Understanding Digital Television: An Introduction to DVB Systems with Satellite, Cable, Broadband and Terrestrial TV Distribution

With the milestones of Digital TV and HDTV, there are
lots of questions to be asked about television of today,,.

Understanding Digital Television explains complex technical systems and solutions in an easy
to comprehend manner along with visual 3D graphics. It helps non-technical individuals such as
managers, executives, general media professionals, as well as TV and home cinema enthusiasts
gain a practical understanding of the equipment, technical aspects of digital television, and various
ways of distributing. Most examples are from a European perspective, but also include comparisons
with North American systems. This book answers the confusing questions about new devices and
digital formats, what to do when the analog TV transmitters are switched off, watching TV using your
broadband connection, and much more.

*Describes the four major platforms of digital TV: satellite, cable, terrestrial transmitters
and broadband
*Uses an extensive collection of illustrations to explain the technical solutions
*Includes detailed illustrations and full-color section
*Contains an appendices dedicated to North American systems

User review
A good non technical introduction
This book is ideal for a hobbist who wants to learn about digital TV technology. IT covers all the details that it sets down to cover and goes into a lot of depth on connecting up antennas and linking the equipment together. The authors ability to express technical material is amazing. Having said that, I am a manager in the Digital TV area and I was hoping for some more material on the equipment and the technolgies from the perspective of both `What they do` and `How they work`.

User review
Review,,.
It is definitively a good book. It is easy to read for everyone trying to get some knowledge about Digital Television. Its 3D graphics are a very nice way to illustrate the concepts. It also includes a color plate with some of the illustrations found around the book.

It is not a highly technical book so everybody could read it. Its brief and concise explanations will take you along the way to understand the most difficult sections even if you are not familiar with the topic.

Most of the book is written from an European perspective but it is not hard to use the things you learn from the North American view. Sometimes, but not always, there are comparisons to the American standards and that helps a lot. The American appendix is quite short for my taste. It is only 20 pages long, of which 8 are full of drawings of areas of coverage of American satellites leaving us with just 12 pages to read.

The people in Europe looking for an easy and nice way to understand digital television should definitively get it.

For people in North America, you could buy it too, but my advice is not as strong as for the European. If you enjoy comparing things and learning from practices at other parts of the globe (which I find to be a more enriching experience), this is the book for you. But, if you are looking for something fast to learn only from your side, you should be thoughtful of your decision.