[78-L] end of 525-line television ^

[Michael Biel]

-------- Original Message --------
Subject: Re: [78-L] end of 525-line television ^
From: Bertrand CHAUMELLE <chaumelle at orange.fr>
Date: Thu, January 08, 2009 6:51 pm
To: 78-L Mail List <78-l at klickitat.78online.com>


Le 8 janv. 09, à 00:28, Michael Biel a écrit :

> -------- Original Message --------
> Subject: Re: [78-L] end of 525-line television ^
> From: Bertrand CHAUMELLE <chaumelle at orange.fr>
>
>> I'm no expert, but I would say that:
> -there was no standard in 1939. NTSC *recommended* 525-line to FCC in
> March 1941. FCC announced that standard in May 1941 (black and white,
> with FM sound).
>
>
> I'm far away from my reference books, but yes, the 1939 Worlds Fair
> broadcasts were in the 440 line system under the FCC's "experimental"
> mode. The commercial standard of 525 lines came in on the same day
> commercial TV broadcasting was authorized, the call letters changed, 
> and
> that first B-U-L-0-V-A commercial was aired, July 1, 1941.

***Abramson ("The History of Television, 1880 to 1941") says May 2, 
1941 for the official adoption by the FCC of the 525-line NTSC 
standard.

> The broadcasts that began on July 1 were commercial in name only. NBC 
had a sponsor, OK, that's why the Bulova time signal is remembered. But 
CBS and DuMont had none.

The word "commercial" in this sense does not necessarily mean
advertising.  In this instance it meant the opposite of "experimental". 
In other cases it means the opposite of "amateur".  Advertising WAS
allowed, and on NBC the first night some of the ads were the ads from
the radio simulcasts, such as the Sunoco ads on Lowell Thomas's
newscast.  I haven't checked the schedules of the other stations.  
>
>
>> But then there was the was the FCC freeze from Feb. 1942 to Oct.
> '44.regarding transmitters and TV-sets.
>
> Stations could stay on the air -- and schedules became comparatively
> short -- but it became tougher to keep transmitters and receivers
> operating as the war continued.

***In fact the industry wasn't really concerned by television at that 
time. RCA had stopped making TV sets the preceding year. General 
Electric had stepped out of television altogether. Roosevelt had 
declared "a state of unlimited national emergency" on May 27, 1941. 
Researchers at RCA's Princeton labs were working on the military radar.

RCA continued to make sets for the public until told to stop in early
1942.  They continued to make sets in small quantities for the military
because TV was used for training during the war.  It was one of the
reasons they could keep their transmitter working.

>
>
>> In May 1944, James L. Fly (FCC) agreed with CBS: "If we begin to make
> 525-line equipment now, we'll never upgrade to a higher definition".
> Almost all of the sets in use then were 440-line.
>
>
> Not true. They were very easily convertible to 525, and RCA had their
> repair crews go to all the homes and convert the sets in time for the
> July 1941 changeover.
> In 1939 thru 41 RCA knew where every one of their
> sets were, and each week every owner got a business reply card with the
> program schedule asking them to check off what they watched and how 
> they
> liked it. It was joked that their ratings used a 100% sample.

***OK, but you're talking about 1941. And the RCA technicians weren't 
supposed to "fix" the Philco, DuMont or other makers' sets, I guess.
So, if a discussion arose in 1944 about the fate of the old sets (i. e. 
not converted to 525-l), that's proof that the problem still existed. 

I don't think there were any non-converted sets.  It only took about
five minutes to retune the horizontal oscillator.  It was an easy fix. 
Anyone who had paid that kind of money for a set in 1939-1941 would pay
the five bucks to convert their set.

> CBS was in favor of throwing away the 7 000 sets, but RCA didn't agree 
and it was even suggested that, after the war, all sets would receive 
the new programs, because the telecasts would be repeated in the old 
standard. That's funny, because that's exactly what happened in France 
when the 819-line standard superseded in 1949 the old 441-line. Each 
program was either transmitted thru two cameras, or repeated the 
following days in the old standard (up to 1958).

Remember that in the U.S. at that time the FCC bumped the FM band out of
the 40s into 88-108 making all FM receivers obsolete, as well as many
transmitters if they couldn't be retuned that high.  So we did
experience it in radio.  CBS didn't push it hard for TV because one of
the features of the CBS system was the easy conversion of existing sets
to color by adding an external color wheel and retuning the deflections,
of course.  The system was killed too quickly for this to really come to
pass, but there is a working example of one of these conversion kits at
the Early TV Museum.  




>
>
>> CBS was working hard
> on a color system, they said they were ready but wanted to use UHF
> instead of VHF and a 735-line definition.
> The first post-war TV-sets were sold to the public beginning Nov. 3,
> 1946.
>
> -As for mechanical television, the CBS color system which went
> commercial from June 25, 1951 to Oct. 20, 1951, WAS mechanical, at
> least on the receiving side.
>
>
> Also at the camera end. Some of the early experimental programs got
> good reviews.

***The camera was electronic but there was a revolving disc in front of 
it with color filters (sequential system). The LIFE 1951 picture on 
Google looks fine.

> The Early TV Museum outside of Columbus Ohio has several
> mechanical color sets working and they look pretty good.
***I wish I could visit it. In Paris, there is an original CBS color 
equipement (camera + receiver) from 1948 at the Musée des Techniques. 
At that time there was a color demo about a surgical operation in an 
hospital (closed circuit).

> BC