High-Maintenance TV
THERE are people for whom getting something to work right is half the fun. For them, there's a new challenge: viewing the digital versions of free broadcast TV.
At some point, cable and satellite services will offer many local digital stations. But until then, watching "The West Wing," the N.B.A. finals or "C.S.I." in HDTV, the digital format that offers gloriously sharp wide-screen images, usually involves getting the signals the old-fashioned way: by means of an antenna and a decoder box. And that can often make grown men cry.
While many users apparently have no problem receiving HDTV or other digital broadcasts, others have flooded online discussion groups like AVS Forum (avsforum .com) with tales of woe.
These users report that decoder boxes may pull in some broadcast stations but not others, depending on the time of day, distance from the transmitter, proximity to other buildings and weather conditions. Boxes from every manufacturer are reported to freeze up and to require rebooting, usually by hitting a reset button or by unplugging the box and then plugging it back in.
Rebooting is not something you expect with a service meant to be as stable as plain old TV.
Neither is constant fiddling with an antenna, something many consumers thought had ended years ago when they threw out their last rabbit-eared TV and hooked into cable or satellite service. But for a digital TV antenna to work properly, its aim must often be as precise as a sharpshooter's.
"Installing an antenna is easy to do as long as you have a signal meter," said John C. Thomas, an HDTV aficionado in Canton, Ga. But signal problems occur if he rotates the antenna even slightly.
When he first installed the antenna in his attic, Mr. Thomas used trial and error, moving it around until he found a sweet spot where reception was best. And it is very sweet indeed. "If I move it a few feet away, then I introduce signal problems that the HDTV decoder box can't deal with," he said.
Perhaps fortunately, a majority of digital TV owners are not even trying to watch digital broadcasts. Since the transition to digital broadcasting began in 1998, 8.3 million households have acquired digital TV's, according to Adams Media Research. But only 1.7 million of those have the built-in hardware or set-top box necessary to receive and decode HDTV broadcast signals. The owners of the other 6.6 million sets are using them to watch standard-definition TV and DVD's.
Under a Federal Communications Commission ruling, all TV's will eventually come with built-in digital broadcast tuners. And later this year, manufacturers will introduce cable-ready digital sets that can receive channels like ESPN-HD and HBO HDTV without a decoder box. According to the Leichtman Research Group, by the end of this year, 3.5 million viewers will be watching some broadcast and cable HDTV channels by cable or satellite.
But today, those who want to watch digital broadcasts free still usually need to use an antenna and a set-top box. And that is where the fun starts.
Manufacturers of decoding equipment say that the problem is not with their hardware. "We've had no decoder boxes returned due to reception problems," said John Taylor, vice president for public affairs at LG Electronics USA, Zenith's parent company and a major decoder manufacturer, along with Samsung, Thomson (RCA's parent), Toshiba and others.
Mark Richer, president of the Advanced Television Systems Committee, the industry group overseeing the transition to digital television, acknowledged that "like a cellphone or satellite TV, there will always be places where a digital broadcast set-top box won't work well."
Rick Roome, a software engineer in Simi Valley, Calif., knows this firsthand. With his equipment, he can receive the digital feed of almost every Los Angeles station. But even though he is using a 17-foot antenna on his roof and lives just 35 miles from the Mount Wilson transmitter, "some days, the ABC station breaks up, freezes and then disappears," Mr. Roome said. "It happens especially around sundown."
Such reception problems can arise from several factors.
Digital set-top boxes are as complex as computers; when broadcasters send digital signals that do not exactly adhere to the official transmission standards, the box may be incapable of handling them.
To cut power bills when digital viewers are few, most broadcast stations that transmit a digital signal are using less than full power to do so. This not only reduces the range that the signal can travel but also provides a weaker signal even when a customer lives well within the coverage area.
Living closer to a broadcast tower does not reduce the likelihood of reception problems. Urban residents can suffer from the effects of multipath transmissions, signals that bounce off buildings and hills and arrive at the TV from several directions.
The earliest digital set-top decoder boxes dealt so poorly with multipath transmissions that the Sinclair Broadcast Group, owner of 62 TV stations in 39 markets, petitioned the F.C.C. to allow for the simultaneous adoption of the European digital broadcast standard, arguing that it was much easier to receive.
Both Thomson and LG say they will incorporate new technology into their next-generation digital TV decoders that should eliminate multipath reception problems. Most consumers will then be able to use just a small indoor antenna to watch digital TV.
"LG's new technology is a giant leap toward addressing the multipath reception problems," said Nat Ostroff, Sinclair vice president for new technology. Now that consumers will easily be able to receive digital broadcasts, "the incentive is there for us to go to full power."
Still, those advances will not solve all set-top-box problems. Tony Boyd, a retail store planner in Dallas, has no problem receiving digital broadcast channels with his decoder box and an antenna. But when he is watching some HDTV channels on DirecTV, the audio or video drops out from time to time, and the box occasionally freezes. Mr. Boyd has gone through two units, but the symptoms persist. "DirecTV cannot solve the problem," he said.
In addition to technological improvements, Mr. Richer's group, the Advanced Television Systems Committee, is working on a set of "recommended practices," guidelines for minimum performance standards for digital receivers. And antennas are not being neglected, either: within months, versions that electronically tune themselves without being moved to receive the strongest signal will appear on the market.
Even when HDTV programming on cable and satellite services becomes ubiquitous, reliable reception of broadcast digital channels using an antenna will remain important, broadcasters say. There will always be people who do not subscribe to satellite or cable, or do not have it hooked up to a second or third set. In addition, some broadcasters have floated the idea of offering a mini-package of cable channels, delivered over the air as a digital broadcast signal.
That plan can only work if reliable reception is a given. "Digital converter boxes are getting better," said Ken Holsgrove, an HDTV consultant and an AVS Forum moderator. But for customers who expect current over-the-air digital TV to work like regular TV, he had some advice: "I'd steer clear of it. The technology will not support their expectations."
THERE are people for whom getting something to work right is half the fun. For them, there's a new challenge: viewing the digital versions of free broadcast TV.
At some point, cable and satellite services will offer many local digital stations. But until then, watching "The West Wing," the N.B.A. finals or "C.S.I." in HDTV, the digital format that offers gloriously sharp wide-screen images, usually involves getting the signals the old-fashioned way: by means of an antenna and a decoder box. And that can often make grown men cry.
While many users apparently have no problem receiving HDTV or other digital broadcasts, others have flooded online discussion groups like AVS Forum (avsforum .com) with tales of woe.
These users report that decoder boxes may pull in some broadcast stations but not others, depending on the time of day, distance from the transmitter, proximity to other buildings and weather conditions. Boxes from every manufacturer are reported to freeze up and to require rebooting, usually by hitting a reset button or by unplugging the box and then plugging it back in.
Rebooting is not something you expect with a service meant to be as stable as plain old TV.
Neither is constant fiddling with an antenna, something many consumers thought had ended years ago when they threw out their last rabbit-eared TV and hooked into cable or satellite service. But for a digital TV antenna to work properly, its aim must often be as precise as a sharpshooter's.
"Installing an antenna is easy to do as long as you have a signal meter," said John C. Thomas, an HDTV aficionado in Canton, Ga. But signal problems occur if he rotates the antenna even slightly.
When he first installed the antenna in his attic, Mr. Thomas used trial and error, moving it around until he found a sweet spot where reception was best. And it is very sweet indeed. "If I move it a few feet away, then I introduce signal problems that the HDTV decoder box can't deal with," he said.
Perhaps fortunately, a majority of digital TV owners are not even trying to watch digital broadcasts. Since the transition to digital broadcasting began in 1998, 8.3 million households have acquired digital TV's, according to Adams Media Research. But only 1.7 million of those have the built-in hardware or set-top box necessary to receive and decode HDTV broadcast signals. The owners of the other 6.6 million sets are using them to watch standard-definition TV and DVD's.
Under a Federal Communications Commission ruling, all TV's will eventually come with built-in digital broadcast tuners. And later this year, manufacturers will introduce cable-ready digital sets that can receive channels like ESPN-HD and HBO HDTV without a decoder box. According to the Leichtman Research Group, by the end of this year, 3.5 million viewers will be watching some broadcast and cable HDTV channels by cable or satellite.
But today, those who want to watch digital broadcasts free still usually need to use an antenna and a set-top box. And that is where the fun starts.
Manufacturers of decoding equipment say that the problem is not with their hardware. "We've had no decoder boxes returned due to reception problems," said John Taylor, vice president for public affairs at LG Electronics USA, Zenith's parent company and a major decoder manufacturer, along with Samsung, Thomson (RCA's parent), Toshiba and others.
Mark Richer, president of the Advanced Television Systems Committee, the industry group overseeing the transition to digital television, acknowledged that "like a cellphone or satellite TV, there will always be places where a digital broadcast set-top box won't work well."
Rick Roome, a software engineer in Simi Valley, Calif., knows this firsthand. With his equipment, he can receive the digital feed of almost every Los Angeles station. But even though he is using a 17-foot antenna on his roof and lives just 35 miles from the Mount Wilson transmitter, "some days, the ABC station breaks up, freezes and then disappears," Mr. Roome said. "It happens especially around sundown."
Such reception problems can arise from several factors.
Digital set-top boxes are as complex as computers; when broadcasters send digital signals that do not exactly adhere to the official transmission standards, the box may be incapable of handling them.
To cut power bills when digital viewers are few, most broadcast stations that transmit a digital signal are using less than full power to do so. This not only reduces the range that the signal can travel but also provides a weaker signal even when a customer lives well within the coverage area.
Living closer to a broadcast tower does not reduce the likelihood of reception problems. Urban residents can suffer from the effects of multipath transmissions, signals that bounce off buildings and hills and arrive at the TV from several directions.
The earliest digital set-top decoder boxes dealt so poorly with multipath transmissions that the Sinclair Broadcast Group, owner of 62 TV stations in 39 markets, petitioned the F.C.C. to allow for the simultaneous adoption of the European digital broadcast standard, arguing that it was much easier to receive.
Both Thomson and LG say they will incorporate new technology into their next-generation digital TV decoders that should eliminate multipath reception problems. Most consumers will then be able to use just a small indoor antenna to watch digital TV.
"LG's new technology is a giant leap toward addressing the multipath reception problems," said Nat Ostroff, Sinclair vice president for new technology. Now that consumers will easily be able to receive digital broadcasts, "the incentive is there for us to go to full power."
Still, those advances will not solve all set-top-box problems. Tony Boyd, a retail store planner in Dallas, has no problem receiving digital broadcast channels with his decoder box and an antenna. But when he is watching some HDTV channels on DirecTV, the audio or video drops out from time to time, and the box occasionally freezes. Mr. Boyd has gone through two units, but the symptoms persist. "DirecTV cannot solve the problem," he said.
In addition to technological improvements, Mr. Richer's group, the Advanced Television Systems Committee, is working on a set of "recommended practices," guidelines for minimum performance standards for digital receivers. And antennas are not being neglected, either: within months, versions that electronically tune themselves without being moved to receive the strongest signal will appear on the market.
Even when HDTV programming on cable and satellite services becomes ubiquitous, reliable reception of broadcast digital channels using an antenna will remain important, broadcasters say. There will always be people who do not subscribe to satellite or cable, or do not have it hooked up to a second or third set. In addition, some broadcasters have floated the idea of offering a mini-package of cable channels, delivered over the air as a digital broadcast signal.
That plan can only work if reliable reception is a given. "Digital converter boxes are getting better," said Ken Holsgrove, an HDTV consultant and an AVS Forum moderator. But for customers who expect current over-the-air digital TV to work like regular TV, he had some advice: "I'd steer clear of it. The technology will not support their expectations."