FCC Mandates Digital Tuners

Gekko writes "The FCC has caved to pressures and has rolled back their mandate to requiring HDTV to 2007." A follow-up to this article: looks like the answer is "yes", although an extra year's delay has been added. Cherish your analog televisions, they will be collector's items. Update: 08/08 20:38 GMT by M : Declan McCullagh notes that there was also a vote on the broadcast flag concept to prevent copying of digital television - a set of draft regulations will be released next week.

One point

[Sc00ter]

They'll only force stations to dump their analog transmitters if 80% of the US is able to recive digital TV. So if people just don't buy new TVs because the ones they have are fine (like me, and most people I know) then there will still be analog stations around for quite a long time.

Re:Free Market? What Free Market?

[joshsisk]

In this instance, it's because the government leases the airwaves to the companies.

Re:Free Market? What Free Market?

[Quixotic137]

Well, the FCC passes out licenses to broadcasters. Basically the broadcasters have to switch or they will lose their licenses. I'm not saying that the FCC should be allowed to do this, but that doesn't mean that they can't.

Re:One problem

[Steveftoth]

S-Video is not digital. It's still analog, but the Ps2, X-Box and GC all support at least one digital output mode for hdtv.

Re:Why a mandate?

[Anonymous Coward]

The FCC mandated UHF receivers in all TVs to get that transition started. Like BNL says "It's all been done before."

Re:Why a mandate?

[MajroMax]

If the market isn't willing to pay for digital television, is there really a compelling national reason to mandate it?

In the FCC's mind, Yes. All the improvements to the TV-signal you listed (color, stereo) have the advantage of being completely backwards-compatible with older broadcasts. Presuming it still physicially functions, there's no reason a TV from 1940 shouldn't be able to watch VHF signals today.

What the FCC's trying to do here is _replace_ the TV standard, not extend it. For the moment, all TV stations have two channels (and frequency bands, by extension) -- their normal VHF or UHF analog band, and a HDTV band. Once the conversion is complete, the FCC will order the VHF/UHF transmitters shut down and the frequency returned for whatever use the FCC deems appropriate. By its very nature, this conversion is _not_ backwards compatible.

It's too far along for the FCC to pull the plug on HDTV, but the transition isn't moving quickly enough that the FCC currently has hope of killing analog TV within our lifetime. Therefore, this move.

Of course, the question now is whether there's enough turnover in TVs that just mandating digital receivers (which are distinct from the display equipment required for the HD signal -- you'll likely be getting analog quality display on the HD signal) will increase the digital market penetration quickly enough to avoid the next boondoggle.

Brief history of HDTV

[SkipToMyLou]

(unfortunately I can't take credit for this one. It was written by a fellow slashdotter a while back, and I've lost the attribution. If the author is still out there, let me know and I'll send you a beer ;-) )

For those interested in a brief history of HDTV, here it is:

Here's how it went:

Broadcast Industry asks for bandwidth for HDTV
FCC says "OK, we'll set aside bandwidth for HDTV"
FCC says "What standards?"
Industry says 'No Standards Please' and come up with EIGHTEEN recommended formats for HDTV. I am not shitting you.
FCC says "Isn't 18 different standards a bit much?"
Industry says "Shut the fuck up FCC, we know what we are doing. The 'market' will handle this!"
Consumer Electronics dudes whine "18 formats make every thing cost more, you are fucking us!"
FCC says "OK, it's your call on standards, 18 formats is fine, infact there are NO STANDARDS AT ALL, 'cause we are letting the 'market decide', but you start broadcasting HDTV now or we take back the FREE bandwidth."
Industry says "What? We really just want the free bandwidth. You really want us to do HDTV??
Congress says "Fuck you Industry. Broadcast HDTV or we'll legislate your asses back to Sun-day!"
Industry says "We're fucked. 18 formats? Why the hell did we do that? Let's change it."
Consumer Electronics dudes say "You ain't changing shit. We are already building the boxes you said you wanted built."
FCC says "Yah, ya boneheads we told you 18 was too many, now you gotta live with it."
Industry says "Well FCC, will you at least make the cable companies carry the HDTV at no charge?"
Cable companies say "Fuck you! You gotta pay! Bwah-ha-ha-ha!"
FCC says "Yep, no federal mandated on HDTV must carry, we are letting 'the market' handle that"
Industry says "We are so fucked. We are spending 5-10 million per TV station in hardware alone and have 1000 HDTV viewers per city, even in LA!"
Consumer at home says "Where is my HDTV? Why does it cost so much? Fuck it, I'm sticking with cable/DirecTV."

Consumer electronics dudes, broadcast industry, FCC, and congress all cry. Cable companies laugh and make even bigger profits.

Re:Collectors Items?

[SpookyFish]

It's more than just a D/A converter, at least in the literal sense. There's a demodulator (8VSB for over the air ATSC, 64/256QAM for most cable systems, QPSK / 8PSK for mini-dish satellite), an MPEG demultiplexer and decoder with overlay capability -- and then a D/A converter if you want NTSC output.

BUT, the delta of $250 is a f'ing JOKE, complete FUD. The cost of these parts in volume TODAY is under $150, and by 2005 will probably be $50 -- at least 10 companies are working on SOC designs(system on a chip) that integrate everything on a single IC.

Re:Digital Tuners

[hilker]

While the arguments of "people have satellite or cable" are valid, there is a VERY larger percentage of people that do not have either.

As of Feb 2002:
Total Television Households: 105,444,330
Basic Cable Households: 73,147,600

So no more than 30% or so of households with a TV don't have cable. Add in homes with satellite dishes and that percentage drops fewer. Source: National Cable & Telecommunications Association. [ncta.com]

Re:Artificial market economy

[CoreyG]

Digital TV does not necessarily mean High Definition TV. A signal can be broadcast digitally in 480p (480 lines progressive) which is what Fox is planning on doing. A 480p signal is not considered an HD signal. ABC is banking on 720p (720 lines progressive; HD). Other networks have decided on 1080i(1080 lines interlaced; HD).

This means you can have a Digital TV that is not HD compatible. Generally, to be HD compatible a television must display either 720p or 1080i. It should be noted that these are not all of the HD signals, but the most common. I believe there are also 1080p, and (maybe)540p or 840i signals, but they are uncommon. To be a Digital TV you only have to display 480p.

Agh

[Henry Stern]

Whenever I see this topic coming up, I'm reminded of the #1 quote [bash.org] on the #geekissues quote database involving inventing a device with which he could stab people in the face over the internet. Will people please learn the difference between Digital TV and HDTV? Thank you.

Re:One problem

[joshua404]

The only digital outputs currently available are Firewire and DVI. Everything else (composite, component, S-Video, even VGA) is an analog signal.

Only a few TVs have firewire and/or DVI support as they are both very new offerings. That and nobody has adopted a real "standard" yet so the mfrs are not committing. Right now it looks as if DVI may gain a foothold - which would be a very unfortunate thing. The implementation of DVI that content providers want to use relies on HDCP copy protection - yet another alarmist, chicken little concoction whipped up by the MPAA. If HDCP is adopted it means that nearly every digital television sold in the US (3 million) not to mention every other country would be useless for HDTV. The MPAA has stated that the only resolution they would support for non-DVI televisions would be a paltry 480p, which is basically a non-interlaced version of what you already see on your TV. While it's an improvement, it sucks compared to true HD (720p, 1080i or the new 1080p).

One of the biggest HDTV/DTV advocates out there right now is Mark Cuban. Apparently he is largely invested in HDTV broadcasting and has told both the MPAA and Congress that he would broadcast "de-rezzed" content over his dead body. Knowing his tenacity and financial clout, it's good to have him on the side of the consumer.

Get over it!

[Dante]

I have had a HDTV (without a tuner) for about a year, I bought a tuner (nice one too)a few months ago and was disapointed,I even bought a fancy antenna. There was only 4 channels that broadcast hdtv and the quality ranged from amazing to _realy_ bad. Left it hooked up but did not use it for a while, then I had it scan for new channels last weekend and lo and behold six new channels! It looks like the local TV stations have been upgrading becase the the quality seemed to of increased also. Now it's worth it, six month ago I am not so sure.. HD is fast becoming "worth it".

Re:One problem

[Qwerty4]

There are currently no digital connections for televisions. Even HTDVs are fed analog component signals. The only digital video connection available is DVI which is used almost exclusively by good-quality PC video cards.

You could argue that FireWire is digital, because it is, but it is not a video carrier. It is just a data protocol which may or may not contain video information.

Analog: RF, Composite, S-Video (Y/C), Component (YPbPr), VGA (RGB)

Digital: DVI

Government already spent the auction money

[edremy]

NPR had a bit on this the other day. The FCC projected that all the analog transmitters would go dark by 2006. They then expected to make ~$15 billion by selling the spectrum to wireless communications companies.

The problem is, the balanced budget agreement signed in 1997 already factored in this money as part of government revenues, and budgets were set assuming the money would be available on schedule. The first auctions were supposed to start this September.

Of course, virtually nobody actually owns a digital TV in 2002, so now the FCC is panicking.

howstuffworks

[Anonymous Coward]

http://www.howstuffworks.com/dtv.htm

UK has had similar schemes for a while now

[Elm0]

In the UK, traditional analogue terrestrial services will be switched off at around the same time as yours in the US (possibly earlier), although with the recent collapse of ITV Digital, this proposal may be shifted further into the future. This has been planned since UK Digital was turned on in 1999.

I can understand why US authorities might want to move over to a completely digital service, freeing up Analogue frequencies to be used for more Digital services. After all, a digital receiver (which will only pick up free to air channels) is around £90 here, which is bound to drop in price when the demand shoots up after Analogue broadcasts are turned off. I don't believe this is as much a conspiracy between electronics companies (the majority of which are Japanese anyway) that some of you make it out to be.

I agree with the poster above who mentions the thinking behind HDTV: is anyone really too bothered about watching anything other than movies in high resolution? I can't see myself being desperate to watch Jerry Springer on HDTV, irrespective of the views I have on the actual program itself.

I don't get it

[david.given]

Whenever I hear people talk about the total shambles that is the US DTV phenomenon, the biggest criticism I come across is that people say they'll have to buy new televisions.

Um, what?

Here in the UK, we're slowly but surely switching over to all-digital broadcasts. I forget when the analogue turn-off date is, but we seem to be on target (more or less). You can't get a new cable or satellite installation these days that isn't digital, and the BBC is picking up the broadcast digital stations.

This is all done with a little box that sits under your TV. It decodes the digital data, and then you plug in a SCART connector or S-Video or whatever you like and watch it on your analogue TV. Usually the boxes come free when you sign the contract. For broadcast, you'll probably end up buying the boxes for under 50 UKP, but then the channels are all free.

So what am I missing? What's all this stuff about having to replace your TVs?

Re:Cellular as an example

[(startx)]

because (as other threads have pointed out), the whole point of this is for the FCC to get the analog spectrum back so that they can re-sell it for something to the order of $15-$18 billion dollars to the phone companies.

RE: One Point

[Anonymous Coward]

Allow me to explain a little bit about how this works. The Head End is your TV Station or service provider, in your town if it is municipal, or somewhere else if you have a commercial provider. All the signals received by the head end are in Digital format, and all broadcasts are in digital format. What this means is that your cable service provider has installed converter boxes to change the signals to a format you can view on your analog TV. One converter per signal (aka channel). Unfortunately this makes it impossible to selectively provide digital or analog signal to individual customers. So in 2007 all the converters come out and you the consumer have two options. 1 buy a DTV, or 2 buy a converter. Your TV's won't be junk, you will just need a converter box.
The reason the feds make this regulation is very simple. There has to be conformity when the change happens, otherwise half your channels would be digital and half would be analog, but that would change depending on the service provider, town you live in, etc, it would be a real mess.
Bottom line is, your analog TV will be fine you will just need a 50 - 100$ converter.

Re:Current Digital Tuners

[Zathrus]

If they don't get things worked out soon then the digital rights management whinges will die. That simple. Because no, they won't change the standard and piss off all the early adopters -- there's too many of them to piss off.

Don't forget that this also requires changes on the broadcast side. Sure, pissing off a few hundred thousand consumers with HDTV receivers may not cause issues. Pissing off a few hundred broadcasters, all of them in the largest markets, will.

As far as getting around it by calling them "monitors" -- maybe, but then you can't have any kind of receiver in there. Questionable if you can even have a speaker. If you put in an analog tuner you must put in a digital tuner -- that's what this FCC decision is all about. You also can't call it a TV, market it as one, or allow retailers to market it as such.

Back on the copyright flag bit -- there's an ongoing battle between the studios and the manufacturers about what should be involved. The studios want very draconian standards, which will toast all current HD sets (they'll be limited to lower resolution analog input). The manufacturers don't want to piss off the consumers or broadcasters. The manufacturers have the upper hand here -- all they have to do is wait and the market will be too big to change.

Note that there are already "copy any/once/never" flags in the standard (I think -- the new Digital VCRs comply to them), but the studios know that they're ineffective (think about how effective DVD regions or DAT copy flags are).