No FIVE on Freeview HD, BBC to provide BBC HD 2

Brian Butterworth published on UK Free TV 15th March 2010 at 14:32

Ofcom has said today that FIVE will not be transmitting on Freeview HD, as their service is not ready, and the other services from Channel 4 and S4C are not viable.

This means the bandwidth will revert to the BBC to provide a second HD service.

So, suddenly, that "old promise" of BBC One HD and BBC TWO HD seems viable once again.

If the BBC scraps the BBC HD channel and provides BBC One and BBC Two programmes in HD this would be a step forward.

Don't expect too much HD in the regions, so BBC One HD will be a service without regional news. The cost of upgrading the many regional news studios to HD would be far too high in the short term, and there isn't room on satellite for many HD streams.

It is likely the regional programmes slots will be given over to "guest" programming from BBC three and BBC FOUR.

FIVE will get another chance to be on Freeview HD in 2012.

Quite why Film 4 HD couldn't have made it isn't clear yet.

This would mean that Freeview HD ends up offering the same channels that are being closed on analogue, but only in high definition, or at least better quality.

This would leave the "digital channels", CBBC, CBeebies, BBC three, BBC FOUR, BBC News and BBC Parliament in standard definition, for now. Any HD programmes for these channels will have to be shown "overnight" on BBC one HD or BBC TWO HD.

Providing two HD simulcast channels on Freeview HD would reduce the overall number of BBC services, which is the current vogue.

Also, it is probably easier to market "this channel now in HD", rather than the current situation.