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Well, my father in law bought a HDTV this past weekend. While setting it up on cable and external antenna, we checked out the KCTS Over The Air High Def channel (Channel 9-5). The program on at that time was about travelling around Europe, and had close ups of castles, old historic towns, and vegetation.

It was....well....incredible. The difference between that and the analog resolution was very pronounced. You could see individual cracks in the building bricks, and every dew drop on the flowers. Ghosting was non-existent, and the overall performance for non-HDTV programming was good. I've gotta get one of those things....

Brad/N7JGX
Whidbey Island, WA

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Whatever.....

Amazing eh ? I felt about the same after seeing off-air HD for the first time. With a small UHF roof antenna I can get 23 (!) digital TV stations here in SoCal. Its interesting to see how each station chooses to carve up their bandwidth. CBS runs a single 1080i HD stream, NBC runs 1080i HD plus two 480i DTV, ABC runs 720P HD plus two 480i DTV, and TBN is cramming five 480i DTV streams on one channel.

The only downer with digital I see so far is the 480i DTV picture quality is pretty grainy compared to analog (looks like crap even on a small screen). I think many people with basic DTV (non-HD) sets will be giving the two-thumbs-down when the FCC pulls the plug on analog.

Yep...lots of DTV channel choices available right now, and I'm guessing more will be on the way. If I had swung his antenna around a bit more, I probably could have picked up a few more digital channels.

I only played with the TV for an hour or so, but I was generally impressed with most of the channels I saw.

Unfortunately, the local cable company does NOT offer any HD channels...so, the father-in-law is switching to a dish...

Brad/N7JGX
Whidbey Island, WA

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Whatever.....

I gotta get one...

? For the 'HD' radio, is this from the narrow-er band spacing? also?

Well, I've had my over-the-air DTV receiver working for a couple of months now. I've been impressed. From here on South Whidbey, I can receive the ditigal broadcasts from all the major Seattle area players (4, 5, 7, 9, 11, 13, 16, 22, 28).
Just about each broadcaster has their DTV "simulcast" of the analog programming, and usually at least one additional digital channel.

KCTS 9 has three DTV channels going. 9-1 is the normal programming, 9-3 is some alternate programming, and 9-5 is their HD programming. There's some pretty cool stuff on that channel - even 5.1 surround.

But, my favorite one is 22-2 - "The Tube" music video channel. It plays music videos 24/7, with very few commercials and NO VJ's, no game shows, no reality show crap. Just cool videos from a variet of artists, genres, and generations. I have it going most of the time.

So far, with just my roof mounted antenna, there is no choppy reception. It's very good on all channels. And since it's digital, there is no ghosting or signal fade. The weather doesn't seem to affect the signal.

Though I miss the History Channel and Comedy Central, I can live without them - especially since my subscription fee is $0.

Brad/N7JGX
Whidbey Island, WA

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Whatever.....

PBS-9- has long been one of my favorite TV channels, as with the History channel. I do agree, $zero$ is the ulitmate subscription price.
It appears with the introduction of digital TV brings compitition between the networks (more offerings).
I've noticed the price dropping for the DTV models too.

Where did the "SoCal HDTV" site go to. Great list of the TV Channels. Any list for the Seattle area channels ?? MTM

few sites I know of...
http://www.100000watts.com/
http://www.rabbitears.info

very long thread on seattle OTA http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=254620

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If I had an antenna, I would; but I can only transmit on 160 meters.
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DE K7MHI