Digital TV Impression

[steve_qix]

I've had a DTV converter going for several months.... so far, the experience is mostly positive.

I have the Insignia box and it is pretty good.  The audio and video are often out of synch, as has been pointed out by many others here.  The audio quality is superior on every channel.  If it's bad on digital, it is worse on analog, so that's good.

The only issue I'm trying to deal with is the hard disk recorder I have.  It has an analog tuner, so I have to put a DTV converter box ahead of it to record.  I can't use the same type of box because the remote control would then control BOTH boxes at the same time, and obviously this would kill any recordings in progress.... so I'll have to find another box that's as good as the Insgnia.

Does any here know if the Zenith box and the Insignia box use the same remote codes?  Internally, these boxes use the same tuner, and are very similar.  The remotes LOOK different, but from an electrical standpoint, I'm not sure.

Thanks and Regards,

Steve

[K3ZS]

If I recall, the Zenith and Insignia are made by the same company.

[Tom WA3KLR]

Both are LG products.

[steve_qix]

Both are LG products.

Right !  I just wonder if they take the same remote.  I need to be able to operate both boxes at the same time, but use different remote controls.

[flintstone mop]

Not to hyjack this thread BUT.............I have a distaste for whomever the main company is for Magnavox/Phillips, etc. Every DAM cheap-ass DVD player I have purchased with different names is controlled by the same DAM remote...what a mess!!! The only hope is to buy a Panasonic.

Fred

[N4LTA]

I have a 37" HDTV on Direct TV - has been for over a year. I love it. The quality is amazing.

When I watch analog TV it drives me crazy with the fuzzyness and lack of quality. What do you expect with UHF frequencies? The multipath is inherent and worse with digital.

Over the air TV is dead in most places and dying most everywhere else.

[Pete, WA2CWA]

Not to hyjack this thread BUT.............I have a distaste for whomever the main company is for Magnavox/Phillips, etc. Every DAM cheap-ass DVD player I have purchased with different names is controlled by the same DAM remote...what a mess!!! The only hope is to buy a Panasonic.

Fred

I make a point to get equipment that all use the same remotes or can be programmed to use the same remote. Saves having to strap several different remotes to my belt.

[WB2YGF]

When I watch analog TV it drives me crazy with the fuzzyness and lack of quality. What do you expect with UHF frequencies? The multipath is inherent and worse with digital.

I have a 42" Sony LCD rear projection.  Excellent for HDTV. It also does a pretty good job with analog.  What annoys me is how bad DTV 480i looks.

[KA1ZGC]

Over the air TV is dead in most places and dying most everywhere else.

...in your opinion. I'm not sure I'd go quite that far.

True, many folks have cable and/or sattelite. My folks have DirecTV, but over-the-air reception is still very important to them. They're not poor by any means, but are looking to cut the sattelite service down to the bare minimum to save money. Their retirement accounts have taken a beating just like everyone else's. I'm sure people less financially secure are cutting those services altogether.

The cable/sattelite carriers are required to carry your local channels, but the determination of which local channels they have to provide to you is based on your Designated Market Area. This can be a pain in rural states.

For example, my folks want to catch their local news from the stations in Bangor, ME, but are considered to be in the Portland DMA, even though Bangor is much closer. As a result, DirecTV provides the Portland stations, and not the Bangor ones. All the sattelite and cable carriers provide the same sets of local channels (they all go by your DMA, as the FCC regs dictate), so changing carriers or services doesn't solve that problem.

So, even for a lot of folks who do have cable or sattelite, broadcast television is still a necessity. The two are not mutually exclusive if you live outside a major metropolis.

[Steve - WB3HUZ]

Traditional over-the-air BC of all kinds is dying. Broadband and 3G/4G wireless will only hasten it.

[KA1ZGC]

With all the luddite-esque pissing and moaning I'm hearing, I don't think the fat lady's going to be singing for at least a few more years. Too many old people have no use for modern technology, and frankly my only use for 3G/4G facilities is to make a phone call. Remember when phones were used to make phone calls? 

...just my opinion, of course.

[WA1HZK]

Hey Steve
I like your new plate!
Expanded basic cable here. I bought a second hand Sony Hi-Def and a new tuna. Now I get the local channels in hi-def but that's about it. To get any more I must puke up some bucks to Comcast. It doesn't seem right that I need to pay more in order to get the new "standard" transmissions. I guess I'll put up an antenna & rotor and maybe a sat. antenna this spring. Living for the day I can flip off Comcast.
Keith

[Steve - WB3HUZ]

Old people aren't driving the market. Dying is the operative word, not dead.

With all the luddite-esque pissing and moaning I'm hearing, I don't think the fat lady's going to be singing for at least a few more years. Too many old people have no use for modern technology, and frankly my only use for 3G/4G facilities is to make a phone call. Remember when phones were used to make phone calls? 

...just my opinion, of course.

[KF1Z]

I have an analog/digital tv   it has no "S-meter" or "quality-meter"...
Nothing even close.


I wasn't able to pick up any analog stations clear enough to watch before...

And now all the "local" stations have gone digital...
I get nothing at all.


I'll stick with sat-tv  til the fiber-optic line rolls out through here next year.

[KA1ZGC]

Old people aren't driving the market. Dying is the operative word, not dead.

Fine, forget old people. There were two halves to the sentence. I'm not "old people", I'm younger than you, and somehow made it through life in hi-tech without mobile broadband.

We've had 20+ years to build a cellular infrastructure, still large swaths of land without coverage of any kind. If you can't get a cell signal in a given area now, you won't be getting a wireless broadband signal there any time soon, either.

In those very same spots, you can pick up numerous FM and TV stations.

As far as the market is concerned, markets aren't driven by demand alone. Supply is equally important. 20 years into it, the supply is still short, with an ever-increasing demand. That won't change until technology catches up with theory. Even if the solution is invented today, it's at least three years from market, and that's if they rush things.

Besides, what you just said about 3G/4G was also said about cable and sattelite TV and radio being the death of broadcast media 20 or 30 years ago. Still waiting for that one to come true. Still broadcast stations out there making money. Perhaps nobody told their audience there's no market for them anymore.

So again, the total heat-death of broadcast is still a few years away. I never said it wasn't dying, I just said the end is still a few years off, and it is. I stand by my statement.

[Steve - WB3HUZ]

We're in agreement. It's not dead.

BTW, radio channels are already available on cell phones (e.g. Blackberry has 150 channels). And if you have a cell phone like an iPhone, you can watch TV too. No three years away about it. It's here now.

I still prefer old school radio but I can see the utility of a distributed delivery system for continuity of service, localization of WX warnings, etc. If I were starting a radio station today, I'd go for cell/wireless distro over a fixed facility OTA operation. Why have one transmitter when you can have 10,000!

[Pete, WA2CWA]

One of my computers has a TV/FM tuner card in it and I can hook the cable to it and watch about 50 different (non premium type channels). Computer even comes with a remote for TV and DVD control. Do a spreadsheet, work the Flex, surf the web, and watch a TV show on one screen and all at the same time. Technology is great.

[KA1ZGC]

Okay, I think I see where the disconnect was (no pun intended).

We're in agreement. It's not dead.

BTW, radio channels are already available on cell phones (e.g. Blackberry has 150 channels). And if you have a cell phone like an iPhone, you can watch TV too. No three years away about it. It's here now.

The end-user devices are here now, yes. The terrestrial infrastructure to support their full feature set is mostly within a few hundred miles of a major metro (I'm talking non-sattelite devices, here). That accounts for a large portion of the populace, certainly, but still leaves some big holes geographically. There are plenty of places I've been to where someone's smackberry or iPhone could make a phone call and run the embedded apps, but was otherwise an electric paperwhieght (I have altoghether too many friends with smackberries and iPhones).

So in that sense, it's still not available everywhere.

I still prefer old school radio but I can see the utility of a distributed delivery system for continuity of service, localization of WX warnings, etc. If I were starting a radio station today, I'd go for cell/wireless distro over a fixed facility OTA operation. Why have one transmitter when you can have 10,000!

Within light-pollution range of a major metro, it would work gangbusters. Rural and mountainous areas are still a bitch because we don't quite have the technology to provide the geographical coverage at microwave frequencies that we can at VHF in a way that's cost-effective.

That's the solution I'm saying is a ways off yet, not the end-user devices themselves. For now, I think it's safe to say that broadcast coverage trumps digital wireless coverage in terms of sqare mileage by a reasonable margin, and head count by a smaller percentage.

One other dimension that haven't touched on is that these are subscription services we're discussing. Broadcast is not. People tend to gravitate more towards free things, and the overall social mood is slowly moving towards frugality. They'll suffer through a few ads to get something for free.

The chaging social psyche might (and I'm theorizing, here) even have a slight chilling effect on improvements to that infrastructure. Everybody knows where their "dead zones" are and have come to accept them as a part of life. Expansion and improvement of the wireless infrastructure has to be balanced with keeping the rates competetive, and everyone's watching their bottom lines that much closer now.

Anyway, we're mostly saying the same thing from two different directions.

[WB2YGF]

People tend to gravitate more towards free things...

Not necessarily...

The problem with terrestrial TV, is that there are a few cable channels I don't want to do without, like CNN, FOX News, CNBC and the WX channel.  I don't see why these can't be provided as broadcast subchannels since they are advertiser supported.  Can you imagine WNBC transmitting CNBC and MSNBC as subchannels for free, and WABC sub-casting the Disney channel for free?  The cable companies would be FURIOUS, and I suspect many people would defect back to free TV. 

Moreover, if the cable companies are preventing this from happening due to some contractual obligation, the FCC should ban these clauses from contracts and encourage the unfettered distribution of cable channels over the airwaves.  Some of these cable channels are as much a part of the fabric of America as the OTA networks once were.

[KA1ZGC]

People tend to gravitate more towards free things...

Not necessarily...

Yes, necessarily. Given the option of a free cup of coffee vs. a $15 latte, most people will take the free cup of coffee, unless they're compulsive spenders (who by definition are not "normal" people), or just plain stupid. Status-spending is losing its popularity.

The problem with terrestrial TV, is that there are a few cable channels I don't want to do without, like CNN, FOX News, CNBC and the WX channel.  I don't see why these can't be provided as broadcast subchannels since they are advertiser supported.  Can you imagine WNBC transmitting CNBC and MSNBC as subchannels for free, and WABC sub-casting the Disney channel for free?  The cable companies would be FURIOUS, and I suspect many people would defect back to free TV.

The reason the broadcast channels don't subchannel the cable channels is because they aren't being offered to them. Maintaining a cable-only program carries far less legal liability than maintaining a broadcast program. Cable and sattelite are subsription-based, therefore not accessible to the general public, therefore Janet Jackson's hooter doesn't get the network (and the innocent affiliates in the cities the complainants live in) some ridiculous fine because America is hyper-sensitive as a culture (the FCC wasn't going to fine anyone until all the Granny Joneses ganged up on Congress).

Cable outfits don't have to maintain a public file, meet a minimum number of hours of "public service" programming, meet a minimum number of hours of "children's programming", or any of that legal vomit. They're free to run their own programming without the boatload of restrictions and federal oversight that broadcast stations have to put up with.

Most of the broadcast affiliates are already subchannelling their own news and weather outlets. At least, they were. Many have stopped because they couldn't make money on it.

The pricing structure is different for cable networks than it is for the broadcast networks. No conspiracy there, that's just private business functioning as designed.

Moreover, if the cable companies are preventing this from happening due to some contractual obligation, the FCC should ban these clauses from contracts and encourage the unfettered distribution of cable channels over the airwaves.  Some of these cable channels are as much a part of the fabric of America as the OTA networks once were.

No. The FCC, along with the rest of the federal governement, should not be in the business of dictating the terms of specific private business contracts unless they have some ownership stake in those companies at the time the contracts are signed. They can (and do) set the ground rules, and otherwise need to stay out of it.

The cable channels aren't being distributed over broadcast airwaves because they don't want to be. That's not a conspiracy, and we don't have some Constitutional right to our favorite cable channels (or even to broadcast television, for that matter). The cable channels can be "part of the fabric of America" (it's not like they're "mom and apple pie" or something) without the goverment putting a gun to their heads and forcing them to become broadcast networks just because you don't feel like paying for them. That's not how this country is supposed to work.

[WB2YGF]

Yes, necessarily. Given the option of a free cup of coffee vs. a $15 latte, most people will take the free cup of coffee, unless they're compulsive spenders (who by definition are not "normal" people), or just plain stupid. Status-spending is losing its popularity.

We aren't talking about BMW's here.  Something that practically everyone has, conveys no status.   Wanting more than a few channels, or avoiding having to put up a 150 ft tower to get reception is not "status spending". 

Even "normal" people pay for cable because they feel it's a product that's worth the cost or they wouldn't have it.  The facts speak for themselves.  Free is often worth what it costs.  Let me know when you see cable and sat market share plummet.

BTW, send me the address where I can get the free cup of coffee.

[KA1ZGC]

You absolutely ignored the logical and factual explanations to wrap yourself around the axles over one single statement. You're not interested in actually discussing the topic, you just feel some need to contradict whatever I say about it to feel better about yourself.

Facts never speak for themselves. Facts just lay there. People speak for the facts.

If free is worth what it costs, why do you think the FCC should force the cable channels to give themselves to you for free? You're defeating your own argument.

[Pete, WA2CWA]

BTW, send me the address where I can get the free cup of coffee.

At some of the rest stops on I70 in Ohio are one place I know where they serve free coffee. You have sneak up on the cup to drink it. Of course, donations are encouraged 

[KA1ZGC]

BTW, send me the address where I can get the free cup of coffee.

At some of the rest stops on I70 in Ohio are one place I know where they serve free coffee. You have sneak up on the cup to drink it. Of course, donations are encouraged 

Yep, there's a couple of them on I-80, too.

For that matter, come over to the house sometime. I'll give you a cup of coffee.

[w8khk]

Several welcome centers on the interstates also serve free coffee.  On I-70 eastbound leaving Colorado and entering Kansas, they have served free coffee for years.  Also entering Virginia from North Carolina on US-29 the welcome center is very careful to make sure the coffee pot is fresh.  Decaf and high-octane, your choice.

Many employers serve free coffee, HP has done it for over 30 years.  Coffee, hot chocolate, tea.  They used to provide free juice, pop, and donuts every morning back in the 80s.