mcgrew's Journal: Where's my damned tablet?

I'd like to know why in the hell nobody is selling a tablet, or maybe an app for existing tablets, that will let me watch over the air TV on it?

All the necessary hardware is there. Wi-fi and bluetooth are radios. Some cell pones can pick up FM music stations, and have been able to do so and have done so for years.

The FM radio band sits between channels six and seven on the VHF television channels. If it can hear radio, it can see TV.

The technology is there, why isn't the commercial device to be found? Offer a tablet I can watch TV without the internet and I'll buy one. Maybe two.

Call Sega about that one

[damn_registrars]

I recall the game gear had a TV tuner option. They didn't make competitive money on either. We would think that it would be possible to do a better job now but you'll have to convince the manufacturers that it is worth their effort.

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[BarbaraHudson]

I'd like to see that on smartphones - give competition to Facebook and Youtube the kids of the world :-)

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[damn_registrars]

Now that you mention it, I recall there was a Korean-made (and perhaps only Korean-sold) phone circa 10-15 years ago that did have a TV tuner built in [geek.com]. For that matter, Sprint has offered TV service on their mobile network for a while, but I'm pretty sure it uses their data network rather than taking in OTA signal directly. Here's a link to a Brazil-specific Samsung Galaxy SII smartphone with a built-in TV tuner (and retractable antenna) [phonearena.com].

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[BarbaraHudson]

So maybe at some point we'll have them too :-) Of course, the carriers won't be promoting them, because that will reduce data use.

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[mcgrew]

The only difference between a smartphone and a tablet is phones can connect to cell carriers. If it will work on your Android tablet it should work on your Android phone, as long as the carrier doesn't block it. And they surely wouldn't, because if you're watching TV on it you're not streaming NetFlix on it.

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[mcgrew]

I just checked wikipedia, it did have a cartridge that would play TV. And effort? The hardware is all there -- TV is digital now. A good programmer or perhaps engineer could do it in a few hours. I see no reason why nobody's done it; maybe it was the Sega flop.

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[damn_registrars]

I see no reason why nobody's done it; maybe it was the Sega flop.

That is my main hypothesis at this point. Sorry if I'm obtuse this week. Basically when one general idea flops when it is attempted by large company A, it takes a lot of momentum before another company B will attempt it again.

That or the bean counters can't figure out a way to make it profitable. If people buy a tablet just to watch TV, there is no returning business until the tablet wears out completely and needs replacing.

I also wonder what the battery impact would be of such an addition. If

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[mcgrew]

Actually, TV would use far less power than YouTube. With streaming, you're transmitting as well as receiving, and transmitting is what eats your battery (besides the screen, which each would use equally). It takes very little power to receive, a lot to transmit.

I doubt anyone would buy one just to watch TV, it would just make the tablet more useful.

Hardware not quite there

[Ignacio]

It isn't enough to have the ability to receive it, you also have to be able to decode it. Why don't tablets have this? I don't know.

But in the meantime there's this [tablet-tv.com]. No Android support yet, but that will come "first quarter 2015" (which of course means "whenever the hell we feel like it").

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[mcgrew]

Programming that would be very simple. Your link shows they've already done it. Guess I'll be buying a tablet and their expensive software.

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[Ignacio]

TabletTV doesn't have only the software; it's also a hardware (antenna and DVR) solution as well. The tablet doesn't do anything but display video.