Martin,

TV is one of those things many people get very passionate over. For me personally, I pretty much stopped watching television several years ago and now average perhaps 4 hours a month (except soccer games!). But for many people, it's a daily thing so it is important.

That being said, you and I both know that with any kind of RF broadcasting there are lots and lots of variables. Digital's "cliff effect" nature is just one of them. As you know, many stations also moved towers, some operate and different power now. Some are higher then they were and need "tilt" now. And the list goes on and on and on.

The other big hidden issue is that of the low percentage of households that rely on OTA coverage, a large percentage of those (especially in the eastern corridor) rely on indoor atennaes. That will likely have to change.

Here is a link that maps the coverage before and after for Philidelphia.

http://www.fcc.gov/dtv/markets/maps_report1/Philadelphia_PA.pdf

As you will see, some specific areas do lose coverage on some channels. They also gain coverage they didn't have before. And overall more people gain than lose on more stations. Every market will be different, but this kind of change is typical from everything I've studied (was my job for a while).

Change is the operative word. It's never easy and yes there will be winners and losers. But overall this change is a positive one; and one I think history will judge as neccessary.

Hope this helps,

I've been really disapointed in tv lately, there just isn't anything on worth watching but the bundle package with digital cable is cheaper that having phone and internet seperate.

Yeah, we ditched the TV in July 1999, so I'm with you there. I really just was hoping for something reliable for emergencies. The junkiest portable from a thrift shop could reliably get UHF 69 and 39 in this area with nothing more than a hunk of wire hanging off the terminals, I just can't believe how truly bad the digital coverage is by comparison.
this weekend, we're going to try ONE MORE TIME to get the antenna up. I have a tulip poplar that's REALLY tall, it towers above all the other trees. My neighbor is one of those insane tree-climber guys you hire for the scary tree-take downs. He's going to haul the antenna, pre-rigged to a 10' length of 2" Aluminum Pipe, to the top of one of the trees and anchor it up there. My rough estimates will have the mid-section of the antenna at about 90' AGL. I am still using Coax as feedline, even though I think twin-lead would do better, and I debated an antenna-mounted amp, but I've had too many of those fail. It's going to be about 140' of feedline until it gets to the house, at which point it will enter an amp and from there, it's going to a Pinnacle HD USB stick connected to a Mac Mini running Boxee and feeding a 22" LCD display. I haven't found anything but a patent to connect the rotor to the tuner for automated positioning, there's plenty of extra boxes out there, none of which I want to get.

The whole point may be moot. DTV may be a case of to little, too late, because I fired up my Verizon 3g wireless modem, and it streamed Hulu just fine, and from what I can tell, WiMax and other Over The Air Two-Way Broadband (OTA-BB) schemes are literally coming soon, and then it won't really matter what the broadcasters are doing, as we'll simply connect - similar to Wifi - the the WWAN in the area (and we have SOLID coverage from AT&T and Sprint, even out here in the woods) - and that's that.

On a positive note, all of this hoo-ha about DTV has revived my interest in Ham Radio, something I abandoned about 7 years ago. I still have some gear in a box in the basement and I think I might putter a bit with a Winlink and a packet relay sort of thing.

Every 6 months or so, I turn the tv on, view the garbage for 10 minutes, then shut it off. It never gets better. My wife likes the soaps during the day. She works from home a lot, and they make good background noise.

I honestly don't care. I only use it for watching dvd's like OBG. I believe you Martin, I'm just finding better things to do with my time, Ham has always been on my list. I might have to look into that also.

There are supposed to be high-end sets that will do that automatically but most rotators are manual, like mine, or semi-automatic. Semi-automatic units will allow you to associate a channel number with a compass azimuth and they can save a step or two.

Almost all the channels I get are available reliably on one azimuth. But there is one channel I seldom watch that sometimes, when the weather doesn't cooperate, requires that I mess with the rotator and watch the signal strength available through the 'display mode' of the digital converter.

Sturgeon's Law applies. A random sampling is unlikely to hit the good stuff. Here in the UK I can find an hour a day easily, out of 24 hours times however many channels I get now. It helps to have a PVR that can seek out and record programmes regardless of when or where they are broadcast. I rarely watch anything live, or found by just switching on the TV. My viewing is planned.