by Mark Ollig

Created on: June 24, 2008   Last Updated: November 01, 2011

Get ready, because the days of analog television reception are soon to be over forever.

The Congress of the United States recently passed a law specifying the date of Tuesday, Feb. 17, 2009 to be the deadline for all television broadcast stations to stop transmitting their analog signals over-the-air and convert to all digital television signal broadcasting.

Digital Television (DTV) is going to take over the center seat and analog-broadcasted television is to be sent into retirement.

You no doubt are asking the question "What about my analog television set?"

If you already have digital cable or digital satellite and a digital television set you already are receiving and watching your broadcasts digitally, the conversion made elsewhere. But if you are not watching them on a HDTV or digital television set, you would have had the digital to analog converter box already installed, of course.

Analog TVs receiving over-the-air programming will still work after that date, but owners of these TVs will need, actually be "required" to buy "converter boxes" to change or convert the over-the-air digitally broadcasted signals into the analog format that will work for your analog TV. These converter boxes will no doubt be available from the major consumer electronic retailers.

Satellite subscribers receiving analog transmissions should contact their service providers about obtaining converter boxes for the DTV transition.

A year ago before I had cable, I used "rabbit-ears" and they seem to work fine when connected to the old television set I had. I could get the local channels and the public broadcasting channel pretty good on a clear day.

At night the signal was better, but during thunder and lighting storms it would get a bit annoying, but it was still free. I saved a lot of money not paying for cable or a dish. I did not have many choices, but it was still a good bargain. I consider like "free" a very good bargain.

Now the question also comes up about who will need to be paying for these converter boxes?

Well, the good folks at your Federal Communications Commission (FCC) have come up with a program under Section 3005 called the "Digital-to-analog-converter-box-program."

Yes indeed. In 2008, households will be able to obtain "coupons" that can be applied toward the purchase of the digital-to-analog converter boxes.

These coupons are good for $40 off the cost of each converter and know that there is a two coupon limit per household.

Where they came up with the $40 number

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