Is anyone else still a Standard Def (SD) holdout?

[SagaciousKJB]

I doubt I'll be able to hold out much longer but I've been refusing to switch over to high-def TV. I have a lot of different reasons, most important in my mind I think is just that's what I prefer and don't want to spend more money to switch over. But my options sure are getting limited. I need a new video card with an S-Video out and it's pretty hard to find out without resorting to eBay. Meanwhile any video game coming out these days doesn't display well on my SD TV, the text is TINY. It really annoys me, I feel like the "industry" is trying to force my hand.

For those wondering why I prefer SD so much... Imagine trying to convince your healf-deaf grandfather that FLAC sounds so much better than MP3. I have terrible vision, and while yeah I can discern the quality difference, for me it's not really something that matters.

Not that I don't have similar like, "vinyl" nostalgia for VHS. I love 1980s era VHS--I don't know what it is but it's like they managed to make life look airbrushed. But that's not my point, I just think my cutoff for video being not "good enough" is wayyyy below the general consensus and it drives me nuts.

[lisati]

I still use an older CRT-based TV that has a redundant analogue tuner (TV in my area went completely digital about two years ago) and that has the older RCA, component & S-Video connectors interconnection with other devices. No HDMI on this TV! The picture quality is adequate for my day-to-day needs.

I even have an assortment of VCRs in various states of repair, but other than copying tapes to DVD I rarely use them these days.

[mamamia88]

Just upgrade already. You will cause yourself more grief in the long run holding off especially if you like games.

[buzzingrobot]

I cancelled cable more than 3 years ago, so I watch No-Definition televison.

[grahammechanical]

I never got as far as switching to the silver plastic curved screen TV that has since been replaced by the flat screen TV. Our old CRT analogue TV still works but we had to buy a digital tuner when they switched off the analogue transmissions.

Now, as regards my computer monitor. Some years ago I had to replace the old CTR monitor and I got a digital TV/monitor. That did HD. And last year I had to replace that and I got a digital TV to use as a monitor. That does HD. But I do not think the free to view channels that it receives are HD.

So, in this house the computer monitor is better quality than the TV set. And that is as things should be. :)

Regards.

[deadflowr]

I cancelled cable more than 3 years ago, so I watch No-Definition televison.

We cancelled cable when the US broadcasters switched to digital over the air.
To us the quality is fine, good hd. But to our friends is it actually really good, even better than their cable or satellite.
The added bonus we found is that because they can now squeeze more info per frequency range, where they split into channels 2.1, 2.2, etc new channels show up randomly all the time. We have something like five or six(maybe more) movie channels now, two piggyback on a local Spanish-language station, which was really weird to find. Though some of the movie channels seem to run movies from old and cruddy vhs tapes, simply horrible quality.
But the general big broadcasters quality is quite superb.

with cable we were feeling that we needed to watch tv, because the absurd cost demanded we do.
Now we watch tv only because we want to.

On the thread topic, though, we finally put our last crt-tv out to pasture recently upgrading that to an hd flat screen-something.
But ole Betsy had a good run, something like 20 years.

[lisati]

I never got as far as switching to the silver plastic curved screen TV that has since been replaced by the flat screen TV. Our old CRT analogue TV still works but we had to buy a digital tuner when they switched off the analogue transmissions.

My initial motivation for getting a digitial tuner was reception of most of the analogue stations that we liked to watch wasn't particularly good at our place. At the time, TVs with digital tuners that we could afford weren't too common in the local shops. When analogue TV was finally turned off in our area, some of our family and friends were caught out.

Sometimes I'm blown away by the changes in what's available on TV. In my lifetime, New Zealand has moved from having one b&w TV station (if you were lucky) with a mono soundtrack, only broadcasting for limited hours each week, to multiple stations, colour picture, the option of 5.1 sound on some programs, widescreen, HD, PVRs...... At last count I could get at least 20 different channels free to air, four of which are timeshifted versions of other channels, all with 24/7 programming.

[Matthew_Harrop]

HD is alright but it doesn't switch me from a DVD to a blu-ray.

[xubu2]

A full hd tv is great, but as monitor for a pc it's crap because most sites still have vertical scroll.
You only lose space :(