Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: And so it begins - Best Buy pulls plug on analog TVs

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Posted by Paul Mayer (Member # 355) on 10-17-2007, 01:32 PM:

quote:
Best Buy Pulls Plug On Analog TVs

The consumer-electronics giant has removed all analog television products from its store shelves and is selling only digital television products.

By The Associated Press

Best Buy said today it has stopped selling analog televisions and pulled all remaining stock from its shelves, signaling the end of an era as consumers increasingly move toward digital products with flat-panel and high-definition screens.

Best Buy (BBY, news, msgs), one of the nation's top electronics retailers, heralded the reign of digital TVs, saying it made the move "as the end of the analog broadcast era draws near."

Best Buy instructed stores to stop selling the products on Oct. 1.

Beginning Feb. 18, 2009, broadcasters will stop transmitting analog signals. Non-digital television sets that are not attached to a cable or satellite service or not equipped with special converter boxes will no longer work.

Best Buy is the first consumer-electronics retailer to report an exit from the analog-TV business.

More than 60 million U.S. households rely on an antennas or analog cable, and cable operators are required to guarantee their customers will receive broadcast channels until February 2012.

Those millions of households offer a lucrative market opportunity for electronics retailers and television manufacturers alike.

"We are committed to helping people understand the digital television transition, and exiting the analog video business is one way we can help avoid confusion," Mike Vitelli, senior vice president of electronics for Best Buy, said in a statement.

After the first of the year, the government will offer every household two coupons worth $40 each that can be used to buy two converter boxes -- devices that pick up digital signals and convert them to analog. Best Buy will sell coupon-eligible converter boxes starting in early 2008.

Posted by Scott Norwood (Member # 30) on 10-17-2007, 01:54 PM:

What constitutes an "analog TV"? One without an ATSC tuner? I thought that it was illegal to sell new TV sets without ATSC tuners in the US as of earlier this year. Or am I missing something?

Without getting political, I'll say that the idea of government-subsidized TV converter boxes is unbelievably stupid, and that they really should have set the analog cutoff deadline many years in the future, probably two standard deviations away from the average lifespan of a TV set (10-20 years?) starting from the date that the last non-ATSC sets were sold.

Posted by James Westbrook (Member # 3690) on 10-17-2007, 02:06 PM:

The "analog sets" will still work for playing back of videos and dvd's. The article implied the tv's would suddenly just all die on Feb 18, 2009.
At one of the local Wal-Marts, there are dvd recorders that have the digital tuners built-in, which would act as a converter for the analog sets. However, one of the associates had placed the "this product will become obsolete for receiving off-air signals" stickers on the boxes and info display cards. I suspect his supervisor told him to do that, misreading or misunderstanding the instructions. I don't think they will sell as many dvd recorders that way...

Posted by Joe Redifer (Member # 3) on 10-17-2007, 02:13 PM:

Who the hell watches TV? I may still need a 240p-capable CRT for my older videogames in the future. Screw over the air broadcast... I find that setting my eyeballs on fire and drinking motor oil is a much quicker way to accomplish the same task.

Posted by Mitchell Dvoskin (Member # 751) on 10-17-2007, 03:14 PM:

digital tuners built-in

Digital Tuners are not the same thing as an ATSC tuner. The term "Digital Tuner" in consumer electronics marketing speak usually refers to a digital tuner that tunes in the analog signal electronically (as opposed to the earlier purely mechanical analog tuners).

Digital Tuner also refers to things like Standard Definition digital cable/satallite tuners.

Posted by James Westbrook (Member # 3690) on 10-17-2007, 05:01 PM:

So the associates at WalMart may have been correct after all...
Since I disconnected from cable, I have been watching television much much less. I can probably do without it on Feb of 09.

Posted by Mark Gulbrandsen (Member # 72) on 10-17-2007, 07:39 PM:

Actually all you guys are off track on the tuner thing. Indeed ALL tuners including the actual tuner in an atsc receiver are analog. The frequency the tuners are tuned to are controled by what is called a varactor diode, varactor diodes have been used in tuners to control received frequency since I worked for Panasonic in 1973!! The varactor diode in the tuner is controled today by a control processor of some sort usually digital but the tuners thenmselves are all analog. The signal received over the air for digital television although digitally encoded is also still an analog FM signal mainly broadcast on the UHF band.

FWIW: A varactor diode changes it's apacitance by changing the voltage across the diode. That change in capacitance is what alters the tuned frequency. In multi band UHF/VHF tuners there can be several of varactor diodes so the full range of frequencies can be received.

Mark

Posted by Chris Slycord (Member # 4239) on 10-17-2007, 10:03 PM:

quote: Scott Norwood
What constitutes an "analog TV"? One without an ATSC tuner? I thought that it was illegal to sell new TV sets without ATSC tuners in the US as of earlier this year. Or am I missing something?

I think you're misunderstanding the mandate.

The mandate is for the manufacturers not the people selling the stuff. By March 1 of this year, all manufactured TVs regardless of size and all devices that have tuners (like DVD recorders or DVRs) have to include an ATSC tuner.

But if I have a store and a TV in stock that was manufactured a few days earlier than that, I can still sell it.

Posted by Bruce Hansen (Member # 281) on 10-18-2007, 03:32 PM:

Just a slight correction; 8VSB (the system used to broadcast "digital" television) is AM. It is NOT an on-off type of thing like you might think something digital would be, it has 8 levels (the 8 in 8VSB). Each level represents 3 bits. for any of us "old" computer folks, think octal. This is how you can get close to 20 megs of data in a 6 meg space. But, you say, if it has 8 levels, it is really analog. The process of transmitting something using a sine wave carrier is analog. Trying to use a square wave carrier would splatter all over the place (a square wave is the fundamental frequency plus all odd order harmonics). The VSB in 8VSB stands for vestigial side band. Most of the lower side band is "cut off" to save band space (the same thing is done now with "analog" TV broadcasts).

Posted by Scott Norwood (Member # 30) on 10-19-2007, 12:00 PM:

quote: Chris Slycord
I think you're misunderstanding the mandate.

Ah, that makes perfect sense. So, basically, they're pulling any old-stock sets that don't have ATSC tuners. That sounds entirely reasonable, and I'm surprised that they didn't do it earlier. Surely, a built-in ATSC tuner doesn't add much to the cost of a new set at this point, does it?

Posted by Frank Angel (Member # 248) on 10-30-2007, 03:40 AM:

Is there such a thing as digital TVs which use CRT displays or have CRTs gone bye-bye?

Posted by Joe Redifer (Member # 3) on 10-30-2007, 03:52 AM:

My HDTV is CRT and has an ATSC tuner, but it is being phased out.

Posted by Paul Mayer (Member # 355) on 10-30-2007, 09:18 AM:

AFAIK no new CRT TV sets are being sold in the US anymore. There were some really cheap small portable SD CRT sets being made up until the ATSC tuner requirement kicked in. Maybe those sets are still available overseas.

Posted by David Stambaugh (Member # 1102) on 10-30-2007, 09:30 AM:

I was just in Best Buy a couple days ago. They still have some CRT-based TVs. All have ATSC tuners now. The least expensive one was a 13" "round-tube" model with ATSC tuner, for $104. All the CRT sets were smallish, most had DVD players built in, don't recall any of them being widescreen. I was looking for a small set for my mom's bedroom, ended up buying a Magnetbox LCD HD for $299.

Posted by Mark Gulbrandsen (Member # 72) on 10-30-2007, 07:03 PM:

I like to walk through Wal-Marts and K-marts in smaller towns to get a feel for what hey are selling and only one Wal-Mart in Elko, NV still had any CRT sets, they rest have had none at all.

Mark

Posted by Chris Slycord (Member # 4239) on 10-30-2007, 08:29 PM:

Even tiny towns have people who want big screens.

My grandfather lives in St Ansgar, Iowa and used to live in Osage, neither of which I expect you guys to have heard of. And him and his wife have had a big flat screen panel for quite some time, as in their retired life seems to involve lots of TV watching.