Why I hate the loss of analog television broadcasts in America.

JDBarrow

JDBarrow

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Pleasant Hill, Iowa
Analog was much more tolerant to signal interference.

When you watched analog television broadcasts, even if some interference came up that turned the screen into snow, you often could still hear the audio clearly, which meant if any storm warnings were being broadcast, you could still hear them, or, if a really gripping sports game was happening, you still had a smidgen of an idea how the game was going. With the stupid digital signals, when interference happens, everything just freezes up and looks like something out of a horror film.

Besides the most obvious benefit, analog television didn't force you to either buy a new TV set, or an expensive converter box. You could use decades old sets aging back to the '50s with the rabbit ears on top to watch local channels for free. When they swapped out for digital, you were either forced to throw away your old box TV for a flat screen, meaning more wasteful throwing away of perfectly functional pieces of tech and more crap in the landfills due to forced and planned obsolescence, or you had and still have to pay a sizeable amount of money for a converter box to even see it.

The picture was also perfectly fine. I don't get why people think they need to be able to see every pore and pockmark in a person's face, the most intricate details while watching. And on top of that, they also helped keep you from staying up too late by signing off and shutting down transmission at about midnight or one in the morning. Which, also was great, because you usually got the seriously sweet end of day salute with the national anthem in the background and showing cool landmarks. Hell, even the snow and test patterns after it shut off were neat in my opinion.

But due to some seriously dumb branch of the U.S. government (FCC) deciding they "needed the bandwidth for emergency lines" and whatever other bullcrap, we got saddled with it. I would've rather them use all the digital bandwidth up for that. That's probably one of the things I actually hate my own government for the most, if I'm being completely honest.

With digital TV and a local indoor antenna, you get nothing or pure crap if there is interference. Sound that cuts in and out and those damned checkerboard squares on the screen. Comcast cable back in the 2000's had this reception trouble when they went digital.

I remember the days when we had an Arche-rotor antenna on your roof from Radio Shack and we lived near a major city, namely San Francisco/Oakland/San Jose/Sacramento. It was the 1970's. A number of local baseball games were broadcasted on local TV: Giants and A's during the regular season. Virtually each and every Oakland Raiders and 49ers game was broadcasted over the local airwaves. No fees. No cable bills. No streaming fees. Just turn the dial on top of the TV set to point the antenna accordingly. Before that, the 1950's and 1960's, a pair of a rabbit ears were often fooled with along with the vertical hold knob and the fine tuning knob. In the early 1980's, we got cable when the rates were reasonable. MTV and Showtime debuted then.

Nowadays, it's all about raping people's pockets. The Big System is trying to get folks to pay for streaming football games and such.

I have not paid for cable/satellite television for a long time. I won't pay money to stream a sporting event also.

Please tell us of any cable-cutting ideas you have?
 
After a storm took out AC power to about 300,000 people around here. Power to the house returned days before the cable TV got power. I went up int the attic and found a half century old rabbit ear antenna. Jury rigged it in the living room. Boy it's hard to aim at a digital TV station. But eventually I got 49 stations & subs. 40 of which I will never watch.
 
JDBarrow said:
Analog was much more tolerant to signal interference.

When you watched analog television broadcasts, even if some interference came up that turned the screen into snow, you often could still hear the audio clearly, which meant if any storm warnings were being broadcast, you could still hear them, or, if a really gripping sports game was happening, you still had a smidgen of an idea how the game was going. With the stupid digital signals, when interference happens, everything just freezes up and looks like something out of a horror film.

Besides the most obvious benefit, analog television didn't force you to either buy a new TV set, or an expensive converter box. You could use decades old sets aging back to the '50s with the rabbit ears on top to watch local channels for free. When they swapped out for digital, you were either forced to throw away your old box TV for a flat screen, meaning more wasteful throwing away of perfectly functional pieces of tech and more crap in the landfills due to forced and planned obsolescence, or you had and still have to pay a sizeable amount of money for a converter box to even see it.

The picture was also perfectly fine. I don't get why people think they need to be able to see every pore and pockmark in a person's face, the most intricate details while watching. And on top of that, they also helped keep you from staying up too late by signing off and shutting down transmission at about midnight or one in the morning. Which, also was great, because you usually got the seriously sweet end of day salute with the national anthem in the background and showing cool landmarks. Hell, even the snow and test patterns after it shut off were neat in my opinion.

But due to some seriously dumb branch of the U.S. government (FCC) deciding they "needed the bandwidth for emergency lines" and whatever other bullcrap, we got saddled with it. I would've rather them use all the digital bandwidth up for that. That's probably one of the things I actually hate my own government for the most, if I'm being completely honest.

With digital TV and a local indoor antenna, you get nothing or pure crap if there is interference. Sound that cuts in and out and those damned checkerboard squares on the screen. Comcast cable back in the 2000's had this reception trouble when they went digital.

I remember the days when we had an Arche-rotor antenna on your roof from Radio Shack and we lived near a major city, namely San Francisco/Oakland/San Jose/Sacramento. It was the 1970's. A number of local baseball games were broadcasted on local TV: Giants and A's during the regular season. Virtually each and every Oakland Raiders and 49ers game was broadcasted over the local airwaves. No fees. No cable bills. No streaming fees. Just turn the dial on top of the TV set to point the antenna accordingly. Before that, the 1950's and 1960's, a pair of a rabbit ears were often fooled with along with the vertical hold knob and the fine tuning knob. In the early 1980's, we got cable when the rates were reasonable. MTV and Showtime debuted then.

Nowadays, it's all about raping people's pockets. The Big System is trying to get folks to pay for streaming football games and such.

I have not paid for cable/satellite television for a long time. I won't pay money to stream a sporting event also.

Please tell us of any cable-cutting ideas you have?
Click to expand...

Many years ago, I bought an expensive Channel Master antenna that was supposed to work great with digital signals. It was not that great at all.
I recently bought a fairly inexpensive digital antenna from Amazon and it works great. I was particularly amazed at the number of channels that it picks up beyond the normal local channels.
There is much improved technology today.

Best of all, signal is over the air and totally free.
I personally prefer the higher resolution of the digital signal, but clearly understand that others may prefer analog.
 
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nicoff said:
Many years ago, I bought an expensive Channel Master antenna that was supposed to work great with digital signals. It was not that great at all.
I recently bought a fairly inexpensive digital antenna from Amazon and it works great. I was particularly amazed at the number of channels that it picks up beyond the normal local channels.
There is much improved technology today.



Best of all, signal is over the air and totally free.
I personally prefer the higher resolution of the digital signal, but clearly understand that others may prefer analog.
Perhaps your igital over analog due to the quality
Click to expand...

Not everybody, depending upon their location and home construction, can get satisfactory or consistently reliable digital antenna performance. Some people live in locations that don't accommodate good digital reception. I live in a senior apartment complex and who knows what old folks electronic healthcare gadget might be playing merry hell with my television reception quality. The high digital resolution is great so long as INTERFERENCE doesn't make a mess of it. Analog can still deal with interference much better. Maybe some snow but clear unbroken sound nonetheless. When reception conditions are perfect, digital shines like a diamond, but whenever a little interference hits, it may collapse like a house of cards.
 
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We used to get analog tv here from Minneapolis 60 miles away with an outside antenna. Now all we get is “The Red Green Show” on cold winter nights. :)
 
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Projectman said:
I grew up with the old analog TVs and three channels. I have zero love loss for the bad old days. Digital TV is infinitely better and technology marches on!
Click to expand...
Again, it depends upon your individual location, home construction, etc. You may happen to live where you can get perfect digital reception. They should have kept analog television in America but maybe have digital for paid cable and satellite.
Of course, Wi-Fi and Internet transmission is all digital. I'm not sure about mobile voice telephone.

I'm still glad that AM/FM broadcast radio is still analog or else my grandfather's vintage 1964 Candle 5-band radio and the original car radio in my 1995 Toyota Corolla DX would fail to work.
 
Interesting stuff here. About 10-12 years ago, I was tailgating at a football game when one in our group turned the pregame on via his 32" TV plugged into the car's cigarette lighter and using rabbit ears. I was immediately struck by how much better the picture was than my cable at home. I began looking for some magic box or contraption and to my astonishment, there was none - just the TV, cigarette lighter cord and rabbit ears.

He said, "Oh yeah, it's better because the signal is far less compressed."

A few articles that I've read support that claim. Now, that was a while ago and I'm not sure if the same thing holds true today. I'm betting that there are plenty of people here who might be able to explain the phenomenon better than I did.
 
JCS123 said:
Interesting stuff here. About 10-12 years ago, I was tailgating at a football game when one in our group turned the pregame on via his 32" TV plugged into the car's cigarette lighter and using rabbit ears. I was immediately struck by how much better the picture was than my cable at home. I began looking for some magic box or contraption and to my astonishment, there was none - just the TV, cigarette lighter cord and rabbit ears.

He said, "Oh yeah, it's better because the signal is far less compressed."

A few articles that I've read support that claim. Now, that was a while ago and I'm not sure if the same thing holds true today. I'm betting that there are plenty of people here who might be able to explain the phenomenon better than I did.
Click to expand...

Was the group 32” TV analog or digital? Rabbit ears can receive digital signals as well. You may have been watching a digital signal and not realizing it.
 
"Was the group 32” TV analog or digital? Rabbit ears can receive digital signals as well. You may have been watching a digital signal and not realizing it."

and

"Analog broadcasts are no longer available. They were definitely watching a digital signal."

Thank you both.

Further reading has me believing that the switch from analog to digital took place in 2009. So either my memory of 10-12 years was off by 3 or 4 or we were indeed watching a digital signal.

I appreciate the information. My dad used to say "If you didn't learn anything new that day, consider it a wasted day".
 
I have never had cable or sat, only a roof antenna ever. I get about 60 digital stations and a few analog. Storms, wind, and leaves on nearby trees cause interference and 1/8 to 1/4 of an inch in rotation brings some in and loses others.
 
I have had cable and satellite back and forth, switching when whatever I was using made me mad. I had satellite last after vowing never to use cable again, mainly due to a beef with Charter. Satellite kept raising their prices. I would go down a tier in order to save until I eventually was paying a ridiculous price for nothing I liked to watch. So I stopped everything and got an antenna. Luckily living in a metro area digital stations come in pretty well and I get enough staions to satisfy me for the most part. My wife watches more TV than me, I'm usually in front of my system.

I hate the way streaming is now. It's worse than cable or satellite due to exclusives. Like someone mentioned they want you to pay for sports. I just prefer to stay out of the fray and just deal with being in the dark when everyone talks about the latest greatest series of programs.

But, yeah, digital is there or not. I remember living in a rural area and receiving an analog station which was fuzzy but still watchable. One thing you can count on though is things will change.
 
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