A million TVs to go dark across London Next week analogue TV will be switched off across London, knocking out an estimated one million TV screens which haven't made the jump to digital yet. The estimate comes from Digital TV, the body appointed by the government to hold our hands through the transition, and most of them will be in back rooms and bedrooms as almost …
On everything except BBC the recent digital reception has been dark for much of the evening. If you want to watch TV at all you had to go analogue.
With the analogue switch off the digital power will need a huge increase.
Can they also switch off some of the dead heads making the programme choice, (it appears that many are based outside of London, is declining quality related to distance from civilisation?
I live in a bit of London (quite close to Crystal Palace transmitter). Great place to live. Yorkshire is also great though I have never lived there.
Not all Londoners only see things inside the M25. Not all those outside never look inside the M25. it does bug me when so many people are rude about London but then don't listen to you when you explain that it is a place I like living in even it they don't.
As to the article. Who gives a toss anyway. Nothing on TV these days except perhaps BBC4 - soft middle class southerner credentials showed there!
And here it is - "Buy a freeview box for £(whatever) with (whatever)% VAT going to the government coffers"...
No thanks. Bastards have already taxed me off the road with their great petrol rip-off.
I'll be watching what little there is that's worthwhile on iPlayer, thank you very much.
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Grief, being shown around the old 405-line TV transmitter as a teenager.
Thing was stuck together by duct-tape. I remember seeing an old resistor (not colour-coded as was, but coded with rings and spots - wartime stuff). It was hanging in the air, tied each end by a bit of twisted wire...Made me proud to get home, switch on my old monochrome 10" Murphy, knowing the signal I was watching was going through that resistor, 20 miles away.
Crystal Palace is the one I can't get .. My aerial (in Leicestershire) points at the local East Midlands aerial at Waltham, about 25 miles away, but I get South Yorkshire / Lincs and Granada as well. Central Tonight, Calendar News or Granada Reports (in HD) are my choices. The auto-tune defaults to South Yorkshire!
To correct the writer - the name of the organisation is 'Digital UK', not 'Digital TV'.
And to the other anonymous coward above, regarding poor reception of digital terrestrial over the last few weeks... well, you may have a specific problem, but there's also been exceptionally high pressure weather.
Two things will improve digital reception at switchover: a) the digital channels will move to the old analogue frequencies, which are not 'squeezed in' so much and b) allow for much higher radiated powers (in the scheme of +10dB, i.e. ten times the power).
So you'll find the situation greatly improved, hopefully...
Am I the only one who is outraged by the fact that the government has taken something that is free (spectrum) and turned it into a cost item which will be passed onto the general (TV-owning) public?
If that isn't taxation by the back door, I don't know what is. What is the point of the government "having more money" when the only ones paying for it are the UK public? Why not just increase tax a little bit and save the cost of the auction?
How about allocating spectrum based on merit?
Now, where's that magnet link for Dr Who?
In the U.S., most average people are still confused about digital TV. Since the analogue switchoff, people think regular TV received with an antenna no longer exists. When they see a TV station received via an antenna, they assume it is coming from a satellite. *sigh* They also do not understand that vintage TV antennas will still work with digital receivers (as long as the antenna wire is connected to the receiver with a 75-ohm connector). Manufacturers are part of the problem as they make money off people's ignorance, and sell antennas with phrases added to the packages like "digital ready".
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