# Why has no car maker done this simple thing **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [October 14, 2016, 8:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-no-car-maker-done-this-simple-thing/768552 "2016-10-14T20:51:10Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 4\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![filmore](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/7993a0/32.png) [@filmore](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/filmore)\ **Post date:** [October 16, 2016, 12:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-no-car-maker-done-this-simple-thing/768552/21 "2016-10-16T00:57:23Z")
**Nansbread1** , although it may be difficult to listen to TV in your car, there are many other solutions which can solve your problem of missing shows. One way is to get a DVR to automatically record whatever shows you want to watch. You can get one from your cable company or buy one yourself. There are also many online ways to watch TV shows now. Hulu is a streaming service which has many current network and cable TV shows. How do you watch TV now? We can probably come up with some ideas so that you’ll never miss your shows again. ---
**Author:** ![Derleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Derleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Derleth)\ **Post date:** [October 16, 2016, 1:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-no-car-maker-done-this-simple-thing/768552/22 "2016-10-16T01:05:14Z")
> [@cochrane](#): > > I know you can’t pick up digital TV (US ATSC) in a moving vehicle. Wouldn’t it also be a problem to pick up the audio part of a digital TV signal if you’re moving? If you can’t pick up a broadcast, you can’t pick up a broadcast. ATSC is how the whole enchilada is encoded, and since that wasn’t designed to work well with moving receivers (or transmitters) you can’t pick it up in a car in any meaningful sense of the term. ---
**Author:** ![Derleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Derleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Derleth)\ **Post date:** [October 16, 2016, 1:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-no-car-maker-done-this-simple-thing/768552/23 "2016-10-16T01:18:05Z")
> [@bob\_2](#): > > Don’t you guys have PVRs or Video on Demand or whatever? There are very few programmes that we watch live these days, if only to skip the adverts and any time filling waffle. You have to understand: The average age around here apparently hovers anywhere from "Back when Carson was on late-night… " and dead. You can tell by the fact they care about getting traditional ad-delivery-mechanism broadcast media live, as appointment listening. 😉 This is also a technical question, and as a technical answer, I’ll say this: ATSC is too sensitive to Doppler and multipath interference (receiving the same signal multiple times, time-delayed, due to the signal bouncing off stuff and finding multiple paths to the receiver) to be usable in a mobile context. There is a standard called ATSC-M/H (ATSC Mobile/Handheld), backwards-compatible with normal ATSC, which solves these problems and could yield TV audio tuners in cars about five years after everyone’s stopped caring about over-the-air TV. ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [October 16, 2016, 10:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-no-car-maker-done-this-simple-thing/768552/24 "2016-10-16T22:40:09Z")
My grandparent had a “portable” radio (It had to be plugged in) with a VHF band as a third option. I remember that you could not only pick up the three broadcast stations in that band, but, in the right area, you could pick up from the cable TV station. Though I may be mixing that last part up with what my Atari picked up, acting like an antenna for the small b&w TV I had in my room. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-has-no-car-maker-done-this-simple-thing/768552.md?page=1)