Ready or Not - The Digital Conversion Starts Today!

The previously delayed conversion from analog to digital television broadcasts begins today across the United States.  Many television stations switched over from analog broadcasting to digital broadcasting overnight.  The rest will switch later today. 

The original conversion date was supposed to be on February 17.  But there was an outcry by politicians who said many people weren't ready for the change, even after the FCC had given people ample time (over a year) to get digital ready with a slew of information both in print and in television ads.  When the proposed delay was announced in January, television stations said they would have to spend a lot of money to continue to broadcast both digital and analog signals into June.  And companies, such as Qualcomm, who had spent millions of dollars to buy the transmission rights of the analog bands being used for television broadcasting had to wait another four months to launch new services, losing millions of dollars worth of potential revenue in the process.  

The switch to digital has been a long time coming.  I saw one of the first public demonstrations of digital television at the 1988 Summer Consumer Electronics Show in Chicago.  Zenith, which was based in Chicago at the time, had a demonstration where they broadcast a digital signal that was able to be picked up in about a 20 mile radius from the broadcast site.  I can't really remember what the program content was, but the picture was pretty clear.  Not as clear as a pure digital signal we get today, but it was better than what was available via an analog signal at the time.    

I had a number of posts on the delay and the circumstances leading up to the decision to push back the conversion date to June 12.  You can read them here, here, and here.  A number of smaller market television stations went ahead with the digital transition on the original February 17 date.  Some stations - such as WQPT here in the Quad Cities - switched to an all digital broadcast signal just recently before the June 12 deadline. 

We had a couple of older analog televisions in our "lodge" and in our bedroom that needed to be replaced once we got DirecTV in March.  I ended up getting a couple Samsung 32" televisions to replace them.  We ended up giving the old TV's to Cindy's dad who lives out in the country near Cedar Rapids and who doesn't watch much television.  He was initially reluctant to take the televisions because he would have to get a converter box.  I told him that he could get up to two $40 vouchers from the Federal Government to help pay for the units.  I'd even sign him up on the Internet. 

About 10 days later he got the vouchers in the mail.  He went to a place and bought a converter box for $49.95 plus tax.  We gave him the televisions and he hooked one of them up in his living room.  He was incredulous as to how good of a signal he was getting with the digital broadcasts.  "I can even get Channel 2 now!  I've never been able to get Channel 2," he exclaimed. 

So, ready or not - the digital conversion is here.  In my opinion, if you weren't ready for it, it's your own damn fault.  It's called progress folks.  And with this, we'll begin to see a number of pretty neat services being offered for cellular and personal viewing devices.  I can't wait. 

Comments

[Bobby Jackson]

I did not hear anything about the digital conversion.