Los Angeles (CA) – United States television broadcasts will become all digital early next year, but most consumers aren’t taking advantage of free government money to upgrade their old analog television sets.  According to a study released by DisplaySearch/NPD, only 6% of consumers have redeemed their DTV coupons from the federal government.  That means there will be an estimated 25 million television sets that will essentially be left in the dark after the digital switchover on February 17, 2009.

Households can get up to two coupons worth $40 each.  These coupons can be redeemed at participating electronics stores for digital converter boxes that will decode over-the-air digital broadcasts into analog signals.  This retrofit program is only needed for older analog sets because modern digital television sets already have a tuner built inside.  Furthermore, cable and satellite television subscribers most likely have a converter box built into their leased equipment.

DisplaySearch interviewed 800 people in July and found that over the air programming is still very popular.  Approximately 23% have one television set receiving OTA signals while 40% use OTA programming exclusively.

The government seems to have done a somewhat decent job of broadcasting the digital switchover and the study shows that more than half the respondents knew about the coupon program.  But Paul Gagnon, director of North American TV market research said, “it’s surprising to see such a small percentage of the converter box coupons redeemed to date.”  He speculates that consumers might be waiting for digital television set deals during the upcoming holiday season.

If you haven’t applied for your converter box coupon, you can do so at dtv2009.gov.  Just remember that this is only need if you intend to watch over-the-air broadcasts and you have an old analog or digital TV.