Summary

NBC's VP of Engineering Peter Smith confirmed that NBC tested both COFDM and 8-VSB in Philadelphia, finding that no 8-VSB receiver — including advanced equalizer chips — performed adequately for urban reception. NBC expressed near-complete agreement with Sinclair's test results and planned further testing in Washington, D.C.

Source document circa 2000 preserved as-is
 

Last Updated Tuesday, February 8, 2000

 

MARK SCHUBIN update regrding NBC

Go To Mark Schubin's Article

 

    There will be more on this in this week's memo, but I just thought I'd let everyone know now. I sat with NBC's Peter Smith at lunch today at the Sony pre-NAB press conference. He confirmed that NBC had tested COFDM and 8-VSB in Philadelphia and, as a result, "we have complete confidence in Sinclair's test results." COFDM, Smith said, was a "reality check." When they got no reception on 8-VSB receivers, they tried COFDM, and at "most" sites, it worked fine (in Baltimore, I was able to find a site where neither COFDM nor 8-VSB worked). NBC said they tried ALL existing 8-VSB receivers -- of any generation -- as well as at least one of the advanced equalizer 8-VSB chips (he could not say which due to a non-disclosure agreement); NONE were deemed adequate for urban reception. He said they were presenting their results to the FCC as the FCC decision on the Sinclair ruling was coming out, so the NBC data were not known to the FCC in time for the decision. "We are in almost complete agreement with Sinclair," Smith said, the "almost" relating to what should be done about the problems. NBC favors selecting a specific version of COFDM for use in the U.S.

    NBC plans a next round of testing in Washington, D.C. soon

 

 

Mark Hyman of Sinclair offers this for us to chew on...

 

    Mark Schubin, an independent engineer and journalist, confirms NBC's test of COFDM and 8VSB and even quotes NBC's VP of Engineering, Peter Smith.

    BTW, Thomson (parent of RCA), a staunch backer of 8VSB at all costs, wrote the test procedures for NBC's Philly tests comparing COFDM and 8VSB. Even Thomson's test procedures could not help 8VSB in yet another side-by-side real demo. Kinda ironic, eh?

    Very reliable rumor (first party, nonetheless) has it that when the NBC results were informally presented to FCC's OET, the OET engineers told NBC that the tests had to be "unscientific." So much for men of science keeping an open mind. No agendas here, huh?

    Please file this in the "Should we have said something sooner?" category.