More than two decades and billions of dollars in the making, the much-anticipated and often-feared switch-over to digital television finally happens Friday -- and most broadcasting and industry analysts say hardly anybody will notice.

''We don't expect much commotion,'' said Marcelo Sanchez, chief of operations at WFOR-CBS 4, who has been coordinating testing and troubleshooting of the digital system among 17 South Florida TV stations that will make the switch. ``The vast majority of TV viewers won't even know it happened.''

The switch -- which will take place at a different hour at each station -- will affect only televisions getting their signal over the air, rather than through a cable system or a satellite dish. These days, that means hardly anybody. Nielsen Media Research estimates that only about 40,000 homes in Dade and Broward counties -- less than 3 percent of those with TVs -- are unprepared for the change.

`NON-EVENT'

''Around the country, hundreds of TV stations switched over to digital in February and March, and it was a nonevent,'' said Tom Hazlett, a former Federal Communications Commission economist who teaches law and economics at George Mason University near Washington, D.C. ``The FCC had all these phone banks set up to handle complaints, and they were letting everybody go by noon. The fact is that most people who don't have cable or satellite also don't watch much TV.''

To pick up over-the-air signals after the switch, most TV sets made before 2004 will have to be hooked up to a digital converter box. The boxes sell for $40 to $50 (the federal government is giving away coupons knocking $40 off that price at dtv2009.gov).

''Most of the people who come in are buying them for an extra set they have in a spare room or in the garage, one that's not hooked up to the cable,'' says Carlos Gomez, a supervisor at the Best Buy store in Doral. ``And we get a lot of people asking what to do about small, battery-operated TVs they have in case of a hurricane.''

Answer: Junk them. Though battery-operated converter boxes are available, they cost around $80, not much less than a new $110 battery-operated digital TV -- and many smaller sets lack the proper hookups for the box, anyway.

HOT LINE

The FCC will be operating a hot line Friday -- 1-888-CALL FCC -- for viewers with technical difficulties, but if past experience is any guide, there won't be many.

''We averaged about 1,500 calls each test, and almost all of them were about where to get the coupons for the converter boxes or where to buy them,'' Sanchez said. ``But there aren't really any technical issues with the digital signal -- we know how to do this, we've been doing it for years.''

Technically speaking, in fact, what happens Friday isn't a switch at all. Local stations are broadcasting two signals right now, digital and analog, and in some cases have been doing it for 10 years. On Friday, they'll simply turn off the analog.

The changeover to digital from the analog system used since the invention of TV in the 1920s has been anything but abrupt. The government began studying the change in 1987, OK'd it 10 years later and ordered TV manufacturers to make every new set digital-capable in 2004. The timetable for the change has been shifted several times, most recently when the newly arrived Obama administration asked Congress to postpone it from February to June.

The change from analog to digital was prompted in part to give consumers a better TV picture, and in part to free up the stronger, low frequencies of the broadcast spectrum for devices that can make better use of them.

''When TV was first developing in the 1930s, technology was primitive,'' said Greg Harper, who runs Panasonic's digital-TV website livinginhd.com. ``There wasn't all this demand for cellphones and Blackberries and stuff. So they used the prime frequencies, the strongest ones, for TV, because nobody else wanted it.''

As new technologies like cellphones and sophisticated emergency communications systems developed, they were assigned to the weaker, higher frequencies where signals could be deflected by buildings, trees or even hard rain.

The frequencies vacated by television's switch to digital will be assigned to law enforcement and other agencies, or will be auctioned off to private telecommunications companies. Meanwhile, consumers will get crisper pictures.

Digital broadcasting will allow most TV stations to broadcast several extra channels. In South Florida, some are already up and running, broadcasting news, weather or music videos: WPBT-PBS 2 alone has five, ranging from an all-science sub-channel to one showing viewer-made videos.

But the new signal also comes with some drawbacks for over-the-air viewers. The chief one: It either comes in perfectly or not all. Homes distant from the TV broadcast towers clustered around LandShark Stadium on the Dade-Broward line may need powerful rooftop antennas to pick up digital signals. ''In Homestead and Kendall, you're going to need an external antenna,'' says Sanchez. ``Otherwise, good luck.''

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