If you’ve lived long enough, springs will look familiar to you. You were navigating comfortably with the TV’s remote control, and all of a sudden, when you changed the channel, the screen was filled with a grainy dance of black and white dots accompanied by a monotonous whisper like the sound of buzz!, waterfall. You pressed the button and there it was: a the perfect sizzle.

Your TV wasn’t faulty and you didn’t need to check for a loose cable on the back of those core sets. The answer used to be much simpler and less worrying. You simply tuned to an unused channel in your area. If you comb your white hair and remember that something similar happened to you at dawn, the explanation might be even simpler: the channel wasn’t broadcasting at night.

things analog past tense.

analog memory

Maybe you remember. May be not. The thing is, the monotonous crackles of televisions spit out as something resembling a blizzard recorded from an old camera emanated from the screen, making it one of the most recognizable household sounds of the late 20th century.

There were those who found this combination one of a kind. relaxing lullaby and who – there is everything in this world – thought he had detected disturbing signals in the irregular whistling; this vein even the ‘X-Files’ screenwriters knew how to use. For pleasures, you know: colors.

If you’re younger and haven’t seen this effect for yourself, nothing will happen. Most likely, the introduction that HBO introduced to you got you used to the sound and image.

The million-dollar question that Jason Futzpatrick, among others, asked on How-To Geek is: Why don’t TVs emit that white or static noise that some describe as snow?

Some of the noise in the television signal comes from the Big Bang. More precisely: cosmic background radiation contributes almost 1% to this noise. When you look back at the seemingly insignificant sizzle, imagine you’re listening to a piece of the universe. pic.twitter.com/C59inUPkNE

— Gaston Giribet (@GastonGiribet) September 4, 2020

The explanation has of course little to do with “Hidden Files” theories. It’s more about the operation of those old-fashioned analog TVs. Think of them as an image-capturing radio station. If you selected an unused channel, the device simply tried to connect without finding the broadcast. Instead of the Saturday afternoon movie you might have wanted to see on TVE, it was random background radiation that brought you back. surrounded.

And what was this?

Well, a cocktail is a combination of electrical noise, radio wave frequencies, and even gamma radiation from the Big Bang converted into microwave radiation. That crackle you might see in your kitchen was nothing more than a “mix” of electromagnetic noise, remnants of other signals, and what’s known as “microwave background radiation.” very low weight in the final effect – but only 1% – it was equally fascinating.

The effect was bizarre, and even today there are those who believe that similar sounds are comforting and can help us sleep, but over time we sacrificed it. get other benefits. The key to why we don’t appreciate it today when we choose a channel without tuning on TV is the leap from analog to digital that has been going on since the late 20th century.

In the United States, the Telecommunications Act mandating the transition dates back to 1996, and in 2009 all high-power analog stations switched to digital. The process that led to what is known as “analog dimming” in Spain has also progressed.

Meanwhile, we left behind this effect characteristic of analogue TVs, but gained significant advantages such as broadcasting a wide frequency range. Now when we get to a string that has no signal, in most cases we find: a black screen and a notification telling us that there is nothing to see there.

We will always remember… and the HBO intro.

Images: Patrick Tomasso (Unsplash) and Fran Jacquier (Unsplash)