Sorting out the digital boxes

[dreyfoos]

I just posted the following to AK-early color TV and for those of you who never go over there...here are some comments about a story run by Consumer Reports online:

The online report is free at http://www.consumerreports.org/cro/e...es-ratings.htm. I thought you had to pay extra to get this online info - but there it is. The report has almost all the detail one could hope for, but....BUT - you'll have to sort it out: The ranking by picture quality might be the least important factor - to each his own. As the report mentions, these are "minor picture flaws." For this collector, of mainly old B&W's, of course anything related to color adjustments are not relevant - unless I really do try one of those new-fangled digital Colordapter wheelie dealies (captions and crawls are screwed on the old roundies anyway). Very important to me is the layout and readability of the remote - almost a deal-breaker for me. I really appreciate that the RCA has some fairly good contrast - for high-mileage eyes - on their remote buttons. OTH, the RCA box has a universal remote volume control capability that would be great - but only works if your TV came with a remote. But, for my ancient B&W's, it's the DigitalStream that fills the bill. Its remote adjusts the volume right in the box itself - and an aspect ratio button right on the remote - niceties which RCA handled differently. The ability to add a channel (from a different direction) is also important to me. I'll be doing some more "box" shopping and I still have some homework to do. And, it's a bit of a moving target: my DigitalStream is newer than the one tested by Consumer Reports and does have pass through.

I will close with my thanks to anyone who posts their experiences on this topic and makes my future shopping a little more informed.

Roger