Here we are, 180 days or so and counting. So, are you still seeing a lot of people unaware, or who aren't ready? What are you doing or going to be doing to ramp up awareness...fast?

While I am, I find most are not. The transition is something people feel they are being forced to do. Those without HD sets are thinking that it's all about that. They don't realize that there is something very positive, for a vast amount of persons receiving tv from cable or satellite to be had. An OTA HD program doesn't only look better on an HD set. It looks better on a 15 year-old television as well. Phelps' 8th gold tonight at the Olympics looked better than the picture of the best cable service, if that can be quantified, of the early 80's. HD cameras are better for detail. You don't have to sign up for that kind of picture if you can get it. Everybody should want it, regardless.

People think that DTV is still something that is in the future, and that they will deal with it then.

Around here, the TV stations and cable companies have been beating it into people's heads. I'm hearing from people who are sick of hearing about it. HOWEVER, we won't know if they got the message correctly until next year. Basically, everyone I talk to has cable and cable is touting that "if you have cable, there's nothing to worry about" so they won't.

I can almost guarantee an avalanche of "Turn my TV back on!!" calls coming into stations and government offices starting the day after shutoff.

I am ready, I've made my affected relatives know about it.

Yes, I am ready. Looking forward to it because I figure I will be to get at least 2 more stations OTA once they fire up their full power digital signals on their new channels. May get a few more if the FCC grants the maximize power applications that were filed in June, although the stations may not be ready to crank their digital power up on February 18.

The public awareness of the analog shutdown is certainly growing, although there is a LOT of confusion and mis-conceptions about it. Perhaps the biggest failing is not making it clear that most stations are already on the air with a full power digital signal. Much of the press coverage and public info give the impression that there is this big magic switchover happening next February with analog being turned off and digital being turned on. But I think they are getting better at explaining it.

A good follow-up question to ask for people that are getting the local digital stations is whether they are ready for all the digital channel changes next February? Around 517 stations will changing their digital channels, many of them from UHF to their upper VHF (7-13) analog channels and in a few cases to low VHF (2-6). How many people are ready for this if they had put up a UHF only antenna?

Around here, the TV stations and cable companies have been beating it into people's heads.
I'm surprised that cable would be beating knowledge about OTA reception into everyone's head. The more FUD there is about how to handle the analog shutoff and how to keep getting pictures with existing NTSC equipment, the better it would seem to be for the cable business.

Basically, everyone I talk to has cable and cable is touting that "if you have cable, there's nothing to worry about" so they won'tIn my area, the cable company is shutting off analog as well. People with old TVs must rent a cable converter box or buy a new TV. That fact is little known. I'm sure that in December cable will inform their customers when they mail out the bills.

A good follow-up question to ask for people that are getting the local digital stations is whether they are ready for all the digital channel changes next February? Around 517 stations will changing their digital channels, many of them from UHF to their upper VHF (7-13) analog channels and in a few cases to low VHF (2-6). How many people are ready for this if they had put up a UHF only antenna?In a recent email, my local CBS affiliate manager insists that the coverage area will remain the same when he returns to RF4 from RF58. He hired consultants that told him RF4 would have lower power bills than UHF. The station engineer is not as optimistic.
This is a quote from sebenste from my local thread.
>WHBF has just put in their post-transition application.

It is still going to be on channel 4.

But instead of 8.4 kw, it has requested 24.1 kw at 1300'. Interestingly, sister station WOI is going for 11.5 kw now on channel 5 out of Des Moines at 1600'.

Don't get excited though. That increases the signals by about 4 dB, but won't make picking it up stronger except close to the tower...it will help it, a little, get over the noise.

The kicker: Because WHBF will probably actually HAVE to run about 20 kw of real juice to make that ERP because antenna efficiency is not good on VHF-LO, if they had taken that power and put it into a UHF channel, they'd have an ERP of well over 100 kw and maybe 200 kw...causing easy reception
across the QC area. And, they could have requested a channel change now, too.

Oh well. Have fun...it still won't be any picnic when they flip back to 4.<

There's another thread on the same subject as this one:
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=1054539



.

In a recent email, my local CBS affiliate manager insists that the coverage area will remain the same when he returns to RF4 from RF58. He hired consultants that told him RF4 would have lower power bills than UHF. The station engineer is not as optimistic.
This is a quote from sebenste from my local thread.
>[I]WHBF has just put in their post-transition application.

It is still going to be on channel 4.
But instead of 8.4 kw, it has requested 24.1 kw at 1300'.
WHBF-DT CBS 4 has been granted it's application to operate at 24.1 kW on VHF 4 post-transition which is a respectable low VHF digital ERP. The funny part is that there are only 2 full power stations in the entire USA currently slated to operate on VHF 4 post-transition, but the other station, WDKY-DT Fox 56 in the Lexington, KY DMA has petitioned for a channel change to UHF 31 (after initially asking for UHF 46 in June). So WHBF-DT may be the only full power station on VHF 4 next year. So they might as well ask for maximum allowed power of 45 kW (Zones II & III) on VHF 4 if they are going to stay there. BTW, VHF 4 should have nominal greater range than UHF because of the better propagation of low VHF over hills, but the question is how much will impulse noise interfere for the deep fringe viewers.

... VHF 4 should have nominal greater range than UHF because of the better propagation of low VHF over hills, but the question is how much will impulse noise interfere for the deep fringe viewers.A lot.

In my area, the cable company is shutting off analog as well. People with old TVs must rent a cable converter box or buy a new TV. That fact is little known. I'm sure that in December cable will inform their customers when they mail out the bills.

Cable companies are required by the FCC to continue to support analog TVs until 2012. My understanding is that most are opting to do this by converting the SD signal to analog and running it across their lines. This uses more bandwidth but is a lot less costly than providing converter boxes to subscribers with analog TVs. Cox Cable in my area has already announced that subscribers will be able to continue getting service by plugging the cable straight into an analog TV.

Cable companies are required by the FCC to continue to support analog TVs until 2012.
However, if the cable company goes all-digital, they can do so if they provide low cost or free converter boxes to the remaining analog subscribers. Hence they still support analog TVs. The 2012 requirement does not really mean that much. Comcast, for example, announced that they will be, IIRC, around 20% of their franchise areas to all-digital by 2009. Given the intense competitive pressure for digital services and bandwidth, we may see many if not most cable franchise markets all digital before or by 2012. But this is getting off of the topic of whether people are ready for the OTA analog broadcast shutdown.

I'm surprised that cable would be beating knowledge about OTA reception into everyone's head. The more FUD there is about how to handle the analog shutoff and how to keep getting pictures with existing NTSC equipment, the better it would seem to be for the cable business.

Like the OTA stations, cable and sat is being required by the FCC to provide transition information.

Can you explain "impulse noise interference". What types might those be?

Can you explain "impulse noise interference". What types might those be?Here are a few examples:

Lawnmowers, automobiles, powertools, overhead power lines/transformers, household appliances, lightning from thunderstorms.....

Pretty much just like interference you get on AM radio.

Once you get to VHF-HI; these issues are "greatly" reduced. On UHF it is rarely a problem.

I am ready. In addition to the 4228, I have a YA1713 waiting for upper VHF DTV, but the 4228 may also work for my location.

Many people have heard about the transition now, but most think DTV won't arrive until February.

I am trying to help a friend get her parents up to speed. They are still watching the ghosty/snowy signals and were just going to get satellite in February. I advised that they should really consider getting a CECB for their old CRT. I gave her an antenna to try in place of the rabbit ears for now, but also suggested that her parents get a coupon for a CECB now.

UHF vs. Lo/Hi VHF awareness is very low and even knowledgeable people locally seem to think we are keeping 2, 4 & 5 in LA (we aren't).

We were discussing ERP and TPO differences vs. costs on the channel change thread, though that info is lost. I'm still convinced that Low-VHF will require so much power to be effective that they will lose that so-called advantage. Low-VHF antenna gains are not very good and some stations will be putting more power in (TPO) than they are getting out (ERP).

Doesn't the FCC have any data on how many houses have converted so far? If anyone else has looked at the Ofcom reports (UK), the difference in available data is stark as well as awareness.

Edit: Added link to Ofcom's report site:

http://www.ofcom.org.uk/research/tv/reports/dtv/dtu_2008_q1/

One point of interest:

1.6 Taking these figures together, the proportion of all TV sets converted to multichannel passed two thirds (68%) in Q1 2008, with the remaining 32% continuing to receive only analogue terrestrial broadcasts. This means that over the last twelve months, the proportion of analogue terrestrial sets fell by over 11 percentage points from around 44% in Q1 2007 to 32% by Q1 2008.

While I'm sure some will say the markets can't be compared, the total number of OTA/terrestrial households is comparable between the US and UK and the UK is allowing until 2012 in some areas.

Here are a few examples:

Lawnmowers, automobiles, powertools, overhead power lines/transformers, household appliances, lightning from thunderstorms.....

Pretty much just like interference you get on AM radio.

Once you get to VHF-HI; these issues are "greatly" reduced. On UHF it is rarely a problem.It's pretty much just like interference you get on AM radio because 8VSB (http://www.8vsb.com/) is a form of AM transmission.

Even on VHF-HI, it's a very annoying problem, for viewers not close to the transmitters. And for LO VHF chs 2 thru 6, it's ridiculous, at least the LO VHF DTV I've seen down in Little Rock. The dishwasher, washing machine cycles, light switches and lightning (the worst) cause problems here. Very frustrating if you've recorded a show, only to find out later it's chock full of audio dropouts because a lightning event was somewhere in the region. It doesn't even have to be nearby lightning. The video glitches are tolerable. But the missing audio is maddening.


I am ready. In addition to the 4228, I have a YA1713 waiting for upper VHF DTV, but the 4228 may also work for my location.Falcon_77, what VHFs will you have? I use the 4228 as a bi-directional antenna with the screen removed, to pick up two markets in opposite directions. One town is ~45 mi away and the other is ~70. Both markets have upper VHF & UHF stations and I get them fine with the 4228. I also use a CM7777 V/U preamp. I get VHF channels 9, 10 & 13 just fine. 9 is digital and 10 & 13 are analog. In Feb., 9 & 10 will both be digital :(

Falcon_77, what VHFs will you have? I use the 4228 as a bi-directional antenna with the screen removed, to pick up two markets in opposite directions. One town is ~45 mi away and the other is ~70. Both markets have upper VHF & UHF stations and I get them fine with the 4228. I also use a CM7777 V/U preamp. I get VHF channels 9, 10 & 13 just fine. 9 is digital and 10 & 13 are analog. In Feb., 9 & 10 will both be digital :(

LA will have 7, 9, 11 and 13. Mystic, CT has access to 10 (and 9 soon). I have the same setups in both locations (4228/1713). I don't remember testing 10 on the 4228 on my last trip. A Winegard HD-1080 I was testing didn't get the job done on 10, however.

I get quite a bit of noise on the analog versions right now, so I don't know how ideal these will be. If we can ever get Land Mobile moved, 14-17 might work.

I'm wondering when local retail stores will start selling the 7-51 antennas. The ones I see are still 2-69. More people might put up antennas if they knew that they didn't need 2-6 here.

I gotta get my antenna up higher (it's on my back porch roof ... still ... shame ...). Once that's done a few of my fading in-and-out DT channels should solidify and I will be happy. At least that's the theory.

WHBF-DT CBS 4 has been granted it's application to operate at 24.1 kW on VHF 4 post-transition which is a respectable low VHF digital ERP. The funny part is that there are only 2 full power stations in the entire USA currently slated to operate on VHF 4 post-transition, but the other station, WDKY-DT Fox 56 in the Lexington, KY DMA has petitioned for a channel change to UHF 31 (after initially asking for UHF 46 in June). So WHBF-DT may be the only full power station on VHF 4 next year. So they might as well ask for maximum allowed power of 45 kW (Zones II & III) on VHF 4 if they are going to stay there. BTW, VHF 4 should have nominal greater range than UHF because of the better propagation of low VHF over hills, but the question is how much will impulse noise interfere for the deep fringe viewers.

Best wishes for someone receiving WHBF channel 4 :)

WDKY-DT channel 4 the only channel I can't get here in Lexington. For FOX, I use on a station in Louisville for HD or just watch the analog channel for SD. Come on WDKY-DT channel 31!

Best wishes for someone receiving WHBF channel 4 :)

WDKY-DT channel 4 the only channel I can't get here in Lexington. For FOX, I use on a station in Louisville for HD or just watch the analog channel for SD. Come on WDKY-DT channel 31!

If 26.5kW isn't enough to remove problems with 4/Low-VHF, what will? I see that WDKY is directional and that about 11kW appears to apply in your direction, but would the full 26.5 be enough?

Stations crying about higher power requirements for UHF, may discover that the same TPO will buy them a lot less grief on UHF, at least compared to 2-6.

Just remember... all we need to do is buy a CECB and we will be fine. :rolleyes:

If 26.5kW isn't enough to remove problems with 4/Low-VHF, what will? I see that WDKY is directional and that about 11kW appears to apply in your direction, but would the full 26.5 be enough?

Stations crying about higher power requirements for UHF, may discover that the same TPO will buy them a lot less grief on UHF, at least compared to 2-6.:rolleyes:
I do wonder if the power savings on low VHF would more than offset the added cost for station staffers and engineers to field all the calls and e-mails about reception problems and interference issues that those low frequencies suffer from?