DTT’s here!
Um ... no, it isn’t. But it’ll be here soon. Or will it? Where is it? Who knows?
It’s been forever since we were first told that we need to be ready for the national migration to Digital Terrestrial TV but nothing ever happens with it. One moment there’s a burst of news about it, promises are made, a cacophony of court hearings waste everyone’s time, then things go silent.
Year after year we’ve been warned that we need to be ready for it but we still don’t have a confirmed date that we need to be ready for.
This from the SABC’s website about when it’s going to happen: “It’s anticipated that the rollout will begin towards the end of 2012.”
Anticipated. Clearly a word thrown in so that the date can be changed at the last minute.
It’s been so dragged out that it’s become a waste of energy and time to even think about it until something concrete actually happens. The cool news is that you don’t need to give it another thought if you’re a DStv or TopTV subscriber because you’re sorted.
I assumed that this was the case but I wanted to be 100% sure so I’ve investigated and both have confirmed that subscribers definitely won’t have to do a thing. Because the signal’s already digital there’s no need to get a DTT decoder when the migration happens.
Interestingly though, both won’t be carrying all of the extra channels that are going to be offered by e.tv and the SABC. As you may know, both broadcasters are going to be introducing extra channels when DTT rolls out. The current SABC channels and e.tv will still be available on DStv and TopTV but they won’t be carrying all of the extra ones so you’ll need a DTT decoder to access them.
Whether or not they’ll be worth accessing remains to be seen of course.
If they happen. DTT’s taking so long to arrive it’ll be a miracle if the extra channels materialise before the next century.