ITV has announced that they will launch an HD channel on the Freeview platform later this year.
A statement from the broadcaster said they had agreed final terms with the BBC (as the operator of Multiplex B which will deliver Freeview HD) to launch an ITV1 HD service on Freeview in advance of the World Cup which gets underway in June 2010.
The new ITV1 HD service will be rolled out across England and Wales with Digital Switchover, starting with Manchester in December 2009 and will be launched ahead of switchover in major cities such as London to enable reception in around half UK homes by the time of the World Cup, according to ITV.
To be able to receive the Freeview HD services viewers will need either need an HD Ready TV set with a new Freeview HD box or a Freeview HD integrated television.
The first generation of Sky HD boxes had both component video and HDMI High Definition outputs, more recent boxes have dropped the component output leaving HDMI as the only HD cable output.
If you have a spare HDMI input on the TV and you are using the TVs internal speakers for sound then the it is very easy to connect the Sky HD box to the TV, a single HDMI cable is all that is required to give you both the video and audio.
Ofcom has announced it has made a provisional decision to reserve an HD slot for Five to provide new services on Freeview from 2010.
Ofcom’s final decision to award a HD licence to Five is subject to it resolving certain key criteria related to its application by the end of 2009.
Five’s licence is the result of a tender process which attracted two bids from Channel 5 and Channel 4 and S4C. According to Ofcom, Five’s application initially involves simulcasting its main public services channel programmes at peak time on HD. This means that Five programmes such as The Gadget Show, UEFA Europa League, CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, children’s show ‘Milkshake’ and movie premiers could become available in HD from late 2010, say the regulator.
Ofcom state that in the future, Five predicts sharing its HD channel with another broadcaster during daytime hours and supplying other services such as Video on Demand in HD overnight.
In addition to Five, Freeview slots have been reserved for ITV—together with UTV, stv and Channel TV—while the other has gone jointly to Channel 4 and S4C.