British Satellite Broadcasting [BSB] D MAC Presentation - August 1988

ALL CONVERSIONS ARE CONVERTED AS RECORDED/DUBBED/ORIGINALLY RECEIVED
British Satellite Broadcasting [BSB] D MAC Presentation - August 1988
These recordings are from original IBA (Independent Broadcasting Authority) RoT tapes.
Twitter: / the_iba_archive
Digitally converted from VHS by Liam Mustapha
This video/channel is non-profit and is for archival purposes only.

[@JackDunford]

"We want something like Two Tribes by Frankie Goes to Hollywood as the intro but not so close we have to pay for it".

[@JackDunford]

"Also, don't have Nick Ross directly looking into camera. Trust me. It's edgy".

[@antster1983]

@@JackDunford Nick Ross isn’t presenting to camera, he’s presenting to the people in the room.

[@d2dar459]

😂

[@MicedVolvo]

Thank you for uploading these IBA videos but could you please check the audio before posting them? I'm wearing headphones and it is really irritating that the sound comes out from only the left channel. Thanks.

[@theibaarchive778]

Hello WAMoore, Thanks for your feedback! Unfortunately, the equipment we are using (Panasonic AG-7750) does not have any Stereo capabilities. We have experimented with adding 'Fake Stereo' tracks to our videos, but it lost the quality in the edited product. Sorry for the inconvenience but I do hope you continue to enjoy the blast from the past! Liam Mustapha ~The IBA Archive Founder

[@MarkPentler]

@@theibaarchive778 can you not just duplicate the track to the other side before saving out? Doesn't seem too tricky. You may have already solved this :)

[@stickytapenrust6869]

@@theibaarchive778 Why are you using such a machine when a domestic Panasonic SVHS VCR will do a better job AND spread mono sound over two channels?

[@Broadercasting]

Have you any MAC media directly transcoded to digital?

[@dangaAgadanga]

Clearly the technology was criminal 😊 Jokes aside, I think it is a shame that, despite this great piece of technology, BSB conceded to Sky's vehicle on the Astra satellite system. I reckon the mistake was the satellite footprint. GB Vs Europe? Ultimately the public went for The Simpsons and the rest of it's American hype.

[@GeoNeilUK]

Well, it's between five channels on a system that was only ever going to offer five channels and four channels out of sixteen from Sky with other English language channels on top on a system that could be expanded by launching another satellite. That was the mistake, not the footprint.

[@Symos]

I wonder if there is a parallel universe where Galaxy viewers are lamenting the decline if Simpsons

[@clyth41]

And it was that good.... It failed

[@GryphLane]

In the same way as Betamax "failed". It was clearly better but marginally more expensive.

[@GeoNeilUK]

@@GryphLane |The problem with D-MAC was PAL was good enough for a market where most of the public had TVs that only had an RF input (meaning they'd have been watching in PAL and in mono anyway) By the time MAC had an actual point, digital had come around and was better than MAC.

[@madmurdock100]

If D-Mac was being developed today, the government would most likely have chosen D2-MAC - the 'cut down' version :D

[@2001JamesTV]

Critisising the size of satellite dishes as if it's a problem, and "hard to install"- nobody seems to have had a problem with them since! Typical companies, inventing problems that don't exist to sell their products. I have a 90cm dish and never considered it an issue XD

[@Gloatysock]

There was a huge backlash from the parts of the public when the prospect of ugly large dishes appearing everywhere was looming, so it was a major issue and concern in the earliest days of satellite TV. One of the big questions was over whether you would be required to get planning permission to install a dish. Many hobbyists using even 80cm and 60cm dishes were having problems with planning controllers prior to the launch of Sky and BSB, and some people had problems even into the 90's. I have to say, I think a lot of the opposition was justified. Now dishes seem to have been unofficially regarded as exempt from permission you see some incredible sights, with a lot of 80cm and up to 120cm dishes plastered all over houses in some areas, often right in front of windows, particularly where there are high proportions of Eastern European people receiving signals from Polsat. I am pretty sure they do not require dishes of that size.

[@gingersensation9584]

"It can be produced cheaply" Ha ha.

[@anthonyperkins7556]

Why was the IBA technical spec for receivers stingy and mean, and only gave them a SCART socket and RF socket? The IBA should have given the receivers two S-Video sockets and stereo phono sockets for connection to a S-VHS video for high quality recordings on S-VHS cassettes and high quality viewing on a S-VIDEO equipped stereo TV, and two SCART sockets one with full 21 pin connection for RGB reproduction and stereo sound from suitable televisions, and a second SCART socket with selectable CVBS / S-VIDEO output to feed a S-VHS or VHS video recorder.

[@davidmackenzie8441]

Was that IBA's decision or BSB's? They probably wanted to keep costs down.

[@anthonyperkins7556]

@@davidmackenzie8441 The IBA imposed this strict technical specification. The IBA promised that you could connect a HiFi system using stereo phono outputs on the receiver and make the most of the excellent picture quality by connecting the receivers S-Video socket to a Super VHS or Hi8 deck to make high quality recordings on S-VHS and Hi8 tape via a Hi8 or Super VHS VCR. Having those outputs mean you can take advantage of the high quality stereo sound and excellent picture quality available from D-Mac.

[@proximusmania]

By the early 90s, D2MAC was the method of choice across Scandinavia. It wasn’t a tremendous leap forward as they’d have you believe here. SIS Racing used BMAC and this was a noted improvement. I think they were the only ones to use this? The receivers were a large black slab, if I remember correctly.

[@anthonyperkins7556]

D-MAC was excellent for picture and sound quality and could easily upgrade to HD-MAC 1250 line pictures with superb digital stereo audio, and exceptional crisp clear images free of crosscolour fringing moire patterning etc.

[@antster1983]

0:28 There's now a branch of Topshop and Topman where the IBA's headquaters used to be.

[@dglcomputers1498]

It's amazing that a high powered satellite transponder is only 110W, a high powered UHF transmitter would be at least 500kW!

[@RobertHellier]

I had a Maspro ? Pace 900 satellite receiver with 60cm dish 1992 and got a new sky card from Radio Rentals

[@cjmillsnun]

The squarial in this demonstration was made from plywood.

[@antster1983]

Nick Ross is the presenter of the demonstration. The voiceover artist (I think) is Peter Wheeler.

[@rtc9063]

Whenever I hear 'IBA' it can only be looked back at the most useless organisation run by people who had no right to be there. The totally incompetence of awarding some of those ITV contracts and then this. Then the utter incompetence of the people put in charge of BSB who seemed to think they were there to do nothing. No wonder they told Murdoch he'd be in charged of the merged company.

[@maniatore2006]

And the Reality was totally Different, and SES Astra Proved it. BSB was Wrong. PAL was more than good enough. And the Later, D2 mac was only used from Several Channels in the Nordic. PAL was the Big winner. And Today England has his Own UK Beam.

[@tomhekker]

Yup. We had a couple of channels in the Netherlands broadcasting in D and D2-MAC, no normal viewer could see the difference with channels broadcast in PAL. For some reason the Dutch PTT was pushing D/D2-MAC hard, while RTL’s Dutch language channel from Luxembourg were just in PAL, and no one except for idiots like me could tell the difference. RTL just saved a bunch of money by just using PAL. There was basically no way you could uplink a PAL signal from the Netherlands as the Dutch PTT basically had the monopoly on uplink services and they refused to do PAL, I guess out of spite that the Luxembourgians were delivering a TV channel for half the cost of the Dutch channels with a larger viewership. The only programme that RTL produced for the Dutch viewers that was in D-MAC was their television news because that was beamed from their studio in Hilversum, the Netherlands to Luxembourg for distribution, because the Dutch PTT didn’t allow them to use PAL. I could barely tell the difference between the feed from Hilversum and the PAL version from Luxembourg.

[@peterainsworth8026]

What a wonderful vision BSB had, a high quality technical and programming proposition. Criminal that Murdoch was allowed to destroy them.

[@GeoNeilUK]

The market destroyed BSB, not just Murdoch. There are two thing sthat could have saved BSB that would also have destroyed the point of BSB. [1] Have a government mandate stating that all satellite receivers have the ability to view both PAL and MAC transmissions. They's mandated BSB to use D-MAC so they should have put a similar mandate on satellite receivers. [2] Allow BSB to rent space on the Astra satellite alongside Sky, broadcasting in whatever standard they felt necessary. Sky used PAL. PAL over Astra was good enough and also delivered everything promised by D-MAC here. Stereo, multichannel and subscription TV. MAC wasn't adopted widely primarily because it was both too ahead of its time and behind the times. By the time there was a need for MAC, digital broadcasting had come about and did what MAC did better. When MAC was released, PAL was good enough and most customers were watching MAC downconverted to PAL anyway, the majority of viewers in the early 1990s were still connecting their set top boxes to their TVs via the aerial socket, which meant PAL video and mono sound.

[@domininic]

ahhh where did those pal / dmac remotes end up?

[@syferdet]

11:18 "Let me now clear something else about aerials..." ME: "Stop throwing eggs at the one atop my house!!"

[@kaw203]

How sky won actually baffles me

[@johnking5174]

Better management, better sales pitch, better programming, better marketing. That is how.

[@notsorandumusername]

Sky was cheaper and worked with plain old PAL. When the majority decides something is 'good enough' they tend to go with the cheaper alternative and that is what Sky offered. When DVD and DVB-S came along, people did get to see the benefits of digital transmission even on an analog tv thanks to the SCART connector which could give RGB colors instead of bog standard PALs component. And digital sound of course.

[@dglcomputers1498]

Simply cost, Sky did not have the costs associated with launching their own satellites, plus as they did not use D-MAC or special antenna the setup could be cheaper, at the end of the day Amstrad dishes were essentially bin lids! (the story is that Alan Sugar looked at satellite dishes and thought they looked like bin lids so brought a machine that made bin lids and modified accordingly). In the end it was decided that neither company was going to last on their own (they were both losing a lot of money) and they were made to merge their operations, naturally when that happened they went for the cheaper option then the satellites and the headquarters were sold off.

[@glassowlie]

@@johnking5174 No. They just manage to broadcast in the UK and then takeover BSB.

[@johnking5174]

@@glassowlie It wasn't as simple as that. Sky paid a fortune for movie rights and sports rights to attract viewers. BSB didn't match the money Murdoch poured into Sky and BSB became second rate. Also BSB satellite dishes were of poor quality and the signal wasn't as good as Sky's