wrote in message
...
On Dec 2, 5:33 pm, "Arfa Daily" wrote:
Bit OT but following on from the interesting discussions we had on
the 'End
of Analog TV', has anyone come across a commercial stand-alone
converter,
that will take in analogue video, and output an RF DTV signal ?
Sort of like
a standard UHF modulator, but producing a DTV compatible signal. I
know that
such items have been put together by hams for digital ATV
transmissions, but
as far as I know, it has all been homebrew stuff.

The reason I am looking for such an item is that I am about to buy
a new LCD
TV for the kitchen that I've just done up. I currently have a UHF
distribution system running round the house, which is fed with off-
air
signals from the roof antenna, as well as output from the Sky+ sat
box /
recorder, and my TiVo box. I would like to be able to watch the Sky
and TiVo
signals on that new set in the kitchen. Trouble is, most of the
sets now
being sold in the UK, have a built in Freeview digital tuner, and
no
analogue capability, so they would not respond to any of the
analogue
signals being fed round the distribution system, including my Sky
and TiVo.

Seems to me that this is going to be a problem in the future, as
many people
feed analogue signals from recorders and sat receivers around their
houses,
to watch on portables in the kitchen and bedrooms etc. As these
sets get
replaced, even if you continue to feed DTV RF signals around the
house, you
are not going to be able to get the additonal signals from your
other kit,
that you previously did. That will mean that the only set that you
can watch
your Sky signals on, will be the one that is directly video linked
to the
box.

I am sure that many people just don't realise what facilities they
are going
to lose in the weeks immediately following the closing down of
their
analogue service. How many people realise that every portable TV,
VCR, DVD
recorder, HDD recorder etc that they now have all around their
houses, is
going to need a DTV STB ahead of it ?

Arfa

A DTV modulator is a good deal more complicated than a simple AM
transmitter used for analog video though I expect there may be some
down the road. With the interfacing to computers pretty simple for
many HDTVs, I suspect it will be more common to use the CAT 5 or 6
networking to watch video from a server computer. I've been doing this
for 4 years now. Gigabit is nice for moving files around the network
but it's perfectly fine to watch a file real time from another PC even
while IT is recording another HD show. 10-100 is more than adequate as
the US datasteam is 19 Mbits max. You don't need anything special to
do this as you can use the router / switch you probably have already.
USB 2.0 is adequate as well and those 500gig drives for $80 can hold
100-200 1 hour shows after the commercials are edited out.

G²

Agreed that this would probably be the way to go if starting again from
scratch. Just seems a bloody nuisance to have to start running CAT 5 cable
around the house, and then to have to use the TV in its monitor mode to hang
on the end of a 'receiver' computer, when there is a perfectly good UHF
network running around the house, which has worked well for years, and
continues to carry the digital multiplexes well enough to be useable, just
about, and hopefully even better when they jack up the power levels on them
after the analogue closedown.

Arfa