Digital Television in The Woodlands

This also pertains to Tomball, Spring and probably Conroe, Texas. Today I jumped into this ocean of digits and found that I like it! I sort of stumbled into it by buying a converter and then a digital antenna. Since my daughter was moving in back with us for the summer or even longer, her HDTV was the first experiment. As it turned out, all I needed was a small $30 antenna, just rabbit ears essentially. At first I thought this device did not work, because when I programmed the channels, I got noisy reception just like before. It looked the same - static reception, because we are so far away from the Houston broadcasting towers. But then I tried something, just out of intuition and curiosity. Wow! I found another signal source on the menu of the television set that was digital. The other source was the old analog broadcast method. The world of TV changed in an instant! Now I have perfect reception for those channels which have already converted to digital broadcasting. And when I mean perfect, I mean perfect! Essentially cable TV through the airway!

Expectations are soaring. Could this be the end of cable TV for us? There will be many questions to be answered soon. Will the value of having piped-in digital reception be significantly lowered? I believe so! Now the question for residents in our area will be, "do I need to have the hundreds of channels provided by my cable TV supplier?" Movies might keep us tuned in, but my son has already found an alternative to that. He has connected his wide-band internet to his TV and now watches on-demand streamed movies from Netflix for a fraction of the cost of cable. I just looked at my cable bill which includes about four paid movies. It is $150, but that includes wide-band internet.

What else might be on the plate? I just looked at my $60 bill for a house phone service. I can purchase equipment for less than $300 to move that service to the wide-band internet without any monthly charges. The house phone will have two lines (two telephone numbers) and one will be the same as I have now. There will be free calling to anywhere in the USA and low cost international call services available, as well as all the telephone amenities we are accustomed to such as call waiting, conference calls, and CallerID. In these times of frugality, I can see equivalent or even better service at much less cost.

Technology continues to offer useful alternatives to quality living, right here in The Woodlands. I am looking forward to the new technology television when the local stations all change their broadcast over to digital on June 12th of 2009. I need to find a place to dispose of my antenna in the attic. I have not used it for years but now it will be worthless. It just takes up space. I will research that issue and share the information with my readers... ps ... after receiving a comment from one of my readers below, I have added a reference on antennas.² Apparently the old antennas will work. I will try out ours in the attic and update this article later.

Now the even better news. We have channels available right now which broadcast only in digital and never have been available for analog TVs. The Houston area is large and there is a wide variety of broadcasters available now. Each analog channel can and will broadcast sub-channels in addition to their current analog mainstream channels. For example, we will have 24 hour weather. I don't have that with my AT&T service except for an application they provide, a slow alternative to direct broadcasting. Of course we will not have a DVR service unless we take the broadcasts through a state-of-the-art home entertainment system or equivalent.

I wonder now how far away from the city one can be and still pick up these channels? There is more research to do. We will point our digital antennas South. I am not sure yet how much we might have to tune up direction to pick up all the channels.The standard network channels all will retain their channel numbers. ABC channel 13 will remain channel 13 for example. Some broadcasting may be on different channels until June 19th. I just previewed all available channels and am having a difficult time picking up channel 45. All others seem to be working just fine. There are three sub-channels for channel 2. Channel 13 had a dedicated sub-channel for the weather. They cover more than just local weather, sort of like the weather channel on cable. I noticed some temporary interference on channel 39. Maybe the weather will affect reception. The television set seems to adjust to fuzzy signals when it loses signal. I checked on reception grade using a website ¹ that will characterize the reception expected in any given zip code; it shows we can expect a "strong" signal, so we qualify for indoor reception. There is a lot to learn. We will dedicate one of our TVs to this new technology and see where we will go from here with the others.

References
¹FCC Information
²Antennas with digital TVs

Car Watch Program : prevent auto theft and burglary - Living Advice in The Woodlands Texas

This program is actually a Texas program. It is sponsored by the Texas Department of Transportation. The Sheriff department and other law enforcement agencies here cannot stop an automobile without due cause unless the owner provides those agencies with permission to stop the vehicle without cause. This particular provision of state law is to help law enforcement officials catch auto thieves. The Texas Auto Burglary & Theft Prevention Authority registers vehicles through a process known as H.E.A.T. to enable law enforcement officers to suspect the vehicle is stolen between the hours of 1AM and 5AM if the car is on the road during those hours. So if you do not regularly use your vehicle between those hours and wish your car to be more visible as a possible theft, you would use this service. 1-800-CAR-WATCH or register online at H.E.A.T. This process also enables cars to fall under suspicion at the Texas Mexico border, so don't be surprised if they stop you at the border and ask additional questions or proof of ownership if the related decal is displayed on your vehicle. That is a good thing to help protect your property! A quote from the the state website: "A car is stolen in Texas every five and a half minutes. More vehicles are stolen between 1:00 a.m. and 5:00 a.m. than any other time." Montgomery County participates in state wide efforts to identify and catch car thieves. It is called the Montgomery County Auto Theft Task Force. There has been a big drop in reported stolen vehicles for Texas since 2001, indicating the program is working. Also, Texas has a 74% recovery rate for stolen vehicles compared to 63% nationally. Some cars are more prone to be stolen that others. Lately, the Acura has been one of the more desired vehicles by thieves. ALso to understand that as many as 25% of 4-wheel vehicles on the road in Mexico are stolen. Mexico allows vehicles to cross into their country without being checked. Almost every vehicle that has been stolen is identified as being stolen after crossing using border surveillance equipment by the law enforcement agencies. But that does not mean the car is recoverable. Leaving your keys in your car is a class "C" misdemeanor. You can be fined up to $500 for doing so. Insurance will not pay you for damages to your car if the keys are in it. It is also a felony to operate a car without the owners permission. Keep that in mind when you borrow someone else's car. The old saying, "three strikes and you are out" applies to this. Three felonies and you lose your privileges. A related program is sponsored by this state agency - HLT, or HIDE LOCK TAKE. This program particularly pertains to The Woodlands residents. This program requests that residents help law enforcement officials by hiding your things in the car, locking your the doors to your car, and taking your keys out of the car when you leave it. Burglaries are a constant threat and an auto0moible parked in a driveway of a home is a target for mischief and theft when these precautions are ignored. Other related advice is to not park too close to the auto in front of you. Think "I need space to get out if confronted by a thief or threatened by suspicious persons nearby." Give yourself the option to leave in a bug hurry if you need to do so. While we are at this, the Sheriff's department recommends that people in this county use steering wheel locks. They are a deterrent to thieves.

• Web Link to Texas Auto Burglary and Theft Prevention Authority
• H.E.A.T. Web link