Definitions for "Cliff Effect"
A characteristic that causes DTV reception to deteriorate dramatically with a small change in signal reception. Unlike analog television where the picture gets ”snowey” and gradually disappears, a Digital picture will be prefect one minute, and lost entirely the next.
Failure of a system when a receiver can no longer receive a vaible signal
When approaching the fringes of reception, analog TV pictures begin to degrade by becoming "snowy." With DTV its all or nothing. In an area with a weak digital signal, a relatively small reduction in signal strength may cause the DTV signal to abruptly change from perfect to nothing; hence the name "cliff effect."