Question about digital TV tuners and digital cable

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FoolOnTheHill

Limp Gawd
Joined
Aug 2, 2001
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398
Hey guys, I hope this is the right subforum for this, if not, I'm sorry. :(

My roommates and I are trying to purchase a TV for the living room in our apartment. We're interested in this tv from Circuit City (namely for the low price, I know it's not super duper). It has a digital TV tuner built in, which is great, because we have Comcast Digital Cable.

What I'm wondering is, if we have a TV with a digital tuner, do we need the extra set-top box, or will putting the coax straight into the TV still work for tuning the digital channels? My knowledge on the subject says yes, but a couple of Comcast reps say I either need a cablecard (which this TV doesn't support, only having a built-in digital tuner) or I need a set top box. I think they're just trying to get me to buy the box from them. :mad:

Does anyone know if this should work? And if it does work, will it still show the program guide and give me access to the on-demand functionality?

Thanks in advance.
 
It doesn't have a digital tuner, thats an regular old standard definition TV.

In order to use your digital cable directly with your TV it needs to support CableCard. Period.

Anything else and you're still stuck with the STB.
 
Well the manufacturer's specs here say otherwise. It has both an analog (NTSC) and a digital (ATSC) tuner. It also lists a program guide for DTV. I know it can only display at standard definitions, but it should be able to tune to digital channels, no? The digial tuner feature was also advertised in a CC circular.
 
digital cable != ATSC. ATSC is terrestrial broadcast, which requires an antenna to tune.
 
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