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Sydney switches off analogue TV

Sydney and surrounding areas has now switched off analogue TV, ending an era that began back in 1956.

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tvcemSydney and surrounding areas has now switched off analogue TV, ending an era that began back in 1956 with the words “Hello and welcome to Television.”

At 9am this morning Analogue was switched off from Gosford to Tomat Creek, and Katoomba to Sydney.

Next week the final markets make the switch in Melbourne and surrounding areas plus Remote central and eastern Australia.

Source: www.digitalready.gov.au/

20 Responses

  1. Now that Sydney has switched off the old Analogue Signals, 82% of Australians have made the switch to Digital Television.
    Melbourne and the remaining areas of Australia will finally have the old analogue signals switched off.

  3. @craig, it should mean at the very least that the networks are now free to make their main channels HD and their secondary channels SD. So Bathurst on Nine in HD, ditto for the Ashes (maybe not this series but the next one) and so forth.

    As I understand it from now on it’s up to the individual networks how many channels they have and how they split them between HD & SD, etc. (within the constraints of their frequency allocations of course).

  4. @Craig – it depends if 7 wants to make the main channel in HD and if you saw the RLWC on 7mate. The PQ look horrendous when they said it was in HD. It also depends on Australia’s Anti-Siphoning laws.

  5. With the shut down of analogue does this finally mean next works don’t have to show some things only on the main channel. So we can get the like of Bathurst on 7Mate in 2014 in HD?

  6. The retune for Sydney North and Kings Cross is currently listed for 18th March 2014 (subject to change).

    Looks like all the channels are moving to the mid 40s.

  7. I turned the TV on to watch it. When the sound dropped out I looked over and my TV had already switched to auto bg blue.

    With spaces where the analogue channels used to be my ABC and Seven reception through rabbit ears is the best it’s ever been. Hopefully it will stay that way if they compress them down into one block and sell of the free spectrum.

  8. I never felt a thing when the changeover happened….*G*….
    ‘My City of Sydney’…still love that song…written by two Americans…and sung by one of them…with such emotion…

  9. I was at a medical centre this morning and wondered why the television was switched off. Time for an upgrade there. Hopefully the Sydney hospital I was in a few months ago has managed to upgrade too.

  11. @Pcrtoo – Great for the 2 or 3 watching channel 7 analogue. I couldn’t see it, I couldn’t record it, since everything I have is now “digital only”.

  13. Just looking of any youtube clips, some starting to come through. Looks like so far only channel 7 did something a bit extra.
    They played My City of Sydney which was how the station used to close back in the day my grandmother used to stay up to watch this most nights as she loved the song. Well done 7 nice touch.

    youtu.be/5Z_GA4TTncA

  16. I switched over to the analog bands for the first time in years shortly before the switchoff today.

    I was not at all surprised to discover that when the screen filled with static at 9am the improvement in program quality was very noticeable!

  18. @Andrew: And that famous film of Gyngell saying “Good evening and welcome to television” which Nine uses in its anniversary shows is not the actual opening broadcast but a re-enactment filmed in 1963.

    Any YouTube videos of the analog switchoff yet?

  20. To be fair — or pedantic, take your pic 🙂 — “Good evening, and welcome to television” were not the first words spoken on TCN9 that night in 1956. Station announcer John Godson wasn’t seen on screen but read out the opening introduction, which was really just a spiel of the call-sign, company name and address and audio-visual technical specs, before Gyngell appeared on screen to announce his immortal greeting.

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