Even as a sighted person, I prefer knobs or other tactile controls.

My friend who is blind has such limited options because so many appliances have gone to digital readouts. I have gone shopping with her, and I remember a talking microwave that was supposed to be a big thing. The voice worked, but the appliance itself was a piece of junk: badly made, very small and underpowered. She realized that and didn't buy it.

It's the government role to force manufacturers to make this happen for blind people, It's actually not that hard to implement such control on appliances for blind people, All the commands are programmed at the chip level, All what the manufacturer needs to do is make an access port or a wireless connection such as RF for an external control box with knobs to be connected to the appliance that can be purchased separately and subsidized by a federal program.

I have glasses and this would be nice to have physical controls on things. And not just TVs but things like tablet, phones or even game consoles.

@@maimetechy You can add external joysticks to those already.

I remember listing to tv radio in the mid 2010's on my mom's sony walkman I remember listening to gumball since I was a big Cartoon Network fan boy they blew my mind and I was able to enjoy my favorite TV such an old device in my backyard... But at last it was mostly a novelty from you since I would just go to the living room and watch it anyways very cool memory definitely sparked my love older electronics and old media!

where is that guy ? where you get get receive channels on it ? Video systems he used !

Was he blind, then?

@@carltonleboss No, he merely sympathized with the idea

@@UnderEu Did he pass the assignment?

@@Cacowninja I think so

@@UnderEu Awesome!

The simple way of making a mix tape too, just took time and a radio on ready to jump up and hit record 😂

That's a cool idea.

I recorded many hours of audio only TV with a shoebox tape recorder (it was a hobby). Much of that stuff was eventually released on videotape and now DVD. Thankfully I scanned my tapes years ago for video game commercials which until KZfaq became ubiquitous, audio was all I had. Evil family member stole most of that and I no longer have it.

I learned how to "patch cord" to the speaker coil itself. Very good audio going right into the tape recorder's input.

@@volvo09 Oh, how I used to spend hours sitting in front of the radio with the finger hovered over the "record" button on the tape deck, ready to record a song that I really loved. I think I still have some of those tapes.

And you can probably do it better than I could being sighted, for sure!

As someone with only light perception and 10 years your junior, rock on man!

That’s awesome, I’m completely blind, too. Wish I could do all that stuff. Like you, I collect cassette tapes and players, but cannot fix it to save my life.

How are you watching this?

@@joesshows6793 blind people use computers and listen to youtube all the time. Also blind doesn't mean they can't see anything blindness is a spectrum.

@@joesshows6793 I use my hearing. I have an iPhone and use the built-in screen reader called VoiceOver. I don't have any useable vission, but I can still follow along because of the spoken dialogue. I'm sure I'm not the only blind person subscribed to this channel.

​@@joesshows6793 Probably using a screen reader.

Could you describe the colour purple

I used to have a Walkman now and pick up the audio from TV stations.

Have fun with receiving two signals 21.4 MHz (2x10.7 MHz, the De facto standard FM radio IF) apart. Many cheap shortwave radios, that use the same 455 KHz IF suffer from mirror frequency problems. So many times a STANAG signal 910 KHz above has caused me issues on these radios.

@@fungo6631 As you say, this can happen in cheap radios. In a radio without SW, like this one, it can be solved easily with a high-pass filter tuned just bellow the low end of the VHF band. Also, if you only have to tune to the audio carrier, you don't need the full IF bandwidth for a TV channel, which would mean greater selectivity and less interference.

There are also a few multi-band radio's out there that also have the TV bands, all on the same large centre dial.

It’s a cost effective route for sure, unless they already had the circuitry and parts for a TV tuner and wanted to use that. Then that would be cheaper

@@onyourjackjones There are about five main parts to what you might call a TV tuner: the tuner proper, the video IF, video detector, the sound IF, and the sound detector. The video IF has several high frequency amplifiers and carefully tuned circuits. These IF stages are often on a main board so it's not something that would be a separate part.

as well as reacting with copper, it also eats into some other plastics, !

My parents had an old fan where one of the prongs actually came off of the plug and was left in the outlet after unplugging the fan because of this. I have enough knowledge where I cut the power to the house at the fuse box, took a pair of pliers, removed the errant prong from the outlet, turned the power back on and took care of that part of the problem. As for the fan, the cord itself was fine so I replaced the plug on the cord with a replacement made for that purpose and my parents had their fan back in working order.

An unrelated but similar symptom happens to telephone central office switching relays. Some start leaking green goo after 50 years

HID Lady you girls did listen to the UK number stations ?

@@lucasrem I am a man.

You never covered it with black construction paper?

@@gregdaweson4657 ended up throwing a blanket over it which is the same idea but far less elegant than a radio that can also pick up TV stations. You’d think it’d be trivial to add TV audio carriers to a clock radio.

It's likely due to how the horizontal drive on those old sets was also used to generate extra voltages for the tuner and such.

​@@seanwieland9763They, actually did. quite a lot of radios had "tv sound".

It's kind of worse now, there are various audio only stations available on digital TV, and modern smart TV's also do spotify etc. so the actual screen does nothing, yet there is no screen off button.

I'll say I think I would have enjoyed it when I was growing up, but I was happy with the CRT hand me down televisions we had.

@@KanawhaCountyWX I started with a hand me down CRT, then got my own CRT with a built in VCR. When that broke a CRT with NICAM stereo. Around that time the UK had started switching off the analogue channels, so a digital 'freeview' box was also required. Then on to a couple of LCDs with built in digital tuners, and now none at all because streaming is more convenient.

Reminds me of the Kurzweil Reader, except that was a standalone device. A deconstructed reader! An uncle of mine is also blind and used screen readers with DOS. Not sure if he ever had one of those scanner things though. He mostly listens to music and spoken word. (And will tear you a new one if you say you like vinyl..!)

How are you able to read or type a reply/comment on KZfaq if you're blind?.

Too bad digital TV killed it.

​@@planetX15 en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Screen_reader

I believe many Americans used composite inputs on a VCR to use the VCR's own RF modulator, but of course SCART was definitely more convenient. I used to have a games console running through the pass-through SCART on a DVD player, which fed into the pass-through SCART of the VCR, and then the VCR SCART into my tiny little Philips TV. (Which was also useful for bootlegging DVDs I'd borrowed from friends...)

If only he used oxygen free copper, the soundstage would have felt so much more wide.

@@volvo09 Also silver plated for treble extension and braided to reduce noise

My CD Walkman from around 2004 has a radio that includes VHF and the weird thing is that I can still hear audio broadcasts not just on channel 6, which I know was the crossover frequency with the low end of the FM band on most radios, but also on 4 and 5.

What's the interest about this device ? I don't see any.

Yea And needed to tune the converter box with a separate tv or only be stuck on one channel Because I have never seen a digital converter box that would allow channel and subchannel selection from front controls

That would be FANTASTICALLY miserable.

@@Veso266 Most converter boxes have channel up and down buttons on the front. Even without those it's trivial to enter channel numbers using the remote.

@@eDoc2020 realy, arent the buttons on the front usualy for saved channels (at least here in Europe u always need a remote to enter manual tune menu (if u are lucky and the converter box even has one))

@@Veso266 The ones I have seen you do a channel scan when you set up the unit (which can be done by someone else if needed) and then by default all the channels are in the up/down list. DVB might be different but ATSC uses channel remapping (for example channel 2.1 is actually transmitted on RF channel 5) so a channel scan is basically _required_ even if you always enter numbers using the remote. Once the scan is complete a totally blind person can pick up the remote and use it normally. Modern remotes tend to have a bump on the 5 key to make blind usage easier without memorizing the entire layout. Some brands (including Samsung and Toshiba) even have Braille next to the Power, Channel, and Volume buttons on their TV remotes.

The F is for field.

Yep, it's easier to just have a TV even if you have low vision in case friends, and family want to watch

My blind friend always had both a radio with a TV receiver and a regular TV for her spouse (who used to sit close as he had some sight) and her children.

There was a really common model that had a vertical tuning dial which tuned AM, CB, and about 75 to 175MHz. I could pick up both TV sound and radio Amateurs using mine, although you had to be very precise with the tuning.

yes, feedline

Thanks, that sounds like the most logical explanation to me!

That's strange. Because as mentioned in the video, radios that could tune in TV stations' audio were relatively common in the US, at least in the late 80s. You could buy one in most major shops that sold Walkman and other radio equipment. In the US, most FM radios could tune in the audio for Channel 6.

@@christo930 They are and were not so common in Europe or outside of the US. Just saying!

@@plan7a "Just saying?" What? I'm sure they existed.

@@christo930: They did/do but they were not as common as they were/are outside the US.

@@christo930 if the local retailer didn't have it, then it basically didn't exist to an 80s child! Not to mention you'd have to know such a thing existed Somewhere to even ask if the shop had it or could order it in. A lot of the trouble in finding useful tech in the 80s and 90s was just _knowing what to look for_ in the first place!

Every TV with a "channel clunker" had a smooth turning fine tuning. It's specifically the channelized UHF knobs that Kevin was talking about. As for how long they lasted, I've seen a video of a cheap TV from 1998 which still had channel clunkers.

How did you leave a comment before the video came out

@@chevysparkgaming KZfaq is very buggy...

ב''ה, usually by the time they'd throw a UHF tuner in they'd throw in a CRT since it's basically twice as much radio components cost wise. Small clock radio or boombox TVs were around and predated the handheld TVs being Radio Shack common by a few years, probably.

haha. the scary part is that riker's is just supposed to hold people awaiting trial, but some do seem to get lost there for years. your neighbor's dad should get "sent up the river" to sing sing (ossining) after conviction!

I know you're joking, but the FCC typically only bothers you if you interfere with safety services or a licensed broadcaster complains. VWestlife is well under any interference limits anyway. Your 7-year old neighbor would earn her dad an official complaint from other hams at worst.

It makes sense. The "big 3" TV networks were all on VHF channels in most US TV markets. UHF was mostly the domain of PBS and independent channels. So it made sense for ABC, CBS, and NBC to "encourage" TV manufacturers to give short shrift to the UHF dials.

One reason is that VHF channels are subdivided on two bands, band I and band III end and channels aren't evenly spaced. UHF band IV and V are adjacent and channels are regularly spaced. Even televison made for the European marked had a clicky dial nd a continuous UHF dial.

The VHF band came first and the UHF band was opened to TV broadcasting later. The continuous UHF tuner made best sense using the technology at the time and was an extra cost option, usually only purchased in areas with active UHF channels. There were some TV sets with continuous VHF tuners, but the manufacturers stopped making them. There were also VHF tuners with strips. A strip for an unused VHF channel could be removed and replaced with a strip for an active UHF channel. RCA's first production color TV set, the CT-100, was equipped with a click stop tuner with extra positions for UHF channels. The problem was that if a UHF channel received a different frequency assignment, you had to have a serviceman replace the strip. It may have been difficult for the servicemen in that area to obtain the strips when a changeover took place. If you had a TV set with a 12 position VHF tuner, had replaced unused VHF channels with strips for active UHF channels and moved to a different area, a VHF channel that had been replaced with a UHF strip might be active and you would need to have a serviceman install the original VHF strip. Hopefully, the first serviceman tucked the original strip away someplace inside the set! When the all channel act was passed, manufacturers complied as cheaply as possible, leading to poor performing UHF tuners that the customer would be forced to buy but not want, especially in areas with no active UHF channels. The later revision to the act required the tuners to be equally easy to use and to meet tighter noise figure requirements. The varactor tuners came out in that time frame. Some TV sets used varactor tuners to meet the requirement, degrading the VHF to be continuous tuning also. The click stop UHF tuner was just a continuous tuner with a click stop mechanism. They calibrated the internal tuning to match the click stop position and made technical improvements to reduce drift. My experience was that the fine tuning would span several channels. So, I could receive channel 44 in the 43 or 45 position by adjusting the fine tuning.

The problem is, you still have to decode the entire ATSC signal just to get the audio portion unlike this device which only needs to tune to the FM carrier. However, if ATSC 3.0 takes off, one feature of it is ATSC radio. While this is intended to provide an HD radio or DAB type experience using a standard television transmitter, this might mean that we might start seeing portable radios or car radios that could also tune to the audio portion of TV channels.