Trutech 17 LCD TV/VCR Tuner

Hi J.R. (another long answer coming your way!)

Thank you for writing back! Well first of all, no, you do NOT need to remove your rabbit ears. They work just fine for receiving the new digital signal. That being said, when you scanned for new channels, did it ask you which type of channels you wanted to scan for? Many recently manufactured TV's have both an analog AND digital tuner. If this is the case with your set (which I imagine is not the case, unfortunately), then most likely it will ask you if you want to scan for digital or analog channels. You should choose digital, and would be all set for the conversion!

Otherwise, I simply used channel 6 as an example, the channels you receive depend wholly on the area which you live. Some broadcast areas use channel 6, some do not. But, one great new feature about digital television is that there is an awful lot of extra bandwidth in the channels allotted by the FCC now, so many stations will add ADDITIONAL channels under the same carrier frequency, (with the additional advertising revenue it behooves them to do so) i.e. channel 6 (or any other channel in your area) may have two or more channels, labeled 6-1. 6-2, etc. Now, if ANY of the channels found by your scan have more than one 'channel' per carrier frequency, then you definitely DO have a digital tuner. If you don't have multiple 'channels' per frequency band (channel 6 would be the frequency band, 6-1, 6-2, etc would be the additional 'channels' per band), then I would say you do not have a digital tuner. One good example would be PBS. PBS has three channels now in my area, and several other areas that I know of, so my guess is that there will be 3 channels in all areas. In my area, PBS is channels 26-1, 26-2, and 26-3. If this is the case for you (the fact that there are multiple channels, not that the channels are any number in particular), again you're all set!

Here's another option to try out- Search the web for the actual frequencies being used by the television stations in your area for digital TV, and plug those in manually (from within the menu, should be an option to manually add next to or near the option to scan for new channels). For example, if you lived in Miami i would plug "Miami area digital channels" into Google. These most likely will NOT be the same as their analog counterparts. ABC in my area is channel 7 (analog), but the new digital broadcast frequency would put it at channel 41. My TV also recognizes (thanks to metadata!) that it should read channel 7, and once programmed, if I enter channel 7 it automatically tunes appropriately.

So, if NONE of your newly programmed channels have multiple channels per frequency band, and you get nothing when you manually enter the new digital channel numbers in, then I would say your TV does not have a digital tuner. You will either need to purchase a converter box, or buy a new television set unless you subscribe to cable or satellite. At this point, you should actually be hard pressed to find an analog tuner alone on a set.

I hope this answers your question conclusively. If not, please comment again, and I will be more than happy to work with you further! Thanks again for visiting!


Hi J.R. (another long answer coming your way!)

Thank you for writing back! Well first of all, no, you do NOT need to remove your rabbit ears. They work just fine for receiving the new digital signal. That being said, when you scanned for new channels, did it ask you which type of channels you wanted to scan for? Many recently manufactured TV's have both an analog AND digital tuner. If this is the case with your set (which I imagine is not the case, unfortunately), then most likely it will ask you if you want to scan for digital or analog channels. You should choose digital, and would be all set for the conversion!

Otherwise, I simply used channel 6 as an example, the channels you receive depend wholly on the area which you live. Some broadcast areas use channel 6, some do not. But, one great new feature about digital television is that there is an awful lot of extra bandwidth in the channels allotted by the FCC now, so many stations will add ADDITIONAL channels under the same carrier frequency, (with the additional advertising revenue it behooves them to do so) i.e. channel 6 (or any other channel in your area) may have two or more channels, labeled 6-1. 6-2, etc. Now, if ANY of the channels found by your scan have more than one 'channel' per carrier frequency, then you definitely DO have a digital tuner. If you don't have multiple 'channels' per frequency band (channel 6 would be the frequency band, 6-1, 6-2, etc would be the additional 'channels' per band), then I would say you do not have a digital tuner. One good example would be PBS. PBS has three channels now in my area, and several other areas that I know of, so my guess is that there will be 3 channels in all areas. In my area, PBS is channels 26-1, 26-2, and 26-3. If this is the case for you (the fact that there are multiple channels, not that the channels are any number in particular), again you're all set!

Here's another option to try out- Search the web for the actual frequencies being used by the television stations in your area for digital TV, and plug those in manually (from within the menu, should be an option to manually add next to or near the option to scan for new channels). For example, if you lived in Miami i would plug "Miami area digital channels" into Google. These most likely will NOT be the same as their analog counterparts. ABC in my area is channel 7 (analog), but the new digital broadcast frequency would put it at channel 41. My TV also recognizes (thanks to metadata!) that it should read channel 7, and once programmed, if I enter channel 7 it automatically tunes appropriately.

So, if NONE of your newly programmed channels have multiple channels per frequency band, and you get nothing when you manually enter the new digital channel numbers in, then I would say your TV does not have a digital tuner. You will either need to purchase a converter box, or buy a new television set unless you subscribe to cable or satellite. At this point, you should actually be hard pressed to find an analog tuner alone on a set.

I hope this answers your question conclusively. If not, please comment again, and I will be more than happy to work with you further! Thanks again for visiting!