Advanced Micro Devices Inc (AMD)

[dacaw]

Hmm, interesting article but it misses one important point.

People with regular old antennas are getting free HD (1080i, 720p) broadcasts now. We haven't watched any analog TV broadcasts since the end of last year. I feel sorry for those paying for cable and getting inferior pictures and sound. Once it becomes known that all you need is a new TV (mine cost $899 from Best Buy and includes OTA decoder) people are going to start switching in droves.

I'm an early adopter but I know quite a few who have gone OTA HD already.

The article mainly addresses the shortcomings of cable and the cable industry's problem of keeping up the number of channels, which people got used to, while massively boosting the bandwidth per channel.

What does it mean for the electronics industry? There's a whole lot of silicon in these boxes. I know AMD is in some set top boxes, there must be some flash memory in the TV too. Where are they going to make all these chips when 250 million viewers decide next year that they want two new HD sets? At $899 they are an easy sell. Am I right in thinking that there's going to be something of a fab shortage?

Then there's the PVRs and recorders that are going to have to be upgraded to HD in a couple of years.

The future of the semi industry looks to be really healthy to me.