[shel]

Can anyone explain why there's such a push in the US to convert TV sets and stations to digital? What's the advantage of digital TV over regular analog TV? Is digital TV common in other countries?

shel (still using a kersosene powered TV set)

[chrose]

I can't speak to other countries, but as far as I know, after Hurricane Katrina there was so much air traffic (frequncies) that emergency channels were getting stepped on and emergency communication was pretty locked up (or out).
So by mandating that tv signals go digital that will free up some of the frequencies for emergency channels in the future. Granted that the tv manufacturers were headed towards digital anyway because of the quality, the government, bless their porky little hearts, chose to step in and hasten that.
Figure that way back the airways were pretty free and clear. Now think of the thousands of signals bouncing around it's easy to see how clogged up things are getting.

[phatch]

This was decided before Katrina. The initial proposal by Congress was in 1996 to swithover in 2006.

It's motivated by a number of factors.

Bandwidth for emergency services but also commercial uses as a good chunk of the bandwidth was bought by Cell phone companies.

More programming on less bandwidth, due to compression. Higher quality programming (theoretical--depends on compression and other format choices)

More control over the media you watch. Not your control, but the broadcaster and producer. You might look into the whole broadcast flag issue for some of those details, but also look at High-bandwidth Digital Content Protection - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia as well as making possible the expiration of content you record.

So it's mostly about money really. How to get more of your money in their pocket.

If you're on a cable or satellite system, you'll get grandfathered in. Not so if you receive TV over the air.

Most of the world is switching and some have completed their switch. Digital switchover - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[Ishbel]

We're in the midst of the digital switchover here in the UK. It has moved on so far that cable TV companies no longer provide analogue 'boxes' or spares for analogue boxes.

When is the Digital TV Switchover? The different regions and dates