How Can This Be?

[bhg481]

http://home.bt.com/news/odd-news/hundreds-of-scots-still-watching-television-in-black-and-white-11364030807881

If you can't access the link (I sometimes have to put a password in) it says that 550 people in Scotland have a Black & White TV licence and 10,000 across the UK. As far as I know ALL digital TVs are colour TVs and only digital broadcasts are made in the UK, so anyone with a black & white licence should either upgrade to colour or cancel their licence altogether as they are either watching in colour or not at all. Do the licensing authority not realise this?

[sunny-dave]

If you only have an old B&W CRT TV and feed it from a freeview box via the RF (aerial) input you will be watching in B&W ...

[bhg481]

Are you saying that a freeview box will generate an analogue signal from a digital signal Dave? I didn't realise that they could do that. I thought you had to connect the freeview box to the TV with a SCART to get a digital signal on an analogue TV and would be surprised if B&W TVs came with SCART sockets (always willing to be corrected).

[sunny-dave]

In my "possibly useful junk" pile, I have a freeview box that generates an analogue RF signal from the digital input (as well as a scart output) - it was inherited from an elderly relative who used it with an ancioent B&W set in her kitchen.

[sunny-dave]

Amazon.co.uk User Recommendation

Still available ...

[bhg481]

Well there's interesting Dave. I have a few freeview boxes in my "possibly useful junk" pile but no old TV to try them on. I always thought the RF feed was a pass-through for the aerial ie, the freeview box used the signal to decode the digital signal which it passed to the TV via SCART; the RF signal went through to the TV (via the aerial) where the analogue tuner decoded the analogue signal. This was fine until they stopped broadcasting an analogue signal when a TV without a SCART socket became useless.

[beso]

Maybe the are colour blind and don't want to pay for what they can't see.

[sunny-dave]

Most freeview boxes had (as you say) just an RF loopthrough - but they had to produce some which added the converted digital output on a spare UHF frequency so that very old (pre-Scart) TV's could be used after the digital switchover. I did actually try the one I have on an old CRT colour portable and it worked OK.

[bhg481]

Interesting link Dave but one of the answered questions states that it can only be connected to an analogue TV via a SCART cable. I'm querying the existence of B&W TVs with a SCART input.

[jomifl]

Sunny-dave If you connect the RF output to a TV aerial you can transmit the signal to another aerial ..illegal of course.

[bhg481]

We're getting crossed posts here Dave but your last one seems to answer my OP - thanks.
So it is possible but I find it difficult to believe that 10,000 people are doing this. More likely they've bought a colour TV second hand (so no dealer to inform the Licensing Authority) and just haven't updated their licence.

[sunny-dave]

I can't imagine a B&W set with a Scart - but I do have a freeview box that adds decodes the digital input and adds it to the RF output (as well as a Scart).

[sunny-dave]

I agree bhg - your answer is probably correct - I'm just splitting technological hairs on a quiet morning.

Dave :)

[-Talbot-]

You don't need a B&W TV licence or a colour one ... apparently!

[bhg481]

There must be 10,000 of those boxes in use in the UK then Dave - I can't imagine ANYBODY would try to cheat the Licensing Authority (smirk).

[viv41]

People STILL watch black and white TV ??

[bhg481]

I think it's more a case of "people SAY they watch B&W TV" viv

[Buenchico]

Very early Freeview set-top boxes nearly all had RF modulators built into them, so that they could send a signal to a TV set's aerial socket. (Similarly, early users of VHS recorders would connect them to their TV's aerial socket, simply because one or both of their devices didn't have a Scart socket). So there might be quite a few of those old set-top boxes around. (Very few later set-top boxes had RF modulators built in, as it added to the cost and most people could use Scart connections by then. However they could still be purchased separately, to go in between a set-top box and a TV's aerial socket).

Interestingly, the fact that a Freeview set-top box handles colour signals doesn't, in itself, mean that a colour licence is required. However if someone with a B&W TV set uses any form of recording device (whether that be an old VHS recorder or the latest digital recorder) then, because it records programmes in colour (even though they won't be viewed in colour), a colour licence is required.