AngelLynn Posted February 17, 2009 Report Share Posted February 17, 2009 Although we have satelite in most of the house, we do have one tv set that doesn't have a satelite connection. We managed to get a converter box for another tv set and we seem to be having problems getting some programs. They seem to be all scaggling looking. I am thinking we may have to get another antenna. Is anyone else having problems with the whole digital transition? I am only asking because it's extremly frustrating trying to figure out how to get this stupid box to work. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
applepansy Posted February 17, 2009 Report Share Posted February 17, 2009 yes, apparently the converter box has to be configured or something . . . we have TVs that are digital ready but everything is squiggly. Dang TV! Shouldn't be watching it anyway I guess. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hemidakota Posted February 17, 2009 Report Share Posted February 17, 2009 For Cox cable customers, there is no need for converter boxes. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AngelLynn Posted February 17, 2009 Author Report Share Posted February 17, 2009 For Cox cable customers, there is no need for converter boxes.Yea, I am kind of glad we went Dish satalite. But still a pain in the rear trying to get the one tv not connected to any other tv system to go over to digital. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
john doe Posted February 17, 2009 Report Share Posted February 17, 2009 Converter boxes are only needed for those tv's which are not digital tv's and receive their signal with old conventional antennas. A tv on a cable or satellite system should have no need for them. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
applepansy Posted February 17, 2009 Report Share Posted February 17, 2009 john, you're right, but how do you get your HD ready TV to get the signal correctly? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Captain_Curmudgeon Posted February 17, 2009 Report Share Posted February 17, 2009 What's "scaggling looking"? If you have things hooked up and switched right, then I'd guess you need a better antenna. Other than that, lds.net's favorite answers are:PraySearch the scripturesSearch lds.org for "digital converter". Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
john doe Posted February 17, 2009 Report Share Posted February 17, 2009 john, you're right, but how do you get your HD ready TV to get the signal correctly? I don't know. My HD TV is hooked up to a cable box. I have converter boxes for the antenna TV's but haven't installed them yet. Maybe that's my project tonight. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
applepansy Posted February 18, 2009 Report Share Posted February 18, 2009 What's "scaggling looking"? If you have things hooked up and switched right, then I'd guess you need a better antenna. Other than that, lds.net's favorite answers are:PraySearch the scripturesSearch lds.org for "digital converter".roflmsoI see this as a sign that we need to cut back on watching TV. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AngelLynn Posted February 18, 2009 Author Report Share Posted February 18, 2009 What's "scaggling looking"? If you have things hooked up and switched right, then I'd guess you need a better antenna. Other than that, lds.net's favorite answers are:PraySearch the scripturesSearch lds.org for "digital converter".LOL No it's a sign that my mom watches too much TV. Seriously the only reason why we got the converter is that no one else in the house wants to watch The Bachelor. We would have been perfectly happy to let the other set in the back room die and be happy with our 200 satalite stations but mom let out a squack that the rest of the family hogs the satlite and doesn't let her watch the Bachelor. And we do it because we complain that the show is nothing but reality soap crud and we'd rather watch BYU or PBS instead. lol Anyway we went to Target and got a better antenna just for her. She's very lucky she had a gift card that she still had left over from Christmas so the antenna and the converter box didn't cost a thing. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MorningStar Posted February 18, 2009 Report Share Posted February 18, 2009 Seriously, I don't see why the government considered this a spending priority. TV is not a need. Shelter is a need. Food is a need. Clothing is a need. I find it ridiculous that the government is paying for people to watch TV. Is this to get people to buy cable who don't have it already so they have to pay tax on it? I refuse to get cable. And I hear that the convertor box isn't working for a lot of people and that they have to get an antenna on top of that and that it still doesn't work! I think I might be saying bye bye to our TV. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AngelLynn Posted February 18, 2009 Author Report Share Posted February 18, 2009 Seriously, I don't see why the government considered this a spending priority. TV is not a need. Shelter is a need. Food is a need. Clothing is a need. I find it ridiculous that the government is paying for people to watch TV. Is this to get people to buy cable who don't have it already so they have to pay tax on it?I refuse to get cable. And I hear that the convertor box isn't working for a lot of people and that they have to get an antenna on top of that and that it still doesn't work!I think I might be saying bye bye to our TV.Well the only use for TV really is for news. Unless you plan on just having it streamed in from the internet. But yea the converter box doesn't work that well.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tubaloth Posted February 18, 2009 Report Share Posted February 18, 2009 After buying 4 boxes. I kind of know a little bit about this. Some converter boxes are better then others, but there really is no way to know which one is good or bad. (its kind of a trial and error) The biggest difference (and probably what you are seeing) is that with a digital signal its either good or NOT. With analog you got the middle ground with the fuzzy lines across the screen. Digital isn't that way. Either you have the signal or you don't! The middle ground is what you are getting with the jurkyness. Your current Analog antenna should work. But the other difference I have seen is you need to POINT the antenna towards the signal. If you have Rabbit ears. There is really no difference in how the Antenna is positions its more of a direction thing. (I have mine both pointed up) Most converter boxes have some way of seeing how strong the signal is. Mine, actually can do a beeping to let me know if I'm getting a good signal or not. This way as I'm moving my antenna around it lets me know. Also I have seen putting Tin Foil on the antenna does help some (looks strange). Once I got everything set I haven't had to touch it in probably almost 2 months. The weather does also affect things, I hope TV stations keep boosting there signal. They do sell Digital Antennas, they are built to pick up this type of signal, but again you never know if the one you are buying is worth while. (The ones at Wal-mart are just that, cheap Wal-mart antennas) There are plenty of reviews on the Internet (google.com is always good). The reason the government is doing this is so they can free up some of these over the air signals and sell them for other communication things. A good thing about the Digital means you can record things digital. My computer has a Digital TV Card so I can record TV shows onto my computer. (I had to buy another antenna for it) but for the most part it works fine. Dish Network also came out with a DTV converter box that works pretty much like a DVR. There are some bugs in it so I haven't put out the $250, so record over the air tv and still be able to pause and fast forward through commercials. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bookmeister Posted February 18, 2009 Report Share Posted February 18, 2009 (edited) Television is a tool of Satan (except for the BYU channel and anything shown on the military channel, the gun channel, or Star Trek). Digital converter boxes are tools of Satan that work only on old black and white TVs with vacuum tubes and screens smaller than 7 inches. Satellite is a tool of Satan (except for the BYU channel and anything shown on the military channel, the gun channel, or Star Trek). The only way to avoid Satan is to either throw your TV out completely, or watch shows only on the BYU channel and anything shown on the military channel, the gun channel, or Star Trek. The Show Survivor is a tool of Satan, even if it is shown on the BYU channel, on the military channel, the gun channel, or Star Trek. Edited February 18, 2009 by Bookmeister additional stuff put in...sorta...kinda... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AngelLynn Posted February 18, 2009 Author Report Share Posted February 18, 2009 After buying 4 boxes. I kind of know a little bit about this. Some converter boxes are better then others, but there really is no way to know which one is good or bad. (its kind of a trial and error) The biggest difference (and probably what you are seeing) is that with a digital signal its either good or NOT. With analog you got the middle ground with the fuzzy lines across the screen. Digital isn't that way. Either you have the signal or you don't! The middle ground is what you are getting with the jurkyness. Your current Analog antenna should work. But the other difference I have seen is you need to POINT the antenna towards the signal. If you have Rabbit ears. There is really no difference in how the Antenna is positions its more of a direction thing. (I have mine both pointed up) Most converter boxes have some way of seeing how strong the signal is. Mine, actually can do a beeping to let me know if I'm getting a good signal or not. This way as I'm moving my antenna around it lets me know. Also I have seen putting Tin Foil on the antenna does help some (looks strange). Once I got everything set I haven't had to touch it in probably almost 2 months. The weather does also affect things, I hope TV stations keep boosting there signal. They do sell Digital Antennas, they are built to pick up this type of signal, but again you never know if the one you are buying is worth while. (The ones at Wal-mart are just that, cheap Wal-mart antennas) There are plenty of reviews on the Internet (google.com is always good). The reason the government is doing this is so they can free up some of these over the air signals and sell them for other communication things. A good thing about the Digital means you can record things digital. My computer has a Digital TV Card so I can record TV shows onto my computer. (I had to buy another antenna for it) but for the most part it works fine. Dish Network also came out with a DTV converter box that works pretty much like a DVR. There are some bugs in it so I haven't put out the $250, so record over the air tv and still be able to pause and fast forward through commercials.Compleatly agree, my aunt who lives in California works at Walmart in customer service and a lot of people come back and complain to her that the converter box is junk and have to get their money back and get another box. Some are good and some are bad as you said. We got a Pansonic HDTV antenna and the signal is so much better thant what we had with the other attenna, and they had antennas at diffrent costs and the one we got was $12, I finally got most of the stations that we use, the most thing I am disappointed about is a lot are Spanish channels. I know for some that's a good thing, but I don't know a lick of Spanish. I spent my time in school learning French so a spanish station is pretty useless. And then many of the Spanish channels have a terrible signal, but I contemplated over this and decided that I wasn't going to bother with trying to get a signal off a spanish station as some of those stations never came in clearly in analog so I didn't bother with it and I don't know Spanish and neither does my family so I just ignored it. We have what stations we need and I am not going to bother trying to mess with the antenna. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
miztrniceguy Posted February 18, 2009 Report Share Posted February 18, 2009 what's an antenna? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tubaloth Posted February 18, 2009 Report Share Posted February 18, 2009 There are extra stations that come in. One station we get is really the same as another just the audio is a radio station. I blocked that one. Another station is all cartoons I turned that station off also. Even if you get more stations then you use to, doesn't mean you get anything helpful. I turn off another sports station from NBC (they have all this olymipic footage so they create a station with it all) And some worship station I turned off. Just because you get the station doesn't mean you have to actually watch it! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AngelLynn Posted February 18, 2009 Author Report Share Posted February 18, 2009 There are extra stations that come in. One station we get is really the same as another just the audio is a radio station. I blocked that one. Another station is all cartoons I turned that station off also. Even if you get more stations then you use to, doesn't mean you get anything helpful. I turn off another sports station from NBC (they have all this olymipic footage so they create a station with it all) And some worship station I turned off. Just because you get the station doesn't mean you have to actually watch it!hmmm I guess this means I can block (turn off) all those Spanish stations. But you seem to be getting more stations than I am. We've got the NBC olympic footage that you mentioned which really is no big deal to me. No cartoon station or worship station. One channel is nothing but local weather 24x7 which is alright. And then two or three PBS stations which is nice since I don't always want to watch Sesame street. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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