OT: Digital TV

....just because I'm bored and can't sleep, and because it has come up here,
at least briefly...

I spent a little of the US government's money on two digital to analog TV
converter boxes. And since then, I've spent a little time watching over the
air digital TV*, here is what I thought (in case you're wondering what it is
like):

The Good:

* Program guide (although it's not very well implemented in either of the
units I have)
* Show information
* The picture really *is* better on a lot of channels that I already
received clearly. Colors are deeper/richer, and the picture seems "finer".
* I get a few more channels (or, probably more appropriately, more
subchannels)

The bad:

* As I expected, channels with poor signals are definitely unwatchable, much
more so than poor analog TV reception ever was. But things have to be pretty
bad, and both of the boxes I got (made by LG, one branded Zenith and the
other a store brand box) do try hard before giving up and acting screwy.
* Bad channels can cause screwy behavior.
* I am more interested in the internals of the box than the programming it
receives. (!!!)
* No battery powered converters for portable sets. (Not that I really use
them, but I have a few.)

The interesting:

* These units do pack a pretty fair punch in terms of onboard processing
power. Although not much information is available on the heart inside these
things (an LG Electronics LGDT1111T IC), I did find out (through unofficial
but believable sources, given the surrounding identifiable components) that
the CPU core inside is an ARM926EJS clocked at 200MHz.
* There's a flash ROM inside...makes me wonder if there's a means to update
it over the air? I should write down the current software revision numbers.

The weird:

* For a very short period of time last week, the automatic channel scan
found a whole bunch of channels located in northern Missouri. When you
consider that I'm up in eastern central Illinois, that's really quite
astonishing. They were very watchable, but faded into darkness after a few
minutes. I still don't know what caused this, but I suspect it was some kind
of atmospheric effect, considering that it was late at night.

Okay, I'll stop with the OT now. I just thought there might be some
interested parties.

William

* very little time. My TV spends most of its time collecting dust. I don't
even watch the evening news most of the time.


.

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