Mainstream broadcaster Five was set to launch its HD channel on the Freeview platform later this year, but it’s just been announced that the regulators have withdrawn Five’s Freeview HD licence.

It seems that Ofcom has been chasing Five for information about their plans and schedules for the Five HD service, and these have not been forthcoming, a clear indication that Five is not in a position to launch an HD offering any time soon.

It appears that the HD licence now reverts to the BBC. In 2011, another Freeview HD slot will be up for offer, so in theory if Five can get it together, they could apply for a licence then, and start broadcasting in 2012.

Good news for Sky and Virgin HD customers – ITV appears to have bowed to pressure and agreed to let their HD service be shown on the pay platforms.

ITV 1 HD is currently available on Freesat (via the red button), and to the lucky few who can get Freeview HD, but from the 2nd of April, ITV 1 HD will be available as a dedicated channel on Sky and Virgin. It also looks likely that ITV 1 will be come its own channel on Freesat, and not hidden behind the red button.

The move means that ITV’s HD coverage of the World Cup will now be available to a greater HD audience.

A quick heads-up to anyone looking to buy a Freeview HD box. You could opt for the Humax Fox T2, priced £150 – or save yourself £50 and go for a Bush Freeview HD box.

This Freeview HD box is available for £99.99 on pre-order, with estimated availability on 31st March 2010

Full details: Bush DVB680 at Argos

Film4 and E4, two of Channel 4’s digital services, will shortly be going “HD” – but only for Virgin Media customers.

The two channelsd will be launching exclusively on the Virgin cable TV platform – doubtless a disappointment to Sky HD customers and those hoping for some much needed HD content on Freesat.

E4 HD is set to launch in April at no extra cost to Virgin Media TV users, with Film4’s HD service set to start in the Summer.

More on Virgin Media at virginmedia.com

Two new Freeview HD Tv sets have gone on sale today at Comet.co.uk. The Sony KDL32EX403U (32 inch) and Sony KDL40EX403U (40 inch) Freeview HD sets use the Bravia engine for top picture quality, support 7 day EPG, have a built-in Freeview HD receiver and support “full” 1080p HD resolution.

Available today for a reasonable £549 (32 inch) or £749 (40 inch) from www.comet.co.uk/shopcomet

More on Freeview HD

A few days ago, we announced the arrival of the first Freeview HD set-top box, the Humax HD Fox-T2. Mere days later, we’re able to announce the first integrated TV with Freeview HD.

The Panasonic TX-P42G20B has built-in Freeview HD and Freesat HD receivers. It’s a 42 inch plasma TV that goes up to 1080p resolution, with a refresh rate of 600Hz. An optional wirelss dongle offers Internet access, and there’s an SD card to let you view photos and videos.

The Panasonic TX-P42G20B Freeview HD TV set

The Panasonic TX-P42G20B is available now in the UK from Comet.co.uk

For a limited time, get £60 by using the code AW60 at the online checkout. Code expires 27 Feb 2010.

The race to get the first Freeview HD receiver to the UK market has been won – by Humax.

The Humax HD Fox T2 is now available, offering subscription-free access to BBC HD and ITV 1 HD.

The Humax HD Fox T2 has an 8-day EPG, HDMI socket, 2 x SCARTs, Dolby Digital Audio Output plus Subtitle and Audio Description support. It has a USB socket for playback of xVid, MP3 and JPG from a conected memory stick or external drive. It supports contents sharing with other devices such as PC and NAS through Home Networking, and has an Ethernet port for connection to online services as BBC iPlayer (coming soon).

It’s important to note that at the moment, Freeview HD is only available in the Granada and London regions.

The Humax HD Fox T2 is on sale now, but hard to find. We’ve listed online suppliers and the best prices on our dedicated Fox T2 page.

More details, photos and specs at http://www.radioandtelly.co.uk/humaxhdfoxt2.html

UPDATE: Our podcast team has released an audio file of their first impressions. Take a listen at Humax HD Fox T2 First Impressions

Freeview has just launched its first iPhone app, offering access to TV listings for over 50 Freeview channels, including BBC HD and ITV 1 HD.

The Freeview HD App includes a “top ten channel list”, a powerful search option, the ability to re-order your channels, and access to Freeview’s Twitter feed for news and programme recommendations.

When you view a listing, you’re also presented with “if you like this, we also recommend”, which throws up some rather interesting results on occasion!

An odd choice to call it “Freeview HD” when Freeview HD’s availability is currently so limited, but this may mark the start of Freeview’s big push to increase HD awareness.

All-in-all, a well designed and powerful little app, great for iPhone and iPod Touch wielding Freeview fans.

“Freeview HD for iPhone” is available for free from the iTunes App Store

Sky is now offering a one Terabyte Sky+ HD box. This increases storage space for TV shows by four times.

The new Sky+ HD 1TB box offers all of the features of the normal  Sky+HD box (including Sky Anytime), but with much recording space – up to  240 hours of HD programming.

The 1 Terabtye Sky+ HD box is available now for £249. Full details at sky.com/1TB

Just a reminder that Sky is currently offering the standard Sky+ HD box for free, with a £25 M & S voucher for a limited time. A great time to get the HD box even if you don’t sign to the HD pack yet. Details on our Sky+ HD page or at Sky’s HD site.

We’ve just completed our updated review of the Western Digital TV HD Media Player.

What is the WD TV HD Media Player? It’s a tiny box that lives next to your TV. Into this, plug a memory stick or a USB hard drive, then playback your video clips, music and audio files, or browse through your collection of photos and images.

It’s not one of those expensive media plays, and it’s not a PVR – It just does a simple job – plug in some media and show it on your TV… in HD. It has two USB sockets, an HDMI connector, digital audio out and a composite AV out.

Easy to use, and on special at one retailer for a little over £60.

See our updated review of the WD TV HD, with screenshots and photos, at radioandtelly.co.uk/wdtvhdmediaplayer.html

Unhappy with the quality of the BBC HD channel? Tell the PM.

As we reported recently, various changes to the BBC HD channel bitrate have angered many HD viewers. The change has resulted in a 40% reduction in bitrate, although the BBC deny that this will have any noticeable affect on the viewing experience. That’s not how many viewers see it.

If you’re an HD viewer and are not happy with the reduction. There’s now a petition to ask the UK Government to apply a little pressure on the Beeb to restore the HD bitrate to its former 16Mbps rate.

If you want to sign, the petition is on the Number 10 website.

Our podcast lads have been hard at work again, and a new audio podcast has just been released.

Catch up on the latest with Freeview HD, the new BT Vision box, more HD channels, some Freesat updates, plus your latest email feedback.

Listen online or download the update from www.frequencycast.co.uk/update.html. Or, if you have an iPod or iPhone, get us from the FrequencyCast Podcast page on iTunes.

Today sees the launch of another HD channel on Sky, bringing the total to 37 HD channels.

This new movies channel features a back catalogue of MGM movies that have been re-mastered into the HD format. The channel runs 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

MGM HD launched on Sky channel 345 today, the 14th December 2009.

To watch MGM HD, you will need to subscribe to both Sky Movies and Sky HD. If you don’t want to sign to Sky Movies, you can get MGM HD as a premium service for £5 a month.

See the updated Sky HD Channel Lineup.

From today, 14th December 2009, E4 goes HD.

The entertainment channel from Channel 4 will be broadcasting high definition content on Sky channel 215, bringing the total number of HD channels on Sky to 36.

E4 HD uses the 1080i HD format, and the channel is included in the Sky+ HD subscription package.

See the updated Sky HD Channel Lineup.

Two new channels have just been added to the Freeview line-up, to co-incide with today’s launch of Freeview HD:

• BBC HD – Channel 50
• ITV1 HD – Channel 51

These channels have been added to the lineup for Crystal Palace, London. We also expect these to be added to Winter Hill (Manchester/Granada) shortly.

As a reminder, there are no Freeview HD receivers on the market in the UK capable of watching Freeview HD. Freeview HD will only be available in the London and Granada areas initially, and ITV1 HD is not set to launch until early next year.

More on Freeview HD on our Freeview HD section.

Our latest free podcast is out – Take a listen to our December edition of FrequencyCast.

FrequencyCast covers Digital TV in the UK, and in this show we look atthe upcoming launch of Freeview HD, an update on Freesat and the iPlayer and other TV and tech news.

In this new show, also look at wireless hotspots, a new kind of magical TV remote control, and a desktop Chumby. We also answer listeners emails, texts and podline calls.

If you’ve not tried FrequencyCast yet, please give us a try. Our shows are free – you can listen online, or download shows to your iPod, MP3 player or desktop computer.

The latest show is available now from http://www.frequencycast.co.uk/latest.html

Got iTunes? Add FrequencyCast to iTunes.

We hope you enjoy our Decemeber show!

The BBC has just released their official timetable for the rollout of Freeview HD.

Manchester and London will be getting Freeview HD at the start of December, as the Winter Hill and Crystal Palace transmitters get the upgrade – although there are unlikely to be any set-top boxes available on the market at the time of launch.

The Freeview HD rollout has been accelerated with an advance network to allow Freeview viewers in London, Glasgow, Newcastle, Leeds, Bradford and Birmingham to get Freeview HD by the end of March 2010, with 50% of the UK able to get HD by the end of June 2010.

Freeview’s Managing Director, Ilse Howling, said: “This is great news for the millions of Freeview homes and viewers who are looking forward to getting high definition with no subscription next year.”

For the full Freeview HD timetable, see our Freeview HD Information section.

Our podcast boys have just released an audio update. Nearly 12 minutes of digital TV news and comment.

Presenters Carl and Pete look at the BBC’s Points of View appearance explaining why BBC HD’s quality hasn’t dropped, Channel 4’s 3D week starts next Monday, problems with Winter Hill and Welsh TV, plus it’s the end of the road for ourkindofmusic.

Listen online or download the feed update at www.frequencycast.co.uk/update.html, or get us from the FrequencyCast Podcast page on iTunes.

The BBC’s Head of HD, Danielle Nagler, appeared on BBC1’s Points of View this afternoon to address viewers concerns about the recent changes in quality on the BBC’s HD channel.

Ms Nagler confirmed that there has been a 40% reduction in the bitrate used on the BBC HD channel, as a result of new BBC HD encoders that were introduced at the start of August 2009 to reduce bandwidth.

Viewers complaints featured in the show talk about a major reduction in picture quality, making it little better than standard definition.

In response to criticism, Ms Nagler responded that there is “No evidence that reducing the bitrate has an impact on picture quality or that there’s an absolute relationship between bitrate and picture quality” – implying that the complainers are just imagining the deterioration of HD picture quality shown by the BBC.

There’s also discussion of the Beeb’s commitment to offer 75% of the content on BBC HD in HD, delays in transmission of HD shows, and display of DOGs (the digital on-screen graphic logo).

From looking at comments on today’s Points of View, many seem pretty unimpressed with Ms Nagler’s defense of the changes to the HD encoding, with accusations of “denial and spin” being posted in threads on the BBC’s Internet Blog.

If you missed the show, look for Points of View from Sunday 8th November on the BBC iPlayer. Direct link to show

If you’re one of the BBC HD viewers that appear to be imagining the quality drop after this 40% reduction, we’d welcome your comments…

Eurosport has joined the High Definition channel lineup on Sky, bringing the count to 19 HD channels. You can get Eurosport without having to sign to Sky’s premium sports package. Eurosport is on channel 412.

Sky’s also recently dropped the price of its HD service. More on Sky HD