Educational Video Script – FCC

Chapter Two - What You Need to Know

This video is furnished by the Federal Communications Commission.

What you need to do to be ready for the DTV transition depends on how the TVs in your home currently receive broadcast signals.

Most of us get our television signal in one of three ways: from a cable provider, from a satellite provider, or over-the-air through an indoor or outdoor antenna -- like rabbit ears on your TV or a rooftop antenna.

If your TV is connected to cable, the change to digital-only broadcasting shouldn’t affect you. Likewise, if your TV is connected to satellite and you receive your local broadcast stations from that satellite provider, the change to digital-only broadcasting shouldn’t affect you.

But if you have a TV that gets an over-the-air signal with rabbit ears or a rooftop antenna, you may need to act.

Built inside your television is a piece of equipment called a tuner. If you have an older television, it probably has an analog tuner. If you have a newer television, one that you bought in the past few years, it may also have a digital tuner.

If you have a digital tuner in your television, it’s a digital TV, and you will be able to continue to watch television without doing anything extra. One easy way to identify a digital television is to look for one of these logos.

But if you have an older TV with only an analog tuner inside, you’ll need to take action in order to keep watching that TV after February 17. You have three different options, and you can choose the one that is best for you.

First, you could buy a TV with a digital tuner and use the antenna you have now to watch free over-the-air broadcasts. Just to be clear, you do not need to buy an HDTV to receive digital television signals. “High definition” is one kind of digital television, but any TV with a digital tuner will let you watch DTV broadcasts.

Second, you could subscribe to cable or satellite, and get your local channels through your provider.

Third, if you want to continue watching free, over-the-air television using the analog TV and the antenna you already have, you can do that – by hooking your TV up to a digital-to-analog converter box.

Each analog TV in your home will need its own converter box. Converter boxes are available in stores now. These boxes generally cost between $40 and $70.

To help out households that need to purchase converter boxes, Congress set up a program that will give you up to two $40 coupons to be used towards the purchase of converter boxes. You can apply for your coupons by calling 1-888-388-2009, or online at www.DTV2009.gov. To find out more you can call us toll free at 1-888-CALL-FCC or go online at www.DTV.gov.

Depending on where you live, you may want to explore whether some of your favorite stations are what are known as “low-power” stations. The February 17th deadline for ending analog broadcasts does not apply to these stations, and if you want to keep watching them after hooking up your TV to a digital-to-analog converter box, you may need a converter box with a feature called analog pass-through.

To find out more about this and other available features, you can call us at 1-888- CALL-FCC. Or go online at www.DTV.gov. You can also check with your retailer.

No matter which option you choose, digital broadcasting can bring more programming choices and better picture and sound quality into your home, so start exploring your options today!

 

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