Cable for the HD box isn't going to be here for a few days...I have digital cable and its grainy as hell...is this normal or am I doing something wrong??? I just took the cable from the old TV and hooked it into the cable input on the new one.

That sounds right, normal cable is crap, in terms of image quailty you just dont reliese it on a normal TV

yup.

Completly normal. You are taking a image already bad image and magnifying it. The cable HD box will only make the HD and some of the digital channels look better. But the analog channels will never look better. I would switch to satellite because the signal is all digital and will look marginally better on SD content.

until you get your HD box, change the resolution on your TV down to 480i or whichever 400 number it is. Think of taking a picture and then blowing it up 10 times. Thats what your TV is doing. Just tune it down until better things come around.

on many cable systems the lower 100 or so channels are analog and look like ca-ca.

Can always pay $10 and get 11 or so HD channels, wouldnt be worth it to me

Quoted: Can always pay $10 and get 11 or so HD channels, wouldnt be worth it to me

With my cable company HD is free, well it's included in the basic package, not exactly free.

Quoted: Quoted: Can always pay $10 and get 11 or so HD channels, wouldnt be worth it to me With my cable company HD is free, well it's included in the basic package, not exactly free.

[napoleondynamite]Lucky!!!![napoleondynamite]

Quoted: Quoted: Can always pay $10 and get 11 or so HD channels, wouldnt be worth it to me With my cable company HD is free, well it's included in the basic package, not exactly free.

I never worked for one it was free with.

When it was first out it was $15 for 3 or 4 channels

Quoted: Cable for the HD box isn't going to be here for a few days...I have digital cable and its grainy as hell...is this normal or am I doing something wrong??? I just took the cable from the old TV and hooked it into the cable input on the new one.

I went through this twice.  The issue is that you probably have a bigger TV which is less tolerant of a poor signal.  Get your cable guys out there to measure your signal strength.  You can still get a good picture without HD or digital BS.  

The first time this happened to me, they replaced over 250 feet of cable, from the house to the pole.  They installed a higher quality and larger cable.  High channels were the killer for me on the grainy-ness.  My old cable had a break in it somewhere.

The second time it was an even larger TV.  Same issue, but not due to a broken cable.  Not enough DB at the house for 3 TVs, including a 60".    A Scientific Atlanta line amplifier was installed to boost the signal.  Problem solved.  FYI, some Home Depot stores carry this amplifier, good quality stuff.

A broken line or poor quality signal will screw up a cable modem too.

Get the cable guys out there.  They know all the attenuation, DB, signal quality voodoo and also have the correct equipment to diagnose your problem.  

Paying for upgraded service will probably not help you a single bit.