FTV and FTA coverage of the Tour de France 2009

[mhku]

Every weekday stage will be covered on the ITV's Red Button service
Coverage schedule on Red Button:

Monday 6th July 1330-1640
Tuesday 7th July 1325-1655
Wednesday 8th July 1330-1635
Thursday 9th July 1330-1640
Friday 10th July 1300-1635

Monday 13th July REST DAY
Tuesday 14th July 1300-1635
Wednesday 15th July 1330-1645
Thursday 16th July 1330-1700
Friday 17th July 1330-1640

Monday 20th July REST DAY
Tuesday 21st July 1155-1650
Wednesday 22nd July 1120-1645
Thursday 23rd July 1330-1655
Friday 24th July 1330-1640


ITV4i is also know as ITVi Quad and is listed as a data service on the Dreambox. It's 4:3 and PQ is only about 2500kb/s, audio is 128kb/s

Satellite: 28.2E
Frequency: 12403
Polarity: Vertical
FEC: 2/3
Symbol Rate: 27500


Other possible TdF coverage:

France 2 (5w) most days from about 1420 CET.
There’s often a short programme earlier at 1250 or 1300 CET for the village départ on France 3 (5w).

Belgium’s RTBFsat (13e)

Italian channel RAI Due (13e)

Eurosport (19e)

ARD and ZDF (13e and 19e)

RTL Tele Letzeburg (19e)


I haven't checked these but these are the channels listed by _http://cyclingfans.net/satellite/2009/tour-de-france-2

 

[Burnham Beech]

ITVi Quad is actually showing the same 16/9 video as Eurosport and the source French broadcasters.

For some reason the Dreambox thinks the video is in 4/3 format.

 

[mhku]

Cheers for that (the streaminfo shows as 544x576 4:3) - picture looks fine in wide.

Bitrate for ITVi Quad is about 2520 kb/s, Eurosport is more like ~6000kb/s

 

[Burnham Beech]

Interesting. I can't see any picture quality difference switching between Eurosport and ITVi Quad on a 42" TV.

Is it possible the DM has the bitrates wrong as well?

 

[mhku]

The bitrate plugin shows ITVi Quad as video max 2522kb/s and audio of 128kbs; shows Eurosport as video 7224kb/s max and audio 192kb/s