axus
join:2001-06-18
Washington, DC Reviews:
 ·Verizon Online DSL
| It's difficult to find a cheap non-USB tuner I wanted to get a gift for a friend who watched over-the-air television, I thought an HD tuner+antenna would be nice. Wow, I couldn't find anything under $200. I think it's still an early-adopter market with early-adopter prices.
There was much more competition and lower prices for USB antennas, I'm assuming they rely on the computer and driver to handle some expensive things.
The first company to design a tuner/antenna for $40+$40 will make millions when the USA switches over from analog to digital and hands out all those coupons. |
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| Antennas are cheap, and they're old technology so the price likely won't be changing soon. Set top boxes are expensive, but most current HDTVs have ATSC tuners.
The coupon tuners won't do HD; doing better than 480i is a disqualification for the coupon program. |
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jp10558Premium
join:2005-06-24
Willseyville, NY | What? That's got to be the stupidest thing I've heard today. Why would the government do that? |
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| The purpose of the coupon program is to allow people with older TVs to continue to use them after the digital transition. It is not to give buyers of HD monitors a free set top box. |
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| The real reason for the coupons is to make sure their remains an audience for the local stations and their advertisers. |
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Time4aNAPPremium
join:2007-04-09
Des Plaines, IL | reply to russotto
said by russotto:Antennas are cheap, and they're old technology so the price likely won't be changing soon. Not when you can take the same old product, put it in a new box with "HD" plastered all over it, and sell it for twice as much!  |
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 cdruGo ColtsPremium,MVM
join:2003-05-14
Fort Wayne, IN
kudos:5
 ·Frontier FiOS
| said by Time4aNAP:said by russotto:Antennas are cheap, and they're old technology so the price likely won't be changing soon. Not when you can take the same old product, put it in a new box with "HD" plastered all over it, and sell it for twice as much! But those old antennas just aren't capable of handling the bandwidth required for that new high definition digital television. Right. 
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Go Colts |
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Time4aNAPPremium
join:2007-04-09
Des Plaines, IL | said by cdru:But those old antennas just aren't capable of handling the bandwidth required for that new high definition digital television. Right. No, wrong! The stickers on the box make them able to handle as much as 6MHz per channel. |
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