Analog NTSC still On-Air
 

Thanks to loophole in law "low power" NTSC still being broadcast
That's if you would call 25KW from 650' tower "low power"
Actually twice the power of the digital version!

I watch it every day to get my NTSC Fix :thmbsp:

There's one here in DFW on Ch 22. They were way behind getting up and running, had to put something on air or they would lose the license. So they put on the "HOT" TV channel.

Here in Champaign IL we have a low power (really low power) analog shopping
channel on Ch. 39. We used to have an analog LP Ch. 7, which would have
been nice for old TVs, but its gone.

Doug McDonald

The only thing is with everything being digital now, who will be searching the dial to even find these stations? Viewership must be minimal so I don't see how these low power stations can stay in business. I bet most of the public do not even know these stations exist.

Wouldn't they also be available somewhere in the digital spectrum and the LP is just an analog simulcast?

As I understand it, the final date for analog broadcasts on these translator or LPTV stations is 9/01/2015. Most have filed for construction permits from the FCC to change to digital before that date.
jr

Not the Ch. 39 around here. I though most were either shopping channels
or one of the multitudes of religious channels.

Doug McDonald

Can't they invoke the "must carry" rule for local cable companies?

No receivable NTSC out here.

HDTV - biggest con job since the Pet Rock. At least older Pet Rocks didn't suddenly become obsolete overnight, forcing you to buy a new one!

Our only LP NTSC station was a religious station (TBN) and went off the air within a few months of the DTV transition. From what I heard, the cost to keep the station on the air was too great and there were not enough people watching to justify keeping it going.

:D l LOL :D

Direct OTA to UHF input
This Pgm letterboxed

My flat screen TV still picks up plenty of analog channels on Time Warner cable. The local broadcast channels in Cleveland, however, are all digital. I did pick up one NTSC low-power religious station on an antenna about three years ago; that station was probably one of the last analog OTA NTSC stations in this area. Haven't seen it since the DTV transition.

I don't know about that. DTV does have its advantages, such as more programs on subchannels and overall better picture quality (due to higher image resolution) than we ever had with NTSC. The reception issues are a problem, but unfortunately they are the nature of the beast, as ATSC (digital) signals are weaker, by and large, than analog signals (for example, the FOX station in Cleveland used to have a 312-kW ERP analog signal, but its DTV signal is probably quite a bit weaker). One other problem with DTV is that the receiver and its antenna, even portables with short whips (like the little Haier 7" DTV battery/AC sets), must be stationary in order to receive any kind of signal at all, due to DTV's highly directional and all-or-nothing nature. This has effectively killed the concept of portable TV, :no: even though the Haier set runs on a rechargeable battery and, in theory, should operate anywhere.

I doubt this situation will change any time soon. Some stations (Philadelphia's ABC affiliate, for one) have increased their ERP power output since the transition in an effort to improve OTA reception in far-suburban and fringe areas, but many others are still running at their original DTV power levels, which means most people still must use outdoor antennas, mast-mounted preamplifiers, and rotors (shades of the early days of b&w and color TV in the late '40s, '50s and, for color, the '60s and '70s) in order to get decent reception. That's the way it is, unless you go to cable or satellite. Don't get me started on those little gutless-wonder indoor DTV antennas such as the ClearCast and Clear TV. I have one of each type of antenna and, while they do work after a fashion in my area (a near-fringe area, at least it used to be for analog NTSC, 35+ miles from the stations), they do not receive two channels (Fox channel 8 and CBS channel 19) due, perhaps, to terrain features of this area.

However, I would not recommend these antennas for reliable DTV reception unless all your area's TV stations are on UHF DTV channels; in this area 35 miles east of Cleveland, for instance, channels eight and 19 are still on VHF channels for which, so I have read here in this forum, an outdoor antenna is required to get any kind of reception of those stations' DTV signals.

Again, that's the way it is and will be indefinitely, unless every TV station in the US is granted permission to increase ERP power outputs to levels approaching or exceeding their present analog powers. I don't see that happening any time soon. :no: