Feb 1 2009 the FCC will cease ALL analog broadcasts. Your Analog TV will only be useful for cable or sat. In order to view any OTA broadcasts you will need to buy an extra Digital box to convert the digital broadcast to Analog for Analog TV's I am assuming that you already have the digital Tv's You do NOT need any digital equipment to record digital TV all digital TV's that I know of have analog outputs. That being said jimisham is correct, Digital is either good or bad unlike analog which will snow up you can still see a signal. If you have drop outs you need a better antenna or point your antenna better. Maybe you have a VHF only antenna or the VHF is a bigger part of what you have. You will still get signals even with rabbit ears but you have to be close to the source. The best bang for the buck is a CM4228 cost about $50 is UHF only which is what all digital channels are and will be, but will get ch 8-12 pretty good also untill the cease to broadcast on those channels. http://www.hdtvprimer.com/ANTENNAS/cm4228.html , if the stations are in different directions you will need a rotor. One good thing is digital travels further with less signal strength and at this time many stations are NOT broadcasting digital at full power yet. I use a CM4228 and get all the network stations at about 50 miles from here is High Definition without drop outs.

Tobr24u, you are incorrect about the Zenith DTT901 not having an analog pass-thru feature. If you look on the Circuit City link I provided above, you will see it is called "Zenith Digital to Analog Pass-thru TV Tuner/Converter Box". Or, better still, check out Zenith's website linked below, where the DTT901 is featured, in capital letters, as "Digital TV Tuner Converter Box with Analog Pass-Through". Or, on that same page, you can access the Spec Sheet. Page 2 of that Spec Sheet devotes about a third of the page discussing the DTT901's Analog Pass Thru feature. Here is a link that might be useful: Zenith Website - DTT901 Converter Box

There is NO 1080P over-the-air broadcasting: you have either 720p or 1080i broadcasting: the differences between the two are not really significant, and your grandmother is unlikely to see any difference at all. The choice of 720p or 1080i is made by the broadcaster, and isn't a user choice. Choose on the basis of needs and price. LCDs work better in brightly lit rooms, plasmas have more natural on-screen motion and a more film-like presentation. When choosing a TV for your grandmother, pick the biggest quality TV set that you can afford that won't give her a headache, and find a set that eschews gimmick features, but provides the best combination of picture quality and ease of use. Many manufacturers charge heavily for features like picture-in-picture, and gamer oriented features that she won't ever use.

Many of the satellite receivers have an antenna option built in but I suppose the new ones don't. Haven't dealt with satellite for a lot of years but the simple answer is yes, she can use both so don't panic. It'll work out one way or another, just the details aren't totally clear until she sees what she has. That someone who told her that was full of it. Now there is another point though. Is she getting a strong signal from the local channel? If it's weak she might not receive it when it goes digital unless the signal strength grows. The thing with digital signals is that they're very clear when they come in, but if it isn't a strong signal there's no signal so it's not going to be the varying degrees of snow and fuzziness like on analog. If she's far from the transmitter or repeater she may not get a signal. Small chance of that though. Just have to try it and see.