What's down the pike?

[poltr1]

I'm leafing through this week's Best Buy's circular. Lots of digital and projection TV sets on sale. But I don't have the room in my house for a projection TV. The 25" I have at home is good enough. (We inherited it from R's grandparents who passed away last year. It replaces the 20" RCA I had for 16 years.)

Are the TV broadcasters still on schedule to cease analog TV signal broadcasting by the end of this year, and broadcast only digital TV signals? I think they're broadcasting both right now.

So...where are the D-to-A conversion boxes?

And Windows Vista (the OS formerly known as "Longhorn"). That's supposed to roll out this year, after having its original release date pushed back. Haven't heard anything recently. The last I heard is that it's still in beta testing. If I get a new PC this year, I'm considering Vista Pro -- but after Service Pack 1 is released. (Poltrone's First Law still holds.)

I think the ear-bud Bluetooth phones are neato. But I can't afford to upgrade now, and won't until I get another job. Are there any adapters so I can use my existing Nokia 5100 phone?

Comments

[bikergeek.livejournal.com]

I think the date when broadcast analog TV goes dark has been pushed back to 2008 or 2009. A large part of the demographic for that service is what I call "little old ladies in tennis shoes"--people 60 and older who are significantly technophobic and are very disinclined to make investments in new electronic hardware. That demographic has a disproportionate amount of political clout, so I don't know if it's ever going to happen until they literally die off.

I think the 20" TV in my living room dates to 1992.

[yourmommma.livejournal.com]

Hey, I resemble that remark. But I'm not in the market for a new TV because I just bought one a couple of years ago that was not digital because it was too freaking expensive back then and there wasn't any digital programming. I didn't give a ratsass. My next one will be digital, but my current one has a lot of years on it. Annoying as shit.

[poltr1]

You're correct; it's been pushed baack to 2009.

[athenawindsong.livejournal.com]

The icon says it all.

[poltr1]

Let me try to bring you up to speed.

TV stations will soon be broadcasting their signals in a digital format, instead of the analog format they've been using for the past 50+ years. Cable TV and many (if not all) satellite services have already switched their signals over to digital.

Advantages: Smaller bandwidth (range on the frequency spectrum) required per channel, more picture information can be broadcast (thus, a higher picture resolution), and therefore, sharper pictures (for those people who own high-definition TV sets).

A few years ago, the FCC decreed that at the end of 2006, all TV stations will be broadcasting digital signals only. It's been a chicken-and egg problem: People don't want to buy digital TV sets because few stations are broadcasting in digital. And broadcasters don't want to switch to digital because there are too few digital TV sets out there.

For the benefit of those of us who can't afford to get a new TV, or don't want to buy a new TV, there should be a conversion box that we can buy at a retailer so that we can receive the digital TV signals but display it on an non-digital TV (with some signal degradation, of course).

[athenawindsong.livejournal.com]

OOOOOH!!! Ok, that makes perfect sense. Thanks for explaining it so well!

[billroper]

Congress either has passed or is about to pass legislation that will spend a large amount of money to subsidize set-top D/A converter boxes for folks with analog TVs. The only reason that this is a theoretically good expenditure is the amount of money that they should be able to raise by auctioning off the reclaimed analog TV spectrum.

[poltr1]

I was at Circuit City today and asked one of the guys in the TV department about the deadline. He said that Congress had just signed it and that it was pushed back to 2009. (Amazing. This guy knew his stuff!)

If I was more talented with electronics, I'd be building D-to-A boxes by now.