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FCC Public Notice for 600mhz Band Plan


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The original announcement can be found here:  http://transition.fcc.gov/Daily_Releases/Daily_Business/2013/db0404/DA-13-614A1.pdf

 

 

 
FEDERAL COMMUNICATIONS COMMISSION ANNOUNCES WORKSHOP 
TO DISCUSS 600 MHz BAND PLAN
GN Docket No. 12-268
 
As part of its Learn Everything About Reverse-Auctions Now Program (LEARN), the Federal 
Communication Commission (FCC) will host a workshop on Friday, May 3, 2013 to discuss technical aspects of the 600 MHz band plan that will result from the broadcast television incentive auction.
 
1 - The FCC issued a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking regarding the broadcast television incentive auction in October, 2012.
 
2 - The workshop will be free and open to the public and will be held in the Commission Meeting Room at FCC Headquarters, located at 445 12th Street, SW, Room TW-C305, Washington, DC 20554. 
Additional details will be released closer to the event date.
 
For more information about the broadcast television incentive auction, visit: http://www.fcc.gov/learn. 
Accessibility Information. To request information in accessible formats (computer diskettes,
large print, audio recording, and Braille), send an email to fcc504@fcc.gov or call the FCC’s consumer
and Governmental Affairs Bureau at (202) 418-0530 (voice), (202) 418-0432 (TTY). This document can
also be downloaded in Word and Portable Document Format (PDF) at: http://www.fcc.gov.
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION, CONTACT: Cecilia Sulhoff, WTB, at (202) 418-0587 (voice) or 
Cecilia.Sulhoff@fcc.gov (email). 
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Is there a way to fight this type of thing from happening? If this band is auctioned off, then we here in Los Angeles will have an even smaller and more crowded spectrum to use, not to mention all the financial difficulties a great many of us will have when our expensive equipment suddenly becomes illegal to use, as it has before in the past.

 

I know Jeff and Lectrosonics have been advocating everyone getting an FCC license, but if everyone here did in fact have one, would we still stand a chance or will they just simply bulldoze our community? I have my license, I hope at least most of us do to. Maybe that will give us standing power.

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I could be smug that most of my wireless are at Block 19, but I'm positive the Senator would (correctly) remind me that the 486MHz-511MHz band would no doubt be swamped if 600MHz+ were taken away! 

 

I hope Shure, Sennheiser, Lectrosonics, Zaxcom, et all will protest the hell out of this!

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Is there a way to fight this type of thing from happening? If this band is auctioned off, then we here in Los Angeles will have an even smaller and more crowded spectrum to use, not to mention all the financial difficulties a great many of us will have when our expensive equipment suddenly becomes illegal to use, as it has before in the past.

 

I know Jeff and Lectrosonics have been advocating everyone getting an FCC license, but if everyone here did in fact have one, would we still stand a chance or will they just simply bulldoze our community? I have my license, I hope at least most of us do to. Maybe that will give us standing power.

That's what Dr. Bill says.  He also says this is a ways off still--the NAB types will not go quietly (or cheaply)

 

philp

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I hope Shure, Sennheiser, Lectrosonics, Zaxcom, et all will protest the hell out of this!

I'm sure they will... And the results will sadly be the same as before. We will be the bugs squashed on AT&T's windshield as they and the FCC move forward with this.

Tell me again how a $150 license (or even 200 of them) is an honest foil to tens of BILLIONS of dollars in corporate driven greed to control the entire spectrum?

The FCC isn't even pretending to require the buyers (and it will be AT&T or Comcast or Verizon again) to fully utilize their EXISTING licenses before they buy more... Why do they need it? To keep their competition from having it. Our own needs, valid tho they might be... Don't even get the slightest notice.

Bend over and grab your wallets, more of your gear is about to become useless.

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600 and above. Gone. Dang. And I was going to get Block 26 one of these days. It was always so open in Manhattan.

Ironically, looking at the chart it looks like my Sennheisers may survive unscathed. Or Sennheiser may have to introduce another letter like they did with G to take advantage of the equivalent of Blocks 19 and 20. And Lectro 470?

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A serious question. Knowing what we know today about the loss of the 600mHz band, if you were going to buy a new wireless system would you chance getting it in the 600mHz band?

 

 

Eric

At this very moment, we'd definitely have to know a bit more before taking that plunge.

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A serious question. Knowing what we know today about the loss of the 600mHz band, if you were going to buy a new wireless system would you chance getting it in the 600mHz band?

 

 

Eric

 

I am in this exact position right now - I was going to purchase Block 26 wireless this summer. I am now holding off on all wireless purchases until I have more information.

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This is years away. Stay calm carry on. Still using my block 27 and 28 with NO problems...

As are plenty of others... The point is that we are doing "that which is not permitted" not "that which is technically impossible" and taking some risk in doing so.

Will it be years before implementation? Certainly. I detailed why in another thread about this recently. At some future point, high powered transmissions will begin, and our existence there (27-29) will move to the "not technically possible" realm. Until that day... Keep Calm and Roll Sound. Just don't think that any comments we might make at the FCC will be anything other than a footnote of "the TV industry expresses concern, we listened, ignored, and did it anyway. They can simply buy new gear."

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when the FCC sold half of the  ENG 2G spectrum for truck to station RF video link to some big Telcom for cell phone use ( was it Sprint?) they were required to pay for the conversion of all TV stations trucks links to studio, and they did.  it was a massive expensive undertaking, the manufacturers did great, the Telcom barely noticed it on their bottom line as all the costs were passed on to cell phone users.

Best to hope for is that Verizon or whoever will pay for your new gear.

good luck and good night   wolf

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From what Mr. Mark Brunner from Shure told me regarding this entire heated topic of 600M going off, it won't be happening soon until post 2014/2015.  Now, not too long ago we had the whole 700M lights out.  With all the adjustments made throughout the entire nation from selling 700M equipments and auction/upgrading/buying new units to accommodate this transition, we, yet again, get shafted to another buy off from Congress.  FCC is only the middle guy here.

 

Regarding usage of wireless mics and where exactly you could use them, the Part 15 Unlicensed Wireless gives users the capability to input numbers for reservation (Spectrum Bridge), however, requires 30 days for approval with only limited amount of wireless data points to be used.  The Part 74 Licensed Agreement allows "us" to claim our fqy to be used at a specific venue/location with a much less downtime, but again restricts us to the number of fqy allowed at that particular place.  NFL/MLB is a whole different league.

 

Most often than not, we would be required to strictly occupy only a 6M of space first from TV 37 above and below.  I believe someone here had already posted this back last year about this.  Let's say TV28 is occupied at your shooting location, "we" won't be able to touch TV27 nor TV29, TV 31 occupied then no TV 30 nor TV32.  Since every city or area is different with TVBD and broadcasting stations, pre-planning is extremely critical, especially for those doing reality and traveling 2-4+ locations a day.  To qualify for registration, we must first use at least 6 fqys, sounds bizarre.  Used to be a guessing pick'n choose game with wireless, but now it's planned and coordinated precisely.  What's very odd is that unlicensed users are able to use adjacent TV bands while Part 74 can't.

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A serious question. Knowing what we know today about the loss of the 600mHz band, if you were going to buy a new wireless system would you chance getting it in the 600mHz band?

Eric

I am specifically staying away from 600 and above for all future purchases.

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  • 3 weeks later...

" if everyone here did in fact have one, would we still stand a chance or will they just simply bulldoze our community? "

yes

 

well of course, it depends,  but in many circumstances I can imagine, I would.

I'd also amortize it on am accelerated basis; thus getting both the value (use and income) along with maximum tax advantage.

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I had a chance at NAB to speak with one of the Shure engineers that will be dealing with this on their end, and helping to craft their responses.

 

His comments can sum up like this:

 

Nothing we do or say as wireless microphone users will be heard by the FCC - we (even Shure) are too small, the money from BigTelco is just too large.

Having a part 74 license is a nice thing, but in the scope of 'being heard' as a member by the FCC... Not worth anything.

Blocks 27+ are probably going to remain functional for the better part of a decade, and not just for political reasons. Technical ones.

The technical reasons are that the Telcos actually prefer the 1800mhz band for urban use, rather than the 800 or sub-700 bands. Why? Antenna sizing. Space on existing towers is limited, lower frequencies requires longer antennas. Longer antennas also may not be technically possible within existing phone handsets!

 

Why buy the frequencies from the FCC then? Because they can, and then BigTelco can keep their competitors from having it. Whether they want to use it or not, they don't want their competition to have any advantages, real or implied.

 

Giants on the playground, and we are ants. All we can hope is we won't be noticed while we go about our business.

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I note there are three current threads on essentially the same topic, --but different geography Europe, North America, and Oceania 

there is a lot these threads have in common. including the fact that there is plenty of lead time to worry about this (not that it would help!)...

The sky is not falling!.

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