High Definition set to sweep the States over next few years

[Gregg Lengling]

Analysts predict that 29 million US households will own HD-capable TV displays by 2008, and that half of these displays will be connected to a high definition television service, according to new research from Strategy Analytics. Eighty-four percent of these HDTV subscribers will be using either cable or satellite services.

HDTV sales are being driven by demand for larger, high quality TV displays. Already today, the majority of TV receivers retailing at E1500, or more, are HD-capable. Strategy Analytics predicts that 4.8 million US homes will own an HD-capable display by the end of 2002, of which nearly one million will also have HDTV tuners for either cable, satellite or terrestrial platforms.

By 2008, the number of HD-capable displays in US homes will have reached 33.4 million units. Of these displays, 27 per cent will be connected to an HDTV service via cable, 14 per cent via satellite, and 8 per cent via digital terrestrial television (DTT). The report identifies the increasing support of cable and satellite operators and their content partners as a key factor in the take-up of HDTV services.

"HDTV has been a long time coming," says David Mercer, Vice President, Broadband Practice, at Strategy Analytics. "But sufficient momentum is now building at both content and operator levels to ensure a successful niche market in the longer term."  
 
Mark Obstfeld is the Editor of TVMeetsTheWeb. He read English and American Studies at Birmingham University (UK), before completing a Master's Degree there in History, Film and Television. He recently graduated with Distinction from the London School of Journalism.

[P a u l]

"Analysts predict that 29 million US households will own HD-capable TV displays by 2008, and that half of these displays will be connected to a high definition television service"

How many households currently own sets? And how many of these can currently display an HDTV signal? Maybe this belongs in another topic.

[mcq]

In the Milwaukee SMSA it's 205.

[Tom Snyder]

It's a lot more than that. I know several people with HDTV's who know about this site, but have never registered, and, beleive it or not, there are tons of people with HDTV's who don't even know about this site.

Now whether or not they all have HDTV's there are enough people intersted in then topic that we've got a lot of traffic here.

While the site has gotten over 1.3 million hits since it launched, the hits constitute every individual page, image and file viewed.

The important number is "visits"... the number of people who have spent any time at all on the site. That number was over 9,000 in October.

Still small in contrast to a 1.5 million metro, but still significant. But since June has been growing at 20-30% rate every month.

[David Hendrickson]

And after my Super Bowl party, I'll bet there will be 2 or 3 more in the metro area. I have long believed that once the millions of sports fans around the country view their favorite sport in HD, the demand will skyrocket.

[Pat]

Some family members from "up nort" came down to watch the Badger game with us.  They stayed to watch the SEC game and Gladiator.

They had been down before to see HDTV, but I was always embarrassed to have difficulties while they were here, and they were *not* impressed!  Maybe I'm paranoid, but I felt they were thinking I was foolish to have spent so much money on the STB and antenna.  (They really like DVDs though, don't we all.)

This is the first time they've had good reception and something to watch.  They loved it and asked all kinds of detailed questions -- may be a convert some day.

[mcq]

 

Originally posted by mcq:
In the Milwaukee SMSA it's 205.

Tom............

If I am a local digital broadcaster, I am looking for hard numbers. The registered users at milwaukeehdtv is about as hard as it gets... so there must be 205 hdtv consumers in Milwaukee Metro. Throw out a couple of wannabes and you have about 50 viewers per major network. Hardly worth the investment in the the new technology from a broadcaster standpoint.

I hope the winking icon sells out my opinion and I'll start using it more often  

[This message has been edited by mcq (edited 11-03-2002).]

[Tom Snyder]

The hard numbers would be easy to gather, if they (or a non-antagonistic media reporter) were just willing to go get them.

I have a feeling that American, Colder's, Flanner's, Best Buy, Circuit City and Sears know how many sets they've sold at their Milwaukee stores. I'd be willing to bet that it's well into the thousands, possibly approaching a 5 digit number.

TV and Radio also use a demographic profile survey called Media Audit to assist them in their advertising buys. I'll bet that "own a High Definition TV" is one of the criteria, and if they extrapolated the percentages on the population at large people would be in for a surprise.

[Gregg Lengling]

Although there are only 205 registered members on this site....that doesn't preclude thousands of others from reading all the posts...remember you only need to log in as a member to post...not to read...I know quite a few people who frequent this site and have never registered but because I list my e-mail I get quite a few private messages of persons that don't want their presence known and I comply with their requests, but let me say this forum is much more powerful than you'll ever know.


------------------
Gregg R. Lengling
RCA P61310 61" 16x9
HiDTV Pro 2 computer reciever card
glengling@ameritech.net

[Matt Heebner]

I think a better way to figure out what the viewing percentage is would be to look at HDTV's sold in SE Wisconsin, and look at HD STB boxes sold as well as intergrated TV's. Anyone wanna bet that its a lot higher than 205?

Matt

[P a u l]

   

Originally posted by Tom Snyder:
The hard numbers would be easy to gather, if they (or a non-antagonistic media reporter) were just willing to go get them.

I have a feeling that American, Colder's, Flanner's, Best Buy, Circuit City and Sears know how many sets they've sold at their Milwaukee stores. I'd be willing to bet that it's well into the thousands, possibly approaching a 5 digit number.

TV and Radio also use a demographic profile survey called Media Audit to assist them in their advertising buys. I'll bet that "own a High Definition TV" is one of the criteria, and if they extrapolated the percentages on the population at large people would be in for a surprise.

I went into Best Buy 3 weeks ago and didn't see one HDTV TV set in the store. I asked the salesman why and he said " they discontinued selling HDTV sets because no one was buying them." To add to that they only had one(uno) STB. It was a Hughes model with Direct TV capabilities for $478.
The hard numbers we use are the Nielsen ratings. And to the best of my knowledge they have no current way of monitoring HDTV viewers. Does anyone have a site for Nielsen? I did a search and found nothing but reports from 2000. I also spelled it with Neilsen and found the Neilson family from England.     Nevermind I just found it.... http://www.nielsenmedia.com/  Oh yes, one more thing. When you all switch from the analog signal over to HDTV we lose you as a viewer and the ratings drop. So lets hope that Nielson gets with the ack and develops some way of monitoring HDTV viewers. Funny how the FCC didn't regulate them to come up with a way to monitor HDTV by Nov. 1. I'm just letting you all know the timer is cute on the front page but I wouldn't get my hopes up for every analog transmitter to be shut down in 2006.


[This message has been edited by P a u l (edited 11-04-2002).]

[This message has been edited by P a u l (edited 11-04-2002).]

[Tom Snyder]

What Best Buy were YOU in? I go to the Northridge and Brookfield ones regularly.. was at Northridge yesterday... there were dozens... big ones, small ones, stacked two high in places and 5 plasmas (those are the ones I go in to salivate over).

[veyj]

Paul,  You've got to be pulling our legs.  That doesn't make sense.  They continue to run print ads and sell HDTV on their WEB site.  Do you think they are going to let American and Circuit City get all the HDTV business?  You must have spoken to one of the brain dead kids whose sole purpose is to sell extended warranty contracts.  You should have asked him an XBox or PS2 question.  Bet he would have had the right answer.

[P a u l]

I went to the Best Buy near Mayfair Mall. Are the sets you are looking at RPTV's or HDTV compatible?

[Matt Heebner]

That Best Buy is seriously space challenged!! They do have a few HDTV's, but they just do not have the room to show all that BB has to offer. They do however have catalogs with pictures of the HDTV's they offer. You can browse through them and order just like a regular sized BB.
I will admit that I have never seen a HD STB there, and I dont think I have ever seen a HD demo loop running on any Best Buy TV.

Matt