Any free broadcast tv with digital?

On Jan 4, 11:10*pm, Patty Winter wrote:

I appreciate the information that folks have been posting. I have
cable and satellite and thus have no need to run out and get a digital
TV or a converter by Feb 2009, but I'm trying to keep on top of the
subject for whenever I do decide to take the plunge.

Seeing as the government is giving you a $40 coupon, it still might be
worth getting, either as Christmas gifts, or save for a rainy day sort
of thing.

"Patty Winter" wrote in message
...

snip

I have
cable and satellite and thus have no need to run out and get a digital
TV or a converter by Feb 2009, but I'm trying to keep on top of the
subject for whenever I do decide to take the plunge.


Patty

No plunge here, either, but I got my feet good and wet. Since we have a
beautiful 35" tube TV, I couldn't justify going full Hi-Def right now, so
for experimenting, I bought a set-top box. For $250 at a local retailer,
I'm pulling digital OTA off a roof antenna and displaying it in SD. (The
box has a selector switch for the display type. I'm a "480i.")

Since digital doesn't require much of a signal to sort out the ones and
zeroes, I get a lot of out-of-town stations that are unwatchable in analog.
Nice.

"Sal M. Onella" wrote in message
...


My goofiest ever multipath experience was on the Navy base in Vallejo, CA.
There was one UHF TV station that absolutely would not come in unless my
roommate had his locker door half-open. Go figure.


It sounds like the signal was bouncing off the locker door. A full moon can
also make it easier to receive signals. I'm in an area where we can pick up
signals across the Lake Ontario. Sometimes they're strong and fairly clear,
other times they barely come in. It depends much upon the weather over the
lake. I've only tried it with analogue so I don't know how good the digital
would be.

--
Patrick Joseph McNamara
E-mail:
Webpage: www.geocities.com/writerpatrick
Blog: http://writerpatrick.spaces.msn.com
Podcasts: http://podcastping.blogspot.com- poetry and podsafe music
and: http://thesilentpen.blogspot.com - an examination of writer's block

Sal M. Onella wrote:

My goofiest ever multipath experience was on the Navy base in Vallejo, CA.
There was one UHF TV station that absolutely would not come in unless my
roommate had his locker door half-open. Go figure.

It never occurred to me that dirty laundry placed strategically around
the room could improve reception.

Sal M. Onella wrote:
"Patty Winter" wrote:

I have cable and satellite and thus have no need to run out and get
a digital TV or a converter by Feb 2009, but I'm trying to keep on
top of the subject for whenever I do decide to take the plunge.

No plunge here, either, but I got my feet good and wet. Since we have a
beautiful 35" tube TV, I couldn't justify going full Hi-Def right now, so
for experimenting, I bought a set-top box. For $250 at a local retailer,
I'm pulling digital OTA off a roof antenna and displaying it in SD. (The
box has a selector switch for the display type. I'm a "480i.")

Is your tv new enough to accept progressive input? Does the converter do
progressive output? If it's called ColorStream or as inputs for a
connection via composite video cables, it's progressive.

See if you notice a slight improvement at 480p.

I can hook up my Toshiba DVR-RW+ with built-in TiVo II via composite
video cables. The whites are brighter.

In article ,
"Patrick Joseph Mc Namara" wrote:

A full moon can also make it easier to receive signals.

???????
Can you offer proof of this? I have never heard of EME (moonbounce)
propagation of broadcast TV signals, or that a Full Moon makes anything
easier (except lycanthropy).
--
Chuck Reti
Detroit MI

On Jan 6, 12:33*am, Chuck Reti wrote:

Can you offer proof of this? I have never heard of EME (moonbounce)
propagation of broadcast TV signals, or that a Full Moon makes anything
easier (except lycanthropy).

Wired Science on PBS just did a feature on a quiet zone in West
Virginia. It was about radio telescopy, where they were minimizing the
interference from non-diesel cars, whose spark plugs may emit Ems, to
wireless sytems, cell phones, even their microwave is lead shielded.

Nearby is an NSA facility eavesdropping on At&T's communication
satellite tracking station, as well as some TOp Secret past attempts
to intercept Soviet broadcasts using the moon bounce technique. I
doubt the moon has to be full. It's still there, ain't it?

So will you be required to have some sort of cable service once it
goes all digital? Or will there be over-the-air free broadcast tv?

ALL digital OTA programming is free and it is available right now if you

USDTV was free? Funny, it only seemed to work when I paid for it.
It was over-the-air and required a specific converter box (one sold
at Wal-Mart).

are within range of a digital station. If you need a converter box for
your analog TVs the government will help you buy two of them with the
$40 coupons they are giving away. Visit their website at http://dtv2009.gov

I haven't been able to find this addressed on that web site: is
EVERYONE with an analog TV and no sat/cable provider eligible for
the converter box coupons? Or is someone with 2 digital TVs (with
tuners), a digital receiver box connected to an old analog DVR, and
an analog TV with only an antenna (a) eligible because they have
an analog TV, or (b) not eligible because they can already receive
digital TV?

On Jan 6, 2:25*pm, (Gordon Burditt) wrote:
So will you be required to have some sort of cable service once
it
goes all digital? Or will there be over-the-air free broadcast
tv?

ALL digital OTA programming is free and it is available right now
if you

USDTV was free? *Funny, it only seemed to work when I paid for it.
It was over-the-air and required a specific converter box (one sold
at Wal-Mart). *

USDTV was a crap pay service and while it was a digital carrier it
was too compressed and expensive for what it was. Good riddance.

are within range of a digital station. *If you need a converter
box for
your analog TVs the government will help you buy two of them with
the
$40 coupons they are giving away. *Visit their website athttp://dtv2009.gov

I haven't been able to find this addressed on that web site: *is
EVERYONE with an analog TV and no sat/cable provider eligible for
the converter box coupons? *Or is someone with 2 digital TVs (with
tuners), a digital receiver box connected to an old analog DVR, and
an analog TV with only an antenna (a) eligible because they have
an analog TV, or (b) not eligible because they can already receive
digital TV?

It appears that everybody is eligible but why would you want a
converter box for a VCR? A cheap ATSC tuner for your computer is so
much better than a VCR. If you have enough money for the computer to
write this on, you shouldn't need a government handout for TV. Or are
you entitled?

GG

So will you be required to have some sort of cable service once
it
goes all digital? Or will there be over-the-air free broadcast
tv?

ALL digital OTA programming is free and it is available right now
if you

USDTV was free? *Funny, it only seemed to work when I paid for it.
It was over-the-air and required a specific converter box (one sold
at Wal-Mart). *

USDTV was a crap pay service and while it was a digital carrier it
was too compressed and expensive for what it was. Good riddance.

I won't disagree with your characterization of it, but it still
wasn't free. Reception also wasn't very good (compared to free
channels), so I dropped it after a few months. I also don't think
it is/was the only pay OTA service.

are within range of a digital station. *If you need a converter
box for
your analog TVs the government will help you buy two of them with
the
$40 coupons they are giving away. *Visit their website athttp://dtv2009.gov

I haven't been able to find this addressed on that web site: *is
EVERYONE with an analog TV and no sat/cable provider eligible for
the converter box coupons? *Or is someone with 2 digital TVs (with
tuners), a digital receiver box connected to an old analog DVR, and
an analog TV with only an antenna (a) eligible because they have
an analog TV, or (b) not eligible because they can already receive
digital TV?

It appears that everybody is eligible but why would you want a
converter box for a VCR? A cheap ATSC tuner for your computer is so
much better than a VCR. If you have enough money for the computer to
write this on, you shouldn't need a government handout for TV.
Or are
you entitled?

No, I'm not entitled, and I don't think anyone else should be
entitled to a $40 coupon on their *THIRD* TV. It's a waste of the
government's money. They may not be able to enforce it, but at
least they could make you assert that you don't currently have any
digital TV receivers to qualify for the coupons.

Where are there cheap ATSC tuners with drivers that run on a reasonably
stable operating system (Windows doesn't count)? Also, I want to watch
TV on a *TELEVISION SET*, not a computer monitor. I've looked at things
like MythTV, and found it extremely lacking in terms of supported hardware
requirements (not that it didn't support stuff: it didn't tell you what
it supported in a way you could actually buy at a store).