[opendtv] Latest 5th Gen

Talked to LG and my other manufacturer in Korea at length.

LG is not making STB's with their 5th generation chip because the cost 
of making them is to high relative to the price they can charge. The 
cost is in the HD decoder area. They are working on reducing that cost. 
They expect to have low cost converters, SD only, by the end of next 
year. These converters will be capable of HD but will not output it. I 
asked if that means they will also have inexpensive HD receivers by then 
and did not get an answer.

The receiver that I tested last week is not sensitive enough. LG is 
working on improving that now with the other manufacturer. One 
difference I was told between the prototype we tested last summer and 
the one we tested last week was that the 5th gen chip was not in the 
tuner in the prototype. This recent receiver was the latest tuner card 
from LG Innotech and the 5th gen chip was in the tuner. .

They are working with my other manufacturer and I will tell you getting 
them to make this receiver will be hard. No one seems that interested in 
8-VSB STB's. Maybe I should start taking names of those who want one so 
we can asses demand.

Really sort of strange that the two biggest critics of 8-VSB in this 
huge country, Sinclair Broadcasting and myself are the ones showing the 
most interest in a decent 8-VSB receiver. The FCC is doing nothing that 
I know of. Congress is ignoring the subject entirely convinced that it 
does not exist. The manufacturer that stands to make the most from 8-VSB 
and one of the only ones making an 8-VSB receiver at all declines to 
make the first decent one because of cost.

I still remember the shock that I experienced when I found out that 
people were attacking Sinclair over COFDM. We had just come back from 
Europe where we had met with a number of companies about COFDM and had 
been really impressed with the level of activity around it. We thought 
we had this big secret that for some unfathomable reason US broadcasters 
had not discovered yet.

I still cannot comprehend the unreality of it all. It simply does not 
make sense that this is happening in the US. How can we as a country act 
this stupid? And it goes on. I have not been quiet about my attitude 
toward LG and 8-VSB in talking to anyone there including those who 
developed the 5th generation chip. I have told them we more than prefer 
COFDM, we intensely dislike 8-VSB.

Would you believe they are sending a TV crew and reporters to interview 
us on our opinion about 8-VSB and their 5th generation receiver? They 
are, next week.

Bob Miller
 
 
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