When high definition television first came out, as sad and surprising this fact is in many ways, not that many people noticed. That's because high definition television was first introduced as a novelty that was designed to impress people. It's only been relatively recently that the technology has seen any kind of wide spread adoption in the United States even though its been common in Japan for years.
The slow adoption of HDTV is surprising considering the "wow" factor of that it inspires in its viewers when they watch it. After all, the older standard definition television format doesn't have the same 16:9 wide screen aspect ratio that HDTV does. It also lacks the high resolution picture of HDTV. HDTV also has Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Sound as its standard sound format. Of course standard definition television can have features like Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Sound and a wide screen aspect ratio, but the defining difference between the two formats is that standard definition television can't have more than four hundred and eighty horizontal lines of resolution in the picture simply because standard definition television screens and don't have enough pixels and the supporting electronics (like digital television receivers) can't support that level of resolution.
Supporting electronics like normal digital television receivers can't support HDTV programming simply because there's so much more to HDTV programming. Programming in the high def format can take up anywhere between six and ten times the bandwidth of programming in standard definition television format. That would simply place too much of a strain on standard definition receiver equipment.
The good news is that high definition television receivers are available that can handle just about everything that can be thrown at them. This includes standard definition television programming, high definition television programming in resolutions up to 1080i, and programming in the little known enhanced definition television format that falls in between.
The even better news is that these receivers are available from Dish Network. Of course, it's really no wonder that the same television service provider that supplies the most national HDTV channels also supplies versatile high definition television satellite receivers.
Currently Dish Network has two high def receiver models available. One- the ViP211- is a basic model that has the ability to deliver all of the types of programming listed above to a single television. It also has all of the other features that make all of Dish Network's satellite receivers easy to use. Features like the Electronic Program Guide (with the added ability to take advantage of the wide screen of the HDTV set it's connected to, so it can display up to three hours of program listings all at the same time), Parental Control Locks, and on screen Caller ID capability come standard on the ViP211.
The premium model is the ViP622 DVR. The ViP622 DVR has the additional ability to send television signals (with the high def programming down converted to standard def) to a second TV and to record programming for later viewing. The ViP622 DVR's internal hard drive can store up to thirty hours of HDTV programming (which is impressive if you recall that HDTV is up to ten times as information intensive as standard def) or two hundred hours of standard definition programming.
These two HDTV satellite receivers ensure that you'll get the value and functionality that you expect while you're watching HDTV as well as TV in other formats.
