North Carolina’s WRAL-HD became the first US TV station to broadcast a digital HD signal on July 23, 1996.

WRAL-TV filed the first application in the US for a license to operate an HDTV station on May 6, 1996, which the FCC granted on an experimental basis. The station became WRAL-HD and operated on channel 32 at 100 kW with an antenna 1750 feet above the ground.

A team of engineers and equipment experts spent 34 days installing a brand new Harris HD transmitter that enabled a small group of people from the media and TV industry to witness history as they watched the first public demonstration of HD technology at WRAL studios. WRAL-HD, owned by Capitol Broadcasting Company, would continue to achieve HDTV firsts for years to come.



Capitol Broadcasting Company President & CEO Jim Goodmon poses with WRAL’s first HD van. Source: CBC

The station’s success was the culmination of a 20-year global initiative to improve the over-the-air TV signal. In 1993, the FCC created the Grand Alliance consortium that helped develop American digital television. The consortium established a system for testing and improving HDTV.

HDTVs were not sold in stores until 1998 and they were an expensive upgrade, especially for the limited amount of HD programming available. That made it difficult to convince viewers to convert, so HD was not widely used until the 2009 government mandate to switch to digital broadcasting. As of June 12, 2009, TV stations only broadcast in the digital format.

HDTV is made possible by digital broadcasting. It offers images with six times the resolution of traditional television images, with digital instead of analog audio. HDTV screens have more than 2 million pixels, a significant upgrade from former TVs that had about 300,000 and were one-third wider.

Digital broadcasts use the same amount of bandwidth (6 megahertz) as used in the analog system, but the efficiencies of digital broadcasting allow for the transmission of more information than the analog system. This translates into higher quality in picture and sound, and more flexibility in programming.

In the 21st century, the focus has been on 4K Ultra High Definition TV, which goes beyond 3840×2160 resolution, and most recently 8K displays.

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Also on this day in tech history:

On July 23, 1962, the first live trans-Atlantic television broadcast took place and was made via the Telstar 1 satellite.

For more moments in tech history, see this blog. EDN strives to be historically accurate with these postings. Should you see an error, please notify us.

Editor’s note: This article was originally posted on July 23, 2012 and edited on July 23, 2019.