Having just had an interesting conversation with an important member of staff at RTÉ I was surprised to find that to the best of her knowledge the Irish Government’s DTT trial is due to be launched this Friday.
The two year trial, which has been in gestation for some time has been alocated an “Autumn 2006” launch date for some time now but no concrete date has been set; it now appears that the launch will be heralded by a press release on Friday morning with no prior warning to expectant fans.
At present RTÉ has yet to see the set-top box being given to beta testers, they do not yet know the exact technology being used in the trial and they have not been informed as to what the initial trial will comprise of.
It is likely that testing of the service will be staged too as the content tender closing date is tomorrow leaving little room to finalise plans in the coming days. That means that the initial signal, should it go out on Friday will be traditional terrestrial TV only with additional programming (and perhaps interactive content, HD trials etc.) coming on board at a later date.
Despite numerous queries I have made to the DCMNR it is still not clear if Freeview standard boxes (which are now available on the Irish market built-in to numerous TV models) will be compatible with the trial.
Good to know the DCMNR is leading the field in communication between its partners…
Update: Somehow missed this thread; apparently the test has already begun (although the official test will probably launch on Friday)