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Jan 2009 Deadline for HDTV Cutoff
stlhawkeye writes "Broadcasters have recently accepted a deadline of January 2009 for the mandatory end of analog television signal broadcasts. Broadcasters have expressed concerns that those without subscription television services will see blank screens unless they buy new units. "
2009 will be the perfect time to officially throw away your TV (Well, keep it for parts) and curl up with a good book.
Oh, but I know what you're thinking: "But HyperChicken, I need my PS3/Xbox360/Revolution". So hook them up to a monitor.
Free of Flash! Free of Flash!
this is the cutoff to convert to DTV not HDTV. how is the public supposed to figure it out if even the nerds can't get it right?
Mike
Millions of people now HAVE to buy new TVs. Is it time to invest in Sony?
M.
Here's the suggested output that will be broadcasted into analog TV's:
"Nothing for you to see here.
Move along."
All I use my analog TV for is watching stuff I downloaded to my computer anyway.
"Anonymous Coward" is for whistleblowers, not unpopular opinions.
Get a FREE Sony PS3
If there was no longer a need for something, it would become obsolete on its own. Demanding that something become obsolete is quite suspicious.
First of all this has NOTHING TO DO WITH HIGH DEFINITION.
It has everything to do with digital broadcasting taking up FAR LESS of the broadcast spectrum that they want to free up for other uses. If the government doesn't step in, that huge portion of the spectrum would be tied up in archaic uses forever!
In a similar sense, sure people can get by using their 56k lines, but wouldn't it be a lot better if everyone had access to fiber, cable, or something else along those lines?
It seems to me that at least part of the reason that America isn't the most technologically advanced nation in the world is because we like to hold on to dying technologies. In the next few years we're going to be seeing HD-DVD and Blu-Ray technology emerging into the marketplace, but a lot of people will still be using VHS.
We might take a hit in the pocketbook, but isn't it time that our country got with the times? I don't mean that we should adopt every new technology even if it's only marginally better, but we shouldn't cling to old technology when there are clearly better alternatives out there.
This is my favorite part of all of this. Not only are those of us that can afford digital TV being double-fucked for the creation of the HDTV standard and then having to pay for the tuner for something we just don't need, we now may have part of our tax dollars pay for someone else's digital tuner converter that can't afford HDTV! Absolutely unnecessary.
(Emphasis mine)
I think you mean double plus -fucked sir...
-ShelbyCobra
Living life in the right side of the s-plane
...this decision is being pushed by the government because they want control over the current analog frequencies, which they will then resell and lease to private industry to generate another revenue stream for the government. And who is payinf ro it? As usual, we are.
"I have never won a debate with an ignorant person." -Ali ibn Abi Talib
Demanding that something become obsolete is quite suspicious.
You misspelled American.
<flamesuit on>
I'll turn into a supernova and burn up everything. Well I'll turn into a black little hole and you'll turn into string.
Quite heavily at TV Snob.com and boy are people confused on even what to buy - if they can convert their existing sets, or if they even want to continue watching TV - just kidding on that front. I think this is a total disaster for TV - there should be more options for people and legacy is legacy - it should still work somehow.
-- Jay Brewer -- http://www.blogpire.com
Is it just me or has the TV-viewing American public gotten totally fucked or what? First we have free TV.. all we needed was a TV and an antenna. This, of course, was supported by advertising. Fair enough.
Next comes cable TV. Sweet! Immunity from foul weather, better content (at least initially) and no commercials! "What's that you say? No commercials? Sorry buddy, I see commercials every damn day on cable TV." Ah yes, friends.. if my recollection is correc, cable TV was supposed to be commercial free as it was a subscription service. But oh how the mighty dollar wins all. We now get 20 minutes of television entertainment for 30 minutes of viewing time (for thsoe wihout a DVR) AND we pay for it!
The boss is calling.. gotta run.
What is your penile percentile?
High Definition TV != Digital TV. You require a digital framework to provide HDTV, but having a digital framework does not imply HDTV. Sets aren't going dark when it comes into effect, but the quality of signal is going to improve greatly.
Canada has had this in effect for a while. The deadline was January, 2005, and as of this writing, all TV channels are available digitally. Except, of course, some of the channels that come from the US. The difference in signal quality is very noticable when watching one of them. Most of the networks are already digital, BTW.
It's still compatible with OTA transmission, as well as analog cable signals. Old TVs can still see it, because the mandate was not to eliminate analog signals, it was to ensure digital availablility. Those of us who have an HDTV, or a digital/satellite receiver have a digital signal, complete with better sound and picture. Those of us on analog still have analog TV.
If you believe everything you read, you'd better not read. - Japanese proverb
the fun part is that NEW analog tv sales STILL outpace HD or even Digital capable Tv sales significantly.
Also digital Tuners that will convert to analog are still INSANELY priced.
when I can get a DTV to ATV tuner for $99.00 then I'll agree that it's a good time to switch.
with DTV's still well over $800.00 and DTV transmitters still 5X the price of the analog gear it is not going to happen.
and everyone forgets about the small town UHF channels. Who is going to buy them a new transmitter when they can barely afford pro-sumer 4 year old camcorders for their news?
Oh and the small college tv channels? what about them?
Who is going to buy them 20 million dollar transmitters?
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
I was born in 1971 and didn't have a TV until my second year in college. (1990). This was a concious decision by my parents. I saw a little TV at my friends' houses. But as a family, we did just fine without one. The notion that tax payer dollars should pay for converter boxen is ridiculous. I would venture to say that if you're the type of person who needs taxpayer dollars to keep your old set running, you're probably the type of person who would be better off throwing your TV in the garbage and going outside for a walk.
From the article "Congress also wants to auction the spectrum to wireless high-speed Internet services. Such an auction is expected to raise up to $30 billion for federal coffers." Which I'm sure will be applied to our ballooning war debt.
As an added incentive, there's all the campaign contributions that the Washington hoi-poloi will get from hardware manufacturers, cable providers, wireless wanks, etc. ad nauseum.
But the long and short of it is that that cute little portable all in one TV will be relegated to semi-functional door stop status if the politicos and industry has their way.
Some days it's just not worth
chewing through my restraints.
It frees up wasted analog RF spectrum space, this can be as much as 6x less when moving to digital format. The upside to this for end-users is that the picture and sound will be much more reliable in the sense that noise that can be seen in the channel currently should be eliminated. There still can be tiling due to transmission problems, but in general the quality is much improved. I'm sure some company will offer a digital tuner that makes the conversion from over the air digital to analog for older tv sets. If people continue to waste RF space by supporting old and unefficient systems it will really stiffle wireless innovation.
Are you this paranoid in real life, or do you just do it to karma whore on Slashdot? If you're really this high-strung, good luck getting past age 50 without having a massive coronary.
ATSC allows the FCC to pack the same number of stations in a smaller broadcast band due to ATSC's superior resistance to interference from transmitters on the same or nearby channels. The channel size remains the same (6 MHz), but the minimum space in between transmitters, both in frequency and geographical distance, is being reduced.
Mea navis aericumbens anguillis abundat
No, they're going to sell it for well below what it's really worth, and those that spearhead the sell-off will reap ENORMOUS CAMPAIGN CONTRIBUTIONS from big media corps.
I'll believe it when my screen goes blank.
Slashdot: 24 hours behind every other site or your money back!
You misspelled American.
"Demanding that something American obsolete is quite suspicious."
I don't get it.
"Meanwhile, lawmakers are eager to reclaim the analog airwaves to improve public safety radio communication. Congress also wants to auction the spectrum to wireless high-speed Internet services."
In a related story, an 88 car pile-up on I-5 today seems to have been caused by an inattentive driver who was configuring his wireless high-speed to receive improved public safety radio communication.
It's a spectrum hog, just like your crappy old car the get 7 MPG and spews out smelly grey smoke. I want those channels recycled for UWB and other wireless services. Some might even be new unlicensed Part 15 bands so The Man doesn't get even his geedy capitalist hands on them.
In addition, I live in the SF Bay area where reliable reception of both analog and digital TV is impossible in most areas without a 70 foot antenna tower. So conventional TV broadcast frequencies are useless to me anyway.
Since by 2009 you will be able to build a digital receiver with NTSC analog modulator for about $10 I suspect stations will be able to offer free or dirt-cheap receiver-converters for those poor folks too poor to shell out 50 bucks for a new digital-ready TV so they can watch The Newlywed Gaem or whatever crap that's still on analog TV. Shoot, by 2009 nice plasma TVS are gonna cost about $200.
Give a man a fish and you have fed him for today. Teach a man to fish, and he'll say "WHERE'S MY FISH, YOU IDIOT?"
Now I know exactly when to throw out the old TV, cancel our cable television service and drop the NetFlix subscription... that should save us about $100/month in subscription fees alone. We could use the extra $1,200/year to put into our other projects.
January 2009, check. Thank you for the reminder.
My daughter will be 4, and that's just enough time for me to educate her about the corruption in mass media and broadcast television.
With the broadcast flag being fully entrenched by that time (whether passed via a rider on some unrelated bill or otherwise), and media being contorted to represent the "Truth" as given by the current administration in power (can you say "Al Jazeera"?), there really is no point to watching TV.
We can't control our media (even media we've bought in the store, er, I mean "rented"). We can't even skip past the commercials on DVDs now. How long before we can't skip past commercials on television too?
The best HD reality shows lie right outside my front door.
Now how does that benifit me at all?
Emergency services (fire, police, ambulance) now have the bandwidth to handle more than one crisis at a time.
You really can get a strong cell phone signal anywhere you're standing.
Gigabit wireless networking.
More Home Shopping Network channels.
There are all kinds of good (and evil) possibilities.
One of things people forget when talking about DTV is this:
All High Definition TV is Digital TV. Not all Digital TV is High Definition.
People who have older, analog only sets will need to purchase a new TV that can decode digital signals or a set top box that can decode and output to the old TV.
People who have cable or sattelite will only need a new box if they want HDTV.
--Mike
Jan 2009 is carefully chosen to be right after the next big election, Nov 2008. The broadcasters have tremendous influence in elections through control over TV coverage. If the broadcasters still don't like the transition plan in summer 2008, they will be able to arrange a further deadline extension through pressuring the political parties.
Why is this modded informative. The poster has no clue. Pick a decoder. Terrestrial Receiver/Decoders have been out for at least 4 years.
Have you ever been to a turkish prison?
Current FM in the US is 88-108 MHz... a mere 10 MHz.. Imagine how many stations we could have, including non profit public interest stations, unlicensed local low power stations, etc with another 29 MHz!?!?!
In medium sized to major cities the FM territory has been maxed out forever. There is clearly purpose, demand, and need to having more stations. The technological cost of extending FM receivers and setting up transmitters is relatively minimal.
Of course we'd have to fight broadcasters for the same reason we've fought them, and lost, on digital radio- more stations make their "property", the existing licensed stations less valuable.
Yes, I use and love internet radio, but FM radio is what the vast majority of people have easy access to. It's what you hear when you eat out and when people drive by with their radios cranked up. At least with massively more stations it wouldn't be the same old 'format'ed sh*t.
And the benefits to letting schools, community groups of every stripe, and pretty much anybody operate low power FM stations with a range of 1-5 miles would be enormous just in terms of the cultural development it would bring. Information wants to be free, but your average 'born in the ghetto' gangster, just to choose an example, doesn't know it because he grows up listening to Ninety-Whatever The Box where he's just a groomed product for the advertisers looking for the 16-29 urban male.
Come on.. auctioning everything off to the highest bidder just ensures that the highest bidder runs society.. and occasionally that turns out to be good, often is ok, but also frequently sucks bigtime.
-dj_virto
I understand that. I'm not talking about the number of stations you can broadcast I'm talking about the way the spectrum is divvied up amongst the various stations in a market. As it stands, many stations have both a 6MHz NTSC allotment (or two in the case of a duopoly), and a 6MHz ATSC allotment (which can be split up as the station wishes). This story is all about the reclaiming of the former. I see no difference in terms of 'saving spectrum bandwidth' between giving a station a 6MHz NTSC allotment and giving that station a 6MHz ATSC allotment instead. Either way, the station got a full 6MHz.
Now, as I said earlier, if the FCC was giving SD-only ATSC allotments to smaller stations, rather than the whole 6MHz, then they could possibly save bandwidth. As it stands, the FCC is taking away stations' 6MHz NTSC allotments and giving them back a 6MHz ATSC allotment. Only in a duopoly situation is any spectrum actually freed up (since they would have 12MHz of NTSC bandwidth but only 6MHz of ATSC).
I think the fundamental differece in our arguments is what we're actually referring to. You're speaking of the program content held within those 6MHz ATSC allotments - I'm only referring to the fact that an ATSC allotment is 6MHz, just like an NTSC allotment, and the fact that the exact same amount of bandwidth will be used in all but duopoly situations, where the bandwidth allotment is half that of NTSC.
FC Closer
I'm happy not being force to waste money every time someone decides that a current technology is obsolete and everyone should be forced to upgrade!
They're not deciding it's obsolete. They're deciding that if they lobby The Powers That Be to force you to switch to an incompatible technology (and thereby make a purchase), you'll probably eventually cave and buy one of their products, thus lining their pockets.
And The Powers That Be are deciding that this is a Good Thing[TM] because it lines their pockets as well.
And the sad thing is that 95% of us will indeed eventually cave sooner or later and line all of their pockets needlessly (doubly so when you consider just how wealthy the media and manufacturing moguls already are), costing us a bit of food on the table and retirement security, despite our Valorous protests of "Then I Shan't Watch TV After 2009!" here on Slashdot.
STOP . AMERICA . NOW
OK, here's my gripe on this. We live in eastern Virginia, well north of Norfolk and east of Richmond, and south of DC. We have satelite TV, and thus would be unaffected by this, right? Wrong. The FCC classifies us as being local to the Richmond market area. Our small, rural county of just over 9,000 is situated right on the Chesapeake Bay, and is very dependant on marine forcasts that are provided by the Norfolk television stations. Because the FCC classifies us as Richmond area, however, we are not allowed to get the Norfolk local stations on Satelite. Point in case of how we are screwed over by this, as we'll have to get either a new TV or a new box of some sort to *attempt* to pick up the digital signal for Norfolk. However, as previously mentioned, this signal is going to be more difficult to pick up because it needs to be clearer for it to work right (we are on the fringe of what you would call the Norfolk transmission area). So, add onto the laundry list of things the FCC needs to change, is the availability of multiple markets "local" stations to users, no matter where they are, so we will be able to get the Norfolk local stations through the Satelite.