About those free billions of dollars, I remember reading that those auctions were being fixed. And if some poor company couldn’t manage to pay its billion-dollar winning bid, by golly, it could just have that dadgum band of the spectrum anyway. Any truth to that?
No. And not only that, if the winner doesn’t pay the bid, they are required to pay a steep penalty and get nothing in return.
I think the question came up with one of the auctions of what to do when when the successful bidder went bankrupt before having completed its payments to the FCC. Did the FCC get to reclaim the spectrum for nonpayment or was it an asset of the bankrupt company. I don’t remember what was decided.
That was the Nextwave case, and it didn’t deal with analog tv spectrum, but with another auction.
Back in 1996, Nextwave Telecom won a bunch of licenses at auction. For that auction, the FCC had an installment payment system. Auction winners, instead of paying the full amount within a few weeks of when they’ve won the licenses (like they have to do today), could pay a small amount up front and then pay the rest in a series of installment payments spread out over a number of years.
Anyway, in 1998, Nextwave filed for bankruptcy. They also stopped making installment payments to the FCC. In response, the FCC cancelled their licenses and reauctioned them. Nextwave sued the FCC, claiming that their debt to the FCC was protected by the bankruptcy, and therefore the FCC shouldn’t have revoked their licenses.
This worked its way up to the Supreme Court, and in 2003, the Court ruled for Nextwave, and made the Commission reinstate the licenses, and refund the money paid by bidders in the reauction.
This is a windfall for conmen, scam artists, rip-off experts. A sample dialogue:
(Bell rings at door of elederly ladie’s home):
(Old lady): “Who is it”?
(ConmNa): Shows FCC “Badge”;“Ma’am, we’re from the FCC, you have an old set, it needs to be modified to accpet the new signals-otherwise it’ll be dangerous!”
(Old lady)“Oh my, will it cost a lot of money”?
(Conman): “No, only about $800 for a converter module”
(Old lady);“Oh dar, i can’t find that kind of money”
(Conman): "No problem-just sign this loan application (at 78% APR)
(Old lady)“Thank you so much!” 
Wilmington NC is going to be switched on 9/8/08.
Can they buy portable digital tvs to watch the hurricane news when their power is off?
What do you mean by this? Are you saying that full-power stations will still be able to broadcast in analog (NTSC)? Because, that’s not what it says here: http://www.fcc.gov/cgb/consumerfacts/digitaltv.html
No. They will be transmitting in ATSC. Channel assignment and modulation mode are distinct and independent. Both NTSC and ATSC were designed for the American system of 6 MHz channels. There is no difference between an analog channel and a digital channel. With a properly engineered station, it only takes a flick of a switch to change from NTSC to ATSC.
There was a short special report on the Wilmington situation on the local PBS station. Because of the concern about the hurricane season, it turns out the commercial analog signals will remain on after 9/8/08 with a limited service. Normally they will just transmit information telling people they need to buy digital sets or converters, but in case of emergency prior to 2/09 they will return to full programming. Also, the local PBS station will not be participating in the early switch-over. They also said they hoped that portable digital sets would be readily available by next summer. However, one side effect of the digital switch is that afterward it will no longer be possible to pick up audio from local channel 6 at 87.7 on an FM receiver.
Digital broadcasting has it’s roots in high def. The Japanaese first started high def in analog with great results. Trouble was in analog high def would take about 6-8 TV channels to broadcast one high def channel. Obviously this wouldn’t take.
By the 90s, technology came about to make high def possible using a digital format, which you can compress and use algorithms. Then about 1995 some broadcasters were upset with paying a lot of money for something the public didn’t want high def. FOX in fact said it wouldn’t show high def but merely upconvert. Then when FOX got football they went to high def.
Then in 1997 it was decided that broadcasters could use their channels anyway they wanted, not just for high def. This allows for one high def channel or up to six standard channels on what used to be one analog channel.
(Yes some broadcasters try broadcasting high def and subchannels but it looks bad)
Of course high def is useless for pretty much everything but nature shows. Is Seinfeld anymore funnier if it’s clear. Will Eli Manning throw a football better? No pehaps maybe in hockey you can see the puck better in high def, but really it’s a waste of money.
So a lot of broadcasters simply are upconverting and people are thinking they are getting high def when they are not. Actually most cable companies compress their high def. If you look at Comcast and it’s network high defs and see those same network channels in high def over the air. The over the air is better.
Once again big business is taking advantage of the confusion to sell people things they don’t need.
Want a high def screen? The human eye cannot preceive the difference between standard and high def in screens smaller than 30" but people will swear they can.
Consumer testings show while most everybody can tell standard def from high def it they are side by side, but if you can’t compare only about 25% of the people can tell. Yet people believe.
The government has made this an emergency thing but it’s not true. There are plenty of ways to get info around.
Broadcasters did not want to change channels so the FCC mandated PSIP which will map a channel to it’s analog channel. For instance WGN-TV broadcasts digitally on channel 19 but you won’t know it cause it’s maps on digital TV’s to it’s analog channel which is 9.
VHF channel 2-6 are horrible for digital TV, subject to much electrical interference.
VHF channels 7-13 are perfect. UHF works well too but it costs a LOT more to broadcast in UHF in terms of power, so most analog TV stations are choosing high VHF (7-13) (See http://dtvallocations.com for a map of where the digital channels are located)
After Feb 17, 2009 low power TV stations will still be able to broadcast in analog if they choose to.
Also the Wilmington test market is a joke as too many people have cable. You’ll still get TV if you have cable. See cable uses QAM not analog or digital. Cable takes analog signals and retransmits them as QAM, so the cable company will do the same for digtial signals.
QAM is digital. The analog video is converted to MPEG-2 digital video encoding. At a digital television station, the MPEG-2 video is used to modulate a carrier with 8-VSB modulation. At a cable system head-end, the MPEG-2 video is used to modulate a carrier with QAM modulation. 8-VSB was intended for use “over the air”, while QAM was optimized for use on a cable system. It’s the same MPEG-2 digital video. An 8-VSB channel can carry approximately 19 megabit/s. A QAM channel can carry approximately 38 megabit/s. Both use 6 MHz of spectrum. Many digital TV tuners can receive both ATSC (8-VSB) and unencrypted digital cable (QAM). Internet cable modems also use QAM for their downstream link.
Analog cable uses NTSC (VSB), just like current analog over-the-air television broadcasters.
A digital cable box receives a QAM signal, demodulates it and extracts the MPEG-2 digital video. It then decodes the MPEG-2 digital video and converts it into NTSC analog video for output to the customer’s television.
Influence my ignorance. Do I have to buy a new TV?
-FrL-
Probably not. Just a digital box. the antenna goes into the box then you plug the box into the tv via scart.
at least that how it was done in sweden (all digital now).
the boxes are pretty cheap too.
if you buy a new tv then you can get one with a digital tuner in it but you dont have to.
No, just a converter box. In the US you can get $40 off the cost of the box buy getting a coupon directly from the government
The boxes should only cost around $40 each*, anyway
*random google results
Something I’d like to know:
We have three TVs, manufactured in 2004, 1995, and 1988 (B&W). We have bought converter boxes for all three. Do we have to wait until next February to test the boxes with the sets?
No. The vast majority of digital stations are already on the air. The deadline is for the cessation of analog broadcasting.
Digital Set-Top Boxes can also be plugged in using RCA, Component, and (on Hi-Def models) HDMI or DVI cables.
They’ve set a date of around 2014 to switch off analogue TV here- penetration of Digital TV is still relatively low and, since most people have CRT TVs, there’s no real benefit for them to spend $70-odd on a DSTB to receive an extra ABC channel and another channel of The News In Latvian/Greek/Kalahari Tongue-Click courtesy of SBS…
Almost all new LCD TVs here have digital tuners in them, usually HDTV, FWIW.
Your signature (last line) reminds me of a line in an old Disney comic book involving an attempt by a non-Indian to make smoke signals, which an Indian reads as:
“Baby fires…fall up to deer…with horse…in pocket!”
hee hee
In Chicago I went from getting 16 TV stations, three of which are near perfect (7, 9 and 26) and Two low power stations (23 and 48 near cable perfect) with analog. When I bought my digital TV I now get three stations (7, 9 and 32).
And 9 and 7 are pixilated to the hilt. Of course the answer is “Get an antenna.” That is fine but going from rabbit ears with a UHF loop and picking up 16 watchable stations to one watchable station is progress? I know an outdoor antenna would help but that’s not always an option.
I live in an apartment with no master antenna so my only option is cable. We can’t get a dish do to the other buildings.
I realize analog is outdated technology but really if I live 5 miles from the Sears Tower and digital is the fussy a signal they should’ve thought of something better, they’ve had over 10 years now to improve this.
Of course the FCC says “We need to free up bandwidth for emergencies, look at Katrina and 9-11.” Yet they fail to say “We could take the frequencies from cell phones after all a cell phone isn’t necessary.” But the attitude is more cell phones for rich people and less TV for poor people.
If you’re still using old-fashioned rabbit ears with a UHF loop, the old girl might just not be up to the task. Odds are you’ll see vast improvement if you just upgrade your indoor antenna. This Winegard antenna is, as I understand it, pretty much the gold standard for indoor reception. Something along those lines will probably improve your situation immensely.