Tuesday, April 15, 2014

Making US based NTSC Television work in India

I recently got a US make Samsung HD-LED television. In India we have PAL signal while in US they use NTSC signal. Both the signals are not compatible and as a result, your new TV may not display accurate colors. Here is how to make it work in India:

  1. Do not panic in the beginning. If you receive a black and white or distorted display, do not panic. Chances are highly unlikely that you have received a faulty television. So be patient and do a lil bit of study

  2. Check the voltage rating of your TV. Most TVs these days support 100-240V connection. Just to be on a safer side read the manual. In case your manual suggests a 100-110V input then get a power down transformer. Get it from a reputed company or your TV may go woof! Be sure to check the power rating of your TV. What I mean is, check the power consumption. If consumption is 50W then get a transformer of power rating 100W and NOT LESS. Getting a higher power rated step-down voltage transformer should be  your first step

  3. If the display is black and white, you have two options:
    •  Get a PAL to NTSC converter. There are plenty of these converters starting from 2,000 Rs to 30,000 Rs. It depends on how much you want to spend on these converters. I did some research on Rs 2,000 Mini NTSC - PAL converter. The link is: here. The problem is, I could not find any reviews on the product from India and the ones available on amazon.com are not good. Another downside is the quality. It cannot convert to hi-def standards. So, I decided to chunk this option.
    • This second option is probably the easier one. I had a NORMAL (not HD) Videocon D2H service in home. So, I decided to drop a facebook message to Videocon's support page. Their response was prompt. A service engineer visited my home the very next day. We came to the conclusion that NORMAL (non HD) Videocon D2H is not compatible with NTSC Signals. However, the engineer advised me to upgrade the service to HD and voila! It works! It only set me back by Rs. 1,400
 There are several D2H service providers but not all support NTSC signals in India. I suggest you take a Videocon D2H service (HD) as it is the best and cheapest option for having your US TVs work in India.

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