Thursday, January 21, 2010

Analog And Digital In Simple Terms

By Edward McKellen

Lots of people talk these days about digital television, but very few actually know what is the difference between analog and digital television. Actually the only difference is the way the signal is transmitted. Analog television signal is transmitted very much like radio signals. The video signal of analog television is AM, and the audio is FM. Because of this, there can be annoying interferences in the signal, depending on meteorological conditions or geographical location.

The resolution and image quality are also restricted, because there are certain bandwidths assigned to analog TV channels. The analog signal is the United States follows the NTSC standard. This had been adopted in the 1940's, and served well since then, but nobody thought at that time that about color television. One major weakness of the NTSC standard is color implementation, so it is no wonder a lot of people call "Never Twice The Same Color" the NTSC standard.

On the other hand digital TV signal is transmitted very similar to computer data: there are two kinds of signal, "on" or "off". This way, the user either sees an image, or not. Gradual signal loss is an unknown term in the era of digital TV: it has no difference how close or how far away the transmitter is from the television, the viewer either sees the exact image, or sees nothing.

Digital TV format has been designed considering all main factors of television signal: B/W, color and audio can be transmitted as progressive or interlaced signal. Basically this means the signal content has greater integrity and flexibility.

Because digital TV signal is made out of "bits", the same bandwidth one analog TV signal requires can transmit digital signal of much higher quality, and there will be even some extra space left. Broadcasters can use this space for extra video, audio or text signals.

This way broadcasters using digital technology can supply more features, like surround sound, multiple language audio or text using the same bandwidth a standard analog TV signal requires. Digital TV has one more advantage: it is able to transmit High Definition (HDTV) signal.

Unlike analog TV, digital technology is also able to broadcast programming in a true wide screen (16x9) format. This means the shape of the picture is very much like a movie screen, so the viewers can see a movie just as the director intended to be seen. Those who watch sports can see more action in one camera shot: it is possible to view the entire length of a football field without having the sensation that it is far away from the camera. The 16x9 format means there will be no more black bars on the top and the bottom of the wide screen image.

In the United State, the date of the digital transition was June 12, 2009. This day all analog TV signals went black. Analog televisions became useless, unless there was an analog-to-digital converter connected to them. The transition was originally scheduled to 2006, but authorities postponed the transition with 3 years because they realized the consumers were not ready. - 33366

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