TV tuner for TV: what is it?
More recently, about half a century ago, residents of large cities had very limited choices when watching television. It was four, maximum five television programs. Residents of small towns or villages could view even less. The picture quality on TVs with this reception was, to put it mildly, not very good.
With the advent of the 21st century, the era of digital television is gradually coming. This is at the beginning satellite television, followed by cable. Gradually, progress moves further and even digital terrestrial television appears. But to receive such channels, new equipment was also required - these are digital television receivers, which people simply call a TV tuner.
This is a separate device that connects to the TV. Subsequently, TV manufacturers decided to implement the functions of this device into television receivers. This is how the internal television tuner appeared.
The content of the article
What is a TV tuner on a TV?
What is a TV tuner for a TV?
Important to remember, that the TV tuner is a separate functional block designed to receive a digital signal.
Moreover, the TV also contains a block for receiving a regular analog signal. This allows the viewer to choose which network to connect to, or both at once.The second thing to note is that the digital signal allows the TV receiver to display high-definition images.
This is especially important if the TV is quite large. The standard analog signal on such a device transmits very low image quality.
What a TV tuner can do
A TV tuner is a pretty smart device. Its main feature is the provision of access to hundreds of high quality television channels. Although its main function is to select and view digital quality signals, being a high-tech device, it allows you to perform many other useful functions.
Since most channels are encrypted, the tuner provides the ability to decode such signals using special passwords. Also very useful for TV viewers is the ability to preview several channels simultaneously. Many tuners allow previews of eight or more preprogrammed channels. And some devices even allow you to function as an alarm clock.
How to choose it correctly
What is a TV receiver?
Besides everything else, Vit's important to remember TVs are manufactured to receive a wide variety of television signals.
And many countries have their own television standards, not only analogue, but also digital television. If a TV viewer buys an imported TV with a TV tuner, he needs to find out what signal this device is designed to receive. Otherwise, watching TV programs will be impossible.
If we talk about analog television, most television receivers have a unified system for adjusting to the received signal.And no matter in what format the signal will be transmitted, PAL, SECAM or NTSI, the TV decodes it. With a digital signal, the situation is different; the tuner will not be able to decode various digital television systems. Therefore, it is important to find out what signal the tuner is designed for, and what signal the TV viewer plans to receive.
Useful information about internal tuners
So, let's look at what digital television signal coding systems can be, and which ones can be used in our territory. In today's television world there are three main digital groups, these are:
- DVB.
- ATSC.
- ISDB.
Let's consider each of these groups and decide in which cases which of them is applied.
What are TV boxes for TV? The so-called European digital television standard. The most famous and used standard by providers in our country. Moreover, it is only a general name for a group of substandards developed on its basis, and this is:
- DVB-C is the main cable television standard. If you plan to use your TV for this purpose, then the tuner must support this particular standard;
- DVB-C2 is the second generation of the same standard, with improved noise immunity;
- DVB-S satellite television. If you have receiving equipment, it allows you to view satellite channels from various providers;
- DVB-S2 satellite standard for high definition image transmission;
- DVB-T terrestrial digital television;
- DVB-T is the second generation of the previous high definition standard. Therefore, when buying a TV, you should decide which digital signal source it will be connected to.
What is a receiver on a Standard ATSC TV? This American digital television standard is practically not used in our country, so television receivers equipped with a tuner with this standard will be completely useless in our conditions.
Japanese ISDB standard for digital television broadcasting with approximately the same usefulness as the American one. But in all these types of television receivers there is one, but important, advantage, this is the quality of the reproduced signal. So what to do if you already have a TV, but the standard is not suitable?
What you need to know about external tuners
In this case, external tuners are used. Due to the fact that they connect to the TV via a low-frequency signal, they will help the viewer watch any necessary channels. But it will also be necessary to select a tuner for the type of television broadcast desired by the viewer.
In order not to get into trouble when buying a TV with a digital tuner, it is important to find out what standard you need as a buyer, and what capabilities this device has.
