As good as Whack-a-Mole’s long answer was, it’s missing a few things that I spent a lot of time searching and reading to find out.
First, it’s not quite true that HDTV standards will not be changing. It’s true that the basic display standards (1080i, 720p, etc.) won’t be changing, but that’s not all that there is to how the picture gets from the studio to your TV. If things like DVI/HDCP get adopted (which looks likely), then current HDTV tuners could well become useless.
Which leads to the subject of “HDTV-ready”, meaning that the TV itself doesn’t include an HDTV tuner: This is not really a “rip-off”, and could very well be an advantage. True, it means an additional $500 or so outlay if you want to receive true HD signals, but if DVI/HDCP renders current tuners useless, I personally would rather find myself needing to spend another $500 for a new set-top tuner as opposed to needing to spend another $2500 for an entire new TV with integrated tuner.
And speaking of tuners, let’s not lose in the shuffle here that almost all HDTVs come with not one but TWO built-in tuners for the old standard NTSC format. And since, as has been pointed out, the current HDTV fare is pretty minimal, you’re going to be watching a lot of regular TV, even with the best HDTV set, for the next few years at least.
Also not to mention the abundance of inputs of various types that all new TVs have. I live in an area of the country served by a cable company that still uses the antiquated A/B system wherein there are TWO cables coming into the house, an “A” side and a “B” side, with about 40 or so channels on each (as opposed to a single cable capable of carrying 120 or more channels). In addition to that, they have digital cable, requiring a set-top. But with all the inputs on my new TV, I can plug the “A” side into one RF input, the “B” side into the other RF input, and the output from the set-top into one of the component inputs. “So what?” you may be saying; with the digital cable carrying all the channels of both the “A” and “B” sides (plus more), why would you even bother with such a complicated setup? The answer leads to one of HDTVs most overlooked advantages (at least for some of us):
If you’re a PIP junkie like I am, HDTV is a dream. with the wide screen, you get “POP” - Picture Out of Picture - or two equally-sized pictures side-by-side. But this would be useless if the only input I had to the TV was from the cable’s set-top; since the tuner is in there, I’d still only get one channel at a time. But with the “A” and “B” cables on the other inputs, I can have one POP from the set-top, and the other from either the “A” or the “B”, freely tunable through the TV.
Ok, back to true HDTV. One of the basic questions that it took me an inordinate amount of time to find the answer to on the web was, “How do I receive real HDTV?” What I found was: First, you need an HDTV tuner, which for most HDTVs means an additional set-top box. Almost all of these are capable of receiving both over-the-air and from satellite. The latter, of course, means that you also need a satellite dish and a subscription to either DirecTV or Dish Network. Most cable systems – even when they have a digital feed like mine does – do not yet carry HDTV. Always remember that HDTV and digital TV are NOT the same.
Ok, so what if I just want to try over-the-air (OTA)? I live in one of the big markets, and supposedly there are a half a dozen or more stations broadcasting HDTV here all the time. What do I do? The answer is, you use an ordinary TV antenna, indoor or outdoor, and hook that to your set-top HDTV receiver. Yes, the pinnacle of twenty-first century digital television technology is coupled with 1950’s television technology. HDTV OTA is broadcast (mostly) on the UHF spectrum, so you go to Radio Shack and buy a $20 “bow-tie” antenna and hook that to your state-of-the-art HDTV tuner.
Another advantage that HDTV has over standard TV is that, since it’s broadcast digitally, there’s no worry about artifacts from a weak signal. In the BC days (Before Cable), a weak signal meant a fuzzy, ghosty picture. With HDTV/digital, the receiver either gets the zeros and ones or it doesn’t; if it can just barely read the signal, you get the same clear picture as if it was a mile from the broadcast tower.
All that being said, I have not yet taken the plunge myself to buy the HDTV set-top (hey, I’ve only had the TV for two weeks) and see for myself if HDTV is really like looking out a window (which is what most first-hand accounts claim). Partly this is because, being rerun season, there isn’t much on that I really want to see. The other part is that, from my wanderings through the web, it does sound like there’s a great chance that DVI/HDCP will turn current tuners into doorstops.
But lack of HDTV does not make my new 46" widescreen a wasted purchase; even if I never get an HDTV tuner, I’m glad I got the TV. Regular TV looks better, and DVDs (mostly) play in true widescreen, with little letterboxing (as Whack-a-Mole noted). That alone makes the purchase worthwhile.