It's official: No one cares!
 

Well, it's official: no one (outside of us TV nuts) seems to care one way or the other -- or even know -- that analog TV broadcasting will end tomorrow. We had planned a big blowout "Farewell" party at our museum with TVs from every era of NTSC - and before - represented, all tuned to the New York stations. (Thanks to all of you who volunteered the use of your sets!)

It would have been the biggest and dare I say best farewell party anywhere in these parts. And not one station was interested in giving it even thirty seconds coverage.

So rather than put up the deep fringe antenna and truck in a bunch of sets, we downgraded the festivities and will be having beer and pretzels in front of an "iffy" CTC-5!

It will be interesting to see how many people do end up caring after their sets stop working. Although I'm cranky enough to want to see a real revolt, I suspect this will all just go out with a whimper.

--Dave Sica

Oh, one local TV Station cared enough to call me.

BTW, I granted them an interview with the Press on the "Demise of Analog Broadcast Television", and, it made today's local cable TV news. All my vintage TV's were filmed in action. Plus, they asked intelligent questions.

Here is a link, enjoy:

http://www.necn.com/Boston/SciTech/2...244756863.html

I had great fun doing this interview.

LJB :smoke:

That's great! Makes me feel a little better at least!

I liked the line: "The man who clings to the past... waves "Sayonara" :)

(Couldn't open your link. Try this one.)

Hey that is great indeed! Nicely handled.

I think the reason is because the TV stations wanna downplay any notions that the fact that digital is inferiour to analogue TV signal. They know damn well it's inferiour, in fact, it's probabally the worst idea anyone ever had, but they dont want the masses to know that.

What they want people to think is that analogue is inferiour, and digital is the cat's ass. That results in clueless morons going out and buying those crappy digital tuners and/or crappy BPC flat screen TVs.

And i better stop here before i keep going on with my rant. There's a lot more than I want to say though.

Wow! What a terrific interview. I can't believe how much of your TVs they showed!

Is that a Dumont RA-105 console?

Thanks!
Matt Davala

Uh, gee wilkes85, why don't you stop being so gosh-darned polite and say what's really on your mind? :)

--Dave

Yup. A DuMont RA-105B "Sussex." I rescued it from a cellar in Butler, NJ. It was a scratched up mess, but, fortunately, the Chassis was in superb condition, and it had a raster!

The cabinet needed to be completely stripped, inside & out. But, the wood and vineer underneath was near flawless. It was a complete restoration, right down to the gold DuMont Decals & Control Labels. I scanned what was left of them and digitally recreated them all. Perfect.

You can pick your teeth in the Cabinet's finish. Plus, it works fabulous now.

The other Sets shown were my Philco 48-1001, DuMont RA-103 Chatham, aka "The Doghouse", and, the RCA Victor 630TS, which was on the Bench.

I'll have a surprise for you all in a couple of weeks. New Teleset is arriving...

Thanks;

LJB:smoke:

As Fred Ward-as Gus Grissom said- "F!ckin' A, Bubba !"

Anyone tried this link?
 

The link does not seem to work, is there some way I can view this
interview? TIA.

With all the saturation of ads out there, you'd have to be not watching TV to be unaware of analog TV ending. Got pretty annoying.

Actually kind of glad...my ham club's 6 meter FM repeater should have a much better receive range now :)

Try this:


http://www.necn.com/Boston/SciTech/2...244756863.html

LJB:smoke:

Great interview, and beautiful sets. :thmbsp:

We the sheeple ... baaaa...

mike

Thanks, Strawman.

Who's the babe in the Avatar?

LJB:smoke:

good job LJB! love when a fellow long hair gets some tv news time! great job man!

Thanks, Rockin'...It was Fun.

LJB:smoke:

Very nice interview :thmbsp:, but that is to be expected from anyone with the name of Lee... (:D) Looks like a very fine collection, too (from what they showed), beautifully restored. Congratulations, and thanks for sharing that link!

It's me, of course. :D

Great interview and great sets! Thanks for sharing.

Another Teleset huh? LUCKY!! I miss my dumont RA-105 colony! I had to give it away when my parents sold there house. Dumont made such beautiful TV's. Maybe you could leak a secret of what new Teleset your getting?

When I get a house I'll be on the lookout for another RA-105. Your lucky your 15AP4 works so well!

Best regards,
Matt

That Dumont is absolutely stunning. There is nothing like a restored vintage TV. I'm glad our hobby gets some mainstream media attention.

I know, the 15DP4A works good. It was a replacement tube marked September 15, 1954. Very slight ion burn, about the size of a silver dollar, but, you can't see it 99% of the time.

...any 15DP4's out there, for a spare, I'm interested.

LJB

Thanks. Took a lot of work to get it that way. It's one of my favorite Sets.

LJB:smoke: