NY Tries Brief Analog TV Shutoff

Analog television channels went dark for two minutes in the New York metropolitan area a few weeks ago, in an early trial run for the DTV transition, scheduled for February 2009.

On October 28, between 5:58 and 6 PM ET, the normal picture and sound disappeared, to be replaced by color bars and a crawl saying "You are seeing this message because YOU NEED TO PREPARE FOR DIGITAL TELEVISION (DTV)." WCBS viewers also received an advance warning and explanation from a newscaster, since the outage occurred during a normally scheduled news program.

Digital broadcast channels continued without interruption. So did cable and satellite feeds, including both their digital and analog versions.

See news.com, including video.

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