Another day of free digital television

This blog entry should be pretty short, as its the weekend, the sun is shining and relatives are visiting. However, I do want to make a few observations regarding my new free, DTV experience.

As readers of this blog are aware, our household, which has one analog television that relies on over-the-air reception, now has the ability to receive off-air digital signals. The technology, while not easy to install, is quite nice in some ways-- now that we're used to it.

More kids Programs! For example, we noticed that none of the analog channels in the Washington area have quality educational children's programs on Saturday morning. This is not the end of the world, but we're surprised that the public stations did not consistently schedule this (after all, young kids don't know if its the weekend). However, now that we have access to the multicast streams of public television stations, we now have kids programs on Saturday. This is very much appreciated in our home, especially on those hot, sultry Washington summer days that makes you gasp like a fish that has been slapped onto hot pavement.

Electronic Program Guide Woes. I have another observation about the electronic program guide (EPG) that is less complementary. The Samsung receiver has an excellent EPG that tells you what is playing and what will be playing in the near future. However, to in some instances, some stations have neglected to add information in their DTV stream identifying the program. All that is left is the default: "DTV program." Hardly helpful, either to the viewer or the station. I'm embarrassed to say that the commercial stations are much better at this than some (unamed) public stations. Also, interestingly, there is a substantial delay in loading the EPG. It seems as if it is loading the information each time the EPG is called up, rather than using some sort of chaching function. As a result, in my impatience, I rarely wait for the entire EPG to load.

Audio Drop-Out. I have heard some talk about the sound preceding the video in some DTV broadcasts, because the two are transmitted separately. But I haven't yet seen evidence of this yet. However, because in digital the audio frequently cuts out when the picture pixilates, as compared to analog reception where the analog is always on (even while the picture may lose color or clarity), it is substantially easier to watch analog than digital. Our preferred means of watching TV is still therefore analog: a surprising state of affairs and one that doesn't bode well for encouraging people to convert to digital before they are forced to.

Fundamental Differences. Look at it this way. Imagine a choice between two cars. One is somewhat dumpy, a bit out of style and worn in places but always starts no matter what the weather and never breaks down. The other is a shiny new high-performance machine with all the newest gagets that is constantly breaking down and may be relied upon to strand you at the most inopportune times. Which car would you drive? Exactly. Analog TV is the Volvo of broadcast technology. If you want a Saab or BMW, try digital TV, but be prepared for what you deserve.