Digital TV deadline extended

[KB9UDE]

Senate passes bill to delay digital TV switch - Yahoo! News

The deadline has been extended to June 12

 

[jinjimbob]

The tv stations can switch anytime before that if they want to though.

 

[capt jack]

Yeh, it's not like we have'nt been told to get ready for 4-5 years, been LOUDLY warned for the last year, had many, many tests run by all the over the airwave stations, and have free or almost free converter boxes stacked up (until recently) like firewood at the stores. All it takes is a few procrastanators to whine to their elected officals, and here comes unlce government to save us from personal responsablity! So they vote to change this "carved in stone"' date. I could care less about the conversion, when or if it occurs, but how do the rest of us who do what needs to be done when it needs to be done ever take our government seriously again? Oh wait.......

Jack

 

[MossRoad]

The tv stations can switch anytime before that if they want to though.

Our local PBS station's analog transmitter burned up early last year. They opted not to repair it and just went only digital from that point on. Most of their viewers were watching them on cable anyway, so they made the decision for economic reasons... it would cost too much to repair it for only 10 more months of service.

 

[ray66v]

From HD love it or hate it thread:

With pretty much all the TV stations currently operating both an analog and a digital transmitter simultaneously, with each transmitter using 5-12 million watts of electricity, that would mean wasting an awful lot of money, and energy, for yet another four months. This extension certainly goes against environmental concerns.

That's around 1700 stations, using an average of 8 extra mega watts, equaling 1360 million watts of power.

An average U.S. household uses about 11,000 kilowatt-hours (kWh) of electricity each year.

One megawatt of energy can generate about 8.77 million kWh annually. Therefore, a megawatt of energy generates about as much electricity as 800 households use.

So, the 1360 megawatts wasted, is enough to power over 1 million homes, for a year.

Surely after another four months, Since years of preparation has not done the trick, there still will be people not ready, then what?

 

[vic4news]

It's not the people that aren't ready, it's the technology. I can't believe how poorly the digital converter boxes work.

I've been watching over the air HDTV for years now, but our spare TV is analog and is connected to a DVR that my wife records a couple of shows on.
There are only two converter boxes that have a timer which is needed if you want to use your DVR or VCR to record shows unattended. Both of them have had problems losing their scheduled events.

Then there is the problem of the ASTC tuners not being able to reliably lock on a station that is more than a few miles away or where mutli-path reception is an issue.

I'm all for HDTV and it is all I watch, but I feel sorry for all the people that still use an antenna to watch free TV and are having the analog signal shut off before there are reliable and cheap VCRs/DVRs and tuners available.

Vic

 

[BungeeII]

I'm sure the biggest reason for the extension was the 2.5 million undistributed coupons and the new requests coming in every day.

 

[MossRoad]

From HD love it or hate it thread:

With pretty much all the TV stations currently operating both an analog and a digital transmitter simultaneously, with each transmitter using 5-12 million watts of electricity, that would mean wasting an awful lot of money, and energy, for yet another four months. This extension certainly goes against environmental concerns.

That's around 1700 stations, using an average of 8 extra mega watts, equaling 1360 million watts of power.

An average U.S. household uses about 11,000 kilowatt-hours (kWh) of electricity each year.

One megawatt of energy can generate about 8.77 million kWh annually. Therefore, a megawatt of energy generates about as much electricity as 800 households use.

So, the 1360 megawatts wasted, is enough to power over 1 million homes, for a year.

Surely after another four months, Since years of preparation has not done the trick, there still will be people not ready, then what?

Could you please explain how one megawatt can generate 8.77 million kwh?

 

[ray66v]

Could you please explain how one megawatt can generate 8.77 million kwh?

I admit, to save time, I did not verify this, before using it in my calculation. looking at it now, your right, it clearly appears to be incorrect.

Here's what I got:

1700 stations, using an average of 8 extra mega watts, equaling 1360 million watts / hr. of power.

1360 MWh x 24 hrs equals 32,640 Mwh, x 120 days, (roughly four months), equals 3,916,800 MWh, x 1,000 to convert to KWh equals 3,916,800,000 KWh, divided by average annual usage of 11,000 KWh, equals 356,072.73 homes for a year?

If this is correct, and since I did the math this time, there's maybe a 50/50 chance, it a far cry from a million, but 350,000 homes is still a lot.

Can anyone verify this answer?

 

[BungeeII]

Here's my short answer.... It doesn't matter.

The cellular companies are stacked up like cord wood waiting to occupy the bandwidth that's being vacated by the broadcasters.