My TV is NICAM, does that mean I have digital TV?
Whilst NICAM and teletext are digital systems, they are not in the sense that people usually mean when describing Freeview, digital satellite TV or digital cable TV.
The NICAM system has been superseded by a technology that now allows the “old fashioned” television system to carry around six times as many channels. Most people get noticeably better picture and sound quality too.
If you have a NICAM TV, you should connect your digital decoder box to your TV using a SCART cable. If you use anything else, you are not going to hear stereo from the TV, as the boxes are unable to “create” NICAM for your TV.
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paulWednesday 24 May 2006 11:41AM
waht does NICAM stand forNICAM = Near Instantaneous Companded Audio Multiplex. "Near Instantaneous" because the audio is dealt with in packets, rather than single samples, "Companded" because the data is compressed by disgarding the least important bits, "Audio" is obvious and "Multiplex" because more than one channel is carried by the data stream. my portable digital tv/dvd player needs an aerial can i use my broadband modem/or pc with tv card in as it is not close to the existing house sky/hd/tv to run a cable connection??? ron hassett: Not as an aerial no. You probably can tune into the box by connecting to the "RF2" output from the Sky+ box. DavidWednesday 3 December 2008 3:18PM
Instead of having two separate cables for HD are there any double cables where only one combined one is needed?David: Sorry, not sure what you mean by "two separate cables for HD" at all. Only one is required, a single HDMI cable... paulSaturday 24 January 2009 9:09PM
What is the difference between pam system and nicam systemDave PuseyWednesday 25 March 2009 12:41PM
I think David above is refering to the two cables from the dish, required for Sky HD.PennyWednesday 12 August 2009 9:45AM
Wadebridge if the tv is digital, do I need to tune all progs in myself, or will it all tune in automatic.
I live in Wadebridge N Cornwall PL276LY
the change over is today 12th Aug and 9th sept.
Do I have to leave the portable tv on all day??Penny: Most digital TVs will, eventually automatically tune.
However, with swithover happening to you today, you will need do a full retune today, on the "final" switchover date AND on 30 September.
There is no need to leave the set on. Depending on the type of TV, normally you select "digital TV" mode, and press the "MENU" button and select "full scan" or something similar. Aidan LunnThursday 11 March 2010 12:57AM
Paul, there is no such thing as a pam system. The *PAL* system, which I think is what you are referring to, is the system we use in most of Western Europe (bar France), most of South America, Southern and South-Eastern Asia, the Middle east , parts of Africa and across the Australasian continent. Eastern europe (the former Soviet bloc), half of the rest of Asia and the remaining parts of Africa use the french-developed SECAM system, which is very similar to PAL.
The rest of the world uses the American-developed NTSC system, which is very different to both PAL and SECAM.
NICAM is the stereo audio system we use in this country (alongside the ancient mono audio system used for non-stereo TV equipment), launched by the BBC in 1986 (although no "official" launch until 1991) and being phased out with analogue switch-off. Pity, really, as NICAM digital stereo has superior sound quality to the digital sound system, which was already settled before the BBC could get a word in, probably to mention developing NICAM for digital TV.Aidan LunnThursday 11 March 2010 12:58AM
add to my previous comment, PAL is the colour picture system we use in western europe etc . . .Aidan Lunn: "...NICAM for digital TV". I'm having a right good laugh at that. I don't think there is a single word of that last paragraph that is accurate. Aidan LunnThursday 20 January 2011 12:19AM
^^ Why? I never said they did develop it. I said that they could have developed it had they got the chance. And I am a personal friend of one of the people who actually developed NICAM. he said it would be quite easy to adapt it for SD anmd HD digital transmissions, complete with more sound channels at higher quality audio than Dolby 7.1.Aidan Lunn: Nope, that still makes no sense at all. Perhaps you should educate yourself about the stuff you post before you post it. shaunSaturday 6 August 2011 9:49PM
Reading the comments about Nicam and digital TV transmission months after they were posted, I honestly don't understand why Mr. Lunn's comments were deemed so wrong. Nicam encoding could have easily been added to a channel's digital data stream instead of adding the Mpeg audio stream as now used. It would have broken the DVB standard, but that doesn't mean it wasn't technically possible, or feasable, (it certainly was) or couldn't even become part of the standard as an option especially with the BBC behind it. Personally I'd say there are issues with both Nicam and Mpeg audio, with Mpeg audio the quality is diabolical at lower bit rates, or with poor signals causing errors, as in digital radio broadcasts. Because of the quantisation Nicam drops bits at high volumes and this is supposedly masked by the ear, but I believe quality is lost, in some circumstances for example a range of pure tones with dissimilar volume levels, but a similar form of masking which fools the ear, is what mpeg audio also relies on.
My main concern with Mpeg is that the broadcaster has too much control of the minimum audio bitrate on Mpeg audio and might be therefore tempted to save bandwidth by using a much lower bitrate than is appropriate. This isn't allowed AFAIK for Nicam, so the sound quality is consistent, always being at the upper limits of the design.
Mpeg audio needs at least 256kbits/sec to compare with Nicam, but Nicam uses more than that I think.
In all cases error correction has to be added after encoding as an extra, the question would be how much would be needed.
Sadly the best systems don't always win in any case.shaun: NICAM 728 was never a candidate for inclusion in MPEG. Companding is a poor compression scheme and the very high bitate - 728kbps (hence the name) does not result in better audio quality than the FFT-based modern computing-based schemes.
NICAM is good in comparison to PAL audio, but that's not saying much. lenTuesday 24 April 2012 10:19AM
why have i lost nicam stereo on my goodmans tv with sky box and i have done a retune.len: The RF output (i.e. output on the aerial lead) of the Sky box doesn't provide stereo sound. This is the same as other devices (recorders, video recorders, DVD players etc) which don't put out stereo sound. lenTuesday 24 April 2012 12:47PM
But it worked all ok until the digital switch over with the sky box now it will only do monojb38Tuesday 24 April 2012 11:21PM
len: To back up what has been said, you cannot have stereo sound from a Sky boxes RF1 or 2 output as the Sky boxes modulator is technically incapable of supplying the type of signal necessary for decoding, if you genuinely did have stereo before then it must have been via a scart connection between both devices, or alternatively it might even have possibly been pseudo stereo should the Goodman's actually have such a facility.
i fletcherTuesday 3 July 2012 6:25PM
just moved new home digital arial not working its a 10 element twin reflectors on bottom of pole is in out connector says 12v with screw to increase decrease assume this is booster any ideas.all cable connections look ok unable to check top of arialupdates
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