DTV SWITCH

At midnight, television broadcasters will stop using analog signals in favor of digital transmission.

That means, if you get TV over the air, and you don’t have a converter box, you won’t be able to watch TV. 

Chances are you’ve heard the warnings; the advertisements have been everywhere.

But if you’ve tuned out the cries to convert your TV for the digital switchover, all you’ll see at the stroke of midnight tonight is a blank screen.

At midnight, all TV transmission changes from the old analog to digital.  It’s a move to give viewers a clearer picture, and more free channels over the air. 

“This is as big a step forward as from black and white TV to color TV,“ TV engineer Steve Kaiser said.

But it’s a step not everyone is ready for.  Experts estimate almost 3,000,000 people relying on old-fashioned antennas will lose reception tonight and more if you count those with old spare TVs’ in a kitchen or bedroom.

“The people who are really affected are the people who have an old TV set more than a year old not on cable or satellite. They need to get a converter box,“ U.S. Secretary of Commerce Gary Locke said.

The federal government spent more than $2-billion to subsidize those converter boxes and even pushed back the switchover from February to June to give everyone more time, but they won’t really know how many people aren’t digital ready until it’s too late.

“There will be a big mopping-up effort after June 12 because at that point then we will know exactly who will be affected.  They’ll start calling TV stations they’ll call the FCC, and we’ll be able to get help to them that way,” FCC Commissioner Robert Mcdowell said.

And so operators are now also getting ready for a blizzard of calls from people who will soon be seeing snow.

Another reason for the switchover to digital TV is it gives more bandwidth to police and fire personnel for emergencies.