DVB‐S2X: the new extensions to the second generation DVB satellite standard DVB‐S2

Abstract

BACKGROUNDIn September 1993, the Digital Video Broadcasting (DVB) project was launched, with the purpose of promoting the switchover from analogue to digital television (TV) broadcasting. It was a private, market-driven association, including all the main actors in digital TV such as broadcasters, network operators, manufacturers and regulators.Thanks to the achievements in the field of digital VLSI technology, both in the transmission and in the source coding areas, the first milestone of the DVB project was the specification of DVB-S. This was DVB's digital, multi-programme, TV system for satellite broadcasting that together with the adoption of MPEG2, introduced satellite direct-to-home (DTH) digital TV.With the worldwide success of this system, it became clear that it could also be suitable for digital satellite news gathering (DSNG) applications, with significant advantages in cost, performance and flexibility over the previous systems. In the summer of 1997, the DVB Project decided to start the development of a new specification for DSNG, based on the DVB-S system but with a number of new features added to cover the commercial and operational requirements of contribution applications. At the same time, DVB-S became the basis of the so called 'DVB family', on which the first generation digital standards for cable (DVB-C) and terrestrial (DVB-T) broadcasting were built.In 2003, 10 years after the standardization of DVB-S, DVB-S2 [1] was the first physical layer system of a new generation of digital standards to be developed in the DVB family. It set the benchmark for technical excellence, drove the design concepts for terrestrial and cable applications and along with MPEG4, led the way for introduction of high-definition TV services. However, DVB-S2 was no longer only a system for DTH broadcasting, but one for interactivity (i.e. internet access) and professional services (e.g. TV contribution links and DSNG) as well. To be able to cover all the application areas, while still keeping the single-chip decoder at reasonable complexity levels, DVB-S2 was structured as a toolkit, thus enabling the use of mass market products for professional or niche applications.In 2013, 10 years after the development of DVB-S2, following a request by the Commercial and Technical Modules, the DVB-S2 group started to analyse a further evolution of satellite technologies to enhance performance in the core markets (DTH, contribution, Very Small Aperture Terminal (VSAT) and DSNG) and to increase the range of applications of the standard to cover emerging markets such as mobile (air, sea and rail) or professional applications. DVB-S2X: THE DVB-S2 EXTENSIONSThe DVB-S2X [2] is an extension of the DVB-S2 specification that provides additional technologies and features for the core applications of DVB-S2 including DTH, contribution, VSAT and DSNG. The specification also provides an extended operational range to cover emerging markets such as mobile applications.

Video scene identification and classification for user-tailored QoE in GEO satellites

“…We also intend, in line with our view towards crosslayer extensions of our work, to study how our scheme can be combined with the DVB-S2X extension of the DVB-S2 specification that provides additional technologies and features for the core applications of DVB-S2. As noted in [46], the DVB-S2X has been introduced at the same time as the new high efficiency video coding (HEVC) scheme and it is expected that new satellite DTH receivers will combine these two technologies to make the delivery of ultra high definition services more efficient. For this reason we also intend to evaluate our scheme with HEVC/H.265 video traces, as HEVC is fast becoming widely adopted.…”

Markov-based satellite channel modeling in DVB systems

“…In this work we have considered a DVB-S2X broadband satellite system in Ka-band (30/20 GHz) 11 able to provide many IP services based on real-time and non-real-time applications such as video Conference, VoIP or HTTP traffic. It is composed of the multi-beam GEO On Board Processor (OBP) satellite, 17 the satellite terminal (ST) with return channel satellite (RCS) 18 located inside the region covered by a particular spot, and the gateway able to connect the overall network with other systems.…”

An SDR-Based Satellite Gateway for Internet of Remote Things (IoRT) Applications

“…DVB-S2X is an extension of DVB-S2 specifications that promotes additional technologies and features. DVB-S2X uses the LDPC (Low Density Parity Check) Forward Error Correction (FEC) scheme proven and strong in combination with Broadcast Control Channel (BCH) FEC as the external code but introduces additional features, which fulfill the M2M/IoT Forward link requirements [35].…”

“…For the phase noise measurements we used components of the TOPCOM library written in C++. The threshold for the reception was the QEF (Quasi Error Free) requirement as defined in the DVB-S2X standard as the ratio between the useful FECFRAMEs correctly received and those affected by errors, after forward error correction FER = 10 −5 [37]. The same reception threshold was used when testing the ACI by generating more DVB-S2X carriers in 4…”