Questions about Freeview

Hi

I know that they will be switching off Analogue TV soon, but I have a question on the picture quality issue, especially in bad weather.

I once went to my friends house, and it was really bad weather outside, and the picture was terrible, yet with Analogue TV the picture was a bit better.

Why is digital TV's signal so sensitive?

Because a reasonable quality wasn't engineered into the system as it is with PAL. The quality of UK digital TV is entirely at the mercy of the bean counters who decide whether or not to squeeze another channel in when there isn't room.

UK digital TV is allready obsolete technology. It's not the future, it's the past.

You know I think I read somewhere they're going to change to 8k in the future - rendering a whole lot of older boxes useless.

To answer the question, this robustness issue *should* improve somewhat (how much is debatable) but as it stands the digital signals are currently transmitted at lower power than analogue ones so as not to "interfere", which in my opinion is just daft. They will supposedly increase the power on switchoff.

Yes they can do, and should. The existing DTT is very constrained by the requirement to co-exist with anlogue. The'll be a tiny bit of extra bandwith available as well. Not all the potential CODFM carriers are used within a channel, gaps are left to protect critical parts of an analoge broadcast, like the colour sub-carrier.

I wouldn't shed any tears for older boxes only capable of receiving 2K. Swapping to a Dixons special coukld be justified on power consumption grounds alone!

You should cross post this tu uk.tech.digital-tv! A lot of people who like to snipe at digita broadcasts just forget that the quality delivered is a managamnt decision rather than being dependent on fundemental engineering design.

Rgds/