Trash find: 1980 Sears (Sanyo)

[fdrennen]

The cable company tries to make you think that without cable one will not be able to get free TV, and many well heeled TV viewers will upgrade to a newer set.

[wilkes85]

Originally Posted by zenith2134

fdrennen- I can't wait. This is a once in a lifetime event for a TV collector. Imagine, 50+ years worth of America's TV sets, all becoming obsolete overnight. This is of course assuming that many people either don't know they could use a converter for digital, or would rather upgrade their tv. Either way, there WILL be some great trash finds, I can almost guarantee that!

And don't forget people who think that even if they have cable or satelite, the DTV conversion will affect them too!

And who here will bet the new digital picture quality will look like a youtube video?
I got digital cable, and a lot of the time there's digital distortion, but it's a lot more obvious on my 25" RCA XL-100 console than my 27" Sears console.

[zenith2134]

I hear ya, wilkes. In regards to either audio or video, my philosophy is that digital is NOT always the devil: Instead, it's the mastering engineer (audio) or system controller (cable/satellite) that suppresses the medium's potential.

Then again, there are times when the signal needs to be compressed or have its bandwith reduced...I know the cable companies here are trying to compete with FIOS and their totally fiber-optic network. Best the cable co. can do at this point is patch in fiber runs where new ones are needed, and install all the associated equipment one location at a time. Sometimes, the controller will obviously sacrifice the cable TV service's pix quality in order to maximize their broadband service's upload capacity.

Also, some digital cable STB's have a "smart" circuit which keeps track of the most viewed channels per room and gives those more priority in the system. Result is the lesser-used channels get choppy and pixelized.