About IHETS Television

NOTE: The lease for the satellite system will expire June 30, 2006. IHETS will not support the system after that time and is offering a new service, IHETS Interactive, to replace it.

IHETS Television uses digital compression technology to transmit multiple 3.3 MBPS program channels on a single satellite transponder.

Programming for delivery originates from campus studios in Bloomington, Muncie, Vincennes, Lafayette, Terre Haute, South Bend, Evansville, and Indianapolis. From there, the signals are transmitted to the GE Americom (GE-3) satellite in geostationary orbit above the equator. The satellite receives the channels and retransmits them to receive antennas at user locations. The signal received at the user site is then decoded and made available to the user as video and audio or as a modulated RF channel that can be tuned on a cable-ready TV set. Any location in Indiana and throughout the continental United States can receive the signal.

From its inception, IHETS Television has had an audio talkback component for immediate student/professor interaction. The present talkback system, designed by IHETS staff, uses circuits of the campus telephone network (SUVON, also operated by IHETS) or of commercial long-distance carriers. The talkback system allows a student to ask or answer a question simply by pushing a button. The student can be heard at all receiving locations for the class.