HDTV and older TV's

There is a difference between ATSC (the new over the air standard) and digitally-encoded analog. I answer these questions all day long at the television station where I work.

Thanks for enlightening me. I was afraid that even with a converter box I would get a picture with a much smaller image.

The television I have is a model that came out before HD, however it has more scan lines, about 50% more than a regular television. I don't remember the sales term, perhaps enhanced picture. Has a great picture on the set and I hate to think about replacing it so will probably go with a CECB.

Well so do I have a real good Analog set a 32 inch Toshiba, the set even has the Red/Green/Blue (Componet Video Input) for the best picture from a DVD~! and for the last 14 years I have been getting Digital signal on my analog TV because I have had Satellite Service! So this switch to over the air digital is no big deal and is a good thing for a better picture and sound.

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Thanks for the replies everyone. I'm pretty sure the signal through the cable is not digital, only because I could upgrade to what comcast advertises as "digital cable", but it is significantly more expensive.

I did have a couple of other questions. We are considering dropping cable altogether which means having to use the converter box. However, with 6 non-digital non-HD tv's on the place I don't want to replace them with digital/hd. Each of these tv locations are wired with rg58u cable.

I'm wondering if I can use ONE converter box and plug my external antenna feed into it, then plumb the output from the converter to the input on the 6 way splitter that is on the outside of the house currently. Thus powering all 6 old style tv's from one converter? So the only difference would be instead of the 6-way splitter input coming from the comcast cable of the telephone pole it would come from the signal converter box?

Now, if the converter boxes also act as a channel changer for the tv set than my plan is not going to work, obviously.

One other question. It has been said that digital over the air broadcasts may offer additional hd channels over our current system. If that is the case, I'm assuming that those of us who are running the old style tv's with the converter boxes will not have access to those additional channels?

Thanks

Does cband use the larger satellite dishes for reception? Is this a monthly service package like dish or direct tv, or is it over-the-air satellite broadcasts available to anyone who can rig up the correct large dish system?

Thanks

My understanding is that the digital converter is a tuner in a box, and will output one channel at a time, of any of the digital channels available to you.

So, you would only get one, same, cannel on all TVs at the same time, but you will have access to all digital channels, the new ones too.

There are tuner boxes available today, but are high-end devices costing more than a cheap digital TV.

Eventually everything will be broadcast or cable-cast on the common new digital standard, and it will be simpler to have components that all tune it in naturally. Between then & now, it is a bit of a mess & a lot of TVs and VCRs will be pitched out at great expense to us consumers. I wonder how bare the shelves will be at Best Buy a year from March when folks not up to speed realize?

At the same time, those with cable & satilite likely are getting vouchers & upgrading their TVs with no real need to do so as they do not need to upgrade at this time.

--->Paul

Someone will be getting rich off of this...and I'm not nearly as concerned about cost to consumers, to whom a TV is really just a luxury item, as I am to the environment as we end up with all these old TV's in landfills.

wayne02 oh no cable and the little dishes prices stink up the air, i pay 7.92 a month for the package i get and alecart scifi for 45 bucks for the year, i pay about 135$ for the year. yes cband uses the big dish but mine is only 6 foot but im in oklahoma which is a good location for a smaller dish.

That's what I was afraid of, watching the same channel on all the tv's is not going to work. The reason we have multiple tv's because different people watch them occasionally at different times in different areas of the place.

There must be an underground techy group that is either in the process, or has already engineered a backyard version of the commercial converter box? How hard can this be for a technical person to do?

What do you expect the street price to be for a converter?

Thanks

Thanks Mike,
That price is certainly much lower than the little dish packages. What does the channel line-up look like for $7.92 per month?

How much does it cost to buy one of those larger dishes?

Are the larger dishes less sensitive to getting a clear shot at the satellite than the small dishes are?

Thanks

http://www.skyvision.com/ look here i get the one that says 8.99 a month but if you buy it by the year it 7.92. i got my 6foot dish for free and for the 4dtv receivers look on ebay and look for a dsr 905 dsr 920 which i have and dsr 922 for used one, but you can buy them for 439$ for new from skyvision if you like new. there not as picky as a little dish but they still need to be aligned right to make things run nicer. cband still bigger is better
but i do very well with my 6 foot. just look around im sure you will find dish setting there not being used and you can probably remove it for free ussally

Here in Canada, we have a satellite service called "Bell ExpressVu", it is very similar to the U.S. Dishnetwork service - they use the same technology.

In Canada, it is legal for me to intercept, decode and view the Dishnetwork satellite service (as it is "foreign") - which I've been doing since 2001 or so. The equipment is very simple and costs about $200 total - and requires only 18" dish(s). I have no monthly payments - and all channels are available to me, including all the pay-per-view.

My point : it may be legal for you, in the U.S., to use the Bell ExpressVu service.

the dvd digital recorder has a choice of screen sizes. you can watch widescreen if that is what it is being broadcast in or you can choose to zoom in on the screen which will fill it top to bottom and cut off the sides to fit.

the tvs also do that. you can choose to watch something in widescreen (movie, tv channel) or you can choose zoom mode. I'd rather lose what is on the sides of the picture than have the tiny picture it makes to see it in widescreen.

I don't know about the digital converter boxes but you could use a dvd digital recorder to feed all the tvs. the one I bought you can hook a vcr to it and change channels with the vcr and the digital sends it. (not sure I explained that well). but at any rate you could feed it to any number of tvs.

yes, hooking up a digital signal to an old analog tv doesn't give you the clarity or definition of the digital signal BUT it is the same as hooking it to a non-digital cable signal. very very good picture.

I found this on an info site:


Can I hook up more than one TV and video recorder to a single digital-to-analog converter box?

You will need one digital-to-analog converter box for each TV set or other device (such as a VCR) that only has an analog tuner. The digital-to-analog converter box basically replaces the analog tuner in one piece of equipment. So if you want to use your analog TV and VCR at the same time (for example, to watch one program and record another simultaneously), you will need two digital-to-analog converter boxes.

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I'll double check their dvd recorder but I don't think it works that way but I might be wrong.

My main television is a 43 inch widescreen model. When watching standard 4-3 aspect ratio programs they have a couple of setting to adjust the aspect ratio. The "Smooth Wide" setting is extremely good. You really don't notice the stretching of the picture unless you are watching football or something similar with straight lines. even then it's very good and you don't notice it much. Most brands of TV have something like that some are better than others. My Hitachi is outstanding in that respect.

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Respect The Cactus!

Dish satellite company is going to take the $40 government vouchers and give you one of the converter boxes- they wont charge anything other than the govt voucher.

Yep! That's the story I got when I called Dish Network.Got a new TV and wanted to go with the HD record/Receiver. $199.00 plus $10.00 mo for the
service.I'm getting an awsome picture now so i told them "No Thanks"!!

Bummer. That's going to foil my plan. Having to watch the same channel on all six tv's makes no sense. There has got to be some techy working in his basement right now to make a backyard version of this converter box for the cost of a few parts scrounged off of other electronic devices or from radioshack...

Another thing I just thought about is I wonder if these converter boxes have remotes to change the channel? Probably not... That's going to be another problem, we like our remotes. I'm not getting off the treadmill to walk halfway across the room to change the channel on the tv.... ...