, ±5, ±7). The power of the pilot shall
be 11.3 dB below the average data signal power.
5.9.3 8 VSB Modulation Method
The VSB modulator receives the 10.76 Msymbols/s, 8-level trellis encoded composite data
signal (pilot and sync added). The DTV system performance is based on a linear phase raised
cosine Nyquist filter response in the concatenated transmitter and receiver, as shown in Figure
D5.17. The system filter response is essentially flat across the entire band, except for the
transition regions at each end of the band. Nominally, the roll-off in the transmitter shall have
the response of a linear phase root raised cosine filter.

R = .1152
1.0

.5

0
d d d = .31 MHz d d

5.38 MHz
6 MHz

Figure D5.17 Nominal VSB system channel response (linear phase raised cosine Nyquist filter).

6. TRANSMISSION CHARACTERISTICS FOR HIGH DATA RATE MODE

6.1 Overview
The high data rate mode trades off transmission robustness (28.3 dB signal-to-noise threshold)
for payload data rate (38.57 Mbps). Most parts of the high data rate mode VSB system are

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identical or similar to the terrestrial system. A pilot, Data Segment Sync, and Data Field Sync
are all used to provide enhanced operation. The pilot in the high data rate mode also is 11.3 dB
below the data signal power. The symbol, segment, and field signals and rates are all the same,
allowing either receiver to lock up on the other’s transmitted signal. Also, the data frame
definitions are identical. The primary difference is the number of transmitted levels (8 versus 16)
and the use of trellis coding and NTSC interference rejection filtering in the terrestrial system.
The RF spectrum of the high data rate modem transmitter looks identical to the terrestrial
system, as illustrated in Figure D5.4. Figure D6.1 illustrates a typical data segment, where the
number of data levels is seen to be 16 due to the doubled data rate. Each portion of 828 data
symbols represents 187 data bytes and 20 Reed-Solomon bytes followed by a second group of
187 data bytes and 20 Reed-Solomon bytes (before convolutional interleaving).
Data Data
segment Data + FEC
segment
sync sync
+15
+13
+11
+9
+7
+5
+3
+1
-1
-3
-5
-7
-9
-11
-13
-15

Levels before 4 Symbols 828 Symbols 4 Symbols

pilot addition
(pilot=2.5) Data Segment
832 Symbols

Figure D6.1 16-VSB data segment.

Figure D6.2 shows the block diagram of the transmitter. It is identical to the terrestrial VSB
system except the trellis coding shall be replaced with a mapper that converts data to multi-level
symbols. See Figure D6.3.

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Reed- Data RF
Data Pilot VSB
Randomizer
Solomon Inter- Mapper MUX Insertion Modulator Up-
Encoder leaver Converter

Segment Sync

Field Sync

Figure D6.2 16-VSB transmitter.

Xa Xb Xc Xd O
Byte to 1 1 1 1 +15
Symbol 1 1 1 0 +13
Conversion
1 1 0 1 +11
MSB 1 1 0 0 +9
7 Xa1 Xa
6 Xb1 1 0 1 1 +7
1st Nibble Xb 1 0 1 0 +5
5 Xc1
4 Xd1 1 0 0 1 +3
From 1 0 0 0 +1
3 Xa2 Xc To
Byte 0 1 1 1 -1
Interleaver 2 Xb2 MUX
2nd Nibble 0 1 1 0 -3
1 Xc2 Xd
0 1 0 1 -5
0 Xd2
LSB
0 1 0 0 -7
0 0 1 1 -9
0 0 1 0 -11
0 0 0 1 -13
0 0 0 0 -15

Figure D6.3 16-VSB mapper.

6.2 Channel Error Protection and Synchronization

6.2.1 Data Randomizer

See Section 5.4.1.1.
6.2.2 Reed-Solomon Encoder
See Section 5.4.1.2.
6.2.3 Interleaving
The interleaver shall be a 26 data segment inter-segment convolutional byte interleaver.
Interleaving is provided to a depth of about 1/12 of a data field (2 ms deep). Only data bytes
shall be interleaved.

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6.2.4 Data Segment Sync

See Section 5.5.1.
6.2.5 Data Field Sync
See Section 5.5.2.

6.3 Modulation

6.3.1 Bit-to-Symbol Mapping

Figure D6.3 shows the mapping of the outputs of the interleaver to the nominal signal levels (–
15, –13, –11, ..., 11, 13, 15). As shown in Figure D6.1, the nominal levels of Data Segment Sync
and Data Field Sync are –9 and +9. The value of 2.5 is added to all these nominal levels after the
bit-to-symbol mapping for the purpose of creating a small pilot carrier.
6.3.2 Pilot Addition
A small in-phase pilot shall be added to the data signal. The frequency of the pilot shall be the
same as the suppressed-carrier frequency as shown in Figure D5.4. This may be generated in the
following manner. A small (digital) DC level (2.5) shall be added to every symbol (data and
sync) of the digital baseband data plus sync signal (+l, +3, +5, +7, +9, +11, +13, +15). The
power of the pilot shall be 11.3 dB below the average data signal power.
6.3.3 16 VSB Modulation Method
The modulation method shall be identical to that in Section 5.9.3, except the number of
transmitted levels shall be 16 instead of 8.

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Annex E:
Receiver Characteristics (Informative)
This annex has been withdrawn. Interested readers are referred to:
• ATSC Recommended Practice A/74, “Receiver Performance Guidelines, 18 June 2004.
• ATSC Technology Group Report T3-600, DTV Signal Reception and Processing
Considerations, 18 September 2003.

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Annex F:
Historical Background (Informative)

1. FOREWORD
This annex contains for historical reasons the background section that was originally published
in A/53 on 16 December 1995.

2. HISTORICAL BACKGROUND
The Advanced Television Systems Committee, chaired by James C. McKinney, was formed by
the member organizations of the Joint Committee on InterSociety Coordination (JCIC)12 for the
purpose of exploring the need for and, where appropriate, to coordinate development of the
documentation of Advanced Television Systems. Documentation is understood to include
voluntary technical standards, recommended practices, and engineering guidelines.
Proposed documentation may be developed by the ATSC, by member organizations of the
JCIC, or by existing standards committees. The ATSC was established recognizing that the
prompt, efficient and effective development of a coordinated set of national standards is essential
to the future development of domestic television services.
On June 5, 1992, ATSC provided information to the Federal Communications Commission
(FCC) outlining proposed industry actions to fully document the advanced television system
standard. The FCC has recognized the importance of prompt disclosure of the system technical
specifications to the mass production of advanced television system professional and consumer
equipment in a timely fashion. The FCC has further noted its appreciation of the diligence with
which the ATSC and the other groups participating in the standardization are pursuing these
matters.13
Supporting this activity, the ATSC Executive Committee requested that the T3/S1 Specialist
Group on Macro Systems Approach meet and suggest which portions of an advanced television
system broadcasting standard might require action by the FCC and which portions should be
voluntary.
Subsequently, T3/S1 held meetings and developed recommendations in two areas:
1) Principles upon which documentation of the advanced television system should be
based
2) A list of characteristics of an advanced television system that should be documented
The list tentatively identified the industry group(s) that would provide the documentation
information and the document where the information would likely appear.

12
The JCIC is presently composed of: the Consumer Electronics Association (CEA), the Institute
of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), the National Association of Broadcasters
(NAB), the National Cable Television Association (NCTA), and the Society of Motion
Picture and Television Engineers (SMPTE).
13
FCC 92-438, MM Docket No. 87-268, “Memorandum Opinion and Order/Third Report and
Order/Third Further Notice of Proposed Rule Making,” Adopted: September 17, 1992, pp.
59–60.

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The recommendations developed by the T3/S1 Specialist Group were modified by T3 to

accommodate information and knowledge about advanced television systems developed in the
period since June 1992. Some of the modifications to the recommendations ensued from the
formation of the Grand Alliance. The modified guidelines were approved at the March 31, 1994,
meeting of the T3 Technology Group on Distribution and are described in Section 4.4.

2.1 Advisory Committee on Advanced Television Service (ACATS)

A “Petition for Notice of Inquiry” was filed with the FCC on February 21, 1987, by 58
broadcasting organizations and companies requesting that the Commission initiate a proceeding
to explore the issues arising from the introduction of advanced television technologies and their
possible impact on the television broadcasting service. At that time, it was generally believed
that high-definition television (HDTV) could not be broadcast using 6 MHz terrestrial
broadcasting channels. The broadcasting organizations were concerned that alternative media
would be able to deliver HDTV to the viewing public, placing terrestrial broadcasting at a severe
disadvantage.
The FCC agreed that this was a subject of utmost importance and initiated a proceeding (MM
Docket No. 87-268) to consider the technical and public policy issues of advanced television
systems. The Advisory Committee on Advanced Television Service was empaneled by the
Federal Communications Commission in 1987, with Richard E. Wiley as chairman, to develop
information that would assist the FCC in establishing an advanced television standard for the
United States. The objective given to the Advisory Committee in its Charter by the FCC was:
“The Committee will advise the Federal Communications Commission on the
facts and circumstances regarding advanced television systems for Commission
consideration of technical and public policy issues. In the event that the
Commission decides that adoption of some form of advanced broadcast television
is in the public interest, the Committee would also recommend policies,
standards, and regulations that would facilitate the orderly and timely introduction
of advanced television services in the United States.”
The Advisory Committee established a series of subgroups to study the various issues
concerning services, technical parameters, and testing mechanisms required to establish an
advanced television system standard. The Advisory Committee also established a system
evaluation, test, and analysis process that began with over twenty proposed systems, reducing
them to four final systems for consideration.

2.2 Digital HDTV Grand Alliance (Grand Alliance)

On May 24, 1993, the three groups that had developed the four final digital systems agreed to
produce a single, best-of-the best system to propose as the standard. The three groups (AT&T
and Zenith Electronics Corporation; General Instrument Corporation and the Massachusetts
Institute of Technology; and Philips Consumer Electronics, Thomson Consumer Electronics, and
the David Sarnoff Research Center) have been working together as the “Digital HDTV Grand
Alliance.” The system described in this Standard is based on the Digital HDTV Grand Alliance
proposal to the Advisory Committee.

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2.3 Organization for Documenting the Digital Television Standard

The ATSC Executive Committee assigned the work of documenting the advanced television
system standards to T3 specialist groups, dividing the work into five areas of interest:
• Video, including input signal format and source coding
• Audio, including input signal format and source coding
• Transport, including data multiplex and channel coding
• RF/Transmission, including the modulation subsystem
• Receiver characteristics
A steering committee consisting of the chairs of the five specialist groups, the chair and vice-
chairs of T3, and liaison among the ATSC, the FCC, and ACATS was established to coordinate
the development of the documents. The members of the steering committee and areas of interest
were as follows:
• Stanley Baron T3 chair
• Jules Cohen T3 vice-chair
• Brian James T3 vice-chair
• Larry Pearlstein T3/S6 (video systems characteristics), chair
• Graham S. Stubbs T3/S7 (audio systems characteristics), chair
• Bernard J. Lechner T3/S8 (service multiplex/transport systems characteristics), chair
• Lynn D. Claudy T3/S9 (RF/transmission systems characteristics), chair
• Werner F. Wedam T3/S10 (receiver characteristics), chair
• Robert M. Rast Grand Alliance facilitator
• Robert Hopkins ATSC
• Robert M. Bromery FCC Office of Engineering and Technology
• Gordon Godfrey FCC Mass Media Bureau
• Paul E. Misener ACATS

2.4 Principles for Documenting the Digital Television Standard

T3 adopted the following principles for documenting the advanced television system standard:
1) The Grand Alliance was recognized as the principal supplier of information for
documenting the advanced television system, supported by the ATSC and others. Other
organizations seen as suppliers of information were EIA, FCC, IEEE, MPEG, NCTA,
and SMPTE.
2) The Grand Alliance was encouraged to begin drafting the essential elements of system
details as soon as possible to avoid delays in producing the advanced television system
documentation.
3) FCC requirements for the advanced television system standard were to be obtained as
soon as possible.
4) Complete functional system details (permitting those skilled in the art to construct a
working system) were to be made publicly available.

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5) Protection of any intellectual property made public must be by patent or copyright as

appropriate.
6) The advanced television system documentation shall include the necessary system
information such that audio and video encoders may be manufactured to deliver the
system’s full demonstrated performance quality.
7) The advanced television system documentation shall point to existing standards,
recommended practices, or guideline documents. These documents shall be referenced in
one of two ways as deemed appropriate for the application. In the first instance, a specific
revision shall be specified where review of changes to the referenced document is
required before changes might be incorporated into the advanced television system
document. The second instance references the document without specificity to revision
and allows any changes to the referenced documents to be automatically incorporated.
8) System specifications shall explain how future, compatible improvements may be
achieved.
9) As ongoing improvements take place in the advanced television system, manufacturers of
encoders and decoders should coordinate their efforts to insure compatibility.
10) The advanced television system standard must support backward compatibility of future
improvements with all generations of advanced television system receivers and
inherently support production of low cost receivers (not withstanding that cost reduction
through reduced performance quality may also be used to achieve inexpensive products).
11) The advanced television system standard should not foreclose flexibility in implementing
advanced television system receivers at different price and performance levels.
12) The advanced television system standard should not foreclose flexibility in implementing
program services or in data stream modification or insertion of data packets by down-
stream (local) service providers.
13) The advanced television system documentation shall address interoperability with non-
broadcast delivery systems including cable.
The advanced television system standard shall identify critical system parameters and shall
provide information as to the range of acceptable values, the method of measurement, and the
location in the system where measurement takes place.

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Annex G:
High Efficiency Audio System Characteristics (Normative)

1. SCOPE
This annex describes the robust mode audio system characteristics and normative specifications
of the Digital Television Standard. Audio encoded per this annex may be transmitted over a TS-
E (see Annex C).

2. NORMATIVE REFERENCES
The following documents contain provisions which in whole or part, through reference in this
text, constitute provisions of this standard. At the time of publication, the editions indicated were
valid. All standards are subject to revision and amendment, and parties to agreement based on
this standard are encouraged to investigate the possibility of applying the most recent editions of
the documents listed below.
[G1] ATSC A/52B: “Digital Audio Compression (AC-3, E-AC-3) Standard,” Advanced
Television Systems Committee, Washington, D.C. 14 June 2005.
[G2] AES3-2003, “AES Recommended Practice for digital audio engineering “Serial
transmission format for two-channel linearly represented digital audio data (Revision of
AES3-1992)”
[G3] ANSI S1.4-1983 (R 2001) with Amd.S1.4A-1995, “Specification for Sound Level
Meters.”

3. COMPLIANCE NOTATION
As used in this document, “shall” or “will”, denotes a mandatory provision of the standard.
“Should” denotes a provision that is recommended but not mandatory. “May” denotes a feature
whose presence does not preclude compliance, and that may or may not be present at the option
of the implementer.

4. SYSTEM OVERVIEW
As illustrated in Figure G1, the audio subsystem comprises the audio encoding/decoding
function and resides between the audio inputs/outputs and the transport subsystem. The audio
encoder(s) is (are) responsible for generating the audio elementary stream(s) which are encoded
representations of the baseband audio input signals. At the receiver, the audio subsystem is
responsible for decoding the audio elementary stream(s) back into baseband audio.

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Audio
Elementary Transport VSB RF
Stream(s) Packets Transmission

Audio Audio Transport Transmission

Source Encoder(s) Subsystem Subsystem

Specified
in this
Channel
Annex

Receiver Receiver
Reconstructed Audio
Transport Transmission
Audio Decoder(s)
Subsystem Subsystem

Audio Transport VSB RF

Elementary Packets Reception
Stream

Figure G1 Audio subsystem in the digital television system.

5. SPECIFICATION
This Section forms the normative specification for the robust mode audio system that may be
transmitted as part of TS-E (see Annex C). The robust mode audio compression system
conforms to Annex E of the A/52B Digital Audio Compression (AC-3) Standard, subject to the
constraints outlined in this Section.

5.1 Constraints With Respect to ATSC Standard A/52B Annex E

The robust mode digital television audio coding system shall use the Enhanced AC-3 Digital
Audio Compression Standard specified in Annex E of ATSC Doc. A/52B, and as constrained by
this annex. Audio bit streams encoded per that specification may be included the TS-E that is
delivered by E-VSB. Constraints on the robust mode audio system shall be as shown in Table
G1, which shows permitted values of certain syntactical elements. These constraints are further
described in Sections 5.2–5.4, and Section 6.

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Table G1 Audio Constraints

AC-3 Syntactical Comment Allowed value
Element
fscod Indicates sampling rate ‘00’ (indicates 48 kHz)
frmsize Indicates the size of the audio frame ≤ ’011 1000 0000’ (indicates a frame size ≤ 448 kb/s
for a six block frame)
bstyp Indicates an independent stream (no ‘00’
sub-streams)
acmod Indicates number of channels, ≥ ‘001’
prohibits 1+1 mode
bsmod Restricts audio service types to CM, 0, 2, 3, or 5
VI, HI, C

5.2 Sampling Frequency

The system conveys digital audio sampled at a frequency of 48 kHz that shall be locked to the 27
MHz MPEG-2 system clock. The 48 kHz audio sampling clock is defined as:
48 kHz audio sample rate = (2 ÷1125) × (27 MHz MPEG-2 system clock)
If analog signal inputs are employed, the A/D converters shall sample at 48 kHz locked to the 27
MHz clock. If digital inputs are employed, the input sampling rate shall be 48 kHz locked to the
system clock, or the audio encoder shall contain sampling rate converters which convert the
sampling rate to 48 kHz locked to the system clock.

5.3 Frame Size

The audio frame size shall be less than or equal to 1792 bytes. This implies a bit-rate limitation
of 448 kb/s for AC-3 frames of 1536 samples (32 msec at 48 kHz).

5.4 Audio Coding Modes

Audio services shall be encoded using any of the audio coding modes specified in A/52, with the
exception of the 1+1 mode. The value of acmod in the AC-3 bit stream shall have a value in the
range of 1–7, with the value 0 prohibited.

5.5 Dialogue Level

The value of the dialnorm parameter in the AC-3 elementary bit stream shall indicate the level of
average spoken dialogue within the encoded audio program. Dialogue level may be measured by
means of an “A” weighted integrated measurement (LAeq) [G3]. (Receivers use the value of
dialnorm to adjust the reproduced audio level so as to normalize the dialogue level.) In order to
enable clean switching (i.e., without level shifts) between main and fallback audio services (that
might have a different number of audio channels), linked audio services shall have values of
dialnorm that result in matched dialogue levels when decoded by compliant decoders.

5.6 Dynamic Range Compression - Artistic

Each encoded audio block may contain a dynamic range control word (dynrng) that is used by
decoders (by default) to alter the level of the reproduced audio. The control words allow the
decoded signal level to be increased or decreased by up to 24 dB. In general, elementary streams

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may have dynamic range control words inserted or modified without affecting the encoded
audio. When it is necessary to alter the dynamic range of audio programs that are broadcast, the
dynamic range control word should be used. In order to enable clean switching between main
and fallback audio services (that might have a different number of audio channels), linked audio
services shall have values of dynrng that result in matched audio levels when decoded by
compliant decoders.

5.7 Dynamic Range Compression - Heavy

Each encoded audio frame may contain a dynamic range control word (compr) that may be
optionally used by decoders to render the audio with a very narrow dynamic range. The control
words allow the decoded signal level to be increased or decreased by up to 48 dB. In order to
enable clean switching between main and fallback audio services (that might have a different
number of audio channels), linked audio services shall have values of compr that result in
matched audio levels when decoded by compliant decoders.

6. MAIN AND ASSOCIATED SERVICES

An AC-3 elementary stream contains the encoded representation of a single audio service.
Multiple audio services are provided by multiple elementary streams. Each elementary stream is
conveyed by the transport multiplex with a unique PID. There are a number of audio service
types that may (individually) be coded into each elementary stream. Each AC-3 elementary
stream is tagged as to its service type using the bsmod bit field. There is a complete main service
and there are three types of associated services.
Associated services delivered in a TS-E shall contain complete program mixes containing all
audio program elements (dialog, music, effects, etc.) that are intended to be presented to a
listener. This is indicated by the full_svc bit in the AC-3 descriptor being set to a value of ‘1’ (see
Annex C of this document and A/52B, Annex A).
This section specifies the meaning and use of each type of service.

6.1 Summary of Service Types

The audio service types shall be as listed in Table G2.

Table G2 Audio Service Types

bsmod Type of Service
‘000’ (0) Main audio service: complete main (CM)
‘010’ (2) Associated service: visually impaired (VI)
‘011’ (3) Associated service: hearing impaired (HI)
‘101’ (5) Associated service: commentary (C)

6.2 Complete Main Audio Service (CM)

The CM type of main audio service shall contain a complete audio program (complete with
dialogue, music, and effects). This is the type of audio service normally provided. The CM
service may contain from 1 to 5.1 audio channels. Audio in multiple languages may be provided
by supplying multiple CM services, each in a different language.

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6.3 Visually Impaired (VI)

The VI associated service a complete program mix containing music, effects, dialogue, and
additionally a narration that describes the picture content. The VI service may be coded using
any number of channels (up to 5.1).

6.4 Hearing Impaired (HI)

The HI service is a complete program mix containing music, effects, and dialogue with enhanced
intelligibility. The HI service may be coded using any number of channels (up to 5.1).

6.5 Commentary (C)

The commentary associated service is a complete program mix containing music, effects,
dialogue, and additionally some special commentary. This service may be provided using any
number of channels (up to 5.1).

7. AUDIO ENCODER INTERFACES

See Annex B, Section 7.

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 Doc. PS-661r4
18 April 2006

Amendment No. 1 to ATSC Digital Television

Standard, Doc. A/53, to Revise Annex C and Define
E-VSB Transport

Advanced Television Systems Committee

1750 K Street, N.W.
Suite 1200
Washington, D.C. 20006
www.atsc.org

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The Advanced Television Systems Committee, Inc., is an international, non-profit organization

developing voluntary standards for digital television. The ATSC member organizations represent
the broadcast, broadcast equipment, motion picture, consumer electronics, computer, cable,
satellite, and semiconductor industries.
Specifically, ATSC is working to coordinate television standards among different
communications media focusing on digital television, interactive systems, and broadband
multimedia communications. ATSC is also developing digital television implementation
strategies and presenting educational seminars on the ATSC standards.
ATSC was formed in 1982 by the member organizations of the Joint Committee on
InterSociety Coordination (JCIC): the Electronic Industries Association (EIA), the Institute of
Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE), the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB), the
National Cable Television Association (NCTA), and the Society of Motion Picture and
Television Engineers (SMPTE). Currently, there are approximately 140 members representing
the broadcast, broadcast equipment, motion picture, consumer electronics, computer, cable,
satellite, and semiconductor industries.
ATSC Digital TV Standards include digital high definition television (HDTV), standard
definition television (SDTV), data broadcasting, multichannel surround-sound audio, and
satellite direct-to-home broadcasting.

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Replace Annex C of A/53E with the following:

Annex C:
Service Multiplex and Transport Subsystem Characteristics
(Normative)

1. SCOPE
This Annex constitutes the normative specification for the transport subsystem of the Digital
Television Standard. The syntax and semantics of this specification conform to ISO/IEC 13818-
1 [C3], with additional constraints and conditions specified in this Standard. Within this context,
other ATSC Standards may further constrain and/or supplement the transport subsystem
specification.14

2. NORMATIVE REFERENCES
The following documents contain provisions that in whole or in part, through reference in this
text, constitute provisions of this Standard. At the time of publication, the editions indicated
were valid. For references not including a publication date, the most recent published version
shall apply. All standards are subject to revision and amendment, and parties to agreements
based on this Standard are encouraged to investigate the possibility of applying the most recent
editions of the documents listed below.

2.1 Normative References

[C1] ATSC A/52B: “Digital Audio Compression (AC-3, E-AC-3) Standard,” Advanced
Television Systems Committee, Washington, D.C., 14 June 2005.
[C2] ATSC A/65C: “Program and System Information Protocol for Terrestrial Broadcast and
Cable,” Advanced Television Systems Committee, Washington, D.C., 2 January 2006.
[C3] ISO/IEC IS 13818-1:2000 (E), International Standard, Information technology – Generic
coding of moving pictures and associated audio information: systems.

2.2 Informative References

[C4] ATSC A/90: “Data Broadcast Standard,” Advanced Television Systems Committee,
Washington, D.C., 26 July 2000 (Amendment 1 dated 14 May 2002; Corrigendum 1 and
2 dated 1 April 2002)

3. DEFINITION OF TERMS
PAT-E – A table with the same syntax as Program Association Table as defined by [C3]
transmitted using an enhanced VSB mode defined in Annex D.

14
Note that there is a coordinated effort underway among ATSC, CEA, and SMPTE to revise
and clarify standards related to delivering closed captions, AFD, and bar data so that each
describes the aspects of the system for which they are primarily responsible without overlap.
This effort is expected to result in revisions of those sections in the ATSC Standards.

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PMT-E – A table with the same syntax as Program Map Table as defined by [C3] transmitted
using an enhanced VSB mode defined in Annex D.
PMT-E_PID – A PID that identifies the Transport Stream packets that carry
TS_program_map_section()s in a TS-E.
Program – Program shall mean the collection of all elements within the emission that have the
same program number, independent of the methods used to propagate the program elements.
Linked – Alternative elements of a Program are ‘Linked’ when they have identical values in the
linked_component_tag field of their Enhanced Signaling Descriptors.
TS-M – The portion of TS-R that contains only all Transport Stream packets transmitted by the
main mode (see Annex D) (see Figure C3).
TS-R – The recombined Transport Stream containing all Transport Stream packets delivered by
all transmission modes (main, one-half rate and one-quarter rate) (see Annex D) (see Figure
C3).
TS-E – The portion of TS-R that contains only all Transport Stream packets transmitted by one-
half rate and/or one-quarter rate modes (see Annex D) (see Figure C3).
TS-Ea – The portion of TS-E that contains only all Transport Stream packets transmitted by
one-half rate mode (see Annex D) (see Figure C3).
TS-Eb – The portion of TS-E that contains only all Transport Stream packets transmitted by
one-quarter rate mode (see Annex D) (see Figure C3).

4. COMPLIANCE NOTATION
As used in this document, “shall” denotes a mandatory provision of the standard. “Should”
denotes a provision that is recommended but not mandatory. “May” denotes a feature whose
presence does not preclude compliance that may or may not be present at the option of the
implementer. Note: this compliance notation applies explicitly to this annex.

5. SYSTEM OVERVIEW
The transport format and protocol for the Digital Television Standard is a compatible subset of
the MPEG-2 Systems specification defined in ISO/IEC 13818-1 [C3]. It is based on a fixed-
length packet transport stream approach that has been defined and optimized for digital
television delivery applications.
As illustrated in Figure C1, the transport subsystem resides between the application (e.g.,
audio or video) encoding and decoding functions and the transmission subsystem. The encoder’s
transport subsystem is responsible for formatting the coded elementary streams and multiplexing
the different components of the program for transmission. It also is responsible for delivering
packets intended for transmission using coding methods defined in Annex D. A receiver recovers
the elementary streams for the individual application decoders and for the corresponding error
signaling. The transport subsystem also incorporates other higher protocol layer functionality
related to properly timing the packets to enable receiver synchronization.

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Transmitter

(video, audio, data, etc.)

Sources for encoding

packetization and
multiplexing
Application

Transport
Encoders
* Modu-
* lator
*
* Transport
Stream
elementary
streams, private
sections, or PES

Transmission
Clock

Format
Receiver

depacketization and
demultiplexing
Presentation

Application

Transport
Decoders

Demod-
*
* ulator
* Transport
*
elementary Stream with
streams, private error
sections, or PES signaling
with error
signaling

clock
control
Clock

Figure C1 Sample organization of functionality in a transmitter-receiver

pair for a single program.

One approach to describe the system multiplexing approach is to consider it as a combination

of multiplexing at two different layers. In the first layer, single program transport streams are
formed by multiplexing Transport Stream (TS) packets from one or more Packetized Elementary
Stream (PES) and/or private section (ISO/IEC 13818-1 [C3] Table 2-30) sources. In the second
layer, one or more single program transport streams are combined to form a service multiplex of
programs (also known as a multi-program transport stream in the MPEG-2 Systems standard,
and a Digital Television Standard multiplexed bit stream in this ATSC standard). Program
Specific Information (PSI), carried within Transport Stream packets, relates to the identification
of programs and the components of each program.
Not shown explicitly in Figure C1, but essential to the practical implementation of this
Standard, is a control system that manages the transfer and processing of the elementary streams
from the application encoders. The rules followed by this control system are not a part of this
Standard. The output of the control system implementation shall conform to the MPEG-2
Transport Stream coding as specified in ISO/IEC 13818-1 [C3] with the additional constraints
specified in this Standard.
In specifying the characteristics of the signal processing required of a system based upon this
Standard, the functions to be performed may be described in terms of encoders and multiplexers
at the transmitting end and in terms of a Reference Receiver at the receiving end. A Reference

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Receiver is defined such that it performs the functions described in the way that they are
described herein, which may or may not be the way in which actual receivers, built to this
Standard, are designed to operate. Some mandatory transmission requirements are stated herein
in terms of the resulting transmission stream elements that are required to be produced, through
use of the Reference Receiver functional definition.

6. SPECIFICATION
This section of the Standard describes the coding constraints that apply to the use of the MPEG-
2 systems specification [C3] in the digital television system including mandatory main and
optional enhanced services.

6.1 MPEG-2 Systems Standard

The transport subsystem shall comply with the transport stream definition of the MPEG-2
Systems standard as specified in ISO/IEC 13818-1 [C3] and shall be further constrained as
specified herein. Program shall mean the collection of all elements within the emission that have
the same value of MPEG-2 program_number, independent of the methods used to propagate the
program elements.
6.1.1 Video T-STD
Video streams in TS-R (Figure C3) shall conform to the T-STD as defined in Sections 2.4.2.2
and 2.4.2.3 of ISO/IEC 13818-1 [C3] and shall follow the constraints for the level encoded in the
video elementary stream. When there is a video stream of stream_type 0x02 in TS-R, the T-STD
buffer Bn defined in ISO/IEC 13818-1 [C3], Section 2.4.2 shall apply15 for such a stream.
When a TS-E is present, video streams of stream_type 0x02 may need to be constructed with
constraints on the buffer size of the T-STD as defined in Section 2.4.2 of ISO/IEC 13818-1 [C3]
so that the variable time delay caused by the E-VSB system does not result in a violation of the
requirement that the TS-R conform per the preceding paragraph.
When there is a video stream of stream_type 0x02 in TS-E, the T-STD buffer Bn defined in
ISO/IEC 13818-1 [C3] Section 2.4.2 for the stream in TS-E may underflow when the low_delay
flag in the video sequence header is set to ‘1’ (per ISO/IEC 13818-1 [C3], Section 2.4.2.6).
When the low_delay flag in the video sequence header is set to ‘1’ for this TS-E stream, [C3] at
Section 2.4.2.6 requires that the delay of data through the STD buffer defined by tdn( j) – t(i) is
<= 1 second except for still picture video data where tdn( j) – t(i) is <= 60 sec, for all bytes
contained in access unit j. The terms tdn( j), t(i), and j are those defined in ISO/IEC 13818-1
[C3], Section 2.4.2. Any elementary stream containing Still Picture data shall include a
video_stream_descriptor() in accordance with ISO/IEC 13818-1 [C3] Section 2.6.2 and shall have the
value of the field still_picture_flag set to ‘1’ and the interval between I frames shall not be greater
than 60 seconds.
6.1.2 Audio T-STD
6.1.2.1 Audio T-STD When TS-E is Not Present
The audio T-STD shall comply with Section 3.6 of Annex A of ATSC Standard A/52B [C1].

15
Section 7.2 also constrains video streams of stream_type 0x02 in TS-M.

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6.1.2.2 Audio T-STD When TS-E is Present

Audio streams of stream_type 0x81 in TS-R (Figure C3) shall conform to the T-STD as defined in
Sections 2.4.2 and 2.4.2.3 of ISO/IEC 13818-1 [C3], with the buffer size BSn = 2592 bytes.
Audio streams of stream_type 0x87 (enhanced AC-3) shall conform to the T-STD as defined in
Sections 2.4.2 and 2.4.2.3 of ISO/IEC 13818-1 [C3], with the buffer size BSn = 5184 bytes.
6.1.3 Program Constraints
This section standardizes how to carry Programs16 in the ATSC system. Each Program shall be
constrained to contain certain standardized elementary streams, which are dependent on the
17
service_type associated with that Program and the use of TS-E. Programs may also contain
private elementary streams as defined herein and/or by other ATSC Standards.
6.1.3.1 ATSC Digital Television (service_type 0x02)
For Programs of service_type 0x02, if there is a video program element in the TS-E, the stream_type
for that video program element shall be 0x02 and the video Elementary Stream shall be based on
the same video content18 as a video program Elementary Stream in TS-M. In addition, for any
given Program of service_type 0x02:
• There shall be at most one video program element present in TS-M.
• There shall be at most one video program element present in TS-Ea.
• There shall be at most one video program element present in TS-Eb.
If there is one or more audio program element in the TS-E, the stream_type for each audio
Elementary Stream in TS-E shall be 0x81 or 0x87 and each program element shall be based upon
the same audio source as an audio element of the Program in TS-M.
6.1.3.2 ATSC Audio (service_type 0x03)
For Programs of service_type 0x03 that include audio program elements in both TS-M and TS-E,
the stream_type for each audio Elementary Stream in TS-E shall be 0x81 or 0x87 and each
program element shall be based upon the same audio source as an audio element of the Program
in TS-M.
6.1.3.3 Unassociated/Small Screen Service (service_type 0x06)
An additional type of television service is reserved for use in TS-E called “unassociated/small
screen service,” which shall use service_type 0x06. An unassociated/small screen service carries
programming whose contents are not based on the same schedule of programming as that carried
in TS-M. Programs of service_type 0x06 shall be announced in TS-E and all program elements
shall be carried only in TS-E. Further constraints on program elements for service_type 0x06 are to
be defined at a future date.

16
Program is defined in Section 3.
17
This field is defined in A/65C [C2], Section 6.3.1 and Table 6.7.
18
The video in the TS-E may be a different aspect ratio, frame rate, and/or bitrate than that in
TS-M.

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6.2 Identification of MPEG-2 Private Ranges

ATSC defines code points in the MPEG-2 user private range and may define code points private
to ATSC users within this range.
6.2.1 MPEG-2 Registration Descriptor
Under circumstances as defined below, this Standard uses the MPEG-2 Registration Descriptor
described in Sections 2.6.8 and 2.6.9 of ISO/IEC 13818-1 [C3] to identify the contents of
programs and program elements to decoding equipment. No more than one MPEG-2
Registration Descriptor shall appear in any given descriptor loop.
The presence of an MPEG-2 Registration Descriptor in any descriptor loop shall not affect
the meaning of any other descriptor(s) in the same descriptor loop. The ATSC Private
Information Descriptor (defined in Section 5.7.3.4) shall be the method to carry descriptor-based
information associated with a private entity.
6.2.1.1 Program Identifier
Programs that conform to ATSC standards may be identified by use of an MPEG-2 Registration
Descriptor (as defined in Sections 2.6.8 and 2.6.9 of ISO/IEC 13818-1 [C3]). When present for
this purpose, the MPEG-2 Registration Descriptor shall be placed in the descriptor loop
immediately following the program_info_length field of the TS_program_map_section() describing this
program and the format_identifier field of this MPEG-2 Registration Descriptor shall have a value
0x4741 3934 (“GA94” in ASCII).
6.2.1.2 Audio Elementary Stream Identifier
The presence of audio elementary streams of stream_type 0x81 that conform to ATSC standards
may be indicated by use of an MPEG-2 Registration Descriptor (as defined in Sections 2.6.8 and
2.6.9 of ISO/IEC 13818-1 [C3]). When present for this purpose, the MPEG-2 Registration
Descriptor shall be placed in the descriptor loop immediately following the ES_info_length field in
the TS_program_map_section() for each program element of stream_type 0x81 (AC-3 audio) and the
format_identifier field of the MPEG-2 Registration Descriptor shall have a value 0x4143 2D33
(“AC-3” in ASCII).
6.2.1.3 Other Program Element Identifiers
Any program element carrying content not described by an approved ATSC standard shall be
identified with an MPEG-2 Registration Descriptor (as defined in Sections 2.6.8 and 2.6.9 of
ISO/IEC 13818-1 [C3]). The format_identifier field of the MPEG-2 Registration Descriptor shall be
registered with the SMPTE Registration Authority, LLC19. The descriptor shall be placed in the
descriptor loop immediately following the ES_info_length field in the TS_program_map_section() for
each such non-standard program element.

6.3 Audio Constraints

For each Program of service_type 0x02 delivered in TS-M, if audio is present, at least one audio
component shall be a complete main audio service (CM) as defined in Section 6 of Annex B.

19
The ISO/IEC-designated registration authority for the format_identifier is SMPTE Registration
Authority, LLC. See (http://www.smpte-ra.org/mpegreg.html).

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For each Program of service_type 0x03 delivered in TS-M, at least one audio component shall
be a complete main audio service (CM) as defined in Section 6 of Annex B.
For each Program of service_type 0x02 completely delivered in TS-E, if audio is present, at
least one audio component shall be a complete main audio service (CM) as defined in Section 6
of Annex B.
For each Program of service_type 0x03 completely delivered in TS-E, at least one audio
component shall be a complete main audio service (CM) as defined in Section 6 of Annex B.
Program elements within one Program with the same value of linked_component_tag (defined in
Section 6.8.5) shall be of the same audio type (for example CM, VI, or HI) and shall be one of
the services defined in section 6 of Annex B.

6.4 Constraints on PSI

All Program elements in the Transport Stream shall be described in the PSI.
6.4.1 Constraints on Main Services’ Program Specific Information
There are the following constraints on the PSI information in TS-M:
• Transport Stream packets identified by a particular PMT_PID value shall be constrained to
carry only one program definition, as described by a single TS_program_map_section(). For
terrestrial broadcast applications, these Transport Stream packets shall be further
constrained to carry no other kind of PSI table.
• The Transport Stream shall be constructed such that the time interval between the byte
containing the last bit of the TS_program_map_section() containing television program
information and successive occurrences of the same TS_program_map_section() shall be less
than or equal to 400 milliseconds.
• The program numbers are associated with the corresponding PMT_PIDs in the Program
Association Table (PAT). The Transport Stream shall be constructed such that the time
interval between the byte containing the last bit of the program_association_section() and
successive occurrences of the program_association_section() shall be less than or equal to 100
milliseconds. However, when program_association_section()s, CA_section()s, and
TS_program_map_section()s are approaching their maximum allowed sizes, the potential
exists to exceed the 80,000 bps rate specified in ISO/IEC 13818-1 [C3] Section 2.4.2.3.
In cases where the table section sizes are such that the 100 millisecond repetition rate of
the program_association_section() would cause the 80,000 bps maximum rate to be exceeded,
the time interval between the byte containing the last bit of the program_association_section()
may be increased but in no event shall exceed 140 milliseconds, so that under no
circumstances the limit of 80,000 bps is exceeded.
• When an Elementary Stream of stream_type 0x02 (MPEG-2 video) is present in the
Transport Stream, the data_stream_alignment_descriptor() (described in Section 2.6.10 of
ISO/IEC 13818-1 [C3]) shall be included in the descriptor loop immediately following
the ES_info_length field in the TS_program_map_section() describing that Elementary Stream.
The descriptor_tag value shall be set to 0x06, the descriptor_length value shall be set to 0x01,
and the alignment_type value shall be set to 0x02 (video access unit).

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• Adaptation headers shall not occur in Transport Stream packets identified by a

program_map_PID value for purposes other than for signaling with the discontinuity_indicator
that the version_number (Section 2.4.4.9 of ISO/IEC 13818-1 [C3]) may be discontinuous.
• Adaptation headers shall not occur in Transport Stream packets identified by PID 0x0000
(the PAT PID) for purposes other than for signaling with the discontinuity_indicator that the
version_number (Section 2.4.4.5 of ISO/IEC 13818-1 [C3]) may be discontinuous.
• This Standard does not define a Network Information Table (NIT) as specified in MPEG-
2 Systems. The use of program_number 0x0000 should be avoided as MPEG-2 Systems
reserves this value for the network_PID, which in turn is used to identify the TS packets of
a NIT.
6.4.2 PAT-E
Sections of the PAT-E shall be carried in one or more program_association_section()s within TS-E
packets and shall be identified by the PID 0x1FF7 and shall only reference PMT_PID values for
TS_program_map_section()s present in Transport Stream packets in TS-E. Sections of the PAT-E
shall be present only in the TS-Eb when TS-Eb is present.
6.4.3 PMT-E
Sections of PMT-E shall be carried in TS_program_map_section()s within TS-E packets identified by
the PAT-E and shall only reference PID values for packets that are present in the TS-E. Sections
of PMT-E shall be present only in the TS-Eb when TS-Eb is present.
6.4.4 Multiple PCR_PIDs per Program and a Common Time Base
For every Program that includes program elements in both TS-M and TS-E, there is a
TS_program_map_section() carried in TS-M and a TS_program_map_section() carried in TS-E with a
common value of program_number. For such a Program, each of the PCRs referenced by the
PCR_PID fields in the two TS_program_map_section()s shall be samples from a common time clock.
Note that a PCR_PID value of 0x1FFF has the same meaning as in ISO/IEC13818-1 [C3]
Section 2.4.4.9.
6.4.5 Constraints on Optional Enhanced Services’ Program Specific Information
There are the following constraints on the PSI information in TS-E:
• Only one Program shall be described in a transport bit stream for TS_program_map_section()s
carried in packets with a particular PMT-E_PID value. Transport stream packets containing
a TS_program_map_section() and identified with a particular PID value shall not be used to
transmit any other kind of PSI table (identified by a different table_id).
• TS-E should be constructed such that the time interval between the byte containing the
last bit of the TS_program_map_section() containing television program information and
successive occurrences of the same TS_program_map_section() should be less than or equal
to 1600 milliseconds.
• The program numbers referenced in the PAT-E shall be associated with the
corresponding PMT-E_PIDs in the collection of program_association_section()s, which are
sections of the PAT-E. The sections that make up the PAT-E shall be carried in packets
identified with the PID 0x1FF7. The TS-E should be constructed such that the time
interval between the byte containing the last bit of the program_association_section() and

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successive occurrences of the program_association_section() should be less than or equal to

800 milliseconds.
• When the video elementary stream_type is equal to 0x02 the descriptor loop immediately
following ES_info_length in the TS_program_map_section() shall contain the
data_stream_alignment_descriptor() described in Section 2.6.10 of ISO/IEC 13818-1[C3] and
the alignment_type field shown in Table 2-47 of ISO/IEC 13818-1 shall be 0x02.
• Adaptation headers shall not occur in Transport Stream packets of the PMT-E_PID for
purposes other than for signaling with the discontinuity_indicator that the version_number
(Section 2.4.4.5 of ISO/IEC 13818-1) may be discontinuous.

6.5 PES Constraints

Packetized Elementary Stream syntax and semantics shall be used to encapsulate the audio and
video elementary stream information. The Packetized Elementary Stream syntax is used to
convey the Presentation Time-Stamp (PTS) and Decoding Time-Stamp (DTS) information
required for decoding audio and video information with synchronism. This section describes the
coding constraints on this MPEG-2 Systems layer.
Within the PES packet header, the following restrictions shall apply:
• PES_scrambling_control shall be coded as ‘00’.
• ESCR_flag shall be coded as ‘0’.
• ES_rate_flag shall be coded as ‘0’.
• PES_CRC_flag shall be coded as ‘0’.
Within the PES packet extension, the following restrictions shall apply.
• PES_private_data_flag shall be coded as ‘0’.
• pack_header_field_flag shall be coded as ‘0’.
• program_packet_sequence_counter_flag shall be coded as ‘0’.
• P-STD_buffer_flag shall be coded as ‘0’.
6.5.1 MPEG-2 Video PES Constraints (for streams of stream_type 0x02)
Each PES packet shall begin with a video access unit, as defined in Section 2.1.1 of ISO/IEC
13818-1 [C3], which shall be aligned with the PES packet header. The first byte of a PES packet
payload shall be the first byte of a video access unit. Each PES header shall contain a PTS.
Additionally, it shall contain a DTS as appropriate. For terrestrial broadcast, the PES packet shall
not contain more than one coded video frame, and shall be void of video picture data only when
transmitted in conjunction with the discontinuity_indicator to signal that the continuity_counter may be
discontinuous.
Within the PES packet header, the following restrictions apply:
• The PES_packet_length shall be coded as ‘0x0000’
• data_alignment_indicator shall be coded as ‘1’
6.5.2 AC-3 Audio PES Constraints (for Streams of stream_type 0x81)
The AC-3 audio decoder may be capable of simultaneously decoding more than one elementary
stream containing different program elements, and then combining the program elements into a
complete program. In this case, the audio decoder may sequentially decode audio frames (or

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audio blocks) from each elementary stream and do the combining (mixing together) on a frame
or (block) basis. In order to have the audio from the two elementary streams reproduced in exact
sample synchronism, it is necessary for the original audio elementary stream encoders to have
encoded the two audio program elements frame synchronously; i.e., if audio program 1 has
sample 0 of frame n at time t0, then audio program 2 should also have frame n beginning with its
sample 0 at the identical time t0. If the encoding is done frame synchronously, then matching
audio frames should have identical values of PTS.
If PES packets from two AC-3 audio services that are to be decoded simultaneously contain
identical values of PTS then the corresponding encoded audio frames contained in the PES
packets should be presented to the audio decoder for simultaneous synchronous decoding. If the
PTS values do not match (indicating that the audio encoding was not frame synchronous) then the
audio frames that are closest in time may be presented to the audio decoder for simultaneous
decoding. In this case, the two services may be reproduced out of sync by as much as one-half of
a frame time (which is often satisfactory; e.g., a voice-over does not require precise timing).
The value of stream_id for AC-3 shall be ‘1011 1101’ (private_stream_1).
6.5.3 Audio PES Constraints for Enhanced AC-3 (stream_type = 0x87)
The value of stream_id for enhanced AC-3 shall be ‘1011 1101’ (private_stream_1).
If an audio service is delivered in TS-E, and is Linked to an audio service delivered in TS-M,
constraints are required on the content of the corresponding audio access units, and on the PTS
values in the corresponding PES packets, of the two Linked audio services in order to enable a
receiver to perform sample time synchronous switching between the two audio services (e.g.,
fallback audio).
The constraints are:
1) That the audio access units of AC-3 in TS-M, and the corresponding audio access
units of enhanced AC-3 in TS-E shall be constructed from sets of input audio samples
that are time synchronous; and
2) That the presentation times corresponding to the corresponding audio access units
shall be identical.
Note that not every audio access unit has an explicit value of PTS in a PES because there is
only one PTS per PES while there can be multiple audio access units per PES. However, there is
a unique presentation time for each audio access unit, and it is the presentation times that must
be identical to enable a receiver to switch between the two audio streams with exact sample
synchronism.

6.6 Services and Features

6.6.1 System Information and Program Guide

Transport Streams shall include system information and program guide data formatted according
to the structure and syntax described in ATSC Standard A/65C “Program and System
Information Protocol for Terrestrial Broadcast and Cable” [C2]. System information and
program guide data shall be conveyed in Transport Stream packets of PID 0x1FFB, which shall
be reserved exclusively for this purpose. System information provides data necessary for
navigation among digital service offerings. The program guide database allows a receiver to
build an on-screen grid of program information for the various services that may be available.

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6.6.1.1 SI base_PID for TS-M

System information and program guide data shall be conveyed in Transport Stream packets of
PID 0x1FFB, which shall be reserved exclusively within TS-R (Figure C3) for this purpose.
6.6.1.2 SI base_PID for TS-E
System information and program guide data shall be conveyed in TS-E packets of PID 0x1FF9,
which shall be reserved exclusively within TS-R (Figure C3) for this purpose.
6.6.1.3 System Information and Program Guide STD Model
The STD model for program guide and system information is specified in ATSC Standard
A/65C [C2].
6.6.2 Specification of ATSC Private Data
Within the ATSC set of standards, private data may be transported by various means:
1) Data services – Carriage of ATSC data services including system information shall be as
documented in applicable ATSC Standards. See for example the ATSC A/90 Data
Broadcast Standard [C4].
2) Private program elements – The stream_type codes in the range 0xC4 to 0xFF shall be
available for stream types defined privately (not described by ATSC Standards). Such
privately-defined program elements are associated with an MPEG-2 Registration
Descriptor (see Section 6.2.1.3).
3) Adaptation fields – Private data may be transmitted within the adaptation field of
Transport Stream packets (Sections 2.4.3.4 and 2.4.3.5 of ISO/IEC 13818-1 [C3]).
Program elements that include private data in the adaptation fields of their Transport
Stream packets shall be associated with an MPEG-2 Registration Descriptor (see Section
6.2.1.3).

6.7 Assignment of Identifiers

In this section, those identifiers and codes that shall have a fixed value are summarized. These
include PES Stream IDs and Descriptors. Stream_type codes for program element types managed
by the ATSC Code Points Registrar (currently assigned or available for future assignment) shall
be in the range 0x80 to 0xC3. Stream_type code 0x81 has already been assigned within the Digital
Television Standard (see Section 6.7.1). Those descriptor_tag codes managed by the ATSC Code
Points Registrar (currently assigned or available for future assignment) shall be in the range
0x40 to 0xEF.
6.7.1 AC-3 Audio Stream Type
The stream_type value for AC-3 audio program elements shall be 0x81.
6.7.2 MPEG-2 Video Stream Type
The stream_type value for MPEG-2 video program elements shall be as defined in ISO/IEC
13818-1 [C3] which value is 0x02.
6.7.3 Enhanced AC-3 Audio Stream Type
The stream_type value for the enhanced AC-3 audio program element defined in A/52B [C1]
Annex E shall be 0x87.

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6.8 Descriptors
Unless explicitly stated to the contrary for a given descriptor, no more than one descriptor with a
given value of descriptor_tag shall appear in any descriptor loop.
6.8.1 AC-3 Audio Descriptor
When an Elementary Stream of stream_type 0x81 (AC-3 audio) or stream_type 0x87 (E-AC-3) is
present in the digital television Transport Stream, an AC-3 Audio Descriptor (AC-
3_audio_stream_descriptor()) shall be included in the descriptor loop immediately following the
ES_info_length field in the TS_program_map_section() describing that Elementary Stream. The syntax
shall be as given in Table A2 of Annex A of ATSC Standard A/52B [C1]. The following
constraints shall apply to the AC-3 Audio Descriptor:
1) The value of the descriptor_tag shall be 0x81.
2) The 6-bit field for Bit Rate Code shall have a value in the range ‘000000’ through
‘001111’ or ‘100000’ through ‘101111’; i.e., signaling a bit rate less than or equal to 448
kbps.
3) The num_channels field shall have a value in the range 1 to 13.
4) The langcod field is a reserved field. Audio language shall be indicated using an ISO-639
Language Descriptor (see Section 6.8.3).
5) The descriptor shall identify the type of the audio service in the bsmod field, which shall
be the same as the bsmod field in the elementary stream associated with this descriptor.
6) The descriptor may optionally carry a 3-byte language code that is represented per ISO-
639. If this language code is present in the AC-3_audio_stream_descriptor(), it shall match the
language code carried in the ISO_639_language_descriptor(), if present.
Effective 1 March 2008, audio language shall be indicated by including the optional ISO-639
Language bytes within the AC-3_audio_stream_descriptor(), at which point the use of the ISO-639
Language Descriptor to indicate language shall be optional, but recommended to support legacy
devices requiring the ISO-639_language_descriptor().
Informative note: Receiving devices are expected to use the bsmod (bit stream
mode) field in the AC-3_audio_stream_descriptor() to determine the type of each AC-3
or E-AC-3 audio stream rather than the audio_type field in the
ISO_639_language_descriptor().

6.8.2 Program Smoothing Buffer Descriptor

The TS_program_map_section() of each program shall contain a smoothing buffer descriptor
pertaining to that program in accordance with Section 2.6.30 of ISO/IEC 13818-1. During the
continuous existence of a program, the value of the elements of the smoothing buffer descriptor
shall not change.
The fields of the smoothing buffer descriptor shall meet the following constraints:
• The field sb_leak_rate shall be allowed to range up to the maximum transport rates
specified in Section 7.2.
• The field sb_size shall have a value less than or equal to 2048. The size of the smoothing
buffer is thus ≤ 2048 bytes.

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6.8.3 ISO-639 Language Descriptor

In the ATSC Digital Television System, the ISO_639_language_descriptor() defined in ISO/IEC
13818-1 [C3] Section 2.6.18 shall be used to indicate the language of AC-3 audio (stream_type
0x81) or enhanced AC-3 (stream_type 0x87) Elementary Stream components.
Effective 1 March 2008, audio language, when indicated, shall be indicated by including the
ISO-639 Language bytes within the AC-3_audio_stream_descriptor(), at which point the use of the
ISO-639 Language Descriptor to indicate language shall be optional, but recommended to
support legacy devices requiring the ISO-639_language_descriptor().
When used, the ISO_639_language_descriptor() shall be included in the descriptor loop
immediately following the ES_info_length field in the TS_program_map_section() for each Elementary
Stream of stream_type 0x81 (AC-3 audio) or 0x87 (enhanced AC-3 audio) or when the number of
AC-3 or enhanced AC-3 audio Elementary Streams in the TS_program_map_section() having the
same value of bit stream mode (bsmod in the AC-3 Audio Descriptor) is two or more.
Informative note: As an example, consider an MPEG-2 program that includes two
AC-3 audio ES components: a AC-3 Complete Main (CM) audio track (bsmod =
0) and a Visually Impaired (VI) audio track (bsmod = 2). Inclusion of the
ISO_639_language_descriptor() is optional for this program. If a second CM track
were to be added, however, it would then be necessary to include
ISO_639_language_descriptor()s in the TS_program_map_section().

The audio_type field in any ISO_639_language_descriptor() used in this Standard shall be set to
0x00 (meaning “undefined”).
An ISO_639_language_descriptor() may be present in the TS_program_map_section() in other
positions as well, for example to indicate the language or languages of a textual data service
program element.
6.8.4 ATSC Private Information Descriptor
The ATSC_private_information_descriptor() provides a method to carry and unambiguously label
private information. More than one ATSC_private_information_descriptor() may appear within a single
descriptor loop. Table C1 defines the bit-stream syntax of the ATSC_private_information_descriptor().

Table C1 ATSC Private Information Descriptor

Syntax No. of Bits Format
ATSC_private_information_descriptor() {
descriptor_tag 8 0xAD
descriptor_length 8 uimsbf
format_identifier 32 uimsbf
for (i = 0; i < N; i++) {
private_data_byte 8 bslbf
}
}

descriptor_tag – This 8-bit field is set to 0xAD.

descriptor_length – This 8-bit field specifies the number of bytes of the descriptor immediately
following the descriptor_length field.

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format_identifier – The format_identifier is a 32-bit field as defined in ISO/IEC 13818-1 [C3], Section
2.6.9 for the registration_descriptor(). Only format_identifier values registered and recognized by the
SMPTE Registration Authority, LLC shall be used (see http://www.smpte-
ra.org/mpegreg.html)20. Its use in this descriptor shall scope and identify only the private
information contained within this descriptor.
private_data_byte – The syntax and semantics of this field is defined by the assignee of the
format_identifier value.

6.8.5 Enhanced Signaling Descriptor

The Enhanced Signaling Descriptor identifies the method of terrestrial broadcast transmission
(main, one-half -rate, one-quarter rate)21 of a program element, and when a program element is
an alternative to another program element, is Linked to the alternative and indicates the
broadcaster’s preference. For example, an Enhanced Signaling Descriptor may indicate that
although an audio stream is the same language and content as another, it is preferred for some
reason.
The Enhanced Signaling Descriptor may be included in either descriptor loop in the
TS_program_map_section() structure.
When the Enhanced Signaling Descriptor is only in the descriptor loop in the
TS_program_map_section() just following the program_info_length field, the linkage_preference field shall
have the value ‘00’. In this case the Enhanced Signaling Descriptor shall indicate the
transmission method (tx_method) for every program element described in the
TS_program_map_section() that does not have a separate instance of the Enhanced Signaling
Descriptor included in the descriptor loop immediately following the ES_info_length field (see
precedence rule below).
The Enhanced Signaling Descriptor shall be present for each program element that is Linked
(linkage_preference not equal to ‘00’) to another program element. Therefore the Enhanced
Signaling Descriptor appears in TS_program_map_section()s in the TS-M, TS-Ea and TS-Eb to
establish linkage.
When the Enhanced Signaling Descriptor is in the descriptor loop immediately following the
ES_info_length field in the TS_program_map_section() then:
• No more than one alternative program element shall be referenced for any given program
element.
• If the program element has the linkage_preference value of ‘00,’ then the program element is
not Linked.
• If the program element has the linkage_preference value of ‘01,’ then the Linked alternative
program element shall have the linkage_preference value of ‘01’ and the two shall have
identical values for program_number and shall have identical values for linked_component_tag.
• If the program element has the linkage_preference value of ‘10,’ then the Linked alternative
program element shall have the linkage_preference value of ‘11’ and the two shall have
identical values for program_number and shall have identical values for linked_component_tag.

20
SMPTE Registration Authority, LLC, 595 West Hartsdale Avenue, White Plains, NY 10607
USA
21
See Annex D for definitions.

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• If the program element has the linkage_preference value of ‘11,’ then the Linked alternative
program element shall have the linkage_preference value of ‘10’ and the two shall have
identical values for program_number and shall have identical values for linked_component_tag.
If the Enhanced Signaling Descriptor is in both descriptor loops, the Enhanced Signaling
Descriptor in the descriptor loop immediately following the ES_info_length field shall take
precedence for the particular program element described therein.
An Enhanced Signaling Descriptor shall be present for each program element transmitted
using one-half rate or one-quarter rate coding in either descriptor loop in the
TS_program_map_section(), or both descriptor loops in the TS_program_map_section(), subject to the
above precedence rule. The bit stream syntax for the Enhanced Signaling Descriptor is shown in
Table C2.

Table C2 Bit Stream Syntax for the Enhanced Signaling Descriptor22

Syntax No. of Bits Format
enhanced_signaling_descriptor () {
descriptor_tag 8 0xB2
descriptor_length 8 uimsbf
linkage_preference 2 uimsbf
tx_method 2 uimsbf
if (linkage_preference != ‘00’)
linked_component_tag 4 uimsbf
else
reserved 4 ‘1111’
}

descriptor_tag – This 8-bit unsigned integer shall have the value 0xB2, identifying this descriptor
as an enhanced_signaling_descriptor.
descriptor_length – This 8-bit unsigned integer that shall indicate the length (in bytes)
immediately following this field up to the end of this descriptor.
linkage_preference – This 2-bit bit field indicates whether or not the associated program element is
Linked to another program element in the transmission. If so, it identifies the broadcaster’s
preference for the program element associated with this descriptor. The linkage_preference field
shall be coded as defined in Table C3.
reserved – This 4 bit field shall contain all ‘1’s.

22
This descriptor may be extended in the future to provide additional capability by adding a byte
loop after the last defined byte. Proposals to do so are expected to be considered in the
future.

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Table C3 Linkage Preference Values

linkage_preference Meaning
‘00’ not_linked – This element is not Linked to any other program element in the transmission
‘01’ linked_no_preference – There is no preference between Linked program elements
‘10’ linked_preferred –This program element is preferred over the Linked program element
‘11’ linked_not_preferred – The Linked program element is preferred over this program element

tx_method – This 2-bit field shall identify the VSB transmission method used to transmit the
associated program element.

Table C4 Transmission Method Values

tx_method Meaning
‘00’ main – This program element transmitted using main coding
‘01’ half_rate – This program element transmitted using rate-one-half enhanced coding
‘10’ quarter_rate – This program element transmitted using rate-one-quarter enhanced coding
‘11’ Reserved for signaling future transmission methods

linked_component_tag – A 4-bit unsigned integer that links the associated program element to an
equivalent, preferred, or less preferred alternative. The Linked program element is the
program element labeled with the same value of linked_component_tag in a
TS_program_map_section labeled with an equivalent value of program_number as the
TS_program_map_section that carries this descriptor. If the program element has the
linkage_preference value equal to ‘00’, then the program element is not Linked and the
linked_component_tag value shall be reserved. See Table C2.

6.9 PID Value Assignments

In order to avoid collisions with fixed PID values and ranges already established in this and
other international standards, transport_packet() PID field values are restricted as follows:
• TS packets identified with PID values in the range 0x1FF0 – 0x1FFE shall only be used
to transport data compliant with ATSC-recognized standards specifying fixed-value PID
assignments in that range. (Informative note: One such use is A/65, which requires the
use of 0x1FFB to identify packets containing certain tables defined in that Standard.)
• In order to avoid collisions with fixed PID values and ranges already established in this
and other international standards, PID values used to identify Transport Stream packets
carrying TS_program_map_section() or program elements shall not be set below 0x0030.
(Informative note: One such use is in ETS 300 468, which requires the use of 0x0011 to
identify packets containing certain tables defined in that Standard.)

6.10 Extensions to the MPEG-2 Systems Specification

This Section covers extensions to the MPEG-2 Systems specification.
6.10.1 Scrambling Control
The scrambling control field within the packet header allows all states to exist in the digital
television system as defined in Table C5.

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Table C5 Transport Scrambling Control Field

transport_scrambling_ Function
control
‘00’ packet payload not scrambled
‘01’ not scrambled, state may be used as a flag for private use defined by the service provider.
‘10’ packet payload scrambled with “even” key
‘11’ packet payload scrambled with “odd” key

Elementary Streams for which the transport_scrambling_control field does not exclusively have
the value of ‘00’ for the duration of the program must carry a CA_descriptor in accordance with
Section 2.6.16 of ISO/IEC 13818-1 [C3].
The implementation of a digital television delivery system that employs conditional access
will require the specification of additional data streams and system constraints.

7. FEATURES OF 13818-1 NOT SUPPORTED BY THIS STANDARD

The transport definition is based on the MPEG-2 Systems standard, ISO/IEC 13818-1; however,
it does not implement all parts of the standard. This section describes those elements that are
omitted from or constrained by this Standard.

7.1 Program Streams

This Annex does not include those portions of ISO/IEC 13818-1[C3] and Annex A of ATSC
Standard A/52B that pertain exclusively to Program Stream specifications.

7.2 Still Pictures

This Annex does not include those portions of ISO/IEC 13818-1 Transport Stream specification
that pertain to the Still Picture model for the main service (TS-M).

8. TRANSPORT SUBSYSTEM INTERFACES AND BIT RATES

8.1 Transport Subsystem Input Characteristics

The MPEG-2 Systems standard defines system coding at two hierarchical layers: The packetized
elementary stream (PES) and the systems stream, either in Transport Stream or Program Stream
format (the ATSC only uses the Transport Stream format). Under this standard and by common
industry usage, private_section encapsulated data is a parallel layer to PES. Physical
implementations may include the PES packetizer within a video, audio, or other data encoder;
and a private_section encapsulator within a data encoder; and not as part of the transport subsystem.
Therefore, the inputs to the transport subsystem may be elementary streams, PES packets, or
private_section encapsulated data.

8.2 Transport Subsystem Output Characteristics

Conceptually, the output from the transport subsystem is a continuous MPEG-2 Transport
Stream as defined in this Annex at a constant rate of Tr Mbps when transmitted in an 8 VSB
system and 2Tr when transmitted in a 16 VSB system where

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⎛ 188 ⎞ ⎛ 312 ⎞ ⎛ 684 ⎞

Tr = 2 × ⎜ ⎟⎜ ⎟⎜ ⎟ × 4.5 = 19.39... Mbps
⎝ 208 ⎠ ⎝ 313 ⎠ ⎝ 286 ⎠
The symbol rate Sr in Msymbols per second for the transmission subsystem (see Section 5 of
Annex D) is
⎛ 684 ⎞
Sr = ⎜ ⎟ × 4.5 = 10.76... Msymbols per second
⎝ 286 ⎠
Tr and Sr shall be locked to each other in frequency.
All Transport Streams conforming to this Standard shall conform to the ISO/IEC 13818-1
[C3] T-STD (Transport System Target Decoder) model.

9. PACKET DELIVERY TO THE E-VSB AND VSB MODULATION SYSTEM

This section describes a reference model for interfacing with the enhanced transmission system
model as described in Annex D and a receiver reference model. These models are used in
specifying system constraints and requirements.

9.1 Head End Reference Model

The E-VSB exciter defined in Annex D can accept three separate Input Streams (IS), one each
for Transport Stream packets destined to be sent via each of the one-half rate (IS-Ea), one-
quarter rate (IS-Eb) and main rate (IS-N) modes. As evinced by Annex D, only one of the three
inputs has a Transport Stream packet at any one time.

IS-Ea IS-Ea’
Rate ½ Fixed
Rate ½ ½ Input
Delay Buffer
EVSB Exciter
Model
MPEG-2 IS-E IS-Eb (Annex D)
IS To be an IS-Eb’
Data Transport To be at Rate ¼ Fixed
Enhanced Rate ¼ ¼ Input
Sources Stream what Rate? Delay Buffer
Packet? Yes
Multiplexer

IS-N Normal Mode IS-N’ Normal

No Fixed Delay Input
Buffer

Figure C2 Head end reference model.

The above Head End Reference Model (Figure C2) models the data flow for Transport
Stream packets from the final MPEG-2 multiplexer through logic and buffers and into the three
exciter inputs (Annex D).
The decisions about whether a packet is enhanced or not, and, if enhanced, which of one-
quarter-rate or one-half-rate is to be used (as shown by diamond boxes in Figure C2), are made

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based on the PID value in each Transport Stream Packet. Special rules for certain streams (like
PSIP-E data) may apply (see A/65C).
The three fixed delay buffers shown in Figure C2 are utilized to effect a delay on each stream
(IS-Ea, IS-Eb, IS-N) to compensate for the fixed variance of delivery time due to the additional
interleaving and error correction applied to streams in IS-E. The magnitude of the delay on each
stream (IS-Ea, IS-Eb, IS-N) that must be applied to the various streams varies by which MAP is
being utilized.
The stream labeled “IS” in Figure C2 may be a MPEG-2 Transport Stream, but need not be.
A Transport Stream has constraints and requirements on it as to timing that need not be met at
IS, but shall be met at TS-R in the Receiver Reference Model. It is, however, at least “similar” to
a MPEG-2 Transport Stream.

9.2 Receiver Reference Model

The modeled Reference Receiver (as shown in Figure C3) has zero processing time, has a packet
selector and has additional de-interleaving for the enhanced data.

TS-E Packet TS-Ea

Reassembly Select next
Rate ½ Buffer available TS -Ea
MPEG-2
or TS-Eb Packet
conformant
Rate? transport
TS-E
stream
Enhanced Data
Deinterleaver & Rate ¼ TS-E Packet
Additional Reassembly TS-R Transport
Processing Buffer TS-Eb Demux
Null
Yes

Off-Air VSB Enhanced

Signal Demodulator Packet? Select next
available TS, TS-E
No TS-M or Null Packet

Emits 188-byte
packet
immediately when
available

Figure C3 Reference receiver model.

The modeled Reference Receiver (as shown in Figure C3) has two 188-byte buffers that are
filled by rate-one-quarter and rate-one-half data as they are recovered from the rate-one-quarter
and rate-one-half E-VSB segments, respectively. The streams TS-Ea and TS-Eb contain the
series of bytes from the respective TS-E reassembly buffers for each packet after it is assembled.
At any time a buffer has an entire Transport Stream packet available for output (188 bytes), that
buffer is selected by the switches and output immediately. The Reference Receiver does not
reorder packets identified with a particular PID.
Note that due to the transmission system and the instantaneously modeled Reference
Receiver behavior, it is not possible for more than one data source (TS-Ea, TS-Eb, or TS-M) to
be emitting data at the same time. However, as it is possible for no data to be available at a given

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packet time, the Reference Receiver selects a Null packet for insertion, so that the output is at a
constant packet rate23 to deliver 19.39… Mbps.
The emitted E-VSB stream shall be ordered and coded such that when processed by the
Reference Receiver, the output from the switch (TS-R) shall be an MPEG-2 Transport Stream
compliant with Sections 1 through 7 of this annex. The PCRs shall be adjusted as described in
Section 9.4.
TS-E is the portion of the E-VSB transmission that results in TS-E in the Reference Receiver
of Figure C3.

9.3 Stream Delays

Some streams shall be delayed relative to other streams by a number of segment times to
compensate for the additional processing of enhanced-mode streams. The actual values needed
are dependent on the particular mix of the enhanced and main rates defined in Annex D Section
5.6. Note that buffers of the below sizes are sufficient to accomplish this delay:
• One-half rate stream: 128 kB
• One-quarter rate stream: 128 kB
• Main stream: 3 MB
This delay compensates for the E-VSB interleaver delay and 164/188 byte packing delay.

9.4 PCR Correction

As the main, one-half rate, and one-quarter rate Transport Stream packet streams are combined
for transmission, the order that the Transport Stream packets are received by the Reference
Receiver from each of the Transport Stream packet streams will be different from original
generation (and therefore they arrive at different times relative to one another). The time
difference is dependent on the packet cadence resulting from a particular rate selection per Table
D5.3 in Annex D. Any Transport Stream packets that are received by the Reference Receiver in
an order different from original generation and that carry PCRs require adjustment due to this
time displacement and the packet placement within each data frame.
The PCRs of all packets shall be adjusted by the emission system to compensate for the
variations in the packet delivery time as compared to the time multiplexed. The adjustment is
based on the timing of a virtual model stream containing the combined packets of all three
streams after recovery in the receiver. (Note that when no E-VSB stream is present, PCR
correction for absolute packet timing occurs prior to the exciter.) This virtual stream represents
the order in which the packets are provided to a reference decoder. The virtual stream is modeled
as making each one-quarter rate and/or one-half rate 188-byte TS packet (recovered from 2 or 3
enhanced packets) available with no processing delay. The Reference Receiver has instantaneous
processing.
The PCRs shall be adjusted by the transmission subsystem such that when processed by the
Reference Receiver, the output from the switch (TS-R) has PCRs compliant with ISO13818-1
[C3].

23
This models a system that produces a constant rate packet stream output, however this may not
be necessary in a real receiver.

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9.5 Packet Ordering

Within each packet stream that is identified with a particular PID, the packets identified by that
PID shall not be reordered by the transmission subsystem.

9.6 Main Stream Packet Jitter Handling (Informative)

The packet timing issues described in this section are solely related to the data packing structure
(at the packet level).
The Transport Stream system target decoder buffer model described in ISO/IEC 13818-1
[C3] §2.4.2 has two different buffers of differing sizes and speeds (three for video). The first
order buffer, TBn, is the smallest and fastest. Care should be taken during the multiplexing
process to ensure meeting the requirements that TBn and T-STD not be violated for any stream
at TS-R.
Adding E-VSB packets to the mix will cause each main stream Transport Stream packet to
incur delay with respect to their original packet timing. The amount of delay for each main
stream Transport Stream packet varies as a function of the MAP number and position in the
frame (indeed, this is true for one-half rate and one-quarter rate Transport Stream packets as
well). As the ratio of E-VSB to main increases, the maximum delay that may be imposed on
main stream packets generally increases due to the increasing limitation on the available packet
position in the VSB frame. At the physical layer, the main stream packets tend to get bunched
together near the bottom of the data frame.
The E-VSB emissions system induces additional variable delay (jitter) to Transport Stream
packets. This delay is knowable in real-time, with sufficient integration between the MPEG
encoding/multiplexing system and the emission system.
Absent such integration, it may be possible to meet the T-STD requirement (and other
timing/buffering-based requirements) by limiting the usage of T-STD buffers by the encoding
system, allowing for some additional jitter.
In particular, for video packets, it is possible that the packet delay can be accommodated by
increasing the average amount of data in the video T-STD buffer or other means.
However, audio is not forced to reduce its bit rate in step with the video. In fact, even when
the available bit rate will not support MPEG-2 video, it can still carry full rate audio. The audio
decoder buffer was not designed to tolerate a significant added packet delay. A consequence of
this is that the audio buffer could underflow unless care is taken in the utilization of the audio
buffer by the system.
It may be necessary to constrain the video/audio encoders and/ or the transmission system in
order to meet the requirement to conform with the MPEG-2 T-STD model under various
circumstances.
In particular, ensuring that no overflow of TBn occurs may require particular implementation
attention to the time between TS-M packets in a TS multiplex as compared to the time between
TS-M packets in the transmitted frame. Under certain circumstances, the number of consecutive
packets at TS-R for any particular stream of TS packets with the same PID must be limited, in
order to not overflow TBn.
For example, when the chosen E-VSB mix provides only a very low rate main stream that is
occupied entirely by an AC-3 audio program, it may not be possible to prevent TBn from

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overflowing after insertion of the E-VSB packets. Avoidance of this overflow condition may
require changes to the original allocation of packet rate to TS-M services or eschewing certain
combinations in the multiplex.
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