Analog Shutoff in Fort Myers, FL

WINK, WBBH, WZVN, and WXCW shut off analog service around noon on 2/17/09. I had a monitor/VCR set up for each (inc. a fifth monitor connected to the converter box). WBBH and WZVN (same building) went to "nightlight" programming 24/7, rather than shutting down their transmitters.

Update: WBBH 20 went off at Midnight on Saturday 2/21, WZVN 26 was discovered off by Wednesday morning, 2/25.

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• ANALOG
• DIGITAL
• WBBH
• WZVN
• WXCW
• WINK
• TV
• FCC
• NAB
• SWITCH
• TRANSITION

[HughTVDX]

Great video!

Sad day really!

[312ustetok]

I don't know the exact reason but I will guess one reason is that that for the digital signal, they are buffering the video/audio so it can be compressed. Then, you could reduce the delay but the compression would be less efficient and the picture quality would suffer. As it is now, it's impossible for digital to be "as live" as analog, otherwise it would be unwatchable, and "liver" is out of the question.

[idellhpcompaq]

@312ustetok i know why they want people to buy a HDTV

[TalksWithDirt]

GREAT! I watched my local PBS change format. It was pretty anti climactic.

[digitalmasterdata]

oowoowo !! super excellent and great at 3:41 ! when he power off all the system ! :) you think probably some geek comes to that old systems and use it again for transmitt some geeky stuff like kdv pthc data on video ?? LOL

[omgmkat]

Wow. I wish that I could have had a setup like this that day! Great video!

[wuzzlevideos]

Because of the compression/decompression required.

[TheGreatCodeholio]

Digital TV is a like downloading an MPEG file (same encoding and bitstream even!), except the TV station beams it to you and the decoder box "plays" it as it gets it. The problem with MPEG is the encoder will naturally delay the video because it has to reorder frames, so that similar frames compress better (as P & B frames that encode only what changed). Typical encoders tend to gather 30-40 frames into a group and work on those, hence the 1-3 second delay.

[egrabow440]

Analog's delay is measured in milliseconds.

Notice how WINK's button-push made it to air. If it were the digital transmitter being shut off, we probably wouldn't even see his hand reaching for it... wouldn't have encoded in time.

[harleykman]

Analog has a delay too.

It's just that we viewers never noticed. We won't notice the digital delay either once analog no longer exists. It will feel live.

[hkfreak]

They're going to need to work on the delay. Taking a full 3 second lag with WBBH's dt signal against the analog signal. How come digital is not "live" or "liver" than analog?