Land of Oz

Television Digital Converter Box

When I was trying to find out about these things, I ran into so much misinformation, it was very confusing. Finally, I decided to just buy one and see what happened.

As you may or may not have heard, there's going to be a change in the way television is being broadcast in February of 2009. Technically, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), the government office on all things radio and TV, has mandated that all TV stations switch from broadcasting an analog encoded signal to a digital signal. This means that all TVs that receive only analog signals won't work anymore. Since the government is tasked with provided at least some "free" TV, they have decided to offer folks a $40 coupon that people can use to buy a converter box that will allow them to use their old TVs to receive the new digital channels. Here's some questions and answers about the process:

Are all TVs affected?
Nope. Only older TVs are. Maybe three to four years old or older. Many newer TVs already have the circuitry inside to receive digital signals. If, like me, you have an older TV using a rabbit ear antenna to watch local TV, you'll probably need the box. According the government web site:

If you purchased a new TV set since 2004, your chances of having a built-in digital tuner improve dramatically. Starting in 2004, many of the TV sets sold at popular electronics stores feature digital tuners that will work after February 17, 2009. But it’s not a sure thing. Even some of the newer TV sets are purely display monitors that lack the internal circuitry needed to pick up digital broadcasts.

Do I need a converter box if I get cable or satellite TV?
Nope. That conversion is already done for you by company providing the signal.

Do I need a new antenna?
Probably not. If your current TV can get local UHF channels - generally channels above 13 - you won't need a new antenna. I have a $25 set of amplified rabbit ears from Radio Shack that work just fine with my digital box.

Does this converter box give me digital high definition TV?
Yes and no. You do get a digital signal, and if the station transmits a high definition signal, you can see it, but it won't be a "real" high definition picture. In my case, highdef shows appear in a letterbox format (has black bars above and below the picture). Since I have an old-fashioned "normal" TV the picture quality won't show the detail available with a real highdef TV. The picture is there, but it looks pretty much like it did with the regular antenna.

What was your experience like?
1. I bought an Insignia converter box for $59.95 from Best Buy. I had no trouble using the $40 coupon (they just deducted $40) so my cost was $19.95 plus tax. The $40 coupon by the way looks like a credit card, not a piece of paper.

2. It can be hooked up two ways. Either running the antenna lead into the box and then another cable from the box to the TV antenna input, or you can run a separate left and right audio and composite video signal from the converter box to your TV. I have a DVD player in my system, so in my case, I ran the antenna lead from my rabbit ears (they sit on top of the TV on a wooden stand) to the converter box, three leads (L&R audio and video) to my DVD player, then three leads from the DVD player to the TV. Using the separate leads supposedly gives a clear picture than using the RF signal.

3. I followed the instruction book, turned everything on and the little box soon automatically searched for channels. I went from five channels to 15. Most station have multiple programs broadcast on their one channel. For example, channel 19 (PBS) has four channels (19.1, 19.2, 19.3, 19.4). The reason for this is digital broadcast signals are more efficient and allow more information to be transmitted over the same signal. Thus, you get four digital programs where only one analog program was before.

What problems did you have?
Nothing really. Don't forget to RTFM. (A polite acronym meaning Read the Flipping Manual) I forgot to peel the plastic wrapper off the included remote battery at first so the remote wasn't working. I also had to shuffle around my video stuff, because I had been using the RF input from the antenna directly to a VHS player so the VHS player was acting as my TV tuner. Now I use the converter box for the tuner that feeds into the DVD player before being routed to the TV.

Was it worth it?
Most definitely. For $20 I went from four and a half TV channels (66 was usually unwatchable) to 15 crystal clear channels (OK - there's some occasional breakup, but not bad). And my PBS channel has great programming on the extra channels. Very cool.

How do I get the $40 card?
Go to https://www.dtv2009.gov/ and sign up. And don't be suspicious/worried that the government is giving you something for nothing. They sold off some extra channels that the conversion freed up and made billions that they can waste on other programs. On the other hand, the $40 rebate program is only costing the government millions.

Labels: government, tech