Now in HD

As I alluded to in the previous post where I was expressing my opinion on something I'd seen on TV...

I bought a new one on Saturday. Usually I avoid open-box specials like the plague but I stared at it real darn hard to make sure there were no dead pixels or scratches on the LCD screen.

It's 19-inch Polaroid FLM-1911, which is the right size for my room. The price was too good to pass up and it does full 1080i. Yes of course I'd like a slightly larger picture but the condition of the set was very good and it was under $300. It only has an analog tuner.

I've had an ATSC (the standard the US, Canada, Mexico and South Korea* have adopted for broadcast HDTV) tuner since October 2005. That too was an extremely good deal. I found out about it online - Radio Shack had put the receivers on clearance. It's not a fantastic tuner - newer ones are probably better - but the price too was incredible. Originally Radio Shack was trying to sell them for about $270 but the product was a little before its time. Sets were super-expensive then and digital signals were not on the air in most DMA's (designated marketing areas). Some markets that had the digital signals on the air were not operating them at full power. I got the receiver for $60 because not only was it clearance but the store I went to had only the floor model :)

The transmission power issue at the time was (and still is) caused by the UHF signal assignments (sometimes VHF, rarely**) interfering with analog assignments in other nearby markets. In some cases interference happens with distant cities because UHF can propagate a long way with the right weather conditions.

*South Korea did a slightly different version of ATSC - they do everything slightly different from everyone else, it seems. It appears to have been done to boost various aspects of their economy. The receivers will use the same chipsets as in the USA but the datastream is slightly different and broadcast on a different frequency. They've put it on 2.6 GHz which is highly directional thus ensuring their broadcasters will have to buy lots and lots of very small antennas to get their signal to cover urban areas. Its a strange choice because ATSC is not great with multipath reception (signals bounce off buildings - it appears as ghosts on analog).

**In Chicago CBS-HD is on a VHF channel and has to broadcast at a reduced power because the channel is used for analog service in markets as close as 150 miles away (?!)

It works great in south Scottsdale with just an indoor antenna because of proximity as well as line of sight to the transmitters. If I had an outdoor antenna I might get the Tucson stations (for what, same thing?) because there is a hint of the signal present on their channel assignments. The antenna requires re-aiming to get the independent and the all-jesus-all-the-time stations but I can pretty much lock in CBS, ABC, NBC and PBS with one antenna position so it makes surfing possible amongst the signals that I would actually watch.

An analog TV might show a snowy picture with distorted sound at that distance but digital is all or nothing.

The quality is incredible. I've used the receiver with my standard set (it down-converts) at times and its crystal clear - but connected to the new HD monitor all I can say is WOW.

DirecTV and Sky look OK on the set, not a hi-def signal but good quality.