LCD TV's defaulting to analog?
 

I was at a pizza parlor in Midland today where they had flat panel 16 X 9 sets set up on the walls. They were tuned to local channels and displaying what appeared to be a weak analog signal from an antenna (grainy with some snow and interference lines)
Do some of these sets default to the analog signal if the digital is too weak? Or were they maybe just not set up to receive the digital signal?
All of the stations here are transmitting digital so there should be a digital signal available. The TV transmitters are probably 15-30 miles away from the pizza shop.

GIGO - they probably have had a crappy antenna hookup all along and just replaced their old sets. Also, there is a huge difference in signal level between 15 miles and 30 miles - could you be more precise?

I am around 30 miles from the transmtters here in Austin, Texas and receive all except 1 of the broadcast HDTV signals using rabbit ears. (I am assumming that the 1 that I do not receive, Fox, is broadcasting HDTV, not certain). Of course, I am converting these to composite video and then NTSC and watching on an old analog set. Because of this, I cannot attest to the picture quality other than to say it looks fine on an analog set when reception is good.

The analog and digital channels are on different frequencies and there's no auto switching between them. If the sets have digital tuners, they have to be set to the digital channel to receive it. If the signal was that weak, then there was probably no reception at all on the digital channel.

One more comment: As might be expected, I do not get snow when the reception is bad. The picture pixelattes or stops and the sound stops(very irritating). This is to be expected with digital signals(In my opinion, the sound stopping is the worst defect in digital-with the analog signal, the sound continues even with a very snowy picture). Because of the sound issue, HDTV could be fairly useless in providing up-to-date information in severe weather.

Re-syncing the HDTV signal takes several seconds using the converter that I presently using. I have just gotten a different one on Ebay. I will see how this one works.

I live in an area where off air reception is questionable at best, so I have to use cable. The weak cable signal really shows up withn HD. Very bad on some channels to the point that they do not stay in sync for more than maybe 30 seconds. I purchased a Motorola signal booster for around $50 and the dropout problem has ceased.Very good looking signal now.

Why did YOU purchase a booster? If you are paying the cable company, they should get their sorry asses out to your house and do what's necessary to get you a good signal!

easier said than done, while i couldnt agree more my friend had an issue with the local cable company (digital cable no less) providing such a weak signal it would pixalate and the sound would cut out. After 3 weeks of them saying theyd send someone out they did, he messed with something at the pole (not even in the house) and took off. No percievable change to the signal strength. He finally went out and got a digital cable signal booster (i think he said it had to be special for digital cable) and that seems to have fixed the problem so far.

Please..let's not go down that road. I was just offering up another option.