On 27/07/2019 01:58, Owen Smith wrote:
ITV1 HD on Freeview has never broadcast in anything other than 2.0 audio. Their stated reason is it being too difficult to switch modes between content in 5.1 and adverts in 2.0. This is clearly rubbish since C4 HD does it with no problems. But given the stated reason was audio for adverts, I had assumed ITV didn't broadcast surround sound on satellite either. Personally the real reason seems like the usual ITV disease of supporting only the lowest common denominator most of the time, HD picture being their only exception to that.
At one time (on satellite HD) the BBC used to switch to 5.1 on every continuity announcement with an animation intended to show off the capabilities of surround sound. Admittedly with regional adverts ITV's switching is more complicated than the BBC's.
As for whether there is adequate bandwidth for additional audio streams, Spain broadcasts MPEG4 over DVB-T for its terrestrial HD channels, but does not seem to have any shortage of HD channels. Many channels have an original language (often English, French, German or Italian) audio stream in addition to the Spanish audio stream.
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