BINGO

That is why I do not use the mits unit. Not that I have anything against Mits, but why pay more. I would stick with the Sony, Zenith, or RCA when it becomes available.

Jon

Clay, all that is very impressive with the EXECPTION of they are local affiliates and are not recieved nationally. Each affiliate must have HDTV capability and 96% do not.....back to my orginal statement. All that shows is the signal is our there but not being recieved because of cost of conversion of equipment by the stations themselves. Just my .02 worth

Neb.

You take a hammer to my TV and I'll take a hammer to yours. Then we can all run out and drop $3 grand on another screen to stare at glassy-eyed for hours...

Thanks for all of the info, guys.

Right now I am still leaning toward the Hughes HIRD-E86 from Best Buy. It is only $500. Here is the Satellite Dish that goes with it for $100.

Since my TV does NOT have the DVI input, I do not want to get a unit (Sony, Zenith, or RCA) that has it. I would just be paying for something that I couldn't use.

srpbaer,

Look at this: Local Station HDTV Status

I live in Austin, TX. Four (CBS, FOX, NBC, UPN) of the six major stations are currently broadcasting in HDTV. My local ABC station is scheduled for March 2003, and I don't think that the WB has announced anything yet. PBS is coming too.

Scan the list for your local stations and see if any are currently broadcasting in HDTV.

Good luck!

Audio-

Is the optical audio connection a digital or analog signal?

Here is a good "from the horses mouth" description on the DTV transition. I believe that there is also a new agreement on the format about 2 months ago that standardized this so that it makes sense now to have the HDTV "converter" as part of the TV.

http://www.fcc.gov/cgb/consumerfacts/digitaltv.html

Here is another good link:

Antenna Selector

Click on Choose an Antenna and enter the requested information.

Clay,
Thanks for the information...one small problem for me...I live in the mountains of northeastern tennessee....We are lucky to get sunshine in the mornings. We do have Charter cable and it is digital but that is all she wrote!!!! I keep hearing about the local stations converting but I will believe it when I see it..Hell, this is the land of moonshine and mono radio...At 34oo feet about sea level I could probally catch the signal from the station....See Ya

Clay, I went to the list and indeed it did list two of the three stations we get here...I called them and they said they were not HGTV capable and would be at least 12-18 months away, wey they were listed on the offical FCC listing too....Just my luck

One thing I forgot to mention when I bought our HDTV satelite box was that we also had to add a second dish (facing east instead of south like the main dish). We have Dish network. Direct tv only uses one dish. If you have limited space, or if having to have a second dish face east would be a problem I would go with Direct over Dish Network.

BTW: The HDTV box through Dish Network was about $700.00 and can be switched between HD signals and regular signals. This is important for those that try to record with a non-HD VCR. A non HD vcr will not record an HD signal.