The book presents the historical evolution of television. It also introduces the basic concepts of digital television, including signal analysis, modulation techniques, source coding, probability and channel coding. The digital television standards, including the MPEG family, the ATSC, DVB, ISDTV, DTMB and ISDB standards are discussed. Several appendices, with topics including Fourier analysis, probability and stochastic processes, tables of Fourier and Hilbert transforms, tables of radiofrequency and a glossary complement the book. Many illustrations and graphics help the reader understand the theory.

Digital television is a new topic in the educational market; it evolved from the amalgamation of different areas, such as source coding, modulation, transmission techniques, channel coding, signal analysis and digital signal processing.

In commercial terms, digital television is a driving force of the economy and its deployment throughout the world generates a huge market as the analog television sets are replaced by the new HDTV devices.

It is important to realize that the media industry, which deals with enormous sums of money each year, relies on equipment to produce and distribute its series, movies and shows. The employment market in this area requires information technology professionals and engineers.

Few books have been published covering all the subjects needed to understand the subsystems that form the digital television network. This book is aimed at senior undergraduate students, graduate students, engineers and information technology professionals in the areas of electrical engineering and computer science. It can be used as a textbook for a course on digital television. The reader is expected to have a background in calculus and signal analysis.