The Switch to Digital Television

With all the hype regarding the conversion of our TV signals from analog to digital, many commercials airing are misleading. Some commercials blatantly state that after the switch to digital "your analog TV will no longer work."

What is the truth? Do you really need a new TV?

The short answer is NO. If your TV was sold after May 25, 2007, it is supposed to be equipped with a digital tuner or specifically state it does NOT have one. It should be labeled with ATSC, DTV, or HDTV; it can also state digital tuner or integrated digital tuner. If your new TV has these words, it should be able to receive and display digital signals.

If your TV was purchased before May 25, 2007, check to see if it can support digital signals. The owner's manual should be able to provide this information. If you cannot locate yours, check online, many manufacturers have their manuals available for free download or viewing on line.

If it contains the words "digital ready, HDTV ready, digital monitor, and HDTV monitor your TV most likely does NOT contain a digital tuner and will not display the new signals without extra equipment.

If you find yourself with a TV that will not display digital, you have several options to get the digital signal in your home.

You can go with cable or satellite service; they provide a set top converter which will also handle the digital signals for your TV.

You can purchase a converter box, it will also allow for the display of the new digital channels.

However, if either of those two options are not appealing, there is a third, little known alternative.

To avoid an extra "box" on your TV and to avoid high prices of cable and satellite, you can opt to purchase a VCR with a digital tuner. In many cases these are packaged with a DVD recorder. They are typically priced at $150 - $200 and contain a VHS player and a DVD player/recorder as well as a digital tuner. Check the packaging before purchasing to ensure it has a digital tuner if you go this route.

You should not need any special antennas to display the digital signal, only the digital tuner, whether it be inside your TV, a converter box, or a VCR, one of these with a standard TV antenna is sufficient, in most cases, for your TV to display the digital signals.

Now, other things to consider; do you own a karaoke wireless microphone; or other wireless microphone system? Many of the manufacturer's of these made these devices to use frequencies between TV channels (analog).

Some of the old analog signals are going to be assigned to emergency services; there is a chance that your microphone can interfere with these signals as there is no FCC compliance with the wireless microphones. A lawsuit has been filed regarding this issue.

Did you know that in severe weather, you may lose your digital signal?

We had a severe storm passing through this evening; it took out our satellite internet signal as well as our satellite TV signal. We had to result to using an "over-the-air" signal for monitoring the weather forecasts.

Surprisingly, we noted that when the storm is at its nastiest, the digital signal we were receiving pixilated much like the satellite signal does just before it is lost. In addition, a "NO SIGNAL" message would flash on the screen at the worst periods.

What does this mean for you?

When severe weather hits your area after the full change over, you will be unable to monitor the weather via TV to determine if you are in danger. As the system gets worse it pixilates (makes it blocky) the signal, it freezes the image, and/or it drops the signal entirely.

If you live in a tornado or hurricane prone area, you may be left unable to track dangerous storms when they are at the point of being the biggest threat to you.

Interestingly enough, to date, this has never been mentioned in any of the media blitz information being disseminated to the public.

Will your old TV stop working with the change? No it will not. You can still do everything you did with it before the change except receive a digital signal without another unit to tune in the digital signal.

If you watched DVDs, video tapes, played computer games, with your television, all of this will continue to function. The only loss will be the analog signals.

How you tell if a signal is analog or digital? Typically, digital signal television channels end with a dash and a number. For example, if you get an analog channel 3, your digital equivalent would be 3-1. At a glance if not digital signal is broadcasting, if you see the static white picture it is analog. Digital signals not being transmitted on are a black screen.

Do not toss out your old TVs with the upcoming change to digital signals. Your standard air antenna and a digital tuner (be it inside a TV, VCR, or converter box) is enough to display the digital channel. It should be noted that you will not receive a digital quality image on your TV if it is not digital capable.