For Terrestrial TV Antenna Users (screen, system, HD, channel)

[TheGrandK-Man]

In terms of interference, would you prefer pixellation and frequent dropouts on distant channels, or, moderate amounts of 'snow'?

[thecoalman]

I'll take the "snow" but no stations in my area broadcast in analog so it's irrelevant.

[MikeBear]

There's no such thing as "snow" with our present digital tv. There's either a picture, OR there's pixelation with low signal. Only our older analog tv system was capable of "snow" but still being watchable.

[victimofGM]

I keep an antenna as a backup and for certain broadcast I absolutely must watch in full HD. It’s so frustrating to see the pixelation or frozen screen. With snow or ghosting I could at least tell what was going on (unless the ghosting included audio from the other station). Those who are fans of sporting events should seriously consider a quality antenna even if they have cable or satellite. The HD picture quality is much better than cable or satellite even if they claim to have HD channels.

[TheGrandK-Man]

So that's two so far for snow over pixellation. Please select an option accordingly.

[thecoalman]

I don't think anyone is going to choose digital issues over snow expect for perhaps some millennial who has no idea WTF you are talking about. Especially if you are one these people that was getting good reception before and are now having issues.



Overall I'm someone that understand the benefits of digital for both the consumer and business's, digital all the way.


There has been performance issues for people but that is not the result of the technology. My understanding it's the implementation. Digital requires less power to broadcast and my understanding is they under estimated how much power they needed to continue to serve people that were getting reception prior to the switch.

[gguerra]

Originally Posted by TheGrandK-Man

So that's two so far for snow over pixellation. Please select an option accordingly.

Again, the poll is meaningless. There is no "snow" since all broadcast TV in the US is digital.

[johnd393]

I think the OP is really asking if I prefer ASTC digital tv over NTSC analog tv. So I'm gonna say I prefer the pixilization & drop outs.
If you prefer a snowy NTSC analog broadcast picture, that comes with no possibility of a High Definition picture.

[TheGrandK-Man]

Originally Posted by gguerra

Again, the poll is meaningless. There is no "snow"
since all broadcast TV in the US is digital.

Then you - and thecoalman - missed the point of both this post and the poll.


Television is an audio-visual experience. When the digital picture pixelates, and then blacks out, you lose sound also.

With analog, on a relatively distant channel, you might see increasing snowiness, but the audio remains mostly clear, even with an occasional flicker. One sense can help mask deficiencies in another, or deficiencies in that sensory input(aforementioned snowy TV pic). Your ears help make up for any snowiness in the picture, so subconsciously it doesn't bother you as much.

With digital, both senses - visual and auditory - are deprived during a dropout, which I, among others I'm sure, find annoying.

You can hopefully guess where I'm going with the whole digital transition as it happened in the first place.

[TheGrandK-Man]

Originally Posted by johnd393

I think the OP is really asking if I prefer ASTC digital tv over NTSC
analog tv. So I'm gonna say I prefer the pixilization & drop outs.
If you prefer a snowy NTSC analog broadcast picture, that comes
with no possibility of a High Definition picture.

You must not have grown up on analog broadcast.

I guess a high-def picture matters less to me than a picture on a TV that is correctly calibrated for an accurate image. As I said to gguerra, you can pretty much guess how I feel about the transitioning from analog to digital broadcasting in the first place. If you own stocks in any publicly traded TV manufacturer, cable-co or sat-co, I'm sure 2009-2012 were very good years for you!