----- Original Message ----- From: "Richard" <legalize at xmission.com> To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> Sent: Thursday, February 02, 2006 7:33 PM Subject: Re: SEMI OT END OF TELEGRAM AGE STOP They should be on the same rack with the handheld TV's that will become useless when we go all digital.

Just like digital cellphones. We all know how much it easier it is to hear someone in a marginal area on digital, right? Why, rather than just a fade out or a burst of static, we get a burst of encoded noise, and a dropped call. Yea, that's progress! --jc Jules Richardson wrote:

----- Original Message ----- From: "Jules Richardson" <julesrichardsonuk at yahoo.co.uk> To: "General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts" <cctalk at classiccmp.org> Sent: Thursday, February 02, 2006 8:39 PM Subject: Re: SEMI OT END OF TELEGRAM AGE STOP now? quality Is radio going digital only? I thought the TV band was enough for everyone to play in once we go digital.

Jules Richardson wrote: TV, or radio? Radio, no idea, but digital TV I welcome with open arms. -- Jim Leonard (trixter at oldskool.org) http://www.oldskool.org/ Help our electronic games project: http://www.mobygames.com/ Or check out some trippy MindCandy at http://www.mindcandydvd.com/ A child borne of the home computer wars: http://trixter.wordpress.com/

William Donzelli wrote: I dunno about an upgade, but it's surely different. Instead of snow you get pixellated. Doc

Doc Shipley wrote: In the demos I witnessed, you get black or frozen instead of snow. Doesn't matter, I'll still take it. -- Jim Leonard (trixter at oldskool.org) http://www.oldskool.org/ Help our electronic games project: http://www.mobygames.com/ Or check out some trippy MindCandy at http://www.mindcandydvd.com/ A child borne of the home computer wars: http://trixter.wordpress.com/

SEMI OT?

Jay West wrote: Ruh roh. Daddy's home. 8-) Doc

OK, it is OT now. When the thread started it was relatively OnT. Western Union had it all and could have ruled the datacom/internet world...but now they just transfer money. What a way to drop the ball. I would bet the only Telegrams sent in the past 10 years were for the Nobel prizes. William Donzelli aw288 at osfn.org

Witnessed this at my sister's house. Switching a channel took over a second. Something about the decoder waiting for the key frame perhaps? Made chanel surfing excrutiating. I will not automatically expect digital TV to be superior to current, will have to see it perform to believe. Warning: thread drift may result in flame damage. Anybody have "The Agency", (CBS 2001-2003) archived? John A., ducking

Chuck Guzis wrote: One word: Netflix. -- Jim Leonard (trixter at oldskool.org) http://www.oldskool.org/ Help our electronic games project: http://www.mobygames.com/ Or check out some trippy MindCandy at http://www.mindcandydvd.com/ A child borne of the home computer wars: http://trixter.wordpress.com/

On 2/3/2006 at 11:14 AM Richard wrote: WAY OT: Give me a break! Hollywood screenwriters can't even come up with an original idea, judging from the number of remakes of old classics (some of which weren't all that wonderful to start with). I note that the "Pink Panther" is due for release, as if anyone can trump the late Peter Sellers in the part. I guess "Plan 9 from Outer Space" is due for the treatment any day now. Netflix seems to be an awfully expensive way to keep the dogs entertained, anyway! Cheers, Chuck

Chuck Guzis wrote: Netflix is "Teh Awes0me!" if, like us, you have a hard time getting the movies back on time. Plus they have a great selection of TV series' compilations, which is the only way I can watch TV. Doc

Jim Leonard <trixter at oldskool.org> wrote: My house has no cable or satellite access; I look forward to throwing away all the TV's when NTSC broadcasts are gone! I should've ditched the idiot box years ago! Tim.

Jim Leonard wrote: Both. I can't really comment on what either is like in the US (except to say that the times when I have been in the States I've been amazed at how bad TV picture quality is - possibly that's due to being used to better vertical resolution in Europe). Experience of digital TV (Satellite or cable) or digital radio in the UK though has been that they compress the data so much in order to provide more channels that the resulting picture/audio is far worse than can be achieved with a good analogue TV/radio with a decent aerial setup. Not to mention that said analogue setups seem to cope far better during periods of extreme atmospherics - digital services on the other hand seem to either break up or stop working altogether. There are of course issues of programme quality too (which seems to affect digital TV far more than radio) - as soon as it becomes easy for a service provider to deliver lots of low-bitrate digital channels rather than a few analogue ones, the quality of actual content goes through the floor because they can't be bothered to keep standards up. In the cases where there *are* good shows, they end up being repeated endlessly, and it's only when you stop and think that you realise there are only a few hours of really good content per month out of tens/hundreds of channels. Now paying nothing for all those channels and *only* paying per-programme for what you watch would be nice - but even then only if the provider can deliver at an equal or superior picture to analogue (otherwise I may as well just go to the movies or rent a DVD). There seems to be a common misconception in society that digital services are automagically better than analogue ones - but that's only true if the people providing those services make a commitment to keep standards up. </rant> :-) cheers Jules

So here is my 2cents .. We live in a cable market, in an urban area, with a TV lifestyle :) I have a cable modem and a splitter running an ATI all-in-wonder card and am very happy with basic cable in a 4 - 6" window on the far left 20" monitor here in my cave. NTSC picture quality is of little importance to me, most of the time the picture is covered with what ever I am doing on that desktop and I am only listening to it. The TV window is never larger than about 8" when I am active watching Si-Fi or Discovery. I wander from CNBC, to Discovery, to FOXnews, to Si-Fi, CNN, to History, from when I get up in the morning and check the monitors, until last glance at the screens before going to bed. I do not conceder basic cable to be entertainment, but a primary information source on a wide range of subjects. If I want entertainment, I join my wife in her room. I check in here during commercials or between shows to deal with e-mail and return calls :) SheWhoMustBeObayed has a 4 year old RCA Big Glass 38" wide screen HDTV with a HD-DirectTV tuner built in. We live in a market with ABC,CBS,NBC,PBS1-4, and FOX DTV on-air transmitters I can see with rabit-ears. We rarely ever watch anything on the big screen that set that is not 1080i HD or DTV at the least. If we had a PAL here in the States, I do not think on-air HD tv would have ever become a reality But NTSC is easy to replace. Where else would the munies get their new wi-fi space. They would have had problems kicking the hams out of their air space :) We purchased the RCA about 4 years back, when the first CBS local went on the AIR and got a new DSS dish at the same time. HBO and HDnet were the only HD choices at the time, Showtime came a year latter when I got the third head and upgraded for the disk. Now it is 4+ years latter and I would never watch analog tv for entertainment again, I have begun going to some movies and being concerned about the graininess. Eye Candy of all kinds, has become addicting, we have been thinking of getting the DirectTV-HD tivo, but I successfully removed video recording from the house when we went HD and it has been nice not to have to deal with it :-) Now to put this back on topic with a request ..... Well kind of ... I am still on the lookout for examples of the IBM 13 Stripe logos (google ThirteenStripers if you are clueless). Ok, all you IBMers out there, drag out those old collectables and take a look. References to any early TSS/360 - 360/67 related documentation using the ThirteenStriper would make me very happy. While you are at it if you find any early block M logos with the old flat bottom M please let me know ! I would like to assemble a photo gallery of known examples. Thanks Bob

And more complciated receivers, with more custom parts, worse documentation, and higher power consumption (I am told the battery life on portable digital radios is a total joke). When the analogue TV transmitters are finally turned off, I, for one, will not be renewing my TV license. There are many more intersting things to do than watch TV... -tony

Jim Leonard <trixter at oldskool.org> wrote: Well, if I had, it would've been a Nobel Prize. To quote Prof. Farnsworth, it doesn't matter which one, they all pay the same! Tim.