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Where Are All of the HDTV Tuners?
An anonymous reader asks: "Today I read about rabbit ears making a comeback with OTA HTDV. I want to purchase a standalone ATSC HDTV tuner to go with my projector, but I am having a very hard time finding one. The big-box stores seem to only stock one or two models and are frequently sold out. Searching online yields similar results. It would seem that there would be ever increasing demand for these tuners given that many HDTVs were sold without internal tuners in years past, and these tuners will be necessary for all old NTSC TVs after the February, 2009 shutdown of analog broadcasts. Where should I look to buy one of these devices? Of the currently available models, which are the best? Will the standalone HDTV tuner become a ubiquitous item as the 2009 deadline approaches?"
The FCC requirement for transmission and TV sales is for DIGITAL TV, which is not necessarily HD, though it can be.
DTV is not required to be HD.
Chances are your local broadcast stations will only be transmitting in HD those prime-time and sports programming. Expect regular morning and afternoon programming to be standard definition with alternate-language or alternate image in the sub-channels (a single DTV "channel" can have 4 SD sub-programs or 1 HD program stream). Some stations are using one sub-channel to show real-time weather RADAR, others do Spanish programming or children's programming.
I would guess that the predicted-cheap-and-ubiquitous set-top-boxes will not support HD since the goal is to get older TVs to still watch this new digital stuff. (Clearly you will not be able to get a higher definition picture on your old tube!)