I suppose you know that law applies ONLY to over-the-air terrestrial broadcasts. It has nothing to do with cable or satellite.
What's digital is the input signal. Does it have a DVI or HDMI input? Those are digital. How about an ATSC tuner (for digital broadcasts by antenna)?
Don't forget that one DTV channel can have up to 4 subchannels. Ignoring that gives you an inaccurate count.
Here, I can get 3 DTV channels, each of which has a subchannel, for a total of 6.
With a little indoor antenna, I get 3 analog channels (only 1 good enough to watch). That same antenna gets 3 (6 including subchannels) digital channels.
OK.
[snip]BTW, you might notice that no TV can be 100% digital and still be watchable. The LIGHT coming from the screen and SOUND coming from the speakers need to be analog, since that's the only thing people's vision and hearing can make sense of.
The real question is whether the coupon will work for a decoder with QAM in addition to the ATSC. I bet you anything the cabl;e companies will drop analog like a hot rock as soon as they can. Comcast has already started in some big cities and they tell me it will be all digital in SW Fla by this summer. Of course they are very happy to rent you a box.
There are many digital circuits on most electronic equipment.
High Definition is one of those digital circuits.
Your 2004 TV is not HDTV capable. The antenna amp is fine.
no it's not. Throw it away. You have to buy a new one for about $5,000.
Actually, High Def has nothing to do with whether the cktry is digital or not. A set can have ALL digital components in it but still only be capable of managing analog TV signals. It's the TV signal that becomes digital for HDTV, so the set requires a tuner which is capable of receiving and handling digital signals. And it will of course, use digital components; it'd be a bear to design an analog digital TV signal receiver.
Well, it's definitely unlikely, that's for sure. As someone mentioned though, the converter boxes to convert digital signals to analog signals will shortly be plentiful and at reasonable prices. Currently used antenna systems etc., should all work fine for digital signals as they are all in the same UHF bands as used today with only a few remaining in the VHF band. So if you currently can receive UHF you'll be fine for digital TV signals. I mention this only because I'm starting already to see some ads hyping special antenna systems for the "new" HDTV switch; those are ripoffs for the most part. I've also seen converter boxes already hyped for as much as $299; a clear ripoff.
Just for clarification, DTV and HDTV are technically two different animals too. If you have HDTV then you have a DTV but if you have a DTV it will receive HDTV signals but might not display in the expected wide screen formats and not with high definition. However, a DTV can still at least receive the digital signal formats as a rule.
Usually if an older set is really HDTV capable, it will have two separate antenna input jacks which connect to two separate tuners, one analog, the other DTV. If a set does not have a digital signal tuner, then it can not receive HDTV.
So a tuner that can handle a HD broadcast signal isn't digital? That's news to me.
Actually, I'm using the inline amp for "lightning protection". Sort of a sacrificial item, hoping that any surge via the antenna will take out the amp before it gets into the tv. I know that's a crap shoot, but amps are a lot cheaper than tv's.
Red
Typical artificial government nonsense. Why not open up the other bands to such uses. It also wreaks havoc with all kinds of existing radio equipment, such as w/l microphones. Force all kinds of consumer to buy new equipment even though the old stuff was still in good working condition (thousands of $ to replace some of it) because some idiots who are too stupid to work at McDonalds want to control us. Government is best which governs least.
Hi, What makes you think the amp will protect your TV set? That's false security. If lightning strikes your antenna(tower), TV will be toast. If and when there is risk for strike disconnect antenna coax and unplug power cord. Electron moves at the speed of light, remember? Ideally antenna structure has to have a good grounding for safety.
What he's saying is that TV's for decades have had some digital components, like the digital comb filter in the OP's 2004 27" set, which almost certainly does not have an ATSC tuner, which is what the real issue is. Even the ATSC tuners have some analog components as well.
The OP is confused in thinking that for the ATSC converter boxs to work, his TV needs to be "digital". It does not. The converters are designed to take ATSC and offer various outputs, including RF NTSC which you can hook up to any old NTSC TV, just like hooking up a VCR. Bottom line, his TV almost certainly doesn't have a built-in ATSC tuner and the converter boxes will work with it to receive std def ATSC that is replacing NTSC OTA, but the TV will not be capable of HD resolutions unless the specs say it's HDTV ready.
I wish my DTV TV set had separate RF jacks. I'd like to use both cable (no digital yet) and antenna.
Almost certainly requiring 2 remote controls (TV & converter), making watching TV more complicated. This problem could be avoided if TVs could have their power interrupted (switched outlet on converter) without forgetting any settings. Few TVs are like that.
Isn't that limited to people who have NO TV source other than antenna?
Many remotes supplied with converter boxes can be programed to operate the TV as well. I have directv, and the remote turns the converter and the TV on and off with one press of a button. It also controls TV volume and all on screen programming fuctions for picture and audio settings, etc. The same remote also controls my DVD player and my stereo system.
Here is a quote from the official web site:
Kevin
I didn't say a strike, I said a surge. I've lost 3 tv's at a different location from lightning surges (nearby but not direct strike) coming into the tuner section via CATV. It didn't toast the whole tv, just the tuner sections. I've not lost this tv with the amp even during severe storms with static electricity dancing within the house. I admitted nothing was sure, but past experience seems to be on my side.
Red
Apparently no one is concerned that the analog VCR's are going to be obsolete also. As I understand it, they will no longer be able to be programmed for multiple OTA channels, but limited to the single channel that the converter box is set to. Correct??
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