High-definition hype splashes beyond TVs

updated 11:02 a.m. ET Nov. 7, 2006

SAN JOSE, Calif. - The term "high-definition" was almost a curse five years ago, when politicians, broadcasters and TV makers were reluctant to hoist massive changes upon the nation's television landscape.

Suddenly the same term — originally meant to describe greater density in TV displays — is being used to tout all kinds of products.

Skin creams. Sunglasses. Laminate counter tops. There's even "Starting High Definition Churches" — a book with guidance on building an HD church with "improved clarity" and "higher resolution."

The new worshipful aura of HD brings a laugh to Dale Cripps, the founder of HDTV Magazine. But the HDTV evangelist quickly turns serious.

As the United States marches from analog TV toward the full glory of digital TV, consumers have to wade through hype, linguistic imprecision and a new foreign language. Market research shows many people are downright confused, which isn't ideal when they're spending $2,000 or more on a new TV.

"Right now people are buying the devices and they don't have all the information," Cripps says. "It's a huge problem."

About 15.7 million households had HDTV sets by the end of 2005, with 50 million predicted by 2009, according to Forrester Research.

The brisk adoption is a consumer electronics industry coup considering how the digital TV format had been introduced only in 1998, thrusting dozens of new technological terms like "aspect ratio," "720p," or "1080i" at consumers, who also must evaluate different kinds of digital TV displays, like plasma, LCD or DLP.

By comparison, it took color TVs a decade to get into just 5 million households during the transition from black-and-white boob tubes.

But the HDTV coup also points to failures in consumer education.

Forrester estimates about half of HDTV owners are not subscribing to an HDTV service through their existing cable or satellite TV accounts. That means some of them are watching the same old standard TV broadcasts on their expensive new TVs, missing the boat for the truly eye-popping images that digital HD programming offers.

What they're seeing on their screens might not look any better than the programming they used to watch, and in some cases, might actually look worse because imperfections would be more visible on the bigger, sharper digital displays.

HDTV delivers images about five times as detailed as standard TV. Beads of sweat are crystalline on athletes' faces. Blades of grass are vivid. And you could pick out grains of real snow — not the TV snow of poor reception.

Forrester estimates at least 4 million households mistakenly assume they're getting high-definition pictures. Those are regular analog cable subscribers who say they're getting HDTV service from their cable operators — which is impossible, since HDTV service comes only with digital cable.

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