For those staying with black-and-white
What’s not to love about HDTV? The picture is fabulous, prices are coming down dramatically and there’s hundreds of sets from which to choose.
But many consumers who buy high-definition television sets are getting them home, turning them on and thinking what they’re seeing on the screen is HDTV.
It’s not. Chances are a new digital set, HDTV or not, offers a much-improved picture than an older, tube-based TV. But that doesn’t mean the screen is displaying programming in high-definition…
In a recent study, the Consumer Electronics Association, an industry trade group, found that 44 percent of HDTV owners actually receive HD programming, 34 percent are definitely not receiving HD programming, 16 percent are not sure and 6 percent think they receive HD programming, but likely are not.
Uncle Dave offered a Post a while back about the ignorance of the folks selling HDTV sets. This article confirms that – and points out that consumers haven’t gotten round to knowing any better on their own.
Of course, the chuckle about this article is that it comes from MSNBC and they don’t offer any HDTV at all, yet.
there is something MANY of you should know…
HD ISNT WIDE SCREEN…
AND, wide screen ISNT HD…
Yeah, my parent-in-laws thought they were getting HD from their basic cable. Even though the pictures were all stretched out and looked like crap.
Now you can get some HD over basic cable if your cable company offers it and your TV or tuner receives open/clear/free QAM programming. Luckily Charter gives us our local channels in HD along with a couple of sports channels. Which is the only thing I really wanted in HD, to be able to watch “the game” in HD.
With upsampling DVD movies don’t look too bad, and if I really want HD I can rent a HD-DVD movie. (And Blu-ray as soon as BD-ROM drives come down in price. I got my HD-DVD Xbox 360 drive for only $117 new at Toys R Us!)
And digital TV isn’t HDTV.
Some will figure it out next February (2009) when analog is turned off. The rest will keep on watching digital cable and digital satellite and be as happy as a baby in a warm-wet diaper.
Predictably, the last day of the Old Year saw the FCC caving in to the whiners at the cheap end of broadcast TV. So, the 2009 deadline for conversion from analog-to-digital is now “flexible”.
http://tinyurl.com/yrdfra
When I bought my new plasma, the guy at Cicuit City told me I would have HD on every channel if I bought a $175.00 HDMI cable. So I’m all set.
Its not the ignorance of the salesman, but the ignorance of the consumers. The same consumer who was too stupid to program their VCR clock a decade ago is now confronted with aspect ratios, 720p and 1080i. Most have no clue, all they know is it looks cool on the wall.
I’ll get the d to a box first, before I get it. The only channel that I watch that has HD available for 99% of the time is Discovery. And I’d still need to get an HD receiver.
No Job
No Fun Stuff.
I blame the content providers!
I blame the hardware companies!
I blame the cable tv industry!
Their greed and open contempt toward the consumer has made HD-TV a nightmare of never ending standards and byzantine copy protection schemes.
They treat the consumer like dirt, and still make money… go figure.
i don’t really care about HDTV. all i really watch on tv is some news and sports. i’ve saw the superbowl in HD and wasn’t impressed in the least. it looked nice but not no $1000(or more) nice. i won’t buy one until they get sub $600 and last more that 5 years.
but then again i have always been a cheap bastard
I agree with you 100%. The only reason I have a HDTV is because my father bought me one. I never ever would have bought one myself. Not that I’m unhappy with it. It’s very nice. And PC games are awesome and the Wii is certainly more playable with split screen.
i won’t buy one until they get sub $600 and last more that 5 years.
You should be in luck in about 6 mos, depending on what size you want. And I don’t know how you can say you weren’t impressed with the Super Bowl in HD. Sporting events are the best stage for HD programing. I cringe when I have to watch a game in standard def.
Wow, you guys made fun of me when I said HDTV was DOA a few years ago. If the number of people who have HDTV’s and actually get HDTV signal is still less than 1 in 10, then I have to stand by my conclusion that it is still DOA.
The reason the FCC will abandon the analog shut off at some point this year is that it will be the effective end of plain old broadcast TV, and the FCC will not have the kind of power that they have now, at that point most people will switch to some sort of Internet distribution method rather than give their cable company even more money for a service they barely use.
In my area, Comcast recently audited for illegal cable hooks ups because the subscrition rate was so low. I was talking to one of the techs and he was surprised, because they were not finding the illegal cable hookups…
I think our predatory capitalism is starting to take a toll on its self, and people can no longer afford things like cable tv, not because they don’t have the money, but because they are all working extra jobs, they no longer have the time.
But then this is Michgian one of two states to have the distinction that it is losing population. Maybe I will view things differently when I get to Florida.
Right now it is 71 degrees and sunny there, and it is 31 degrees and coudy here. I went swimming in the ocean in December. Wow I couldn’t do that when I lived in Santa Cruz.
P.S. They have given me 20k for relocation expenses. Is that normal?
#13 – read the article and do the math. Or do you plan to go to work for Fry’s.
The HD signals are everywhere – even if your cable company is run by dunces. That’s what satellites are for.
The matching dunces are the set-owners who don’t know what they have, what they’re doing and what they’re watching. Sadly, they also vote.
The folks who are leasing into Sat HD are there to get it by intention – and the satisfaction numbers are without comparison in the SD world.
14, thats LOW cost to get a new home.
What some may not know, is that Digital signals are STILL analog.
#15
1/6 * 1/2 = 1/12 which is less than 1/10.
That means after nearly a decade of relentless promotion of HDTV, and several acts of congress, there is minimal to no evidence of widespread consumer uptake of HDTV in its complete form(a tv capable of hdtv + hdtv signals). That is in a television saturated culture. AKA HDTV is DOA.
Other evidence… No winner in the HD-DVD vs Blu-ray competition, both sell peanuts compared to traditional DVD, in a time frame which DVD completely displaced VHS… The highest selling video game console is not capable of HD resolutions. The most common fault anyone has with the AppleTV device is that it has no composite video output, and no HD content. The Tivo with HD capability has had little to no uptake after a hugely successful SD product. Microsofts video download service reports that sd movies are downloaded at 20 to 1 over hd movies.
Finally, in your Satelite hdtv format, both Echostar and DirectTV stocks are down over the last year, because they are both losing subscribers.
If you want actual references to any of these do your own homework. I have provided you with more than enough evidence to get started googling. IMO you should be able to confirm every one of those anecdotes in the next 5-10 minutes with google.
#16,
Well, I sort of assumed I would buy my own home once I got down there. Was gonna use the 20k for rent until I found a new house to buy, and to pay a moving company to move all my stuff. But then I started doing the math… It sounded like a lot of money at first… but wow, a cross continent move costs a lot of money. No wonder people are urged to complete that sort of move after college, and before they start working.
The good news is, so far my house searches reveal that this is an excellent year to be buying a house in florida.
What some may not know, is that Digital signals are STILL analog.
Care to explain that.
#19,
I had the comcast set top box until last year. I just couldn’t justify my comcast bill inexplicably going up what seemed like $5-$10 every four months or so. With the plain old cable to the tv receiver I get the bad analog signals. With the digital set top box, instead of getting the fuzzy analog interference, I got the weird digital artifacts from the same channels I get analog.
My guess is comcast is expertly using their bandwidth over the coax to push down both analog and digital content, in duplicate. I know they run adds that suggest the analog broadcasts are gonna go dark any day now, for several years now, and that I need to pay them an extra 60 bucks a month for a different type of interference. Comcast has gone down hill the last couple of years.
Nobody seems to notice that the guy in the bw picture in the post, looks a lot like Christopher Walken showing the watch in that Pulp Fiction segment.
Is that implying something to American consumers?…
#20 that’s all fine and good and but it doesn’t clarify ECA absurd statement that all digital signals are still analog.
Nobody seems to notice that the guy in the bw picture in the post, looks a lot like Christopher Walken showing the watch in that Pulp Fiction segment.
That’s easy.
1. It doesn’t look like him
2. Who cares
#19
All digital signals are analog according to ECA
I suspect that what ECA is getting at is that the real world is not digital. Your “digital” computer isn’t digital. All of the microprocessors and electronics inside are specialized analog components. If they were true digital devices they would run a lot cooler.
In “digital” tv the information may be digital but the channels and equipment that move that data are analog.
Perry
24,
almost.
The original signal to SEND the digital signal HAS to be analog. If it were digital, it would be Fiber optic.
Its the idea of sending Varying waves of frequency to SIMULATE/create the DOTS and dashes of DIGITAL.
You can send the information, but its FIRST in analog, and converted. and you get your fun FILLED data to show a picture.. You will get Values and so forth, and its ALOT of data to be sent.
Insted of Waves/signal/pictures to deal with, we are recieving “1234532536457648765643512354364576586443451324325647” and then converting it to a Picture in digital.
Its kinda stupid if you ask me.
@#23
I take it you never seen Pulp Fiction…
ECA, yes you’re right. And your DSL is analog also. Digital signals MODULATED over analog.