What is the deal with my TV reception?

April 23, 2009 11:15 AM

What is the deal with my TV reception?

I live in Laramie, Wyoming. Presently, I can receive a handful of TV stations on my analog antenna. However, when I scan for them with my antenna hooked to a digital converter box, I can only get on channel.

The ABC station in Denver went all-digital this month, yet I'm still getting signals on my analog antenna. What's the deal?

If I can get an analog signal, shouldn't I get a digital one too? I can't put a larger antenna outside of my apartment, and I'm not too interested in getting cable. Help!

posted by elder18 to technology (9 comments total)

Digital signals have a very sharp dropoff point, unlike analog. With analog, you can get hints and wisps of a signal and still have a viewable picture. With digital, if you're outside the range to CLEARLY get all the 1s and 0s, then you're SOL.

I think this was named the "digital canyon" by someone a while back, in the run-up to the conversion day, and it was mentioned that a lot of more distant customers were going to find themselves in the dark.
posted by hippybear at 11:23 AM on April 23

Crutchfield's page on HDTV is a great resource and includes a link to (and instructions for using) AntennaWeb to determine what TV transmitters are in your area and what types of antennas will receive the transmissions.

Short answer: Just because you can get an analog signal does not mean you should also be able to get a digital signal.
posted by odinsdream at 11:25 AM on April 23

Nope. Read up here and here. While there's no such thing as an analog vs. digital antenna, per se, almost all digital today is UHF, for which rabbit ears antennas are ineffective.

With a decent UHF antenna you should be fine. This DIY coat hanger antenna really does work well -- it's what I'm using.
posted by Zed at 11:26 AM on April 23 [1 favorite]

It's just frustrating because due to the fact Laramie is a) in a valley and b) not really close to any TV markets, I'm going to lose all but one of the few channels I have.

Leave it to the government to take something that works fine for everyone (analog TV) and shut some people out with something else (while paying millions of dollars to do it).

What a bunch of shit.
posted by elder18 at 1:15 PM on April 23

Not for nothing but as a guy who makes his bones in TV theres a lot of validity to this switch.

If you've got a good internet connection you may want to check out an "over the top" box or system check out boxee or zillion tv.
posted by bitdamaged at 2:21 PM on April 23

^ actually analog TV allocations of swathes of the EM spectrum was a big government giveaway to the broadcasting interests in the 40s and 50s. Spectrum was just as much "the commons" in the early 20th century as the the range was in the 19th century.

By reversing this wasteful allocation and moving terrestrial stations to digital we will eventually free part of the electromagnetic commons for future uses, which will no doubt eventually include femtocells and other bottom-up distributed networks & repeaters like FIDONET and early internet of the 1970s & 1980s. (The USG is also re-auctioning parts of the new spectrum for billions of dollars).

It's unfortunate that rural dwellers are getting screwed by this, but the economics of reaching the sticks with anything other than AM talk radio are a bit dodgy.
posted by mrt at 2:28 PM on April 23

By reversing this wasteful allocation and moving terrestrial stations to digital we will eventually free part of the electromagnetic commons for future uses, which will no doubt eventually include femtocells and other bottom-up distributed networks & repeaters like FIDONET and early internet of the 1970s & 1980s. (The USG is also re-auctioning parts of the new spectrum for billions of dollars).

I think the last part of your comment is going to overwhelm the first. The public airwaves haven't been open for public use for decades. Just read up on the low-power FM fights that have been going on since before this century started. The end result is that the airwaves are not free, will not be open for grassroots bottom-up networks, and will ultimately only be given to large players for use.

The hippie side of me wants your words to be true. The part of me which pays attention to the real world says that they are not now, and will not be in the future.
posted by hippybear at 7:05 PM on April 23

I read somewhere, but can't find the source now, that digital TV broadcasts only go 1/3 the distance of analog signals at the same output rating. Or something like that. If you look at a signal map, the coverage for digital stations is a LOT smaller than the previous analog reach.
posted by bengarland at 7:52 PM on April 23

So, from what I understand, most digital channels are on UHF, which has a shorter transmission range and is less able to penetrate intervening obstacles like hills, trees and buildings. But, I also am led to understand that though most channels will move to UHF for the switch, many of them will move back down to VHF once all the analog channels are gone (at least here in San Francisco anyway) in about another year.

On a side rant here, the FCC has been telling people about the digital switch for years and most stations have been broadcasting digital for a couple years now. I find it absolutely incredible that people are mad at the government for what is essentially their own laziness and procrastination. People keep asking me when they're going to "turn on" the digital. They don't seem to understand that it's already on and they're just turning off the analog.
posted by runcibleshaw at 12:50 AM on April 25