Digital TV Myths
There was a press release recently issued by TeleTruth.Com on the state of HDTV and digital broadcasting recently. Specifically, it dealt with Over The Air (OTA) reception. I responded to the original author with some advice and corrections to the original article, which could have been a bit misleading to the average consumer. Below is my response. You may want to read the original press release before reading the reply. Hopefully, there is some info here that you will find useful without referring to the original article though.
Date: Thu, May 22, 2008 3:23 pm
To: tom@teletruth.org
Subject: “A View from the Digital Divide DTV Front”
I’m not really sure how to address the issues in the article, so I’ll just try making a few points and suggestions below. Many, if not most, of these points would not be understood by the average consumer, but that’s another matter:
Mistake #1 - Buying a converter at Best Buy. You are far better off buying online or via mail order from a company that specializes in broadcast or Over The Air (OTA) antennas than purchasing one art a mass market retailer like Best Buy. Probably the best place you can shop is at solidsignal.com . They have a wide range of boxes, many of which are cheaper than the one you purchased in the article. They also have excellent customer service and can make some useful suggestions by phone. You can also compare a number of boxes on websites such as amazon.com as well.
Mistake #2 - Listening to a salesperson at Radio Shack. Let’s face it, if someone really knew a lot about local broadcasting, they probably wouldn’t be working at Radio Shack to begin with. The suggestion for you to buy an in-line amplifier to solve your problem of lack of signal strength was just plain stupid. Radio Shack is no place to look for expert advice.
Mistake #3 - Looking for antenna installers. If you couldn’t find a few hundred antenna installers in the state of New Jersey, you were definitely looking in the wrong place. If you are going to use the Yellow Pages, try looking under “satellite television”. The satellite installers that have been around for a long time also commonly install broadcast reception antennas as well. They just don’t want to spend the money on advertising to the small audience that buys OTA antennas. In particular, look for a dealer that does more than just DirecTV or DISH Network only. The dealers that install C-Band dishes and do commercial installs are your best bet. They will know the inside scoop on your local broadcasters better than anyone at Radio Shack.
Mistake #4 - $300 for an outdoor antenna??? I’m not sure what antenna you bought, but if you are doing a self-installation it should not cost anywhere near that much. I bought my own OTA antenna from solidsignal.com and paid around $75. That antenna is longer than I am tall and provides far better reception than most people would ever need. Unless you are running more than 100′+ of coaxial cable, you shouldn’t need an amp and the rest of the costs (cable, connectors) are pretty minimal. It might be cheaper to figure out EXACTLY how much cable you need, then buy it by the foot at a local hardware store, rather than buying a whole spool or a 100′ length with the connectors already crimped on.
Mistake #5 - Assuming that the signal you get today is similar to the one you will get after analog broadcasting is phased out. The fact is, very few people are actually watching their TV via digital Over The Air broadcasts right now. Most of them are still tuning in the analog channels or get their signal from the cable TV company or by satellite. The broadcasters know this. Since many broadcasters are still “toying” with HDTV, quite a number of them are only broadcasting a digital signal on limited schedules or are using limited transmitter power to save money on electricity at the moment. After all, if they are simulcasting both digital and analog signals at the same time using the same amount of power they are having to pay DOUBLE the electric bill, which is a big concern for many small stations. I think you’ll find that once the old analog signals go away, you will see broadcasters start firing up their transmitters at full power. It makes quite a difference when a broadcaster goes from a minimal 50 Watts to a full 200,000 Watts.
Mistake #6 - Expecting to get the same number of channels that are on analog. I’m sure that there are quite a number of low-power (LPTV) channels that will never make the conversion to digital, because they simply can’t afford transmitters at this point. Quite a number of other stations simply don’t have their digital systems set up yet, or are only broadcasting on a limited basis. Quite a few of them will likely wait right up until the last minute to make the transition. Until then, you should still be able to receive them on analog. Bottom line… Don’t take “overlap” of analog and digital for granted! Expect one or the other, but don’t expect to get a perfect signal from both. After all, it’s not like you are actually going to watch BOTH the analog and digital version of the same channel.
Mistake #7 - Forgetting the past. People these days quite simply take getting a decent TV signal with little or nothing for an antenna for granted. It wasn’t always that way, nor was it ever intended to be that easy to get a picture. In the early years of TV broadcasting, an outdoor antenna was almost always required, but people weren’t complaining about it back then. The only reason that it is so easy to get a signal with “rabbit ears” these days is because the shift from TV receivers using tubes to solid-state technology has made pulling-in a watchable picture infinitely easier. Solid-state amplifiers are much more sensitive and produce much less “noise” than vacuum tubes. If you tried plugging-in a circa 1940’s TV set in the same location you are in right now with rabbit ears, you wouldn’t get any picture at all. If anything, it cost far MORE to buy a TV and antenna (when you take inflation into account) back in the “old days” than it does today. Broadcasters are already pumping out signals using hundreds of thousands of watts of power. It’s the consumer’s job to turn it into a watchable picture. TV was not initially designed to be that easy to pick up. Older Americans would probably be the first to remember this. To be honest, today’s generation has been rather spoiled after growing up with cable TV or satellite television. Over The Air reception will never compete with those technologies when it comes to how easy it is to get a “perfect” picture.
Mistake #8 - FCC testing of HDTV converter boxes. ALL boxes sold in the U.S. have to be granted FCC type acceptance prior to being imported into the country or sold. Some companies have gone through the additional steps of getting their products “certified” for use with the coupon program as well. As for “practical” testing, there really is no need for it. Nothing that happens in the world of broadcasting is anything more than a matter of math. An engineer can tell you exactly what signal level to expect at a specific location well prior to hitting the transmit switch. Most products these days are only “simulated” before going into mass production. Even airplanes. The FCC has already “done the math” on the issue and broadcast engineers have already calculated the specs each broadcaster would need to get the same coverage as they had previously and what specs receivers would have to meet in order to receive them. There is no guess work going on here. It is simple math.
Mistake #9 - I wouldn’t exactly call this a mistake, but more of a reality check. All electronics products eventually become obsolete. Some sooner than others. Just ask anyone who has owned a Betamax (or any VCR, for that matter), video disc player, CD mini-disc player, Digital Audio Tape players, 8-Tracks, cassette players, 78 RPM record players, Windows 95 or any number of other examples. Some products far, far more expensive than portable television sets have been pulled from the market after as little as a few months in the past. How about all of the people that rushed out at bought non Blu-Ray HD-DVD players are getting their money back? TV sets purchased in the late 1930’s still work today (albeit in black and white). I’d say that most of these people have gotten their money’s worth by now.
Let’s not forget that the broadcasters themselves are being forced to shell out millions of dollars on new equipment, and that the FCC has pushed back the final switchover date on HDTV numerous, numerous times in the past at their request. It’s either now or never. The rest of the world is passing us by. The previous delays have already led to our version of HDTV being a half-baked solution compared to newer technology. Let’s just get on with it. I hope you find some of this info useful.
