DTV transition: More awareness, but not action

With the DTV transition in the U.S. set to occur in about four months, Consumer Reports has some encouraging news on consumer awareness of the nation's impending switch to all-digital TV broadcasts, but it also found that many consumers are still confused and unprepared for the switchover.

The good news: Consumer awareness about the end of analog TV transmissions is up significantly.

According to the results of a telephone survey conducted in September by the Consumer Reports National Research Center:

• 93% of Americans with at least one television in their house know about the switchover to digital TV. (Last December, only 64% of those consumers were aware of the national DTV conversion.)

Of those who are aware of the DTV transition:

• 82% of respondents believe the options they have for the conversion are clear. (Only 58% were clear on their options back in Dec. 2007.)
• Awareness of the federal $40 DTV converter box coupon program (https://www.dtv2009.gov) also jumped, from 27% to a whopping 76%.

The not-so-good news: Even though there's a high level of awareness, there's also a lot of confusion about exactly what will happen on Feb. 17, 2009.

• 41% believe that all TVs—even digital TVs—will need a converter box to function.
• 29% believe that all households will need a digital TV.
• 25% believe that everyone must subscribe to a cable, satellite, or fiber-optic TV service in order to watch any TV programming.
• 9% still believe they will have to throw out their analog TV sets

The really bad news: The DTV transition may not go well for millions of Americans.

• 60% of consumers in households in which all TVs will be affected by the conversion still have not taken action.
• Fewer than half (44%) of consumers in households with at least one television affected have requested a DTV converter box coupon so far.
• Nearly half (49%) of the consumers who requested a DTV coupon have not used it to buy a digital converter box yet.

If you are among those who are not yet ready for the switch, visit our Guide to the DTV Transition to find out what it means to you and how you can prepare. We have a complete Guide to DTV converter boxes and free DTV converter box Ratings online. We're continually updating the Ratings as new models are introduced and will soon be adding nearly a dozen new models.

Don't forget to visit the free "Getting Ready for the Digital TV transition" discussion forum on ConsumerReports.org's message boards for additional help. And keep up to date with the DTV transition by bookmarking all the DTV-related posts on our Electronics Blog: https://blogs.consumerreports.org/electronics/digital_tv/index.html.

Hear Us Now, the consumer advocacy arm of Consumers Union (CU, the publisher of Consumer Reports), is urging consumers to get involved and make their concerns known to U.S. government officials. To learn more about CU's efforts, visit the "Transition to digital TV" page on HearUsNow.org: https://www.hearusnow.org/tvradio/12/

—Paul Eng

—Paul Eng