Testing, testing, digital
transition in action

By Diane Prokop
Times Staff Writer

When WHYY’s chief technology guru Bill Weber used a paper clip to show me how he could pick up a beautiful digital picture on a 1987 analog TV set, I was more than intrigued.
He mentioned using a paper clip during the Jan. 29 WHYY DTV transition seminar, but I had to see it in action. Weber inserted the simple office doodad in the antenna input on the back of the converter box and voila – magic.
I couldn’t wait to try it at home (just outside the city). If I could get a great picture and receive all the extended channels that both the Philadelphia and Trenton markets broadcast, I’d drop cable and save myself at least 50 bucks a month.
Getting my hands on a box, however, was the first hurdle.
While the boxes are now available at Best Buy and Wal-Mart, previous visits to local Target, Wal-Mart and Radio Shack stores were fruitless. Employees said they were either not in stock or they were not allowed to sell them just yet.
Finally, I tracked one down last Wednesday at a Best Buy store at Red Lion Road and the Boulevard. When told by phone that they had them in stock, I didn’t ask if they were allowed to sell them, I shot down there and bought one for $59.99.
When the cashier rang it up, a pop-up message told her to ask if I was using the coupon. (Each household may apply for two $40 coupons to subsidize two purchases of the converter boxes. The coupons must be used at the time of purchase and cannot be redeemed for cash.) I told her no, thanked her for the box, checked in at the office and ran home with what I hoped would be a new money-saving toy.
The Insignia box came with a push-on coaxial cable, red, white, and yellow audio and video connectors and a remote control with one AAA battery.
First, I thought I’d try the set in the living room. I thought better of it though, as I’d have to pull out all the DVDs that were stacked around it in the entertainment center and try not to scratch up the wood like I did the last time I tried to move it.
Upstairs to the 20-inch set in our bedroom. I was extremely careful not to scratch the wood as I turned the Magnavox, since my husband had built the cabinet it sat in. Alas, the back of the set had a spot to connect a red cable and a white cable but not a yellow cable. OK, then, I tried to undo the cable connection. It was too tight and I didn’t want to force it.
We’ve got five TV sets in our house — one in each bedroom, one in the living room and one in the basement. So I moved on to the next one in my daughter’s bedroom, again without any luck. Her TV had the three color-connector inputs but I had no luck with the paper clip antenna. It did, however, bring on a rant by my daughter about messing with her stuff.
On to the basement. Again no luck…so back to the living room set. I carefully turned it around and disconnected the DVD player, which was plugged in via the red, yellow and white connectors and plugged in the converter box (I didn’t have to disconnect the cable but switched the TV setting to auxiliary). I adjusted the paper clip and turned both the TV and converter on and used the automatic set-up feature to scan the channels.
I was able to pick up Channel 3, the three Channel 6 outlets — regular, public affairs and weather — along with a few others, but the picture was more like a Max Headroom bad satellite feed and not the plethora of crisp, colorful images I had hoped for.
A trip back to the basement to hunt down some old rabbit ears and then connect them to the converter box didn’t do much to improve the picture.
I had to get back to the office, so I left everything hooked up, so my husband could play with it when he got home from work.
He didn’t have much luck in the living room but was able to get a better picture with rabbit ears on our upstairs set.
The next day we made a lunchtime stop to his mom’s house in Somerton. She has the easy red, white and yellow connectors on the front of her living room TV, so we thought we’d give it a go. Besides, Mrs. P doesn’t have cable and will need to use a converter box to watch all her favorite programs, come Feb. 18, 2009.
We were able to pick up 26 channels via the converter box and the rabbit ears she currently uses, including five Channels for 48, three for Channel 6, and four for NJN. However, we weren’t able to pick up NBC10 or WHYY TV-12.
WHYY spokeswoman Lauren Gallagher explained that since Channel 12 is broadcasting in both digital and analog formats, they aren’t able to broadcast digitally at full power until next February, at which time their entire broadcast area should be able to receive the station’s digital signal.
That’s not the case for Channel 10, according to spokeswoman Eva Blackwell. She said the station is viewable on digital Channel 67. We’ll have to test that next time around.
If you have installation questions, you can call the WHYY Technology Hotline at 215-351-1270 or visit www.dtvanswers.com ••
Reporter Diane Prokop can be reached at 215-354-3036 or dprokop@phillynews.com