Though this comment is not specific to your post, I thought I'd chime in with a response to Swampwalker's remark about digital cable. I subscribe to AT&T digital cable in the Seattle, WA, area, and my experience is the same as Swampwalker's: digital cable video quality is no better than analog, and in this area has been further aggravated by frequent service problems. The extra expense for the digital subscription has yielded nothing, and I am seriously considering reverting to analog service until I am forced to choose something else. The television and cable broadcast industries have, in my opinion, done a miserable job in offering better picture quality (let alone content), which leaves me very dubious about HDTV as a viable offering in the next 5+ years (even if there is a federal requirement for adoption of the HDTV standard).