IN THREE DAYS, Federal Communications Commission regulations will divide the sheep from the goats — those who have prepared for the conversion to digital television from those who have not.
The conversion was supposed to happen at the first of the year, but the attendant confusion persuaded the government to extend the deadline until June 12. That’s Friday.
People who have cable or satellite television service do not have to worry about the change. The companies that provide their service will see to it that the signal that reaches their sets is the signal those sets can display.
But people who get their television programs over the air, from an antenna, will have to have a converter box to make sense out of the digital signal that every station will be required to broadcast.
Conversion boxes are still available at television and electronic shops. Federal coupons to cover the first $40 of the cost of a box are still available and will be until the end of July.
For more information, visit the government’s conversion Web site, www.dtv.gov.
Friday is DTV-Day. Be prepared — or learn to love radio.
Patrick S. Kelley
Editorial Page Editor
dml (anonymous) says...
We got 2 converter boxes earlier this year from wal-mart and the remote has quit working on both of them. We also have to sometimes unplug them and for a day to get them to work again. If you cannot get a coupon, save yourself the time, money, and headache and just get a new TV.
June 9, 2009 at 10:52 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
madpoet (anonymous) says...
We got our boxes from Radio Shack, I'm pretty sure. They still work fine. I don't remember the brand or I'd tell you, dml.
Since only 27 didn't switch over on the original date, we've been using our converter all along. I think the whole moving the date was ridiculous. We had plenty of notice. All the government did was create more confusion and cost tv stations more money. We almost didn't get our coupons since we weren't planning on buying the box too far in advance (always out of stock anyway!) and the coupon was only good for a couple of months. We skated in right ahead of their, oops we're out of money, problem. I don't see any improvement in our tv quality and when it's windy or stormy we lose signal. Sigh. Oh well, they freed up bandwidth for the emergency communications at least.
June 10, 2009 at 10:14 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
neighbor (anonymous) says...
Using our convertor boxes, there is a humming noise on the sound. The interference I suspect is caused by the use of a signal amplifier that is needed to even be able to pick up the digital signal. Just what I needed, more remotes.
Part of me thinks that is no coincidence that they don't work well, that they wanted us to spend money twice. Once on the convertors, the second time when we got sick of trying to make our old tvs work and then give in to buy new ones. Then when everyone has bought digital tvs, they will come up with another signal we'll have to switch to.
No preaching needed, I know that's what drives our economy.
June 10, 2009 at 10:46 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
seriouslyfolks (anonymous) says...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NdnrFx...
Dude!
Patrick thanks for reminding me of this song.
I totally forgot about Europe.
June 10, 2009 at 11:10 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )