I was looking at the '81 Sony cable-ready console that I got today and was wondering when cable ready TV's hit the market. The oldest one I've seen was a '79 Zenith System 3. It only went to channel 36 and had a green LED readout. Were there any cable ready sets made before '79?

i think rca had a digital reading tuner in the colortrak from late 1978. at that time i really wanted one of those beauties. had to settle for the philco hybrid we were watching.maggie came along around that time too as i recall.

Come to think of it, I do remember seeing some RCA's from the late '70's with digital readout tuning. Some had a switch for cable/normal and others were just strictly off-air tuners.

I'm going OT on my own thread; but, I remember seeing a sears tube-type color console with pushbutton varactor tuning. I think it was a Warwick built set from the mid '70's.

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back in '94, we inherited my Uncle's circa '81 Zenith console. It was cable ready up to 36, had OSD, and used an ultrasonic remote.

One thing I've never seen was a Zenith Chromacolor II chassis with a digital readout tuner. I really don't know if there were any.

I remember, back in 1980, someone saying that they bought a new cable ready TV set so they could tune in HBO (which apparently on a channel somewhere between 6 and 7, not scrambled). seems that the cable company had supplied subscribers cable boxes, with a microprocessor based denial system (that is, it looks for codes in the vertical interval and decides if you are allowed to watch that channel). Also heard that people would drill a hole, thru the vents, into the micro chip, killing it and thus allowing everything to be viewed. Seems the micro wasn't used to tune the channels.

The earliest TV I remember having CATV channels available was around 1985~86' It was a really nice 25 inch NEC TV/Monitor. We had a good 2 years of unscrambled Cinemax and HBO.

My aunt had a 25" GE made in 10/78 that was cable-ready with a one-knob varactor tuner. Too bad she didn't actually have cable.

The '74 Magnavox I have sitting here (waiting to be parted out :( ) isn't cable ready-but it does have digital display. Not done with LED's but with miniature lamps. (or so it seems)

I remember, back in 1980, someone saying that they bought a new cable ready TV set so they could tune in HBO (which apparently on a channel somewhere between 6 and 7, not scrambled). seems that the cable company had supplied subscribers cable boxes, with a microprocessor based denial system (that is, it looks for codes in the vertical interval and decides if you are allowed to watch that channel). Also heard that people would drill a hole, thru the vents, into the micro chip, killing it and thus allowing everything to be viewed. Seems the micro wasn't used to tune the channels.

Do I smell an urban legend here? Drilling a chip without causing deadly
shorts sounds like an unlikely proposition...

Years ago, I heard of people wrapping tin foil around the cable wire and sliding the foil up and down the wire to bring in HBO. The cable company got wise to what people were doing and changed their "scrambling" scheme. Now, all of the "premium" channels are carried via digital cable, making it necessary to rent a pre-programmed digital cable box from the cable company.

I have a 1949 Zenith with a factory installed telephone jack labeled phone vision. It was tried I guess, in the Chicago area by the telephone company, selling movies for $1.00, a considerable charge back then. The idea didn.t work too well, tv signals through the existing telephone lines back then left a bit to be desired.

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Cable cards always struck me as an odd and complicated way of getting the job done. Imagine if they started broadcasting Premium digital channels OTA after 2009? That'd be fun!!!


Earliest cable-ready I've seen was a Maggie Star System...or was that OSD but not cable-ready? :scratch2:

I was looking at the '81 Sony cable-ready console that I got today and was wondering when cable ready TV's hit the market. The oldest one I've seen was a '79 Zenith System 3. It only went to channel 36 and had a green LED readout. Were there any cable ready sets made before '79?

It had to be late 1970's. BTW, our 1982 System 3 goes to channel 55, but we can only tune up to channel 36 although we can go to 39 if we hit it just right and pray. It also has a green LED readout.