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Mr. Jamieson gets Digital TV

Mr. Jamieson is the 2000th household to get government assistance from analogue to digital. But will he still be smiling when he finds he doesn't have HD?

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You reckon as the 2000th household to convert from analogue to digital under the Government’s Household Assistance Scheme that they might have forked out for a big screen TV….

But Merbein resident Frank Jamieson (pictured right) had to settle for a visit from Executive Director of the Digital Switchover Taskforce, Andy Townend (pictured left)  instead. Heck, he didn’t even get Senator Conroy in the flesh. Merbein, near Mildura, is a long way after all.

Instead, Senator Conroy said today’s announcement reflects the enthusiasm of the Mildura community to be digital ready with only 55 days remaining until the Sunraysia region fully switches to digital TV on June 30.

“Mr. Jamieson will now be able to enjoy much better picture and sound quality, and more channels,” Conroy said. “Previously he had only received the four analog channels but he now has access to 16 channels of digital TV.”

Mr. Jamieson is apparently looking forward to watching the news, documentaries and football in high definition digital quality, says Conroy’s release.

But if the photo is any indication of his transition to digital, Mr. Jamieson doesn’t look like he’ll actually be getting high-definition quality. That’s because he appears to have an analogue TV, Senator. What that would get him is TV shows that are screening on HD channels but in the poorer analogue quality.

Didn’t anyone explain this to Mr. Jamieson? Or maybe not to the Senator.

Households eligible under the scheme are those where they own a functioning TV, do not already have access to digital TV and at least one resident is in receipt of the maximum rate of the:

* Age Pension,
* Disability Support Pension,
* Carer Payment, or
* Department of Veterans’ Affairs (DVA) Service Pension or the DVA income-support supplement payment.

“Time is running out to be fully ready for the digital switchover in June so I would urge those households in Mildura who believe they are eligible for assistance to contact the Household Assistance Scheme Information Line on 1800 556 443,” Conroy said.

And ask nicely for a HD TV while you’re at it.

18 Responses

  1. Good point Mr. Do-Bee.

    I am 36 and from regional Victoria also and can remember when we only got the ABC and Channel 6(WIN).
    SD is better than no D.

  2. Ed, that’s exactly why I still have my 63cm CRT. Most of the programs that I watch and which would benefit from being in HD aren’t, because the source isn’t, so I miss out on very little in that area.

    I don’t think the freqs for the current analogue channels will be available to the FTA stations to use as additional bandwidth. Apart from being a lower freq range, I believe that it will be auctioned off for mobile data usage.

  3. A flatscreen HD TV for Mr Jamieson? Hardly, he should be thankful the government aren’t saving sheckles by giving out SD-only set-top boxes!

  4. If I were Mr Jamieson, I’d be glad to be able to watch Australian digital tv on a small screen that doesn’t accentuate the inadequacy of our 15 year old MPEG-2 compression system. Massive flat screen tv’s merely blow-up the nasty blocky compression artifacts inherent in the very low bite rates at which we receive SD and HD signals. In fact they don’t replicate motion or colourimetry nearly as well as a good CRT tv.

    But if having a massive tv that dwarfs your neighbour’s, makes you feel more affluent then go for it. In reality, it is case of the emperor’s new clothes. The only use I see for big tv’s is if you have a movie collection on Blue-Ray, the only truly domestic HD video source available in Australia. Maybe when the government turns analogue signals off the bandwidth freed up will allow the broadcasters to transmit something resembling true HD.

  6. Let’s just hope he has an outdoor TV antenna because with an indoor one he’ll just be pulling his hair out with all the freezes and dropouts making it totally unviewable compared to having a mildly snowy picture on analogue but at least still being viewable.

  7. Craig, it’s been a long time since any Australian FTA channel has been 1920×1080. They’re a maximum of 1440×1080 now, since they struggle so much for bandwidth having to run one HD channel and two SDs when they only really have enough bandwidth for the HD channel by itself.

  8. after they leave his house what’s the bet he forgets how to use it, it took a number of times before my parents figured out how to use the digital set up I did for them, and every now and then they still have questions/problems when trying to record with an STB through a VCR. people need help in how to use these devices not just set them up, and they need to be told several times, hopefully that hotline helps with issues like this too.

  9. He’ll be getting better than analogue quality, it’ll be more like DVD, which isn’t bad and is a vast improvement over analogue tv… However that said, HD is a vast improvement over DVD quality.

    Instead of 1080i, he’ll get 576i.

  10. The gentleman would’ve grown up without television and, if he has lived in a country area for most of his life, spent most of his adulthood watching one commercial and one government run channel. I’m sure he’ll cope without seeing the footy in all it’s HD glory.

    I know I was thankful just to be able to view metro channels through snow on a 32cm black and white AWA TV back in the ’70s. You guys make me laugh when you complain about the picture quality on SD vs HD.

  11. Its time for Freeview and Conroy to stop saying 16 channels – IMO that is false and misleading. There could be 16 by the end of the year, but for now its 11. But hey, whats a little false advertising when it helps sell people on digital tv?

  13. Well their already wasting funds having “box installers” on hand. Much better things to do with the money Rudd & co haven’t yet flushed away than buy the guy a big tele!

  14. David I think the whole idea behind the publicity event was to remind analogue viewers that the scheme can provide them with help to convert to digital without having to fork out for a new digital LCD or Plasma TV. If they had given him a new TV it sorta woulda defeated the purpose of the publicity message, don’t ya think?

  16. Yes he’ll get HD but with letter box screen and 640×480 quality picture, far from the 1920×1080 of full HD.

    But I guess it’s better that snow in 2 months time!

  17. He’ll be further disappointed to realise that 5 out of the so called 16 channels are simply simulcasts of others in HD – not that he would be able to tell on that TV in any case!

  18. I think most importantly is that it’s not the 2000th household to convert, but rather the 2000th to need help in converting to digital. Way to run an awesome campaign dudes, 2000 households couldn’t figure out what you were talking about in a small subset of the Australian population. Epic.

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