When digital-tuner TV works right, it works wonders

The future of TV looks impossibly sharp on RCA's 27F634T — except when it comes up as a blank blue screen with a "signal unavailable" message.

This unremarkable-looking cathode-ray-tube set is the cheapest digital television yet sold. That makes it a fulfillment of the part of digital TV that many people don't know about: not high-definition TV, but free, over-the-air broadcasts with far better reception than analog (except when they conk out) and multiple channels for each station.

Get ready

There will have to be many more sets like this if Congress sticks to its plan to require analog TV broadcasts to end in February 2009 (more than two years later than the original target of Dec. 31, 2006). The 2009 date is in the budget bill now nearing passage in both houses, which banks on the money the government will make by auctioning off spectrum used by analog channels today.

At that time, everybody who watches over-the-air TV will need either a converter box to pull in digital signals — the budget bill calls for limited subsidies for households that can't afford one — or a set with a built-in digital tuner like the RCA model. (Digital tuners are often called ATSC tuners, after the Advanced Television Systems Committee that came up with the digital-TV standard.) Sets that are connected only to cable or satellite boxes, VCRs, video-game consoles or other nonbroadcast video sources, however, won't be affected by the analog shutoff.

The RCA set is ready for that deadline, and at a list price no steeper than that of many less-capable analog sets: $359.

What is digital TV (DTV)?


It's a new type of broadcasting in which images and sound are delivered by cable, satellite or over the air using digital rather then more common analog technology. Digital TVs provide far better reception than analog sets do. Pretty soon, we'll all be using DTV — Congress is requiring analog broadcasts to end by the end of February 2009, although there's talk it will extend the deadline.

Levels of digital television programming:

Standard Definition TV (SDTV) — SDTV is basic display and resolution. Transmission of SDTV may be in either the traditional (4:3) or widescreen (16:9) format.

Enhanced Definition TV (EDTV) — EDTV is the next step up. EDTV comes in 480p widescreen (16:9) or traditional (4:3) format and provides better picture quality than SDTV, but not as high as HDTV.

High Definition TV (HDTV) — The Cadillac of digital television. HDTV in widescreen format (16:9) provides broadcasting's highest resolution and picture quality. HDTV and digital TV are not the same thing — HDTV is only one format of digital TV.

That doesn't buy you a flat-panel screen, a wide screen or even a particularly large one; the 27F634T's display spans just 27 inches. It's big and heavy, about 130 pounds in its box, and it suffers the strange quirk of taking a good 10 seconds to turn on. The first review unit loaned by RCA even showed up dead on arrival. But the tuner inside this humble set — with some trial and error — can provide TV service far better than what you'd think possible from any free, over-the-air signal.

Perfect picture

Instead of fuzzy, scratchy, noisy analog reception, digital channels with strong enough signals come in perfectly. Not good, but perfect — clearer than any compressed version of an analog signal packaged and retransmitted over cable or satellite. And most local stations broadcast multiple digital channels: ABC, CBS and NBC affiliates provide their own weather feeds, while PBS affiliate WETA offers three additional digital channels.

The RCA set and any other "standard-definition" model show these broadcasts at a resolution no better than a DVD's, but any high-definition set would display the full HD picture from the same signal.

If, however, the digital broadcast wavers or the antenna isn't positioned right, digital can look awful. Blotchy patches can bloom across the picture and the audio will cut in and out — like watching Internet video, except the screen doesn't show a "buffering" message when the signal falls short. At worst, the TV will give up entirely, presenting a blank screen with that "signal unavailable" message.

To avoid that requires a return to the lost art of antenna positioning.

With a good tuner and a little time to position the antenna, you don't need to pay by the month to watch TV — spending the equivalent of a new TV in cable or satellite charges every year. In the bargain, you get a bonus set of digital channels that a cable or satellite operator probably won't offer at any price. And you only need one remote control to pull this off.

So why do many electronics manufacturers continue to treat digital tuners as some kind of expensive luxury? That's an excellent question. Although screens larger than 36 inches should now include this hardware, per a Federal Communications Commission requirement, many smaller sets omit it — I haven't found any sets smaller than 26 inches with digital tuners.

And it's not as if vendors are simply selling those screens as pure monitors. They do include tuners, only they're the analog kind that will turn into pumpkins in three years — a tiny fraction of the life span of most TV sets.

You don't have to buy those sets.

The alternative isn't shelling out a thousand bucks or more on a new LCD or plasma screen. This RCA model shows that a set with a built-in digital tuner doesn't have to cost more than an analog television with a built-in expiration date. If only there were more like it.