The Digital Transition: What Happened to Analog Television?
By: Derek Gerry As part of the digital transition on June 12, 2009, all high-power analog TV broadcasting will cease, and the bandwidth used by those stations will be allocated to other purposes. While there’s no shortage of cheerleaders for the new digital technology, there are also some detractors and even conspiracy theories about how this bandwidth will be used. Was the upheaval necessary? Will there be benefits? The answers can be a little complicated. Begin with Bandwidth Bands are specific wavelengths of radio waves, measured in Hertz (Hz). Like light waves, radiation waves and sound waves, there is a spectrum of bands, and some are more powerful than others. For several decades, high-powered network TV affiliates have used channels, essentially small pieces of bandwidth, to broadcast television in the 700MHz band. This is one of the most powerful radio waves, capable of traveling great distances and penetrating concrete walls. For a network hoping to send out a strong signal, i
