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Television Media Entertainment Hardware

CableCARDs and HDTV 223

Posted by michael from the widescreen-but-still-schlock dept.
An anonymous reader writes: "HDTV is the next big thing. I attended the NAB conference in Las Vegas last week and everyone was pitching HDTV or asking about it. DesignTechnica has an interesting article on CableCARDS, which allows viewing HDTV through a CableCARD compatible HDTV set without needing a set top box. Cable companies are required to enable CableCARDs with card-compatible HDTVs by July 1, 2004. So here's some questions: Has anyone heard of CableCARD? Is anyone planning on buying a CableCARD compatible TV? How many people actually get HDTV in their area, and how many channels? HDTV is so hyped right now but seems that there is barely any deployment."
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CableCARDs and HDTV More

CableCARDs and HDTV

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  • ... if you had never heard of it and you read /. ... its probably nothing ;p

  • Err? (Score:5, Funny)

    by maan ( 21073 ) * on Sunday May 02, 2004 @12:59PM (#9034610)
    The cable operators include Adelphia, Bright House, Charter, Comcast, Cox, Insight, Mediacom, and Time Warner (or as it was known until recently, AOL Time Warner, bwahahaha!). Comcast was missing from the list for reasons not fully explained at the press conference.
    Err? What I missing here? Proofreading is so underrated...

    Maan

  • Firewire on Digital Cable (Score:5, Informative)

    by AIX-Hood ( 682681 ) on Sunday May 02, 2004 @01:02PM (#9034628)
    The FCC recently stated that all cables boxes that offer HDTV now must have working firewire outputs. This of course lets users now record the transport stream right off the cable box, and allows DVR's to do the same. The regular broadcast channels are required to be unscrambled at all times, but the premium channels are kind of up in the air at the moment and will probably require more decryption at the end. The question is, will DVR's such as Tivo, start coming with this cardcapable thing so that decryption can happen and let us record even scrambled shows?

  • The problem with HDTV right now... (Score:5, Informative)

    by adenied ( 120700 ) on Sunday May 02, 2004 @01:08PM (#9034666)
    The problem with HDTV and digital broadcasting right now is there's very little HD content. Some examples..

    PBS around here (San Jose/San Francisco) only broadcasts HD starting at 8pm. They however have pretty decent content and it's all HD when they say it will be. It looks great, it's just limited in what they show.

    The rest of the broadcast networks have very little content. Maybe one or two shows a day at best and the occaisional sports event. NBC had the Kentucky Derby in HD yesterday, but it wasn't even advertised as such and I didn't know if it would be HD until I turned it on.

    And one of the problems with some of the "HD" broadcasts is that a lot of the cameras they're using aren't even HD. They're standard definition that's then upconverted to either 720p or 1080i. Or if you're Fox, 480p 16x9. So a good bit of "HD" sports is actually just clean SD.

    Then there's stuff like ESPNHD. They usually just take the ESPN feed and stretch it to 16x9 which is really lame. They have maybe 4 or 5 events in actual HD per week.

    And then there's also the question of how do you get the content? I tried over the air with an antenna and that was just painful. Even a fairly high gain one didn't work too well for me. You can't get broadcast HD over any of the DBS services (Dish, DirecTV, Voom) except CBS. You have to generally get Cable TV for that. So I got Comcast out here and get all the broadcast stuff. But it's still more cost effective for me to have basic digital HD service on cable for HD broadcast content and also have Dish Network 200 service for all the other content.

    And I hardly watch TV. Sigh. But I got a HDTV so I really want to watch HD content when I can.

    The service I'm currently looking at switching to is Voom which is a DBS service from Cablevision that has something like 30 HD channels, many of which are their own content. It's about the same price as Dish Network, but has fewer channels. Luckily mostly the ones I watch from time to time. I'd have to keep cable for the broadcast channels.

    Some people might say it's a waste of time. And they're probably right. But HD does look awesome so at least it's kinda fun.

    • Re:The problem with HDTV right now... (Score:4, Interesting)

      by AKnightCowboy ( 608632 ) on Sunday May 02, 2004 @01:17PM (#9034716)
      And I hardly watch TV. Sigh. But I got a HDTV so I really want to watch HD content when I can.

      What exactly turns you people on about watching TV in higher resolution? I've been watching TV on a standard television for decades now and I've never sat there and said "you know, this episode of Law and Order would've been much better if it was broadcast at a higher resolution". I'm a computer geek and love my new toys, but I have absolutely zero interest in buying an HDTV compatible television set. The paradigm of a central broadcaster feeding me content without interactive control over it is boring to me. If my TV died tomorrow I'd probably go for years without replacing it. It's just not a focal point of my life.

      • Re:The problem with HDTV right now... (Score:4, Insightful)

        by jfengel ( 409917 ) on Sunday May 02, 2004 @01:26PM (#9034767) Homepage Journal
        Look at it the other way: if the government were to declare that new TVs would have only 240 scan lines rather than 480, would your TV experience be substantially diminshed?

        Picture quality does matter, especially as TVs get larger. It probably doesn't matter enough to junk an entire infrastructure, but this is a lot more about reclaiming bandwidth than it is about resolution. The new standard reclaims valuable spectrum and replaces it with a format that makes better use of the bandwidth.

        Or alternatively, it's a way for the existing networks to grab additional bandwidth while fighting tooth-and-nail to keep from giving up the old one. Either way, the new picture is really, really pretty, when you can get it.

      • Re:The problem with HDTV right now... (Score:5, Interesting)

        by blincoln ( 592401 ) on Sunday May 02, 2004 @01:34PM (#9034815) Homepage Journal
        For me, the actual television shows wouldn't matter. I don't watch broadcast or cable, I use my TV as a monitor for watching DVDs on.

        I would love to have an HDTV so I could see more detail in the films I watch. I'm not interested in paying the ridiculous amounts of money that they cost right now, so it will probably be a few years before I have one.
        • I would love to have an HDTV so I could see more detail in the films I watch.

          Are HD DVD films available in the US yet?

          nick ...
          • The HD DVD consortium has yet to approve a standard. It's expected that they will decide and manufacturers and content providers will have product on the market within the next year or two. Currently, JVC manufacturs an HD VCR (the JVC-HD3000 and newer HD4000). This takes standard and HQ digital VHS tapes. Some film distributors have released films on the new format, but not all, and the content is "protected" by an encryption system similar to DVD CSS. If you're looking for HD films on tape, it's available
          • Are HD DVD films available in the US yet?

            No, but given that my 4:3 TV set gives widescreen DVDs an effective vertical resolution of something like 200-300 pixels, an HDTV would still be a massive improvement.
          • Yes, just one, a recently released Terminator 2 Disk [amazon.com]. But there isn't a player sold for it at this time [though it will work on your computer].

            People need to check their facts. (see below).

        • I would love to have an HDTV so I could see more detail in the films I watch.

          Well, it depends. Certain categories of movies, while they are very very entertaining (and quite uplifting), when they look more real, are actually less appealing (eww, what are those...).
        • You wouldn't see any more detail from your DVD. It wasn't encoded from HD.

          But you can go to a theatre, can't you?
          • You wouldn't see any more detail from your DVD. It wasn't encoded from HD.

            I mentioned this in a reply to another comment, but I see not everyone is reading it, so here is a longer explanation:

            NTSC has an effective vertical resolution of 482 pixels. A letterboxed image occupies about a third to a half of the vertical space on the TV depending on the aspect ratio. That means that only 160-241 pixels are allocated for the vertical resolution, out of the actual ~480 (again, depending on the aspect ratio and

      • Re:The problem with HDTV right now... (Score:4, Funny)

        by br0ck ( 237309 ) on Sunday May 02, 2004 @01:55PM (#9034930)
        I thought hockey games were basically just contact figure skating until I watched it on a friend's HD and saw that they actually play with a puck! I had no idea.
      • You obviously haven't seen a good HD broadcast. First you need a good TV. I recommend a LCD rear projection (like the Sony Grand Wegas) or a good Plasma. Size does matter. Mine's 50" for sitting about 10-12 ft. away and it works quite well.

        Then you need to find some good content. Law and Order isn't going to do much for you. Find a sporting event, like a football game, or a baseball game (not on Fox though!) in 720p. Or 1080i. Don't bother with 480p because it looks alright (better than standard de
      • First you say you aren't interested in HDTV, then you say you really aren't interested in TV at all...

        You might as well ask for car companies to design a car for people that don't drive.

        I've never sat there and said "you know, this episode of Law and Order would've been much better if it was broadcast at a higher resolution".

        Well, you've never seen anything in a higher resolution, so how do you know it isn't going to be compellingly better?

        Personally, I'm more excited about the fact that TV will finall

    • ESPN-HD (Score:3, Informative)

      by maynard ( 3337 )
      Then there's stuff like ESPNHD. They usually just take the ESPN feed and stretch it to 16x9 which is really lame. They have maybe 4 or 5 events in actual HD per week.

      I couldn't agree more; ESPN has really dropped the ball here. The major networks broadcast sporting events in HD most of the time. And HDNET usually beats ESPN for broadcasting HD sporting events too. Don't buy the DirecTV HD package for ESPN, that's all I have to say. --M
      • ESPN is apparently physically building out their addon HDTV studio to their complex in CT. When it is done, sportscenter HD and more content is supposed to follow. As it is, their schedule has gotten much better as of the start of the year - now they have almost 1 hd game a night, whereas last fall it was that football HD drama show, and one or two college games a week.

    • Re:The problem with HDTV right now... (Score:5, Informative)

      by -tji ( 139690 ) on Sunday May 02, 2004 @01:42PM (#9034859) Journal
      I also live in the SF Bay area, and my experience with HDTV is the opposite.

      There are around 20 channels with digital broadcasts right now (depending on where you are in the Bay Area, you may be able to pick up more from Sacramento, etc. In the Peninsula, I get 20). Prior to digital TV, I couldn't get acceptable analog reception, so I paid for cable. Now, I use a simple antenna to get all the locals, so I don't need to pay for cable anymore.

      As for the HDTV content.. I don't know if you're expecting all the content from the last 50 years to be magically converted to HDTV, but I think most people would expect a transition period. Currently, most of the new staged shows are done in HDTV (The West Wing, CSI, ER, Law & Order, etc.) but the "reality" shows with all the handheld cameras are still 4:3 SDTV. It will take a while before the small/cheap units used in those shows are HD.

      And, almost all the big sporting events - World Series, SuperBowl, NCAA Final Four, etc. are done in HD. The amount of sports done in HDTV is rapidly expanding. ESPN is ramping up their studios and equipment and are doing more and more HD. Fox will do up to six NFL games per week in HD this year, ESPN already does their Sunday Night football game in HD, and Monday Night Football is HD. If you're an NFL fan, you'll see almost nothing but HDTV this season.

      With digital signals, MPEG2 compressed, I can easily use a PCI card in my HTPC to record HDTV programs for time shifting. I record The West Wing and Malcolm in the Middle every week, and skip through the commercials on playback. All at a much higher quality than available through other means.

      With all the incredibly expensive infrastructure the broadcast industry has invested in, I'm actually surprised at how fast the conversion is going. And now, as it is being seen as a competitive advantage, the momentum seems to be growing even faster.
      • Heh, no, I'm not expecting the last 50 years of TV to suddenly become HD. However, it would be nice if the major networks would broadcast things like the NHL playoffs in HD. Or film more new content in HD. I realize it's young, and the networks are providing more and more. It's just something to gripe about on a boring Sunday.

        One of the things that annoys me is the sporting events that are in half assed HD. Like the wide shot of the field is HD, but half the other shots aren't. I know this will event
        • You're right about the coverage being non-optimal for 16:9. There is a big difference between the evens on HDNet and one of the networks where they have to optimize it for 4:3. A couple years ago, CBS did a bunch of NCAA basketball games in 16:9. So, it looked great for HDTV, but the SDTV viewers got a letterboxed game. I guess they got a lot of complaints, because they dropped that method.

          And, yes.. Fox Sports 480i->p 16:9 sports presentations suck. They are filmed with 480i cameras, so the qual

    • Re:The problem with HDTV right now... (Score:4, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 02, 2004 @02:20PM (#9035097)
      OTA HDTV reception is a pain in the ass.

      You either have signal or you don't. In analog you could watch the screen and see if you are improvined your reception or not. As is, my HDTV signal drops out for 3 sec every 5 min or so and I don't have a clue how to improve the reception. At least with analog, the reception just gets worse, but you can still see and hear what's happening. No such luck with HDTV.

      Also, with analog, the artifacts are spread uniformly over the image. However, with digital the artifacts happen right where the action is. I assume this is due to the nature of the compression.

      HDTV is beautiful when it works, but there is not much to work with when it doesn't.
    • I tried over the air with an antenna and that was just painful. Even a fairly high gain one didn't work too well for me.

      You bought too early. The ATSC receivers (5th generation now hitting market and 6th generation in the works) are getting better and better at pulling in the 8VSB signal. I'm telling everyone not to buy before next Christmas, and I personally am not buying before Christmas 2005. I want 1080 native resolution anyway and you just can't get that for a reasonable price yet.

      But thanks for

  • DirectTV HDTV (Score:5, Informative)

    by mp3zero ( 306357 ) on Sunday May 02, 2004 @01:12PM (#9034685)
    I signed up for DirectTV HDTV about two months ago. I was an existing directTV customer but I still talked them into selling me the equipment for 99.00 (normally 399.00). The equipment consists of a Samsung HD DTV receiver and a new dish to pick up the HD channels. (also picks up all the international channels DTV offers)

    Channel Lineup:
    ESPN
    Discovery HD
    HDMovies (Movie channel showing various movies from classics to recent favorites)
    HDNet - pretty much a worthless channel showing repeats of recent Nascar Races, Horse, Races, and concerts. They also have some original series on it (I think).

    CBSHD - I live in Utah and they allow me to pick up the CBS HD feed from LA. This is great because I can watch my shows an hour later in HD without needing the off air ant.

    If you subcribe:
    HBOHD - The regular HBO in HD.
    SHOWTime HD - The regular showtime in HD.

    Cost: Basis HD is 10.95 a month. HBO is 12.00 a month and Showtime is 10.00 a month.

    Is it worth it?

    Hmm.... I can tell you this. I am a big fan of Sopranos and Deadwood (HBO series) and love watching them in HD. I also enjoy watching Golf in High def on the weekends. You can tell a HUGE DIFFERENCE between the shows in HD and regular shows. People come over and just say WOW to the sporting events. Movies are not that much different.

    So, its worth the money (10.95 a month) to me just to get golf in HD on CBS on the weekends. Basketball playoffs are also great. Its hard to watch golf/basketball in non-hd now.

    Cons:
    No STINKING TIVO!!!!!! I can't wait for the HDTivo to be affordable.

    Just my .02
  • Since I have built my own DVR (four tuners, hardware decoder, using this software [www.sage.tv], I would really like to be able to upgrade to HDTV tuner cards and keep my DVR.

    Are you listening Hauppauge [hauppauge.com]?

  • I have one (Score:4, Funny)

    by nil5 ( 538942 ) on Sunday May 02, 2004 @01:13PM (#9034695) Homepage
    A 114" HDTV to be precise. Doesn't everybody have one, or are you one of those welfare-receiving, MacDonalds eating East LA pieces of trash. Come out to the Cape sometime (that's Cape Cod, you ignorant baffoons), and I'll show it to you after we take a spin in my Aston Martin, you pathetic mendicant.

  • Set top boxes suck (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Stevyn ( 691306 ) on Sunday May 02, 2004 @01:16PM (#9034708)
    between digital cable and direct tv satellite, I've always thought that a set top box hinders the viewer from the easiest viewing experience. A feture like picture-in-picture is lost. It requires you to program another remote, and for some people this is a pain. It can require the user to have two remotes, one to turn on the tv, switch it to cable input, and adjust the volume and then one to changed the channel and use the converter box.

    For me it's not that big a deal, but for people who aren't engineers the logic of how to turn on the tv and change the channel is actually difficult for them to understand. Say for example, the television I purchased had a standard digital cable converter built in, it would make it a lot easier to use the service. Maybe it could work by the cable company sets up the firmware so make it more customized for their customers.

    Maybe I'm missing something here, but I should not have two remotes to watch tv, and I don't think I should have to deal with programming those multi-remotes either. Finding the codes when those batteries die at this point in the game is a waste of time in my mind.

    Maybe this issue of remotes sounds petty, but this would be one of the main driving forces in getting people to buy a new television if the sales clerk can relate this ease of use to them.

    • Re:Set top boxes suck (Score:3, Informative)

      by Monoman ( 8745 )
      I'm with you. There needs to be some standards so we can just plug cards into the back of TVs. Let me choose cable, satellite, or whatever I want.

    • Re:Set top boxes suck (Score:5, Insightful)

      by bob65 ( 590395 ) on Sunday May 02, 2004 @02:50PM (#9035276)
      between digital cable and direct tv satellite, I've always thought that a set top box hinders the viewer from the easiest viewing experience. A feture like picture-in-picture is lost. It requires you to program another remote, and for some people this is a pain. It can require the user to have two remotes, one to turn on the tv, switch it to cable input, and adjust the volume and then one to changed the channel and use the converter box.

      I sort of have the opposite view. I think TVs should do one job, and one job only - display whatever is input to them (in fact, I think they should not have speakers either). Decoding of digital cable content (and in fact, tuning analog cable channels) should not be the job of the TV. TVs should have one single input (like a DVI port, or something to keep the image digital). Everyone should also have an A/V receiver so they can plug all their equipment into one central source - perhaps there could be a market for cheap stereo receivers, for those who don't need 5.1 dolby digital surround sound. Connections to the A/V receiver should be *fully digital* (maybe then they could have all audio/video data on one line).

      Why do I think this is a good idea? Because it is much more simpler, especially for those who aren't inclined or willing to understand how everything works - there's only one connection to the TV, so you obviously plug the video out to the TV - anything else like your DVD player or digital cable terminal plugs into the A/V receiver. There would be no "changing your TV to channel 3 and changing your cable terminal to channel 56" nonsense, which is probably the root of confusion for most consumers. Also, it is much more modular - what if a new cable or satellite technology comes out down the road? Do you really want to buy a new TV? What if a new video techology comes out? What if you need more inputs? What if you want to upgrade your speakers? Upgrade the TV only? The multiple remotes issue could be solved by mandating a standard interface that the A/V receiver uses to communicate with all peripherals. That way, all communications would be between the remote and the A/V receiver, with the receiver controlling functions on other devices such as DVD playback or changing of channels on a digital terminal. The TV could have a power-save function that would turn it off when no signal is detected (or, an interface could be defined so that all A/V receivers would have control over the TV power).

    • You're so full of shit. When we got digital cable(time warner), a man from the cable company came out to hook up the boxes. He programmed the remotes for our tvs and showed us how to use them. There are power buttons on the remote for the tv and the cable box. Most of the time my family just leaves the cable box on and just turns the tv on and off. I doubt the box uses significantly more power when on than when off. They rarely need the original tv remote(only time is when they watch dvds and need to

  • Still waiting (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Snover ( 469130 ) on Sunday May 02, 2004 @01:19PM (#9034727) Homepage
    For a CARD that goes into my computer so that I can watch digital CABLE. Now they've stolen the name with a completely different concept. What the fuck?
    • The movie studios and cable networks are so protective of their precioussss content that they won't let it go anywhere near a PC for fear that Bunnie Huang or Jon Johansen will crack it.

  • Boston MA Stations (Score:5, Informative)

    by maynard ( 3337 ) on Sunday May 02, 2004 @01:19PM (#9034728) Journal
    I own a Hitachi HD widescreen RPTV and a Sony HS20 HD Front Projector. I have both OTA and DirecTV STBs; here are the channels available in my area:

    Broadcast OTA:

    WGBH-DT PBS 2-1 SDTV and 2-2 HD channel
    WBZ-DT CBS 4-1 HD
    WLVI-DT ABC 5-1 HD
    WCVB-DT NBC 7-1 HD
    WFXT-DT FOX 25-1 Widescreen SDTV
    WSBK-DT UPN 38-1 HDTV (Enterprise is in HD, for what little that's worth)
    WLVI-DT WB 56-1 HDTV (Smallville is in HD, for what little that's worth)

    Over DirecTV Sat:

    76 Discovery HD
    78 HDNET Movies (lame movies no one remembers, in HD)
    79 HDNET (some interesting stuff like quality reporting, some lame stuff like old Charlie's Angel's and Hogan's Hero's repeats, in HD)
    85 Pay Per View in HD
    88 HBO-HD
    91 Showtime-HD

    -------

    Boston is a good area for OTA HD. Also, the local cable company Comcast has finally gone HD and will rent an HD box for $7/mo. If you only have an HD ready set and want a cheap STB, Comcast is definitely the way to go (I went Sat before Comcast rolled HD out). You can also pick up a cheap OTA STB these days for about $200. The Sat STBs are, IMO, not really worth it. If I were buying today, I would go cable or OTA only. Note that HD TIVO has recently been released and should be on store shelves now or very soon.

    HD is broadcast in most major metropolitan markets now. And don't forget the advantage a widescreen TV offers for DVDs. It really is worth the money, IMO.

    Cheers,
    --Maynard
    • Yea, here in Houston you get 8 channels of HD and some spanish channels which only broadcast 480i on their digital network. I bought a Hughes $300 DirecTV/Off-air receiver and a Total Choice w/o Local package. It works out pretty well but I am worried if it will be upgradable to 8-PSK when DirecTV switches over to all HD.
    • Yeah, we get 8 here in Hampton Roads, VA too. To see what is available in your area look Here [antennasdirect.com] or better yet, Here [antennaweb.org] for what is available in your area. I'm waiting for the ATI HD-tuner card to add to my system plus an antenna from the site linked to above. Fortunately, where I am at all 8 stations are within 5 degrees of each other and one stationary antenna will pull them all in.
  • I have not jumped in the HDTV water yet out here in the desert of the metropolitan Phoenix, AZ area - but my brother-in-law has. We spent the first three days after installing his beautiful 60+ inch TV just watching the KAET feed. Since then, HD gets used for major football games and that be it, Homer. About fifteen hours of HD programming has been watched in the two years he's had the set.

    I told my wife yesterday that if we were to take the plunge - prolly next year - we'd be shortly upgrading our DirectT
    • I told my wife yesterday that if we were to take the plunge - prolly next year - we'd be shortly upgrading our DirectTV subscription to HD programming.

      I've been waiting for a plasma screen that has native 1920x1080 resolution. It's about time I'd think.

  • Brighthouse in central florida (Score:5, Informative)

    by techstar25 ( 556988 ) <techstar25.gmail@com> on Sunday May 02, 2004 @01:22PM (#9034749) Journal
    High definition channels, with widescreen programming:
    ABC local affiliate
    CBS "" (you haven't lived until you've seen CSI:Miami in HD
    NBC ""
    Fox ""
    PBS ""
    The WB ""
    UPN ""
    Discovery HD theatre
    HBO-HD (Sopranos in HD, bada-bing, plus all the movies are upconverted to 1080i from their original film source msking them that much nicer than the DVD equivalent at 480p)
    Showtime-HD (same as HBO)
    INHD and INHD2 (an assortment of various HD programming, sports-looks like your are watching through a window in the luxury box, movies, specials, concerts, IMax movies)
    HDnet HDnet Movies (various programming like INHD)
    HDNets and INHDs are $6 mo. to subscribe. HBO and Showtime are included if you get them regularly. All the other channels are free with digital cable, so there is no additional fee to lease the HD set top box. The only downside is that once you've seen HD you can't go back. Other channels start looking like crap to you.

  • Austin, TX (Score:2, Informative)

    by hJordanH ( 645049 ) *
    I imagine it is the same for all Time Warner Cable subscribers, but here in Austin, HDTV has enough channels to make it worth while. Half of our local broadcast stations are up {CBS,ABC}, 2 iNHD channels (movies, sports, etc), Discovery HD Theatre, Fox HD, HDNet, HDMovie, HBO HD and Showtime HD. Most of the programming is good, the box outputs any format you would want, up to 1080i. The HD Decoder box is the same price as the regular digital box. I haven't checked out the Firewire capability, but the port
  • I do not have HDTV in any form, but is gaining appeal for me simply because it is cooler than normal TV (not that I even really watch that, but still...). I have done research and have seen in many markets most of the major broadcast networks do have a fairly decent HDTV lineup, including most of the prime-time favorites.

    Your question is valid and needed, however, because there really is little consistency so far. What you can get in HDTV varies from market to market and with cable from provider to provi

  • Hmm... (Score:3, Informative)

    by Cyno01 ( 573917 ) <Cyno01@hotmail.com> on Sunday May 02, 2004 @01:36PM (#9034827) Homepage
    Suprised no ones mentioned this yet, but theres a new satelite provider, Voom [voom.com], offering over 40 channels of hi-def programming. It seems to run about the same as standard services, $40 or so a month up to around $80 with all the premiums.

  • HDTV is widely available (Score:3, Insightful)

    by jfengel ( 409917 ) on Sunday May 02, 2004 @01:36PM (#9034829) Homepage Journal
    How many people actually get HDTV in their area, and how many channels?

    Actually, nearly all of the networks in nearly all of the major markets are broadcasting HDTV. If you're not in a major market, coverage is far spottier, but a substantial fraction of the people in the US do live in a major market.

    The number of people actually receiving the signals is pretty low, since the TVs are expensive, but the digital signal is there, in lower resolution. The actual high-definition content is pretty low, since it's expensive to produce (requiring new cameras and other equipment), and so people aren't buying the very pricey TVs. No content, no viewers; no viewers, no content.

    It also doesn't help that we're still waiting on standards like high-definition DVDs. Supposedly that's busily being resolved. They're also finally starting to put out the high-definition content over cable wires (which many people in the major markets have) and satellite systems (which are immensely popular among people too far from a major market to get cable, and also among those who find the cable companies obnoxious).

    Me, I'm waiting on a cheap digital-to-analog converter so I can watch the new signal on my old TV, since the signal is clearer than analog.
    • Don't forget people like me, who own decent HDTV capable sets, BUT haven't bought the set-top boxes because they are still priced outrageously.

      An Off-The-Air *ONLY* (no DSS support) set top box is still over $300. I'm not going to spend that just to watch mediocre television programming at high resolution!

      Hopefully the prices will come down soon, making it more worthwhile. I'd pay at most $200 for an OTA set top box, $300 for something with satellite support.

      And that's only because I'm a geek; I'm sure m
  • HDTV won't be anywhere near ubiquitous for some time, probably 5-7 years, maybe longer. Takeup times for new technologies always take longer than hype suggests.

    A few comments

    1) HDTV has been mandated by law, but there is a lot of consumer confusion in the market about what comprises HDTV, which TV sets will actually deliver an HDTV signal, and so on. Here's more on the confusion http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/3403493.stm

    2) We're looking at 5-7 (or more) years before sufficient turnaround from

  • HDTV - Really? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by gessel ( 310103 ) on Sunday May 02, 2004 @01:49PM (#9034892) Homepage
    Try to find a true HDTV Monitor. No, not HTDV compatible, but really HDTV.

    It's not 1024x768 (DMD) or even 1280x1024 (LCOS). It's 1920x1080. Didn't the industry learn from the lawsuits on disk drive size and display diagonal measurements? (Of course they did, they learned that lying generates far more profit than the resulting lawsuits consume.)

    I think it's kind of a rip that there's a ton of hype over HDTV, and that people are rushing off to buy HDTV "compatible" TVs, spending nearly $10,000 for some, and not one is true HDTV. Of course, in a year or two when the plasma screen finally fades away, the replacement model might actually be HDTV.

    OK, there are videophiles who know the difference, and dig up something real like a nice Barco CRT projector. But most people are being defrauded.

    Nicolas Negroponte said it best:

    "When you look at television, ask yourself: What's wrong with it? Picture resolution? Of course not. What's wrong is the programming."
    • OTOH, if we forced manufacturers to produce 1080p displays or nothing, we'd likely get nothing.
    • My set does 720p native. That is true HDTV. HDTV isn't just 1080i but also 720p and many of the TV sets with an HDTV logo on them do that just fine. (Although I think the only difference between HDTV and 'HDTV Compatible' is the tuner.)

      My Hitachi 50V500 gives me a GREAT picture on HD signals. Yes, 1080i stuff is being downsampled to 720p but it still looks better than the 20" CRT I had a while ago. Some day soon we'll have 1080p displays. Of course the cable systems can't handle 1080p (it would take

    • Manufacturing tolerances for full 1080i support (Score:5, Insightful)

      by maynard ( 3337 ) on Sunday May 02, 2004 @06:02PM (#9036414) Journal
      It's not 1024x768 (DMD) or even 1280x1024 (LCOS). It's 1920x1080. Didn't the industry learn from the lawsuits on disk drive size and display diagonal measurements? (Of course they did, they learned that lying generates far more profit than the resulting lawsuits consume.)

      I think it's kind of a rip that there's a ton of hype over HDTV, and that people are rushing off to buy HDTV "compatible" TVs, spending nearly $10,000 for some, and not one is true HDTV. Of course, in a year or two when the plasma screen finally fades away, the replacement model might actually be HDTV.

      The problem here is that you expect manufacturers to build to the 1080i/p standard before the technology exists. The best sets for high resolution out there are still CRT based, because LCD (and that goes for LCoS too) and DLP technologies simply don't offer more than 720p resolution at the consumer end of the market. In fact, there are no DLP chips out there that do more than 1280x720, and the high end of LCD Front/Rear projection is still 1366x768 (Sony HS-20). Only a CRT offers full 1440x1080i resolution, because CRTs are inherently analog technology from the electron beam out to phosphor.

      If you want full 1920x1080 resolution you must either wait for LCD/DLP technology to progress to native HD spec resolution (probably two chip generations away before it hits consumer), or buy a very high end CRT based system. I have an HS-20 LCD front projector (720p native) and a Hitachi 51S500 RPTV; a low end model with three 7" CRTs and semi-decent optics. It only supports 1080i at 1440x1080. The better RPTVs use 9"CRTs, with better optics, but they're still limited to 1440x1080. The only "real" CRT systems out there that do full 1080i spec are commercial units for pre and post production, usually costing somewhere in the range of $25K - $30K.

      Why is this? Because the scan times for 1080i and 1080/24p are insanely fast, and the bandwidth requirements are insanely high. It's not just a computer monitor. And with an RPTV, the convergence issues alone get in the way of full 1080i. Really, the upshot here is that full 1080i spec was written long before the technology existed to display such resolutions. Only today with the migration away from CRT to digital LCD/DLP chip technologies are we coming close to display devices capable of real 1080i. And note, plasma doesn't even come close.

      Anyway, feel bad about it all you want, but I think the manufacturers are doing a fine job with implementing the standard given current technology. I note that my 51" RPTV with the higher resolution isn't much nicer than images projected against my 117" screen at 720p. Honestly, one can't tell the difference, though 480p from DVDs does suffer with such a large screen size.

      The real PITA has been the fight over DRM and copy controls interfering with rollout of content and obsoleting old HD displays. There will be a lot of very pissed off customers once they realize their component only HD sets are worthless for HD content in the next few years.

      Cheers,
      --Maynard
      • n fact, there are no DLP chips out there that do more than 1280x720, and the high end of LCD Front/Rear projection is still 1366x768 (Sony HS-20). Only a CRT offers full 1440x1080i resolution, because CRTs are inherently analog technology from the electron beam out to phosphor.

        Actually, TI already has begun manufacture of a 1080 DLP chip. The xHD3 chip was demoed at a trade show back in February in a Samsung RPTV prototype and should be out in the market by the end of the year.

        Oh, and there's been a 108

    • Re:HDTV - Really? (Score:3, Insightful)

      by batkiwi ( 137781 )
      1080p is not the only HD signal. You're forgetting about 720p and 1080i.

      While I agree that many 480p only sets are being sold as HDTVs when they're really just progressive scan SDTVs, all you REALLY need is a 540p screen to be able to display 1080i signals and be a "proper" HDTV, which many displays can do.

      Not to mention the amount that do 720p native nowadays (mostly RP and FP though, almost no tubes that I know of).

  • CableCARDs (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Bishop2020 ( 680200 ) on Sunday May 02, 2004 @01:50PM (#9034903)
    I'm an electronics salesperson at Sears and I looked up this CableCARD business a month ago when I was reviewing the new lineup of televisions we are slated to get around August. From what i was able to gather, the cable companies will be required to issue you a card, probably some form of smartcard, that you can insert into your CableCARD/HDTV ready set and it will instantly unlock all of your standard/digital/high definition programming. To me this seems like a big plus in making HDTV deployment easier for "the masses". I cannot tell you how many people come to me and want an HDTV integrated set believe that it will allow them to recieve HDTV programming from either satellite or cable. After explaining that they will only recieve broadcast and they still need a set-top box they are usually rather peeved at the whole HDTV transition nightmare. So, from my POV i would have to say that this is a good thing. Now if only it was a DirecTV card instead of cable i would be even happier. Cable in my city is absolute trash (Comcast). So when these sets arrive i will have the dilemna of whether or not to advocate them just because i don't want to force crappy service on my customers. I still like the old RCA 38" widescreen CRT HDTV with integrated broadcast and DirecTV reciever. I just think that set was released ahead of its time and was an RCA :(
  • Between the local stations broadcasting in HDTV already and the satellite or cable systems, I have well over 25 HDTV stations that operate at least 20 hours a day of content each.

    Too bad I still don't have an HDTV...

  • Related news (Score:3, Informative)

    by Apreche ( 239272 ) on Sunday May 02, 2004 @01:54PM (#9034925) Homepage Journal
    The FCC is going to require firewire on all cable boxes.

    link [gizmodo.com]
  • Here is a good site that updates HDTV listings:

    http://hdtvgalaxy.com/broad.html [hdtvgalaxy.com]

    It does not list Fox shows, because they are broadcast in 480p widescreen, not true HD. Fox is in the process of transitioning to 720p HD. Their 480p material, while not as sharp as HD, is MUCH better than SDTV.

    All the big sporting events are shown in HDTV (e.g. The Olympics, Super Bowl, NCAA Final Four, World Series, NBA Championship, etc.) and the amount of HD sports is rapidly expanding. There will be a large number o
  • So what we have here is an alternative form of....watching....TV. Albeit very interesting, and easy to get, not much offered because the production market hasn't stepped up yet. HDTV's users right now are in an unofficial beta phase, even if they disagree with me they should understand a few things:

    The technology is changing every month when considering HDTV.

    It maybe a big jump but it's too short of what is possible.

    It's expensive not matter how much you say (look what I got for $XXX/month)

    I think it's

  • Just to clarify (Score:2, Informative)

    by ballsmccoy ( 304705 )
    I bet you actually thought people actually agreed on something right? Wrong, the CableCard is not a simple smartcard a la DirecTV. The CableCard "slot" is extactly that, a standard "slot" with a standard CableCard "bus". The card issued to you will be more like the PCI, AGP PCI-X etc. expansion cards we are used to in computers exept that these will be fatter and look more like a SBAWE32 with the daughtercard and all the addional Soundfont ram installed.

    All that said, its still better than a set-top, bu
  • Comcast Digital/HD...straight into the Mac via FireWire...nice...

  • Still waiting... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Kjella ( 173770 ) on Sunday May 02, 2004 @04:18PM (#9035765) Homepage
    ...to see what exactly HDTV-DVD will mean. 720p60? 720p30 1080i60 1080p24? If and when I'm getting an HDTV, I want to see movies on it. 2/3rds downscaling (1080->720) would suck (take 3 lines, combine down to two... far worse than 2 lines native). On the other hand, getting a much more expensive 1080 set makes no sense if 720 will be the standard, due to size constraints or whatever.

    And have they finally agreed on a *final* standard that won't be cut off or downscaled later (analog, firewire, HDMI???). A TV isn't like my computer, that one gets upgraded or replaced quite often. They need to tell me what exactly I can expect to get, not today, but several years ahead. So far, they haven't done that.

    Kjella

  • HDTV is so hyped right now but seems that there is barely any deployment.

    This has been true for any value of "now" going back to at least the early 1990s, IIRC.

    Even better, there was a guy on the evening news last week talking about the FCC's mandate for digital TV, too. Basically, it's also all hype with little reality mixed in. He said that it took decades for even the lowly VCR to gain 85+% household penetration and that it is basically a joke to expect mandatory ubiquitous digital TV by 2006 or wh
  • Not until this post. I have not even seen or heard of a TV with such a thing. Of course since no stations around here have HDTV yet, who cares? Even Direct TV only has a few. Check back in 10 years when it's half deployed.

    When there is a standard, without built in DRM, I'll consider it. Not until then.

  • I'm in Fishers, IN, and I receive my HDTV through Insight Cable. My bill runs around $110 per month, which includes cable modem, basic cable, classic cable, digital cable, HBO, and Showtime. The digital content requires an $8 per month STB, and the HDTV content requires a $13 per month STB. I currently receive NBC, CBS, ABC, Bravo, PBS, HBO, and Showtime in HD. I could pay another $10 per month to get ESPN, Discovery HD, HD Net, and HD Movies, but I'm not really interested in those. The HD content is

  • CableCARD means "Digital Cable Ready" (Score:4, Informative)

    by tintruder ( 578375 ) on Sunday May 02, 2004 @09:19PM (#9037444)
    This is not just for HDTV.

    The CableCARD is shaped just like a PCMCIA card and if you go to BestBuy, Circuit City, or similar right now, you can see Panasonic HDTVs with the slot right on the front. http://catalog2.panasonic.com/webapp/wcs/stores/se rvlet/ModelDetail?storeId=11251&catalogId=11005&mo delNo=PT-56TWD63

    Only they are not "documented" as CableCARD because the service is not available yet, so the sales folks have no idea what the slot is for.

    Nonetheless, it is there on those Panasonic sets. Probably others too.

    Basically, what it does is make the TV DIGITAL CABLE READY, just like all TV sets made since the late 1980s are "Cable Ready" and do not need a STB for tuning regular unscrambled channels; "Expanded Basic" service.

    However, if you want the premium channels, you needed a STB or descrambler, except for the fact most of the cable providers have moved most, if not all premium channels from Analog to Digital.

    Now if you want to read more about CableCARD, there are several nice "White Papers" at www.motorola.com, or www.cablelabs.org.

    These sites explain how the card works, and how, unlike Dish/DTV, the receiver should be able to communicate with the cable company via the cable itself, no phoneline connection required.

    I went to the local Comcast tech center where I live and did find out that these cards are NOT transportable between areas, due to the fact they are authenticated to the physical street address where they are installed (basically they should work anywhere on that specific cable trunk, but not across town) and possibly to a specific serialized/addressable receiving device (TV, Tivo, PC Card etc.).

    This will not be easy to "hack" for those who are already thinking about it, as the CableCARD is not just a PCMCIA memory card, but supposedly has an encryption ASIC on it which compliments the QAM Tuner chip in the receiver, which itself was designed from the start with encryption in mind. Never mind the Broadcast Flag, the whole thing is DRM'd up the butt.

    An interesting note for the PC crowd....most SONY DTVs use ATI HDTV tuners, so hopefully we will see Digital Cable Ready cards for PCs.

    This is a big deal because all of the current HDTV card providers have no problem with OTA HDTV tuning, but keep trying and failing at QAM tuning. My guess is that are not getting access to the right chipsets for this purpose, and are trying to make do with older/less capable technology...since the PCI Bus is unsecure, all that DRM would go away once the full transport stream exits the tuner onto the bus.

    Since these TVs have the right chipsets and can do Digital Cable Ready, it seems like the problem is solved and just needs to be transplanted to the PC HDTV Tuner guys. Or we need to wait for that damn "Trusted Computing" (we big corporations don't trust you hacker/pirate consumers PCs) like the Intel "Sandow" platform.

    Last, consider the price plunge we will see when DC Ready + CableCARD is available everywhere and 90% of the HDTVs have no slot in them. That is going to be some pricey inventory to discount when the only products selling have the slot so your new 50" 3" thick plasma will not need a phonebook sized STB sitting next to it.

    Also consider how pissed off SciAtlanta and Motorola are about this...it means millions less sales of HDTV STBs to the cable companies...once all the TVs have CableCARD slots, the STB market is dead and only the chipset makers will be making money.

    And pity the cable companies that have contracts to BUY STBs to lease to customers for $5-$10 per month...they will be sitting on piles of unused STBs and they will lose that extra revenue from the rental.

    In this effort, each of the players has a deep financial interest in what technology goes where and when, and the fact that some companies will necessarily be screwed for "the good of the consumer" makes all of them less interested in making this stuff available rapidly or easily.

    We'll see it soon, but not as soon as we should be.

    And my bet is that it is not problem free in terms of interoperability, tech support, or performance.

    But it is still pretty cool.

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