Category: Consumer Electronics

Aldo Cugnini Receives Highest ATSC Honor

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June 12, 2025, Washington, DC — ATSC, the Broadcast Standards Association, has honored AGC Systems Principal Aldo Cugnini with the 2025 Bernard J. Lechner Outstanding Contributor Award at the 2025 ATSC NextGen Broadcast Conference this week. In accepting the award, Cugnini thanked ATSC President Madeleine Noland, Chairman John Taylor, and the ATSC Board of Directors for bestowing this prestigious award upon him. He also thanked his many ATSC colleagues who have served as invaluable experts.

The Bernard J. Lechner Outstanding Contributor Award is presented annually to an individual within the ATSC membership whose technical and leadership contributions to the ATSC were judged to be invaluable and exemplary. The Award recognizes the first recipient, the late Bernard Lechner, for his outstanding service to the ATSC.

More information about the Award and its namesake is at the ATSC announcement.

 

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The Trouble with Watts

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I recently read an article in a well-known consumer-facing technical hobby magazine, where the author used the phrase, “watts per day.”  This is an erroneous concept (the technically-trained author should have known better), which illustrates a matter that is often confusing to the average person.

“Watts per day” is not a meaningful unit of measurement.

The watt (W) is a unit of power, which is defined as the rate at which energy is transferred or used. One watt is equal to one joule per second (J/s).

The unit of energy is typically measured in joules (J), but it is also commonly measured in watt-hours (Wh) or kilowatt-hours (kWh). One watt-hour is equal to one watt of power used for one hour, and one kilowatt-hour is equal to one kilowatt (1000 watts) of power used for one hour.

In other words, the “watt” conveys the notion of the rate of energy consumption. When we pay for energy consumed, we pay for kilowatt-hours.

Therefore, if you see the phrase “watts per day,” it is likely that the author was trying to convey the notion of power used over a period of one day, and the correct usage would be to express it in terms of watt-hours (or kilowatt-hours) per day.

As an example: if a piece of equipment is rated at 100 watts, and the equipment is used for 8 hours every day, then we can say that the equipment consumes 800 watt-hours of energy (not power) per day.

Additional reading: why “RMS watts” makes no sense!

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Cugnini to Present Talk on New Audio/Video Technologies

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AGC Systems’ President Aldo Cugnini will deliver an online talk, entitled “New Audio/Video/Wireless Technologies For Home Entertainment.”  Scheduled for Thursday, November 18, 2021, 6:30PM EST, and hosted by the IEEE Consultants’ Network of Northern New Jersey, the talk will explain how new technologies like UHDTV, HDR, and HEVC enable audio and video devices to efficiently deliver the latest entertainment to consumers.

The talk is free, and can be accessed by registering here.

This presentation is partly sponsored by Elecard.  Click here for more information on their video and stream analysis tools.

Video Pioneers Remember Historic HDTV Debut

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Grand Alliance Prototype

Twenty-five years ago this week, the world’s first HDTV broadcast system was unveiled in Las Vegas at the 1995 NAB Show.  AGC Systems’ Aldo Cugnini was there, as one of the many engineers who developed the “Grand Alliance” digital HDTV system.  Then at Philips, Aldo had a leadership role in the system’s development, which went on to become the ATSC digital television system.

Click here to see historic videos of the debut of HDTV.

Android 10 — One Step Forward, Two Steps Back?

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Many consumers have long admired the Android operating system as a more “open” alternative to the closed iOS ecosystem.  But more and more, Google seems intent on ruining this past advantage.  Already, highly-admired features, like running apps from an SD card (and getting add-on storage), have been dropped from most phones.  And while Google has claimed that change was for “better security,” many observers felt it was simply to upsell more storage.

Now, with its latest rev — Android 10 — Google adds more than 60 new features to the OS.  And while some of these again are “security updates,” you can find gobs of information elsewhere that runs them down. BTW, rumor has it they didn’t give this “Q” release a food-name, because of lack of a good candidate.  Really?  What’s wrong with “quince,” or “quinoa”?

The rev does come with a host of new issues, however, such as the following:

  • Dark Mode.  Introduced on Android 9 (Pie), Dark Mode provides a more-sexy theme based on blacks and dark colors.  But amazingly, it doesn’t work with Google’s own Gmail or Maps apps.  Duh.
  • Non-erasable Location Cards.  This is a really annoying problem: visited location cards can’t be stopped from re-appearing in the Android Auto startup screen, even if you don’t have any interest in going to that location.  One user complained about the dreadful situation where she was at a funeral for her mother, and now the damn phone keeps reminding her about that visit ad nauseum.  While it may be possible to delete this by blocking all location history, that’s somewhat akin to using a sledgehammer to hang a picture.
  • Pixel Sensor Broken Issue — Many users are finding that the sensors on their Pixel phones stopped working after the update.
  • A Memory Leak has been reported that allows a closed app to remain resident in RAM.

Of course, any software update will have its growing pains, along with some workarounds.  But when you build a feature like Location Cards and don’t think through something that would be obvious to any user, you’ve got a serious problem somewhere in the product development process.  And what’s really inexcusable is that, from the posts on Google Help, it seems that issues like the Location Card problem have been known to Google even with Android Pie — and their staff responds by saying the behavior is “subjective.”

You’d think Google would have the resources to develop features that are useful and not annoying.  Perhaps 10.1?

— agc

Selected Papers

  • The Promise of Mobile DTV, NAB Broadcast Engineering Conference Proceedings, 2011.
  • A Revenue Model for Mobile DTV Service, NAB Broadcast Engineering Conference Proceedings, 2010.
  • Considerations for Digital Program Insertion of Multiple-Video Programs, NCTA Fall Technical Forum, 2002.
  • Digital Video and the National Information Infrastructure, Philips Journal of Research, Volume 50, Issues 1–2, 1996.
  • MPEG-2 video decoder for the digital HDTV Grand Alliance system, IEEE Transactions on Consumer Electronics, Vol. 41, Aug 1995.
  • Grand Alliance MPEG-2-based video decoder with parallel processing architecture, Intl. J. of Imaging Systems and Technology Vol. 5, No. 4, 1994.
  • The ISO/MPEG Audio Coding Standard, Widescreen Review, June/July, 1994.

Musical Instruments

Past accomplishments include:

  • Successful market entry of microprocessor-based electronic keyboard with PC interface
  • Delivery of pre-production advanced-technology guitar amplifier
  • Patent filing for novel MIDI-based musical instrument

NAB 2019 Conference Widely Featuring ATSC 3.0

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More than 100 NAB Show sessions and more than 50 exhibitors will feature Next Gen TV technology that is now voluntarily spreading to cities throughout the country. Powered by the ATSC 3.0 next-generation broadcast standard, Next Gen TV promises to deliver sharper, more detailed pictures and lifelike multichannel audio with upgraded broadcasts that will be transmitted and received in the same Internet Protocol language as Internet-delivered content.

Jointly sponsored by the Advanced Television Systems Committee, the Consumer Technology Association and NAB, the “Ride the Road to ATSC 3.0” exhibit will be featuring a series of free presentations about all facets of the ATSC 3.0 standard. And attendees can pick up a free Guide to 3.0 at the Show in the Central Lobby of the Las Vegas Convention Center during the show.

Single Frequency Network Demonstrations

The NAB, with support from a number of technology companies, will demonstrate the Single Frequency Network (SFN) capabilities of the Next-Gen TV standard, showing how reception can be improved in difficult locations and in moving vehicles by deploying multiple broadcast towers transmitting the broadcast signal on the same channel.

Using several local transmissions, special SFN viewing kiosks will showcase the flexibility of the ATSC 3.0 standard. Dozens of sessions planned in the exhibit will include updates on the Dallas, Phoenix, Santa Barbara, East Lansing, Cleveland, and Korea ATSC 3.0 deployments.

Scores of papers and sessions will be presented about Next-Gen TV during the 2019 NAB Show, with session topics that will cover consumer research, consumer device plans, conformance testing, audio enhancements, station build-out advice, watermarking, advanced emergency information, channel security, advanced advertising and interactivity. In addition to ATSC, CTA and NAB, exhibit sponsors include Pearl TV, Sinclair Broadcast Group, LG Electronics, Dolby, Sony, Samsung and the AWARN Alliance. The centerpiece of the Ride the Road stage is a giant new LED videowall optimized for broadcast applications, provided by LG Business Solutions.

AGC Systems president Aldo Cugnini will be at the show, and available for discussions regarding support for ATSC and other related ventures. If you’d like to meet up, please contact us.

FCC Opens Up Spectrum Above 95 GHz

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This month, the Federal Communications Commission allowed a plan to make the spectrum above 95 GHz more readily accessible for new innovative services and technologies. Calling the initiative “Spectrum Horizons Experimental Radio Licenses,” the plan is outlined in a First Report and Order, which allows a number of changes to existing rules, including:

  • a new category of experimental licenses, to increase opportunities for entities to develop new services and technologies from 95 GHz to 3 THz, with no limits on geography or technology; and
  • making 15.2 gigahertz of spectrum available for unlicensed use.

The Order specifically allows two types of operations:

  • A Spectrum Horizons experimental radio license can be issued for the purpose of testing and marketing devices on frequencies above 95 GHz, where there are no existing service rules.  Licenses are issued for a term of 10 years and may not be renewed.
  • Unlicensed operations are allowed in the bands 116-123 GHz, 174.8-182 GHz, 185-190 GHz, and 244-246 GHz, that are consistent with the rules proposed in the Spectrum Horizons, Notice of Proposed Rulemaking and Order.

Part 15 of the FCC Rules was also amended to extend operational limitations and interference measurements covering frequencies above 95 GHz.

The new rules provide that the Commission may, at any time without notice or hearing, modify or cancel a Spectrum Horizons License, if, in its discretion, the need for such action arises.  Some commenters raised the issue that this could result in an abuse of the complaint process, but the Commission pushed back, saying they “routinely work with parties to resolve potential or actual issues…”

The Commission withheld action on their proposal for licensed fixed point-to-point operations in a total of 102.2 gigahertz of spectrum, and opposed the concerns of the ham-radio organization ARRL regarding protection from interference.  In defending the latter position, the Commission states, “both the amateur radio service and the experimental licensing program are designed to contribute to the advancement of radio knowledge,” and goes on to say that “we will instead require all Spectrum Horizons License applicants to submit an interference analysis that would address the potential effects of the experimental operation on existing services.”  

In addition to Chairman Ajit Pai, the proposal has general support — albeit with certain cautions — from all four of the other commissioners, who evenly represent both sides of the political aisle. 

— agc