General Information

Serial #

N/A

Part Number

2

Total Parts

7

AKA

N/A

Patents

N/A

General Description

Synthetic casing and buttons; metal connectors

Dimensions

Note: These reflect the general size for storage and are not necessarily representative of the object's true dimensions.

Length

15.0 cm

Width

4.5 cm

Height

2.3 cm

Thickness

N/A

Weight

N/A

Diameter

N/A

Volume

N/A

Lexicon

Group

Communications

Category

Television

Sub-Category

N/A

Manufacturer

AKA

Access

Country

China

State/Province

Unknown

City

Unknown

Context

Country

Canada

State/Province

Ontario

Period

September, 2011

Canada

The donor and her sisters purchased this converter for their mother on August 30, 2011. The donor’s mother found that the picture on screen would fairly often become digitized (large pixels; garbled, partially blackened, jumpy and/or frozen image) and that she had to frequently adjust the “rabbit ears” on top of her television set to obtain a better picture. This is more symptomatic of issues with the antenna’s age, size, and/or gain more than it is indicative of any quality or functionality issues with the converter. Nonetheless, this constant adjustment proved to be very difficult for the owner, who is in her eighties. After using this product for a week, she abandoned it in favour of digital cable service from Rogers. The object was donated to the Museum shortly after. (From Acquisition Worksheet, in Supp. Info.)

Function

A device used to control some operations of another piece of equipment from a distance, in this case a television converter.

Technical

Since 2005, various countries worldwide have been gradually making a transition away from broadcasting analogue television signals. A transition to digital signals will allow the vacated frequency spectra formerly used by analog transmission to be reused for other communications purposes. Canada’s transition was completed by August 31, 2011. The CBC is permitted to use some analogue signals until August 31, 2012, when the Canadian transition will be officially complete. A converter such as this one enables incoming digital broadcast signals to be displayed on existing analogue receivers. It not only converts the signal from digital to analogue, but also alters the resolution and frame rates so that they are compatible for display on analogue television sets. (From Acquisition Worksheet, in Supp. Info.)

Area Notes

Unknown

Details

Markings

Proper front: All buttons labelled for function/ "Access/ HD TM"/ Inside battery compartment at proper back: two raised outlines of batteries molded into the plastic with the markings: "+/ UM-4/ AAA/ IECRO3.1.5V"/ White round sticker inside the battery compartment: "PASS/ 2008/ QC74"/ Numbers 1 to 12 around perimeter of sticker

Missing

Appears complete

Finish

Black synthetic rectangular remote with black, grey, red, green, yellow and blue buttons and white and red markings.

Decoration

N/A