Portland, OR - OTA [Text View] - Page 21

R11

05-15-06, 11:52 AM

Speaking of channel 6.1 - what is going on with their audio?? I've heard so much static over the last few nights. On Survivor tonight, it was fairly regular occuring every 5-10 seconds. At first I thought it was the show, but then was hearing it through commercials too.

Is it the national feed, or is KOIN asleep at the switch??

Anyone having the same problem? Any ideas??It's KOIN's audio set up. Nothing to do with the net feed at all. They've had the issue ever since they set up their DD 5.1 encoder. It occurs during non 5.1 programming. Comes and goes. I suspect it's something they can calibrate/adjust out, but it seems to keep drifting back. Right now it's gotten quite bad again alright :(

The big three PDX stations all have screwy audio. KOIN has this recurring static/shaker noise. KATU leaves their audio set to DD 5.1 continuously so that it requires a manual switch to PCM audio to get center channel on all non 5.1 programming. KGW leaves their audio set to 5.1 as well, but it seems like they are doing their own matrixing of the audio at the station so everything is delivered in discrete "5.1" sound. But their levels seem to be pretty messed up. The LFE is way over boosted IMO. It seems like maybe they have been trying to adjust it a bit over time, but I still feel like I'm sitting next to a carload of kids with their sub booming away during non 5.1 programming, commercials etc.

Is there any hope they will all get decent audio and video setups by the time the hard cutoff occurs? I sure hope so...

ron

dnamertz

05-15-06, 07:03 PM

dnamertz

05-20-06, 12:12 AM

I recently hooked up my new Pansonic 50PX60U and have a bow-tie antenna to receive OTA HD channels, but I don't get an HD version of FOX. The only FOX channel that was found when I scanned was channel 12. When I went to program the channels manually there was not a 12.1 to choose from. I get all the other HD channels, including 49.1 and OPB-HD...but no FOX. Is there a FOX OTA-HD signal in Portland?

scowl

05-20-06, 12:19 AM

Yep, KPTV-DT is channel 30. If you can get KGW and KOPB, you should get KPTV too since it's in the same cluster of towers.

dnamertz

05-20-06, 10:36 PM

Yep, KPTV-DT is channel 30. If you can get KGW and KOPB, you should get KPTV too since it's in the same cluster of towers.

OK, I found it. If I key in channel 30 it automatically goes to channel 12.1.

dgehred

05-22-06, 07:28 PM

I heard the same static every 10 - 15 seconds during the Survivor finale also. How annoying is KOIN? Get your act together!!!

There's a multi-day article in The Oregonian that started yesterday about the big shakeup at KOIN over the last few months. It sounds like a big mess, and it makes you feel for everyone that got fired.

Part 1 (http://www.oregonlive.com/search/index.ssf?/base/entertainment/1148001934102540.xml?oregonian?altssf&coll=7)

and

Part 2 (http://www.oregonlive.com/search/index.ssf?/base/living/1148262918119570.xml?oregonian?ylvcpc&coll=7)

It continues through Thursday.

-Dan

Konrad2

05-23-06, 02:26 AM

Phantom Gremlin

05-23-06, 03:53 AM

Anyone know the long-term frequency lineup after the analogs shut down?

You can always try reading the first article in this thread. :)

For example it says KGW digital moves to channel 8.

Konrad2

05-23-06, 11:39 AM

> You can always try reading the first article in this thread.

Sorry about that. I didn't notice that article 1 had been
"updated" recently. Thanks for the pointer.

Larry Hutchinson

05-23-06, 06:20 PM

I heard the same static every 10 - 15 seconds during the Survivor finale also. How annoying is KOIN? Get your act together!!!

Very odd. Other than a couple of brief audio-video glitches, neither me nor my wife noticed any repeated static.

Perhaps we just didn't notice or perhaps it all depends on your hardware. Mine is a HD DirecTiVo feeding an older Marantz amp via optical.

jpistacc

05-23-06, 09:33 PM

Lately, I've been troubleshooting some receptions issues specific to KGW. By accident, I noticed that my signal meter (on my directv hd-dvr) jumped from the low 70's to the high 80's when I unplugged the antenna. Unfortunately, I lose the remaining channels without an antenna. Since they are all on the same hill, I'm at a loss as to why I get such poor signals from KGW with the same antenna I need to receive the other channels. Anyone have any insight or suggestions? I'm using the Terk HDTVS antenna mounted in my garage and live in Tigard (7 miles from towers).

Thanks.

jtundrea

05-24-06, 09:04 PM

Checked Antennaweb and I'm between 5 and 6 miles from the towers in Bearverton (97006). I'm close to Hwy26 and there are no large obstructions or trees however I'll be installing an indoor antenna on the first floor of a two story house. I'm considering the Pro Brand HD3150PLUS or the Samsung SIR-T451 HD TV tuners to purchase. I do not have cable and only interested in OTA. I have and Westinghouse LCD 42" LCD monitor with HDMI and DVI inputs. Two questions:

1. Which would you recommend of the two receivers.

2. Since all the channels I am interested are on UHF does it suffice to have a bow tie antenna with a 300 ohm transformer to 75 ohms or do I need a silver sensor

Schwinn

05-24-06, 09:40 PM

Anyone know the long-term frequency lineup after the analogs shut down?

KATU "2" stays with chan 43
KPXG-DT 4 Do they stay on channel 4 ?
KWBP-LP 5-analog ???
KOIN "6" stays with chan 40
KGW "8" do they stay at 46 or move digital to channel 8 ?
KOPB "10" 27 -> 10
KPTV "12" 30 -> 12
KWBP 33 stays at 33
KNMT 45 -> 24
KPDX "49" 48 -> 30
(Any stations I forgot? Any corrections?)
Anyone know why KATU and KOIN are staying UHF? I would think the
VHF-LO channels would be preferred, due to lower electric bills and
better propagation?

I'm working on an antenna upgrade and wondering if I will need
VHF-LO after the analog cutoff?
No one else has answered so I'll give it a go.
The latest available to me info tells me:
Channel 4 will move to channel 22
Channel 5 is a low power rebroadcast of channel 32 from Salem(33 digital in Portland) for Portland Metro people who can't get a good picture on 32 will shut down.No word on if there will still be a Salem broadcast tower or not.
Channel 8 has requested to keep 8 but word here is the FCC has turned them down(for unknown reasons) in which case they will likely stay on UHF.
Word is the VHF low channels (2-6) aren't good for Digital broadcast in most areas of the country. While the high VHF are great for digital. Local broadcast on 4 seems to disprove that point in the Portland area? Feel free to chime in if you have better info.

Schwinn

05-24-06, 09:49 PM

"2. Since all the channels I am interested are on UHF does it suffice to have a bow tie antenna with a 300 ohm transformer to 75 ohms or do I need a silver sensor"
I'm using a Radio Shack Twin bow Tie antenna with 300 to 75 ohm transformer works great on all local channels analog & digital VHF & UHF even though it's a UHF antenna. More then one person has said this antenna works as well or in some cases better then the silver sensor.
If your talking about the small single indoor bowtie(that comes with VHF rabbit ears ) that is likely too small .

Phantom Gremlin

06-02-06, 04:17 PM

scowl

06-02-06, 04:57 PM

One small good thing has happened. KWBP's encoder is now sending proper MPEG-2 repeat flags for filmed material. That means it's using less bandwidth since it doesn't have to send redudant frames so there are less blocky artifacts. I've confirmed this by comparing recent reruns of Smallville to when they were aired at the beginning of the season. Definitely an improvement.

rifleman69

06-02-06, 09:48 PM

So quiet here. I thought I'd hype FIOS a little just to perk things up. It's not Comcast so I figure it's fair game for this forum.

They did a bunch of "locates" in my neighborhood a few months ago. I never knew there were so many colors in the rainbow! I asked one of the people and he said it was for Verizon. But he also said that they were having problems digging up nearby streets because of too many rocks etc. So he was speculating they might *never* make it to my street.

Anyway, I'm seeing lots of fiber being pulled down Boones Ferry Road, so maybe I'll get FIOS after all. But with all the rain the locates have started fading. Wonder how long they last?

I bet we'll have our "locates" on our street until the end of summer. They say those things would wash away within a couple of days at most...it's been over a month and a half. Wish I had grass in the front yard as it would be gone by now with the mowing.

I'm going with the internet first as the tv won't be here for at least a year at the soonest.

123HDTV

06-02-06, 11:08 PM

I had to have a FIOS service tech in recently on a problem and she said FIOS TV should be around by the end of the year. Has anyone seen where Verizon has applied to Washington County for a franchise?

I haven't seen anything.

audioxcel

06-03-06, 12:50 PM

I have a Sony DHG-HDD250. About a week ago the guide info for KPDX began showing up as "no listing". Anyone else have this problem? I don't want to do a complete reset if the info is not being sent.

hilladen

06-03-06, 08:19 PM

"Three cities in Washington County – Beaverton, Hillsboro and Tigard – will be Verizon’s first FTTP markets in the Northwest." Though I have seen crews out in the city of Durham and understand Tualatin is included as well.

ridgefamus

06-04-06, 08:30 PM

We had our neighborhood "fibered" last year by Verizon. I have been getting mailers from them encouraging me to switch from my DSL with them to FiOS for internet - all at the "low" price of $39.95 for a year commitment at the lowest of their 3 speed teirs. A week ago a Verizon guy shows up at my doorstep to say they are prepared to hook me up to FiOS at no charge for installation of one computer in the home, a WiFi router, at the 5 Mbps down/2up speed. All for $29.95 a month, no commitment and the price is good "forever". All he needed was my OK for a date for them to bury the line from the street to the house and a date for the installation. The burial has been done while we were away for the week (nice neat job, BTW) and I get hooked up tomorrow. I'll see if the installer has any better info on TV.

Moral: Don't jump at the first offer from Verizon.

mmihalik

06-04-06, 09:37 PM

Several months ago when they were done with the fiber activity in front of my house, I gave Verizon a call.

Was offered the $29.95/mo offer; I was previously a DSL subscriber.

When I asked about the rate - I was told the only requirement was the automatic billing and 1 year contract. I was told this rate would be "forever" too.

I have not looked back; it took a while for them to get things right, since the contractors ran the fiber from my house to the wrong box in front of my house (I have lots of scrap fiber cable from this misstep). I am one tap from the end of the fiber run on top of Cooper Mountain.

At the same time, they changed my phone service from copper to fiber as well - I have two lines.

So, several months later, I am a happy camper for both internet and phone service. No problems to date. I highly recommend the service.

I also have Comcast Cable Internet for comparison purposes (and backup since I work from home). FiOS is measureably faster.

Mike

joelowe

06-04-06, 11:44 PM

I have a Sony DHG-HDD250. About a week ago the guide info for KPDX began showing up as "no listing". Anyone else have this problem? I don't want to do a complete reset if the info is not being sent.

I'm seeing the same problem on the same hardware. KPDX has had no program info for over a week now. If anyone has info on how to fix this, or what the cause is, it would be appreciated.

earletp

06-05-06, 12:42 AM

Just so you two know, KPDX is sending out the guide and it displays fine for me. A re-boot of your receiver may not be a bad idea.

Phantom Gremlin

06-05-06, 05:32 AM

Right now I'm also not seeing any guide info for KPDX. Yes I power-cycled my HD tuner just now and still nothing.

Also KPTV has flaky guide data as well (are they jointly run?). For example on KPTV it said I was just now watching The Taxman, but there is no additional information such as plot summary.

Still, even under best conditions the OTA guides are a pathetic joke compared to what I get with DirecTV TiVo.

audioxcel

06-07-06, 10:47 PM

Just so you two know, KPDX is sending out the guide and it displays fine for me. A re-boot of your receiver may not be a bad idea.

Thanks for the info. I tried a cold, hard reboot 4 days ago and a hot reboot (exit + guide) 3 days ago. Neither caused the TV Guide info for KPTV to reappear. I also tried a channel auto rescan, same result....nada, zip.

audioxcel

06-07-06, 10:51 PM

I'm seeing the same problem on the same hardware. KPDX has had no program info for over a week now. If anyone has info on how to fix this, or what the cause is, it would be appreciated.

I think the cause is the switch that was made when the station ownership changed. Some how it caused the Sony recorder to no longer recognize the data.

masmith

06-08-06, 09:07 PM

I hate, I repeat hate, KATU HD. I get everything but this god-awful station. The cheap ass-holes can't turn it up enough to get the entire metro area for either the Superbowl or the NBA Finals.

I repeat, I hate them. If KPB, and the WB can reach me, those sick fu&*S should be able to! Now they are just hi-jacking both national championships.

And of course, they denied my waiver request 2 times. I hate them.

Thanks.

scowl

06-08-06, 09:13 PM

Looks great here. KATU is the strongest station I get out of all the digital stations (KGW is a little stronger).

Jeremy517

06-08-06, 09:46 PM

I'm in Newberg, and KATU is one of the two stations (KOIN being the other) that I get perfectly 99.9% of the time. Even with Chehalem Mountain sitting between here and the towers, KATU is great for me.

123HDTV

06-08-06, 10:40 PM

audioxcel

06-08-06, 11:45 PM

masmith

06-08-06, 11:57 PM

I repeat, I hate them.

Budget_HT

06-09-06, 12:52 AM

masmith,

I am probably missing some history here, but have you worked your way through changes of antenna placement (not just rotation in place), etc., in your attempts to get all HD channels OTA?

What kind of signal quality readings do you see for KATU? Constant or varying a lot?

It seems like you might be frustrated over hills and/or buildings and/or trees that might partially block or reflect signals causing your difficulties with KATU-HD reception. Certainly KATU cannot be held responsible for those types of variables and issues.

KATU's sister station in Seattle has a couple of broadcast engineers that particpate in AVS Local Reception threads from time to time and also communicate one-on-one with us via email to offer suggestions for dealing with reception and PSIP issues.

I know in the area where I live, moving the antenna a few inches or feet can make a world of difference in receiving a problem station. Some folks have found better results going under nearby trees. There have been reports of many strange antenna placement solutions that most folks would never have guessed beforehand.

Last but not least, is it possible that KATU could be coming in too hot at your location? Digital receivers do not like excessive power levels. Have you tried an attenuator (like the variable RF attenuator available at Radio Shack)? That has helped many people with overly strong signals and some multipath situations (i.e., lowering the reflected signal power below the receiver's threshold leaving it "seeing" only the direct signal).

Like I said, without knowing your history, I could very well have repeated things you have already considered and done.

Good luck with your continued efforts.

hilladen

06-09-06, 10:21 AM

Also, where are you located masmith? Perhaps there is someone who is near you that can offer some helpful suggestions for getting KATU tuned in.

skihoodoo

06-09-06, 12:32 PM

i have a strange placement i think in order to get some hd channels out of eugene i have to put the antenna down at lake side and poing at a tree and use a radioshack amplifier and i get 3 stations out of eugene good and one out of corvallis (pbs).
one ch my tuner can see but not enough signal to pull it (kmtr dt ch 17) and one station has no signal but not up at full power (kezi dt ch 44)

gobigreen

06-09-06, 01:12 PM

KATU used to be a very strong station for me (along with all of the rest). I have had almost no problems (initially had some problems with KOIN) in over a year with any station until a couple of months ago I started having problems with KATU. The signal just drops to nothing periodically. I have adjusted the antenna but can't get the strong signal (solid 90-92) I used to get. I had to change the channel during the NBA finals last night as it was unwatchable with the reception drop-outs.
I was hoping KATU was having some temporary transmission problems but it appears that is not the case.

rifleman69

06-09-06, 02:00 PM

Anyone watch the World Cup this morning? Looked good on the Deuce in HD...tomorrow should be interesting when the games are on KATU.

ridgefamus

06-09-06, 02:09 PM

Anyone watch the World Cup this morning? Looked good on the Deuce in HD...tomorrow should be interesting when the games are on KATU.

You get The Deuce OTA?? :rolleyes:

rifleman69

06-09-06, 02:45 PM

Well since it's on both OTA and regular cable/satellite, figured it should go here. Comparing tomorrow's version with today's. :)

rifleman69

06-10-06, 02:08 PM

Sweden/Trinidad & Tobago was great on KATU-HD. Liked the ABC version over the ESPN2...losing the crawl on the bottom is fantastic.

Those graphics though for the starting lineups are way too big, cover up a ton of the screen at the beginning...one early goal would change all of that I'm sure.

earletp

06-11-06, 02:43 PM

KGW needs someone monitoring their digital feed. The audio has been nothing but static for at least an hour I'm aware of.

rifleman69

06-11-06, 05:50 PM

KGW needs someone monitoring their digital feed. The audio has been nothing but static for at least an hour I'm aware of.

I actually had nothing on KGW-DT for a good portion of yesterday. Not even a searching for signal or anything so it should have been from their end. 8.1 and 8.2 were dead when I turned on the parade for about 10 minutes yesterday.

blueduramax

06-11-06, 06:01 PM

I actually had nothing on KGW-DT for a good portion of yesterday. Not even a searching for signal or anything so it should have been from their end. 8.1 and 8.2 were dead when I turned on the parade for about 10 minutes yesterday.

It just so happened that yesterday I took my 4228 antenna out of the attic and put it on the roof. I did a rescan and no channel 8. Now I understand possibly why.

Also, while rescanning my Vizio P42 plasma, five channels came up I had never seen. They were channel 45-1 thru 45-5. There was no picture but my tuner detected them. What was that?

Jay

audioxcel

06-12-06, 01:17 AM

Just so you two know, KPDX is sending out the guide and it displays fine for me. A re-boot of your receiver may not be a bad idea.

What receiver are you using? I still can't get the TVGOS for KPDX after trying everything including completely restarting the TV Guide by changing my zip code.

earletp

06-12-06, 02:04 AM

What receiver are you using? I still can't get the TVGOS for KPDX after trying everything including completely restarting the TV Guide by changing my zip code.

That's the issue, your problem is with TV Guide and not with KPDX. I have an LG LST-3100a which decodes the PSIP information sent by KPDX (and each idividual station) for it's guide data.

Does TVGOS have contact information to report incomplete listings?

audioxcel

06-12-06, 02:15 PM

That's the issue, your problem is with TV Guide and not with KPDX. I have an LG LST-3100a which decodes the PSIP information sent by KPDX (and each idividual station) for it's guide data.

Does TVGOS have contact information to report incomplete listings?

I don't know what feedback they accept maybe I will look at their site later today. The good news is that I figured out a way to get the program listings.

When I first set up my DHG-HDD250, I turned off all the SD channels except OPB because I don't tune to them. Last night I turned the KPDX SD channel back on and reset the entire guide by entering another zip code. This morning the DT channel was still showing "no listing" but the SD channel had all the program info. I went into the guide set-up menu and reset the SD channel to tune to 49.1....voila, I have the guide info and when I click on it, it tunes to the DT channel. The call sign is showing KPDX instead of KPDXDT but it is definitely tuning to the DT channel.

blueduramax

06-20-06, 05:50 PM

Anyone have any ideas what channels 45-1 thru 45-5 that my tuner recently picked up were? There was no picture, but the tuner set itself to those channels. Any ideas?

Jay

Paul_PDX

06-20-06, 05:56 PM

From Lee Woods first post to this thread -

KNMT (24, TBN) DTV 45 - Operates a very low power (560 watts) DTV station at the Sylvan Site with an omnidirectional antenna. Carrys Five SD programs in a multicast. 24-1 mirrors the KNMT analog programming, 24-2 and 24-3 various religious programs, 24-4 religious programs in Spanish and 24-5 consists of childrens programming. Work is under way to increase power to 1,000 kW. Includes PSIP Program Guide and 708 and 608 Closed Captions.

blueduramax

06-20-06, 07:33 PM

Hey Lee,

Thanks for the answer. At least I was not imagining the stations. I guess my tuner was doing a pretty good job.

Jay

rifleman69

07-01-06, 10:06 PM

Anybody have word when DirecTV is adding our locals via satellite instead of OTA? Was supposed to be June or July but haven't heard a word about it yet.

Anyone, Bueller?

Phantom Gremlin

07-02-06, 01:59 PM

Anybody have word when DirecTV is adding our locals via satellite instead of OTA? Was supposed to be June or July but haven't heard a word about it yet.

At least DirecTV has already announced locals for us. Based on DMA, they initially bypassed Portland for quite a few smaller markets.

But I'm not in the least interested. HD locals require a huge dish plus DirectTV doesn't offer an HD DVR that can record from them.

rifleman69

07-04-06, 12:50 AM

Yeah I'm not interested as much, but I need to have my antenna readjusted, channel 8 is pretty much dead to me (although I can get just about everything through the tv only now).

earletp

07-10-06, 07:31 PM

scowl

07-10-06, 08:56 PM

Well, KWBP's HD programming doesn't nearly fill up their bandwidth at this point so a subchannel probably won't affect it.

hilladen

07-10-06, 10:28 PM

Isn't WB turing into CW?

antenna-seeker

07-10-06, 11:01 PM

Greetings,

Is anyone using the Terk HDTVS antenna in this area? The antennaweb site has us at about 7.5 miles away from the transmitters (we're in Aloha, 198th, down in the hole south of TV Hwy). We get passable reception of analog channels on our old amplified rabbit-ears/loop, though one must adjust the gain to avoid distortion when changing from VHF up to the UHF channels (e.g. 49). Some snow here and there, likely due to the indoor rabbit-ears being in a partial basement and behind an iron stair railing!

Amazingly, we get decent reception of the digital channels on this same indoor setup, but any movement
(people, cars) between our site and the transmitters can cause dropouts. So it would look like we don't really need much amplification or gain (some channels work well with the amp powered off), and just need to get a smallish antenna up above the moving/interfering objects. View from the roof looks clear.

In particular, I'm interested in folks' experience with this HDTVS antenna for both UHF and VHF frequencies, given that some of the HD/digital channels will be moving to their VHF frequencies in the future. Plus we still use our old analog VCR and TV, having just moved to digital recently. Advice on something cheaper than the above unit would be appreciated, as well, if folks are getting good results in our vicinity.

I would also welcome references to antenna installers (Beaverton/Hillsboro). I can manage this myself, but am willing to pay for someone's local expertise, esp. if I can avoid buying/returning multiple units until we get a good solution.

Thanks and regards,
A.S.

bpayne

07-11-06, 11:32 AM

FYI

Just found out that Portland, OR locals are set to launch August 28. This is a soft date and apparently there is a chance it may be moved back a bit- no word on if all four networks will be launched initially.

rifleman69

07-11-06, 11:48 AM

They're also broadcasting Fox Sports North West in HD (in mpeg4) for DirecTV...which means you need the H20.

rifleman69

07-11-06, 11:49 AM

Has anyone else noticed that TitanTV now lists a sub-channel for KWBP-DT?
They apparently aren't transmitting it yet, as my box doesn't pick it up, but that is disappointing news for the new CW coming this fall.
The progamming is listed as The Tube Music Network.

Tube is being carried by just about every CW affiliate, some sort of new music channel that apparently they feel we need. Whatever

Konrad2

07-11-06, 02:18 PM

Is anyone having problems with KOPB digital (chan 27) reception?

It was okay on Sunday the 9th, but Monday and Tuesday I'm getting
*thousands* of "Dropped pkts (Continuity Counter Errors)" in
a half-hour. On a good day I get 0-10 per hour.

Analog channel 10 is fine, as are 24, 49, 54.
Digital channel 30 (KPTV) is fine (close frequency).
Digital channels 4 (KPXG) and 46 (KGW) are fine (same tower).

I didn't change anything between Sunday and Monday.

xsrsmithx

07-11-06, 04:23 PM

earletp

07-11-06, 05:14 PM

Well, KWBP's HD programming doesn't nearly fill up their bandwidth at this point so a subchannel probably won't affect it.
heh!! You're probably right. :)

Isn't WB turing into CW?
Yes, KWBP is one of the O&O's.

Amazingly, we get decent reception of the digital channels on this same indoor setup, but any movement
(people, cars) between our site and the transmitters can cause dropouts. So it would look like we don't really need much amplification or gain (some channels work well with the amp powered off), and just need to get a smallish antenna up above the moving/interfering objects. View from the roof looks clear.
Before you invest in another antenna you might want to try just getting a longer piece of coax and reposition the one you're using. It can be striking how much difference that can make.

antenna-seeker

07-11-06, 10:28 PM

.... Terks have had a pretty bad reputation in the past. Replaced it with a Channel Master 8 bay UHF HD antenna mounted in my attic. It does a great job of getting all stations no matter which way you point it. I also had pretty good luck with a small indoor Silver Sensor (Fry's) antenna.

Steve

Thanks for the note. Yes, I've been seeing elsewhere that Terk's are overpriced. Your datapoint about the CM 8-bay UHF unit is helpful, too. How does it do on the old analog VHF stations, especially the low-band?

It looks like both Channel Master and Winegard have good reputation. I'm liking the smaller size units for our application, if possible. Any experience with the Winegard SquareShooter? E.g. the SS-1000 (no amp) or SS-2000? They claim to pull in VHF ok, too.

Well, thanks again for the input.

Regards,

A.S.

123HDTV

07-11-06, 10:40 PM

I have the 50 inch Radio Shack antenna Model VU-75 XR. I live in Tigard about 8 miles from the towers with some large trees and a small hill in the way and this antenna performs great.

Konrad2

07-12-06, 02:35 PM

> Anybody have any opinion on the over-all quality, construction and performance of
> Channel Master vs. Winegard?

I don't have personal experience with Channel Master antennas, but after reading
lots of comments on the web came to the following conclusions:

Many people have had good luck with the Channel Master 4228 (8 bay bow-tie UHF).
Many people have had good luck with the Channel Master amplifiers.
But: some say that the quality of Channel Master antennas are not as good as they
used to be. The 4228 is steel, thus prone to rust, and weighs more than
aluminum antennas (high shipping costs, more strain on mount and especially
the rotor if you use one.), and has a higher wind load than the PR-8800.
On the other hand the CM-4228 has slightly higher gain than the PR-8800.

If you have money to burn and want the highest quality, look into Blonder-Tongue
and Scala. Blonder-Tongue costs approx 10 times as much as Winegard and Channel
Master.

Terk is widely regarded as overpriced. They cost more but they are not better.

Avoid Radio Shack.
Radio Shack antennas may work okay when new, but degrade rapidly.
Radio Shack amplifiers have high noise figures and overload easily.

Many people have had good luck with the XG91 UHF Yagi.
Although I saw at least one report of it arriving already rusted.

Word is that the 8-bays do better in attics than Yagis.
Word is that the Yagis do better outdoors than 8-bays.

The Portland VHF-LO stations are supposed to go away in a couple years.
I wanted to keep the antennas in the attic to protect them from
wind, corrosion, critters, etc.

So I mail-ordered the Winegard PR-8800 (8 bay UHF) and YA-1713 (VHF-HI).
Got some Zenith RG6-quad-shield coax locally from Lowes. Claims to be
weatherproof/waterproof. Appears to be good quality.

The PR-8800 does okay on VHF-HI (8,10,12), so if you don't care about
VHF-LO (2,4,5,6) and want to save a few dollars you could try it alone.
The YA-1713 does okay on VHF-LO.

The Winegard PR-8800 and YA-1713 and the Zenith RG6-quad-shield coax
provide very good performance for a reasonable price. (PR-8800 $38.99,
YA-1713 $32.99, plus shipping)

JimProuty

07-12-06, 07:03 PM

I have the 50 inch Radio Shack antenna Model VU-75 XR. I live in Tigard about 8 miles from the towers with some large trees and a small hill in the way and this antenna performs great.

I'm in Tigard, too. I use this :p

http://images.amazon.com/images/P/B000EIOQBM.01-A1L4LS2KNDBWYV._AA280_SCLZZZZZZZ_.jpg

hilladen

07-12-06, 09:45 PM

Did you make that out of your suspenders?

antenna-seeker

07-12-06, 10:57 PM

The Portland VHF-LO stations are supposed to go away in a couple years.
I wanted to keep the antennas in the attic to protect them from
wind, corrosion, critters, etc.
. . .
The PR-8800 does okay on VHF-HI (8,10,12), so if you don't care about
VHF-LO (2,4,5,6) and want to save a few dollars you could try it alone.
The YA-1713 does okay on VHF-LO.

Thanks for the advice (and to others who have responded, as well).

In re-reading the 1st post here, I see that only some of the VHF-HI channels (8, 10, 12) are expected to be in use after analog goes away. Given our location close to the transmitters, we may get by with a pretty small unit. I like the looks of the Winegard PR-4400, size- and performance-wise, and it's a lot cheaper than the SS-1000, etc. I was looking at a comparison chart (hdtvprimer website) which implies it isn't bad at VHF frequencies, gain-wise, so it may be fine here given your experience with the PR-8800.

Thanks again for everyone's input. I'll report back on how it goes.

A.S.

Konrad2

07-13-06, 12:29 PM

> Given our location close to the transmitters, we may get
> by with a pretty small unit.

Signal strength is only part of the story.

> I like the looks of the Winegard PR-4400, size- and
> performance-wise

I went with the 8800 rather than the 4400 not for signal strength,
but for the tighter beam pattern, which gives less chance for
problems from multipath and interference.

The 8800 is basically two 4400s bolted together. You could gang
two 4400s together if one doesn't perform well enough, or split a
8800 in two and point the two halves in different directions.
If you wanted to do this with an outdoor installation you'd have
to get creative with the mounts, which could easily be more hassle
than the $20. In an attic you can just prop them against something.

Basically, for $20 more I'd go with the PR-8800 rather than the PR-4400,
unless you want to put it in a spot where the wider 8800 will not fit.
Or if you want the wider beam pattern to pick up another transmitter,
which you probably don't need in Portland with the towers grouped together.

123HDTV

07-13-06, 01:13 PM

Found this on the HDTV Programming forum here at AVS for those who watch golf...

"Live coverage of the 2006 British Open, airing on the ABC Television Network on Saturday and Sunday, July 22nd and 23rd , is being shot in standard definition PAL using the 16x9 aspect ratio. ABC will maintain this aspect ratio by airing this program upconverted from PAL to 720P on our HDTV broadcast to ABC affiliate stations. This will not be an HD sourced program, but should provide viewers with an enhanced viewing experience. The highlight programs and wrap-up shows will not air in this enhanced format. All broadcasts will be stereo. The standard definition broadcast will be a 4x3 centercut of the 16x9 source image."

xsrsmithx

07-13-06, 04:07 PM

I will be moving from Aloha to the La Center/Battleground WA. area next month and was wondering how the OTA reception is for the Portland locals from there? I have an 8 bay Channel Master antenna that should work ok. Or not..?

Also will be going from a Dish Network Dish 500 to a Dish 1000 and was wondering about that reception also from sats 110, 119, and 129. Especially the 129 sat.

Any information will be helpful.

Steve

123HDTV

07-13-06, 10:15 PM

Forego the 1000 if you can and do a dual 500 setup. The larger dish will net you better reception. People with the 1000's have been having awful times with dropouts.

I've got a dual 500 setup and I only drop out sporadically.

xsrsmithx

07-14-06, 10:44 AM

mrock12

07-14-06, 05:14 PM

I receive OTA very well from the Battle Ground area. I have a ChannelMaster 4248 Yagi on my roof on a 10' pole. The 8-bay 4228 should be plenty of antenna to get the locals from La Center, although I'm not an antenna expert.

123HDTV

07-14-06, 11:24 PM

What switch do you use with that combination?

Steve

It's a DPP-44 since I've got 4 receivers.

antenna-seeker

07-16-06, 04:03 PM

I went with the 8800 rather than the 4400 not for signal strength,
but for the tighter beam pattern, which gives less chance for
problems from multipath and interference.

Good point. I'm put off by the size of the PR-8800 (and the CM 4228), although I like their ability to receive VHF -- the 4228 seems to do better for those, according to what I've read. And I do want to receive the VHF channels, since after the analog locals go away, we'll still want to receive 8, 10, and 12 to get those stations' digital signals.

Lately I'm leaning toward the smallest of the available VHF/UHF combo units: CM-3016, Winegard's HD7210 or PR-7010. These look like they have directionality better than 4-bay UHF antenna's, not quite as good as the 8-bay UHF's, but way better VHF gain than both. And appearances lead me to believe they will have less "sail-action" in the wind than the 8-bay UHF units. It also wouldn't hurt my feelings if our analog TV and VCR could receive clean VHF channels 2, 6, 8, 10 and 12 over the next couple of years. We have only one digital tuner right now (our first, no HD monitor yet), and the kids like to watch on-air programs while the digital tuner is recording something "important".

As you mentioned, gain is likely not an issue at my location, 7.5 miles from the towers. The reception we get on our amplified indoor loop is pretty decent for most digital UHF stations -- KOPB (PBS) is the only one with too many dropouts to tolerate. Getting anything up on our roof should be a big improvement.

Well, if anyone has had terrible (or good) results with the above in my area (Aloha, 198th between Farmington and TV Hwy), I'd appreciate hearing from you.

Thanks again for everyone's comments.

Regards,

A.S.

Konrad2

07-16-06, 10:55 PM

> I'm put off by the size of the PR-8800 (and the CM 4228),
> although I like their ability to receive VHF

The PR-8800 is much smaller than a VHF antenna.

Are you concerned with size because of wind loading, or something else?

> And appearances lead me to believe they will have less "sail-action"
> in the wind than the 8-bay UHF units.

The Yagi and log-periodic are mainly horizontal, the 8-bays are
mainly vertical. I wouldn't want to try to predict what direction
the wind is just above an angled roof. Wind tends to vary a lot,
so I suspect either style would catch a lot of wind at times.

Do you have an attic? At 7.5 miles an attic antenna may work well,
unless it is "looking" through metal, or concrete/stone/brick.

> It also wouldn't hurt my feelings if our analog TV and VCR could
> receive clean VHF channels 2, 6, 8, 10 and 12 over the next couple
> of years.

> We get passable reception of analog channels on our old amplified
> rabbit-ears/loop, though one must adjust the gain to avoid distortion
> when changing from VHF up to the UHF channels (e.g. 49). Some snow here
> and there, likely due to the indoor rabbit-ears being in a partial
> basement and behind an iron stair railing!

I'll second earletp's suggestion of trying your rabbit-ears upstairs.
Do you get ghosts, or just snow? I would expect you can get enough
signal strength (no snow) for 2, 6, 8, 10 and 12 with just rabbit-ears
unamplified if you have them up out of the basement. Channel 5 might
be a problem. 5 is only 2.7 KW next to channel 6 at 100 KW. A severe
test of a tuner's adjacent channel rejection. I think I could get 5,
even with the PR-8800, if 6 weren't interfering with it.

Rabbit ears aren't very directional, so ghosts might be a problem.

I wasn't able to completely eliminate ghosts on KOPB-10 with rabbit
ears. The PR-8800 has fainter ghosts on KOPB-10 than rabbit ears.
The YA-1713 does not have visible ghosts on KOPB-10 unless your eye
is 2 inches from the screen.

I just took a second look with the PR-8800 alone, but this time without
the VHF-UHF combiner, which does some unknown amount of filtering.
6, 8, 10, 12 are fine (faint ghost on 10). 2 has enough strength, but
has more ghosting than rabbit ears. 5 gets interfered with from 6.

> KOPB (PBS) is the only one with too many dropouts to tolerate.

Is it consistently bad, or does it vary from one day to the next?
See my posting #5083 above.

I've been experimenting with antenna aim/placement, amplifiers,
attenuators, etc. I don't think the problem with KOPB-27 is
signal strength.

My best guess is interference. Trapping out the FM band helped
a LOT.

Anyone have a spectrum analyser? Or know of some strong signal that
comes and goes?

earletp

07-19-06, 09:02 PM

Konrad2, Do a search for "Tri-Met" in this thread. Could it be you are running into a similar issue as scowl?

Konrad2

07-20-06, 01:50 AM

> Do a search for "Tri-Met" in this thread. Could it be you are
> running into a similar issue as scowl?

I don't think so. The times when the problem happens do not
correspond with traffic.

antenna-seeker

07-20-06, 05:55 PM

> I'm put off by the size of the PR-8800 (and the CM 4228),
> although I like their ability to receive VHF

The PR-8800 is much smaller than a VHF antenna.
Are you concerned with size because of wind loading, or something else?

Mostly wind loading, the appearance isn't a huge concern.

> And appearances lead me to believe they will have less "sail-action"
> in the wind than the 8-bay UHF units.

The Yagi and log-periodic are mainly horizontal, the 8-bays are
mainly vertical. I wouldn't want to try to predict what direction
the wind is just above an angled roof. Wind tends to vary a lot,
so I suspect either style would catch a lot of wind at times.

Agreed; However the horizontal VHF/UHF combo units have a lot of space between the really long elements, hence would seem to have less wind resistance. Less visible impact from the street, as well, though as I said that's not such a worry.

Do you have an attic? At 7.5 miles an attic antenna may work well,
unless it is "looking" through metal, or concrete/stone/brick.

Our attic is problematic for routing the wire down to the basement. It's much easier to get the wire down there from outside the house.

I'll second earletp's suggestion of trying your rabbit-ears upstairs.
Do you get ghosts, or just snow? I would expect you can get enough
signal strength (no snow) for 2, 6, 8, 10 and 12 with just rabbit-ears
unamplified if you have them up out of the basement. Channel 5 might
be a problem. 5 is only 2.7 KW next to channel 6 at 100 KW.

In the basement, we get analog 10 and 12 sharp and clear, with amp gain at medium. The lower channels have some snow and ghosting but are watchable. We get 49 sharp and clear with the UHF gain at maximum. I found moving the rabbit ears upstairs made no difference, but that could've been due to a crummy 40' cable I was using at the time.

I just last night found the signal meters for our digital tuner (Miglia TV Mini HD). I'm a bit suspicious of these meters since the "Quality" meter was at 100% for everything (or 0%, nothing in-between). But the "Strength" meter seems to vary when I adjust the gain controls, so at least that gives some feedback.

So, with the amplified rabbit ears/loop in the basement, most stations are stable, with signal strength at the 75-80% level, with UHF gain at about medium/high setting. The exceptions are 32.1 (KWBP-33), and 10.* (KOPB-27). 32.1 comes in at 60% on the "Strength" meter, but suffers from serious pixellation and occasional dropouts; Adjusting our gain controls makes no change in the meter nor in dropout situation.

> KOPB (PBS) is the only one with too many dropouts to tolerate.

Is it consistently bad, or does it vary from one day to the next?
See my posting #5083 above.

You know, when we first got the digital tuner, 10 came in stable, with only the occasional glitch or dropout. After about a week or two, it became unuseable and has stayed that way since then. The timing of it getting bad for us probably coincides with the date you mention in #5083. On our "Strength" meter, it cycles from maybe 35-40% to 0% and back, perhaps every 2 seconds. Once in awhile we'll get a lock that lasts longer, but it really is unwatchable. Adjusting the gain seems to make no difference.

Actually, our UHF gain control seems to only affect our Strength meter readings on channels in the mid-high 40's. As I mentioned above, 33 (KWBP-DT) was unaffected by adjusting the gain on our amplified rabbit-ear/loop setup (which, BTW, is probably 15 years old, behind a newish 4-way splitter from Radio Shack).

I got to thinking that our location in a little "dip" at the bottom of the valley between the transmitters in the West Hills, and Cooper Mountain/Miller Hill behind us to the south, could well be giving us some signal reflections from the houses just behind us, and the hills further south. I have on order one of those Winegard Ghost Killer 7210 units to try out; It allegedly has a high front-back gain ratio for this kind of situation.

Oh, I never did post our antennaweb. stats. Here they are (digitals only, but the local analogs are mostly at the same locations):

* yellow - uhf KOIN-DT 6.1 CBS PORTLAND OR 55° 7.5 40
* yellow - uhf KPDX-DT 49.1 UPN VANCOUVER WA 49° 6.8 48
* yellow - uhf KGW-DT 8.1 NBC PORTLAND OR 50° 7.1 46
* yellow - uhf KATU-DT 2.1 ABC PORTLAND OR 55° 7.5 43
* yellow - uhf KWBP-DT 32.1 WB SALEM OR 55° 7.5 33
* yellow - uhf KOPB-DT 10.1 PBS PORTLAND OR 50° 7.1 27
* yellow - uhf KPTV-DT 12.1 FOX PORTLAND OR 50° 7.0 30
* yellow - vhf KPXG-DT 22.1 i SALEM OR 55° 7.5 4
* green - uhf KNMT-DT 45.1 TBN PORTLAND OR 55° 7.6 45
* red - uhf KOAC-DT 7.1 PBS CORVALLIS OR 180° 61.3 39

We'll see how it goes.

Thanks again for everyone's comments.

A.S.

Konrad2

07-26-06, 01:33 AM

> You know, when we first got the digital tuner, 10 came in stable, with only the
> occasional glitch or dropout. After about a week or two, it became unuseable and
> has stayed that way since then. The timing of it getting bad for us probably
> coincides with the date you mention in #5083.

Interesting. For me it was bad for about 2 days, then returned to normal, and
has been normal since.

Pat Shearer

07-28-06, 11:30 AM

Check out the newest channel on the air in Portland, 32.2 which is The Tube Music Videos network. I think you will enjoy it as those of us around Portland's WB have for the last few months. I launched the channel on the air last night at 7pm.

By the way, for those who will complain about stealing bandwidth from the HD programs, that is not the case. We have a new statistical multiplexer that harvests null bytes out of the two streams and puts out one stream. The way the box is setup, it will steal valid bytes from the Tube if needed to keep the HD signal at it's full bitrate. You should not notice any difference in the PQ on the HD.

Your feedback would be appreciated and thanks for watching.

Pat Shearer
Chief Engineer
KWBP-TV
ch 32 analog, Salem
ch 5 LP, Portland
ch 33 DTV

R11

07-28-06, 12:18 PM

By the way, for those who will complain about stealing bandwidth from the HD programs, that is not the case. We have a new statistical multiplexer that harvests null bytes out of the two streams and puts out one stream. The way the box is setup, it will steal valid bytes from the Tube if needed to keep the HD signal at it's full bitrate. You should not notice any difference in the PQ on the HD.OK. So what exactly is the "full bitrate" for the WB's HD feed then Pat? If this is truly the case and your HD feed actually is getting full bit rate now, I can only imagine how "nice" The Tube is going to look from time to time. D* has been doing stat muxing for years now so they can stack HD channels up on their transponders and it's never been the same. See also FOX on Sundays during NFL season... Pardon my skepticism, but it sounds like just another bit sharing scheme to me Pat. Or has the WB really discovered a way to "manufacture" new bits and this is the Lucky Charms of digital broadcasting?

ron

Phantom Gremlin

07-28-06, 12:42 PM

R11

07-28-06, 01:08 PM

Thanks, Pat, for posting.

It's not fair to berate Pat for this situation. He didn't wake up one day and decide to do this to spice up his otherwise mundane existence. Instead some PHBs decided this and Pat is doing the best he can to minimize any possible bad effect on his primary HD feed.

I don't care WHAT he puts on, it's surely less of a waste of bits than the KGW weather channel. Has nobody at NBC heard of the Internet?Um, Hellooo. Did you actually read my post? If you had, you would know that no where in it did I "berate" Pat in any way :rolleyes:. Clearly this has nothing to do with him and nobody ever said it did.... I was simply expressing my healthy skepticism and looking for clarification/further info. Hey, I'm all for somebody finding the holy grail of bandwidth sharing, but over the years there have been many claims made that have failed to live up to their promises.

BTW, nice berating of NBC there...

ron

scowl

07-28-06, 01:13 PM

KWBP's HD bitrate was already only 13.1 Mbps so I believe we won't see any difference.

R11

07-28-06, 01:47 PM

There you go. IIRC, they were already doing things a bit (no pun intended) differently with their set up anyway. And IMO, (nothing against Pat of course :) ), their HD PQ has never been anything to write home about...

ron

scowl

07-28-06, 02:21 PM

Their bit rate is higher than KOIN's HD channel. I think both are using the MPEG-2 repeat flags wihch reduces the data rate needed for 24 fps material.

earletp

07-28-06, 02:47 PM

Pat has always been great to us and I doubt you'll find much of anything other than support for him and the time/work he puts in.
Also his willingness to discuss the various aspects of WB's transmission is well known. :)

For a refresher on how things are now being done at the WB, start with post 3699 in this thread.

(edited to add a link for easy reference)
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=5528407&&#post5528407

R11

07-28-06, 02:54 PM

6-1 definitely suffers during high demand peaks when the sub channel is up and running too unfortunately. The KOIN sub looks pretty bad now. Imagine what it might look like at times if 6-1 came in and stole a few more bits during peak hits. Kinda like 8-2 used to look like all the time (and Weather Plus does now...) :). My TV is in for repair at the moment, but it will be interesting to see how The Tube looks. Given the kind of programming the WB does it probably won't be too bad most of the time unless there's lot's of flashing lights in those videos...

At least we have something to talk about besides antennas for the moment :D

ron

earletp

07-28-06, 03:15 PM

and most all programming seems to be suffering from the "Oh my!!, I really look like that in HD? Can we do something to soften up that image and tone it down a bit?"

I still remember the first time I watched Leno in HD, "Wow, I can even see the individual holes in the mic screen that's sitting on his desk." Now it's more of a textured blob...

earletp

07-28-06, 11:18 PM

It looks like KWBP is really having some issue this evening.

(at least The Tube is working) ;) :D

(edited to add...) It's all better now. :)
I also noticed The Tube tripped the DD indicator on my receiver, though 32-1 still shows DPL.
If you're around Pat, does that mean you resolved your issues with DD5.1 and once you have the programming we'll get DD5.1 audio back?

Larry Hutchinson

07-29-06, 01:54 PM

Check out the newest channel on the air in Portland, 32.2 which is The Tube Music Videos network. I think you will enjoy it as those of us around Portland's WB have for the last few months. I launched the channel on the air last night at 7pm.

I never thought I would watch a subchannel but I must say, The Tube is very enjoyable. Everything from Janis Joplin to Death Cab for Cutie.

Virtually everything I have seen so far is music that I would actually listen to -- unlike MTV where I recently TiVoed about 10 hours of their stuff (videos only the wee hours of the night/morning) and found exactly one video that I liked.

Thanks Pat!!

Pat Shearer

07-29-06, 02:16 PM

R11 - I agree with others that think that your original response was a bit harsh. Being a bit skeptic is fine but I have to assume from your comments that you are not an MPEG2 expert and therefore don't understand the nuances of bit rate reduction through statistical multiplexing and variable bitrate encoding. I can get all technical on you but it would serve no purpose. Let me just say that before you go off on your rant, it would serve you better to ask polite questions and become educated so that you don't look so foolish in front of your peers here on the forum.

I will try to explain a vew things in semi-technical language for the benefit of those who would like to know what we are doing with our signal. This may get a bit lengthy so feel free to skip over this post if you don't care to learn the details.

A couple of months ago, we implemented variable bit rate (VBR) encoding with our HD encoder in Seattle. That is an expensive option that of course, does not return any additional revenue. I am strickly limited to a fixed 14MBit stream from Seattle so the VBR option actually improved the PQ during high motion programming. VBR works by varying the bitrate according to what is actually needed to encode the picture instead of constantly using bits for things that don't change. Having analyzed the bitstream coming directly off the WB's satellite receiver, I can tell you that the max they do is about 16MBs of video. Add in the audio streams, data and overhead and that doesn't fit inside a 14MBs pipe so at times, we used to lose bits which results in macro blocking of the picture. That has visibly improved with the change to VBR.

As a side benefit to VBR, there are times when the programming requires substantially less than the 14 we have available. During those times, the encoder streams less bits and "saves up" room in the buffer for when more bits are needed. The end result is that the AVERAGE bit rate is now limited to the 14 but the bursts can go much higher. A really good analogy is traffic on I-5 during rush hour. You may go anywhere from 5MPH up to 40MPH but you average 25MPH. Travelling at an average of 25MPH will get you there in the same amount of time that it would if you drove a steady 25MPH but the difference is that if you drove at a steady speed during rush hour, a whole lot of cars would jump in front of you when the traffic was moving faster. Then, when it slowed down, you would crash which is what the HD encoder tries to avoid :) VBR lets those "extra cars" into the bitstream which results in better PQ.

The Tube Network is sent with VBR and we do not re-encode it like we do with the WB HD stream. By putting those two VBR signals into the statistical multiplexer (statmux) there is always the possibility of sqeezing out a bit better composite signal and that is what is happening. The statmux has a zillion configuration settings that I will be tweaking over the next few weeks to see how far I can push it to maximize PQ on both streams. Also, the Tube has plans to reduce their bitrate somewhat with a newer generation encoder. The software for the statmux has a pie chart display that shows each stream along with the leftover space which is filled with null characters. That allows me to adjust things dynamically while making sure things don't get messed up.

The statmux went bonkers last night and screwed with the main stream. The video was a bit jerky and the audio was stuttering. Fortunately, I can get into the box through my VPN from home and I was able to reset it and things went back to normal.

As for the 5.1 sound, the equipment for that is in our control room in Seattle and it requires a lot of coordination to get things back to where we have 5.1 again but it will be happening pretty soon. We have to do some extensive testing because anything we change affects not only our over the air DTV but also the analog signals and the feed to Comcast (digital and analog). I have one single stream coming down the pipe from Seattle and do all the downconversion locally and then feed it out multiple directions for delivery to your homes.

A couple of weeks ago, I spent a night at the station working with the AT&T technicians who installed another fiber into our building. With that installation completed, we now have a truly redundant fiber path. The two fibers come from different directions to the building and come from different fiber loops through the area which means we are better protected from "backhoe fade" which is what happens when a bozo on a backhoe cuts through a cable. We are constantly upgrading our system for better redundancy and reliability to keep our programming flowing at all times.

Thanks to those of you who appreciate my efforts because your kind words mean a lot to me. I will try to keep you updated as we continue to make progress. In the meantime, please do take a look at the Tube. I have been watching it in my office for a while and I really enjoy it. I'm 52 and the music is mostly stuff that I enjoy so it is definitely unlike the other music video programs out there.

Thanks for watching Portland's WB - soon to be Portland's CW.

Pat Shearer
Chief Engineer
KWBP-TV

skihoodoo

07-29-06, 02:42 PM

pat any word on when comcast will add tube.

Pat Shearer

07-29-06, 08:03 PM

Comcast is supposed to add the Tube very soon because our corporate people and their corpoate people came to some sort of agreement over carriage. If it doesn't happen within a couple of weeks, you should call them and complain.

123HDTV

07-29-06, 10:57 PM

Pat,

Does that mean you have definitive bandwidth between here and Seattle now? I seem to remember a while back you said the connectivity was sort of a metered connectivity and that added some weird variables into the mix.

Thanks as always for the information. It's fascinating technology.

dogday

07-31-06, 06:20 PM

Hi Pat,

What is the frequency assignment for the Tube? I'm trying to add it to my Dish channel list without going through the long, tedious channel scan.

Thanks a bunch!

greg

Pat Shearer

08-01-06, 09:27 PM

Does that mean you have definitive bandwidth between here and Seattle now? I seem to remember a while back you said the connectivity was sort of a metered connectivity and that added some weird variables into the mix.
We started out at a lower bitrate from Seattle and now with the addition of VBR, our effective rate is much higher than original. In the beginning, we received about 11.4 of video and now our video can burst up to 13.9 but with VBR, depending on the content, it can burst much higher. At this time, there are only a few instances where our connection limits the rate so we still do have the occasional blocking in the picture but I have not seen one in a while. It takes a lot of fast motion to cause that to happen and during the fast motion it is harder to see the blocking anyway.

What is the frequency assignment for the Tube? I'm trying to add it to my Dish channel list without going through the long, tedious channel scan.
Over the air it is 32-2 so if you can dial that in with your remote, you should get it. Another trick is to tune to some other OTA channel, turn off your receiver for about 30 seconds, turn it back on and then use the up or down channel buttons to go to our channel. It should pick up the additional stream when you move through our main channel.

Sorry about the Tube being off today but we had a technical issue to resolve and everything should be back to normal early Thursday morning.

Pat

123HDTV

08-01-06, 10:49 PM

Hi Pat,

What is the frequency assignment for the Tube? I'm trying to add it to my Dish channel list without going through the long, tedious channel scan.

Thanks a bunch!

greg

You can also go into the menu where you would scan for digitals and just add 33 manually. It will go out and search and find 32-1 and 32-2. No scan!.

dogday

08-02-06, 12:10 PM

You can also go into the menu where you would scan for digitals and just add 33 manually. It will go out and search and find 32-1 and 32-2. No scan!.

That's the one! Thanks!!

oiler_head

08-02-06, 01:51 PM

I bet we'll have our "locates" on our street until the end of summer. They say those things would wash away within a couple of days at most...it's been over a month and a half. Wish I had grass in the front yard as it would be gone by now with the mowing.

I'm going with the internet first as the tv won't be here for at least a year at the soonest.

Rifleman, have you or Phantom Gremlin got any updates on the FIOS plans for Tualatin? I live near Blake and Martinazzi. They've marked all the way up Blake (towards 205) including our fill in lots. Last week, I talked to a verizon guy working on the stree and he confirmed that Verizon is installing conduit for the FIOS service.
Unfortunately, this week I haven't seen any trucks around (they stopped about midway up Blake by Byrom Elementary). The Verizon worker said that Verizon needs to get 200K people signed up in Oregon so they can offer DirectV service over fiber instead of satellite. That would be intresting to me although it seems a little odd...

Has anyone seen any other FIOS activity around Tualatin?

rifleman69

08-02-06, 03:36 PM

Haven't heard anything for Tualatin, but they've been by my place in Beaverton about every third day with their trucks, tables, and umbrellas. Seems that there's always someone there with a laptop testing the speed of the FIOS.

Still nothing on the website saying we have service, but on the truck they do have their number saying it's available.

Try 503-53F-IBER and see if they can give you any answers. I don't think you'll see the TV version of the fiber until the end of next year at the earliest.

Robert Spalding

08-02-06, 03:41 PM

Directv over Fios? wow thats interesting

oiler_head

08-02-06, 04:20 PM

Directv over Fios? wow thats interesting

That's what the man said. I clarified it with him because I, too, thought it was odd. I would love to ditch my dish and get the service over the fios line. I would guess there would need to be an adapter of sorts to have it work in conjuction with any of the DTV receivers out there. :confused:

At any rate, the contractor trucks are back on the road and I've got additional spray paint on my driveway :D

Phantom Gremlin

08-03-06, 03:46 AM

Rifleman, have you or Phantom Gremlin got any updates on the FIOS plans for Tualatin?
No activity in my neighborhood in Tualatin, near Ibach park.

My locates are mostly faded out. So the prediction from one of the locate guys is correct. Verizon is moving much slower than they initally planned to.

Phantom Gremlin

08-03-06, 03:57 AM

The version worked said that Verizon needs to get 200K people signed up in Oregon so they can offer DirectV service over fiber instead of satellite. That would be intresting to me although it seems a little odd...
In a strange way, this makes sense.

It really depends on how DirecTV's contracts are written with their content providers. If DirecTV isn't restricted to delivery over satellite to each individual home, then an arrangement like this is an incredible win for both DirecTV and Verizon.

DirecTV saves because they don't need to pay the moron satellite installers to put up a 30" dish (currently needed for HD) and then run 4 coaxes to a multiswitch and then run more coax to individual receivers.

Verizon wins because if they were going to offer TV then they were going to do the cable work in the house anyway regardless of where the programming originates. This way Verizon doesn't have to sign carriage agreements with ESPN or with the NFL or even with competitors like G4 (owned by Comcast).

Although I think I'd pay extra to NOT have G4 available to me. :)

earletp

08-03-06, 02:09 PM

As for the 5.1 sound, the equipment for that is in our control room in Seattle and it requires a lot of coordination to get things back to where we have 5.1 again but it will be happening pretty soon. We have to do some extensive testing because anything we change affects not only our over the air DTV but also the analog signals and the feed to Comcast (digital and analog). I have one single stream coming down the pipe from Seattle and do all the downconversion locally and then feed it out multiple directions for delivery to your homes.

Good news on the 5.1, and all of the other work that has been happening in the background.
Thanks for the update Pat!!

Earl

antenna-seeker

08-05-06, 03:44 AM

At least we have something to talk about besides antennas for the moment :D
ron

Speaking of antennas.... :p

Thought I'd post results (my last post was #5103 above). We installed a Winegard HD7210P "Ghostkiller" antenna (without preamp) last weekend; Well, it went up first on a tree-pruning pole and some old RG59 cable to test locations the previous weekend, but we put up a permanent mast just last Saturday/Sunday. We're now receiving all the local digital stations, including 22 (on VHF 4), with no more dropouts. Our "weakest" channels are still 32 and 49 (digital), at 75% signal strength on our tuner's meter, but that's up from 60-70% on our old amplified rabbitears/loop.

Now that we don't get dropouts on 32 (KWBP-DT), we do notice significant blockiness during fast-motion segments (sometimes not-so-fast). Note that we're viewing the digital channels on a non-HD TV, but most channels don't have these artifacts, so I'm assuming they are related to the input our system is receiving. The only other channel with these artifacts (though fewer of them) is digital 49; They show up as horizontal bars during pause or slow-motion playback.

Note that all this signal comes to our digital tuner via 100' of RG6 (probably not the best, from Fry's) and still that 4-way splitter from Radio Shack. So things should improve as I shorten up the cable once it's properly routed and cleaned up, and maybe even get a really good splitter. I still have some tinkering I can do with what direction the antenna is pointed, as well, but my analog reception is crystal clear at the moment (including UHF), so we're bound to be doing well for digital too.

Well, that's it for now. Hope it helps others, as I've been helped by folks who posted their antenna experiences in the area.

Regards,

A.S.

hilld

08-05-06, 09:42 PM

discwog

08-06-06, 01:18 AM

RBMD

08-13-06, 01:39 PM

scowl

08-14-06, 02:33 AM

A couple of months ago, we implemented variable bit rate (VBR) encoding with our HD encoder in Seattle. That is an expensive option that of course, does not return any additional revenue. I am strickly limited to a fixed 14MBit stream from Seattle so the VBR option actually improved the PQ during high motion programming.
One occasional consequence of this is you can have a "bit starved I-frame" after a sequence that required a lot of bits.

Here's an A/B comparision of the season premeire of Smallville. When the bad guys showed up and started blowing stuff up, all the explosions when the episode first aired were very pixelated. When the episode reran months later they looked much with the varialbe bit rate. Unfortunately there are a couple of relatively still shots after action sequences that jumped out because they looked so bad.

Close up of bad guy during the first airing right after a bunch of explosions:

http://home.pacifier.com/~scowl/hdtv/BeforeVB.jpg

Same frame after much less pixelated explosions during rerun:

http://home.pacifier.com/~scowl/hdtv/AfterVB.jpg

I think after the action, the encoder had no choice but to compress that I-frame more to keep it from overflowing the buffer. Fortunately with ATSC, you get a new I-frame every second or two but the artifacts during that second really jump out.

It's a fair tradeoff though. :)

lewlew

08-14-06, 10:05 AM

scowl, help me out here. I'm looking at your pictures but don't understand. In the first pic I don't see any pixelization but I do see something that appears to be noise on the far right edge. Please tell me exactly where to look for it.

In the second pic the color appears to be washed out. The background appears to be less detailed as can be seen by comparison of a small green clump of bush just off the bad guy's left shoulder, and the blue sky appears very blotchy.

Just how is the second pic better than the first?

scowl

08-14-06, 11:48 AM

scowl, help me out here. I'm looking at your pictures but don't understand. In the first pic I don't see any pixelization but I do see something that appears to be noise on the far right edge.
That's garbage from the capture buffer that I forgot to crop out.

In the second pic the color appears to be washed out. The background appears to be less detailed as can be seen by comparison of a small green clump of bush just off the bad guy's left shoulder, and the blue sky appears very blotchy.
Yes, you're seeing this correctly.

Just how is the second pic better than the first?
It took fewer bits to transmit leaving more bits for the scene before it that had lots of explosions.

ridgefamus

08-14-06, 12:36 PM

Did anyone else see the Battlestar Gallactica -The Story Up To Now last night on KGW? I started watching on Comcast 708 and saw that it was letterboxed. Then they flashed something about it being presented in HD followed by a note about it being in Widescreen (probably to appease the non-HD viewers who wonder why the bars top & bottom). HD wasn't evident on Comcast so I switched to OTA, thinking KGW guys forgot to flip the switch, and it filled my screen. (Looks like Comcast was the one who dropped the ball, but I thought they were just a pass-through[?]). But it wasn't even close to the HD I recall seeing when BSG had their mini event in HD on NBC last year. It was a good recap that made the juices start to flow in anticipation of the new season on SciFi in Oct.

darkluna

08-14-06, 01:08 PM

I stumbled into 32.2 The Tube last weekend and have been enjoying it. A lot of the videos are live-performances, which is interesting. The Tube is the first sub-channel of any kind that is, at certain times, more interesting than the main-channel.

Pat, thanks for sharing some of the inner-workings of putting HDTV-OTA. Although I'd love to see a full bandwith feed, and dedicated 100% to channel 1, I have seen some improvement to the feed over the summer, so whatever you're doing has definitely helped the situation.

Check out the newest channel on the air in Portland, 32.2 which is The Tube Music Videos network. I think you will enjoy it as those of us around Portland's WB have for the last few months. I launched the channel on the air last night at 7pm.

By the way, for those who will complain about stealing bandwidth from the HD programs, that is not the case. We have a new statistical multiplexer that harvests null bytes out of the two streams and puts out one stream. The way the box is setup, it will steal valid bytes from the Tube if needed to keep the HD signal at it's full bitrate. You should not notice any difference in the PQ on the HD.

Your feedback would be appreciated and thanks for watching.

Pat Shearer
Chief Engineer
KWBP-TV
ch 32 analog, Salem
ch 5 LP, Portland
ch 33 DTV

deviationer

08-14-06, 06:45 PM

Ok so I recently got the 37" Westinghouse 1080p HDTV "monitor" the LVM-37w3. Great HDTV. I have it hooked up to a computer (2.2Ghz Athlon XP, 1GB, X800XL, Soundstorm...Digital Coax out to Logitech Z-5500) using a dvi to dvi cable and I have an ATI HDTV Wonder ATSC tuner card.

Now the antenna that came with the tuner card is ok. After using the ATI tuner sofware (which is crap) and testing out Beyond TV (which is decent) I finaly settled on SageTV. It provides some great options and PVR fuction, and it seams to do a lot better job of tuning the channels. BUT I get random drop outs of signal and pixelation, sometimes they last for 10-30 seconds.

So what would be the best indoor antenna for the portland area? I live in the gateway area, near 122nd and glisan. (Already checked the antenna web)

Now I have already tried 2 powered antennas I have, one is for outdoor use (big, round, and white) and an indoor one. Both didn't help much, maybe because they aren't ment for HDTV?

I swear it's the vortex of TV reception, not matter what you do, analog or digital you can't get a great picture for most of the time.

earletp

08-15-06, 12:04 AM

crossbeaux

08-15-06, 12:42 AM

I thought I saw something about BG being on NBCs lineup this fall. But a search of nbc.com doesn't reveal anything. I watched a good portion of this on comcast (recording on the DVR), and except for the first few seconds, it was in HD. Much better than on SciFi

ridgefamus

08-15-06, 12:54 AM

It was KGW, they flipped the switch at the same time you said you changed over.

KGW is still by far the worst at switching to HD for anything other than regular primetime programming.

Thanks. Once I make the switch to OTA, it's rare I go back to check. I thought I was being patient with KGW and the BSG show but I was too stoked to try to see it in HD once I saw the "Presented in HD" thingy on the screen. When I did get to OTA, I couldn't figure out how I was getting HD from KGW when Comcast didn't have it. It was MY timing that had me confused. :o

Seems we on the West Coast were the only parts of the country to see this last night. The SNF game precluded those to the right from getting it.

lewlew

08-15-06, 10:50 AM

scowl,

Would you please post pics of the previous scene (if you can) to show why the bit starved second pic above is all that special and worthwhile?

Does this process try to even out the crappiness of one frame to make an average crappiness of the whole segment?

I'm not a genius with this business stuff and there must be a reason why they are using a puny signal from Seattle, but why don't they just put up a bud and take the full signal right off the sat?

crossbeaux

08-15-06, 01:01 PM

Thanks. Once I make the switch to OTA, it's rare I go back to check. I thought I was being patient with KGW and the BSG show but I was too stoked to try to see it in HD once I saw the "Presented in HD" thingy on the screen. When I did get to OTA, I couldn't figure out how I was getting HD from KGW when Comcast didn't have it. It was MY timing that had me confused. :o

Seems we on the West Coast were the only parts of the country to see this last night. The SNF game precluded those to the right from getting it.
Slightly off topic here, but I seem to remember when the Oregonian had articles on the fall TV schedule, the NBC list included Battlestar Galactica as one of the prime time show. But nothing was said in the articles, and an examination of the NBC website reveals nothing. Does anyone remember this or know what happened? It would be really nice to see that show in HD.

earletp

08-15-06, 04:56 PM

Seems we on the West Coast were the only parts of the country to see this last night. The SNF game precluded those to the right from getting it.
It's nice we get the breaks once in a while. :D

On a side note, I mailed KATU to check on the status of Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy once they go HD on Sept 11th. We'll not be seeing them here, nor anytime in the near future. (the word "years" was used...) heh!!

Earl

crossbeaux

08-15-06, 06:21 PM

Slightly off topic here, but I seem to remember when the Oregonian had articles on the fall TV schedule, the NBC list included Battlestar Galactica as one of the prime time show. But nothing was said in the articles, and an examination of the NBC website reveals nothing. Does anyone remember this or know what happened? It would be really nice to see that show in HD.
I guess I'll just respond to my own post here. :) The Portland Comcast thread noted that Comcast was adding Universal HD in early September, so with cable, I guess there is a way to see BSG in HD. Apparently not OTA though.

hilladen

08-16-06, 12:47 AM

Why wouldn't KATU carry them in HD? Are the shows charging an arm and a leg for them? Seems fairly odd.

ridgefamus

08-16-06, 01:05 AM

Why wouldn't KATU carry them in HD? Are the shows charging an arm and a leg for them? Seems fairly odd.

You probably meant KGW. AFAIK, BSG is an NBC Universal property currently airing (new season starts in Oct.) on the SciFi network. I don't think anyone at NBC has the cajoles to commit to putting this edgy drama on the major network - yet. The show has created lots of buzz but apparently not enough to lure major advertisers to put it on the network. But NBC has used some opportunities in its off-season scheduling to provide a glimpse of BSG. Besides the show last Sun., it aired a two-part mini series of 3 hours last year - all in HD. It's produced in HD but shown on SciFi in SD.

I am excited as a Comcast customer to learn that we will be getting Universal HD and that BSG is presented there in HD, but I can't mention that here as it's OT. ;)

I'm sure there's lots of discussion elsewhere about the wisdom or not of NBC keeping BSG under wraps.

scowl

08-16-06, 02:25 AM

Why wouldn't KATU carry them in HD? Are the shows charging an arm and a leg for them? Seems fairly odd.
I'm assuming you're talking about Wheel of Fortune and the new syndicated HD shows...

They don't have the equipment to delay syndicated HD programming which usually comes off a satellite late at night. They do charge an arm and a leg for that stuff. It often requires recabling and replacing a whole bunch of other equipment too.

123HDTV

08-16-06, 09:50 PM

They do charge an arm and a leg for that stuff.

and sometimes a first born.

antenna-seeker

08-17-06, 11:23 AM

Now that we don't get dropouts on 32 (KWBP-DT), we do notice significant blockiness during fast-motion segments (sometimes not-so-fast). Note that we're viewing the digital channels on a non-HD TV, but most channels don't have these artifacts, so I'm assuming they are related to the input our system is receiving. The only other channel with these artifacts (though fewer of them) is digital 49; They show up as horizontal bars during pause or slow-motion playback.

Normally I don't answer my own posts, but I know you were all dying to know. (:-) The above turned out to not be an OTA reception/picture-quality issue.

We got rid of the blockiness by turning on the display de-interlacing in our EyeTV Mac. Seems to fly in the face of the documentation since we're using a regular non-HD CRT TV, but can't argue with the results.

R11

08-18-06, 07:52 PM

rifleman69

08-19-06, 11:57 AM

Point of clarification, most people use the smilies at the end of their posts, and not the beginning to state that they're kidding and/or being sarcastic.

rcbaker

08-19-06, 12:31 PM

This is my first post. I hope that it will be of help to anybody living in West Linn who is in the process of deciding on OTA HDTV.
I just finished building a HTPC and decided to try the HDTV Fusion 5RT Lite for OTA. I live at Hidden Springs and Suncrest Dr. and have a 2 story home. After installation of the Fusion app., I received all the Portland networks including OPB with about a 75% signal indication.Picture was crystal clear and detailed. Stuttering occurs at below a 65% signal level as indicated on the app software. I used the Silver Sensor indoor antenna that was provided as a bundle with the Fusion 5 purchase and my computer CRT monitor.
Channel 49-1 was also clear along with 24-1,2,3,4. I am still trying to get the Fox channel 12 which I believe is 32-1 but after only one day of playing with my setup, I have not yet succeeded in receiving 32-1. I have not yet tried recording and will probably use 3rd. party software such as BeyondTV or SageTV to do the PVR work
In summary, very little effort for good HDTV.

HTPC setup is as follows:
Intel P-4 2.6 Ghz. CPU
Asus P4C800-E Deluxe mother board
Windows XP Home o.s.
1 gig. of Ram
260 Gig, Seagate Barracuda HD
ATI 9800 Pro video card
Sound Blaster Live sound card
Fusion 5 RT Lite
No front end HTPC software or any other 3rd party software yet

DSHolt

08-19-06, 01:51 PM

I am still trying to get the Fox channel 12 which I believe is 32-1 but after only one day of playing with my setup, I have not yet succeeded in receiving 32-1.

I live in Tigard/SW Portland area and I receive Fox on 12.1.

DSHolt

08-19-06, 02:08 PM

Hello, just purchased my first HDTV. I have an antenna on the top of my house and most of my stations are coming in superb with outstanding picture quality. The only exception is NBC 8.2. There is much pixelization and blockiness. At times the picture will stop for a second or two and then resume. Some evenings are better than others and there was one evening this week where my TV couldn’t find 8.1 or 8.2 (NBC weather). Am I safe in assuming that this is a problem caused by me not having a very strong signal? Does NBC broadcast at a lower bit-rate than the other stations?

I apologize if this has been discussed at length in the prior posts and I missed it. :o

rcbaker

08-19-06, 02:27 PM

DSHolt,

Thanks for Fox info. I will try that

dnamertz

08-19-06, 02:28 PM

I don't watch much OTA HD content because I'd rather watch stuff on Tivo (non-HD) that watch it live. However, I did watch the Hell's Kitchen finale live on OTA HD on FOX and noticed that the picture wasn't much clearer than SD.

Today I switched over to OTA HD and noticed the golf tournament on CBS was amazingly clear...it looked like I was there in person. Then I turned on the baseball game on FOX and the HD signal wasn't that great, not nearly as good as CBS was, even though I was receiving a stronger signal on FOX (82%) than I was on CBS (73%).

I noticed that FOX was in 720p and CBS was in 1080i...is that the reason for the huge difference in picture quality? Does FOX in Portland always broadcast in 720p?

hilladen

08-19-06, 03:35 PM

DSHolt, you may have a problem with multipathing. Where exactly are you and are there any large trees or buildings between you and the towers?

crossbeaux

08-19-06, 05:03 PM

earletp

08-19-06, 07:28 PM

earletp

08-19-06, 07:35 PM

I am still trying to get the Fox channel 12 which I believe is 32-1 but after only one day of playing with my setup, I have not yet succeeded in receiving 32-1. I have not yet tried recording and will probably use 3rd. party software such as BeyondTV or SageTV to do the PVR work
In summary, very little effort for good HDTV.

Fox is on 30-1, not 32-1. 12-1 is remapped from 30-1 by your tuner and the PSIP data transmitted by the station.

I don't watch much OTA HD content because I'd rather watch stuff on Tivo (non-HD) that watch it live. However, I did watch the Hell's Kitchen finale live on OTA HD on FOX and noticed that the picture wasn't much clearer than SD.

Today I switched over to OTA HD and noticed the golf tournament on CBS was amazingly clear...it looked like I was there in person. Then I turned on the baseball game on FOX and the HD signal wasn't that great, not nearly as good as CBS was, even though I was receiving a stronger signal on FOX (82%) than I was on CBS (73%).

I noticed that FOX was in 720p and CBS was in 1080i...is that the reason for the huge difference in picture quality? Does FOX in Portland always broadcast in 720p?
No, it's because neither the baseball game nor Hell's Kitchen were shown in HD, they just were shown on an HD capable channel.
Yes FOX always broadcasts in 720p, as does KATU.

rcbaker

08-19-06, 09:49 PM

Thanks Earletp

dnamertz

08-19-06, 11:22 PM

No, it's because neither the baseball game nor Hell's Kitchen were shown in HD.

That suprises me, especially a major league baseball game. Heck, there are preseason NFL games in HD.

DSHolt

08-20-06, 01:18 AM

DSHolt, you may have a problem with multipathing. Where exactly are you and are there any large trees or buildings between you and the towers?

I am just off of 62nd and Taylor's Ferry. Yes we do have a lot of very tall trees in the neighborhood. I guess I will have to do a search on multipathing to see what that is :p

dnamertz

08-20-06, 11:01 AM

No, it's because neither the baseball game nor Hell's Kitchen were shown in HD, they just were shown on an HD capable channel.
Yes FOX always broadcasts in 720p, as does KATU.

Is there a way to know whether a show is supposed to be broadcasting in HD or not?

earletp

08-20-06, 02:12 PM

Is there a way to know whether a show is supposed to be broadcasting in HD or not?
You can use an online guide service such as TitanTV.com which is accurate about 95% of the time, or the individual network websites (abc.com, cbs.com, nbc.com, ect.) which are accurate about 99% of the time. There is also the HD programming forum here at AVS.
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/forumdisplay.php?s=&daysprune=30&f=34
It will often give you a heads-ups on future as well as current programming.

Phantom Gremlin

08-20-06, 05:23 PM

I guess I will have to do a search on multipathing to see what that is :p

A good site that explains multipath and HDTV in general is

http://www.hdtvprimer.com/

Of course avsforum has lots of HDTV discussion as well. For example here is an antenna topic thread

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=381623

Also check out this forum especially the stickies

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/forumdisplay.php?f=25

I personally had enough difficulty with multipath that I decided to get the $10 cable from Comcast. YMMV.

deviationer

08-22-06, 06:57 PM

There's no such thing as an HD antenna, You may need an outdoor antenna since you have that hill between you and the towers The indoor antenna I use is the Silver Sensor, it also seems to be highly praised by many.
Try putting a longer coax on your current antenna so you can move it around a bit. Sometimes movement of even a few feet can make a big difference.

thanks. I actually solved my issues by replacing the low quality 6' cable that came with the attenna for the ATI HDTV Wonder with a high quality 12' cable and then found a place where I can put the attenna where I get all channels in prefect quality.

Just by doing that my siginal quality went from 60-90% to 90-100% on all channels.

Pat Shearer

08-25-06, 02:18 AM

Rant? WTF? :confused: No offense Pat but I'm going to have to say the same thing to you that I said to the ONE other poster that took exception to my post to you. Did you even read it? Did you NOT notice the winking smile right at the very beginning? What's that make me, a "happy ranter" I suppose? :rolleyes: Come on friend, before you get all emotional and take things the wrong way and start making baseless personal attacks against people you really aught to take a little time to think things through a little first. In no way was my post meant as any kind of attack on you or your station. I simply was expressing some skepticism and honestly asking you for additional info because I do have interested in and follow these things.

OK Ron, how about we agree that you had the emoticon which you intended to show that you were not ranting but I missed it because it was 11 lines above the actual text that you wrote which made it easy to miss. Your message had several words emphasized with quotes which is why I saw an attitude come through. As you can see from the other comments about The Tube Network, it seems to have gained a loyal following so I would call it a success. I simply cannot get a higher bitrate from Seattle so you might as well give up on that idea.

As with everything else in life, monetary considerations force us to make compromises and higher bitrates mean more expense. This station spent about $4M building the HD transmission facility and the monthly operating costs are in the $6K range. Not one single penny of additional revenue has come into the station as a result of this process so my opinion is that all forms of DTV, even the crappy SD pictures on some feeds are a bargain for the consumers since the price for OTA reception is still 100% FREE.

BTW, please don't degrade my favorite breakfast cereal in your future rants. ;) <<--- This is a properly placed emoticon where it won't get missed and will be associated with the proper text.

No hard feelings on my end as I'm just trying to do the best I can with the available resources. Maybe after we shut off the analog sites in 2009 and start saving over $18K / month, there will be more money available to apply to DTV.

Pat

lewlew

08-25-06, 09:59 AM

Schwinn

08-25-06, 06:42 PM

I'm curious to know what percentage of viewers in our area are actually receiving analog OTA as their sole source of local programming.

It would seem that every new digital OTA person who comes to this forum is totally ignorant of antennas before they get here and then get educated. It's not as if they were watching analog OTA the day before.

If the analog percentage is lower than the digital percentage, why not shut the analog off now?:D:D:D

i don't have a clue what the percentages are. The info is likely available somewhere.
I can tell you why analog shouldn't be turned off at this time. Digital isn't really ready for prime time ie general public use as a replacement for analog. Example last Monday I got home at like 7:59 PM knowing that "Prison Break" comes on @ 8PM. Despite the old chestnut of "it's on the same tower as channel xx so you shouldn't have any issues if you get channel X, channel 12.1 has a very strong sweet spot at my location and that spot varies with time of year ,weather & trucks and cars parked in certain spots on the street. So knowing it could well take me 5 min or more to get a digital picture on 12.1 I tunned to analog 12 knowing I could watch and hear the program as soon as i turned the set on. The digital system used most everywhere but the USA has this ability . Despite whatever advantages our system of digital has over the other we got stuck with the hard to tune version. The other version works more like our analog in that it still works if the antenna is turned off the sweet spot but of course works best when turned correctly. My guess is the public is going to go nuts when analog is turned off. It will be great for cable and dish companies.
So while digital TV is great when it works as it should it often doesn't. No I'm not a newbie anymore with digital. I get a great picture on all the locals 12.1 just takes extra aiming. It wouldn't be so bad if it didn't change all the time.

bpayne

08-25-06, 08:21 PM

scowl

08-25-06, 08:57 PM

I can tell you why analog shouldn't be turned off at this time. Digital isn't really ready for prime time ie general public use as a replacement for analog.
So you didn't spent hours on your roof futzing with your antenna trying get a half-decent picture from analog? My dad sure did. I was the one who stood in front of the TV saying "Better! Worse! No go back!" Then when he'd come down, we'd argue whether that was really a better picture or whether he had wasted a half hour up there.

And yes, reception came and went during the seasons where we were. We were surrounded by hills covered in deciduous trees and these caused ghosts and color smears during certain times of the year. These kinds of reception problems were what made cable (all ten channels of it) so appealing when it was first introduced. We were finally able to get our local channels consistantly.

The digital system used most everywhere but the USA has this ability . Despite whatever advantages our system of digital has over the other we got stuck with the hard to tune version. The other version works more like our analog in that it still works if the antenna is turned off the sweet spot but of course works best when turned correctly.
If you're talking about COFDM, it does a little better (mostly because other countries' channels have one or two Mhz more bandwidth to transmit the same bit rate) but VSB-8 receivers have improved dramatically over the years. Antenna placement is much less critical now. The latest ATSC receivers are easier to use than COFDM recievers were in their original tests.

So while digital TV is great when it works as it should it often doesn't. No I'm not a newbie anymore with digital. I get a great picture on all the locals 12.1 just takes extra aiming. It wouldn't be so bad if it didn't change all the time.
I'm not convinced that your reception problem can't be solved.

rifleman69

08-26-06, 12:40 PM

Just an FYI for everybody out there, DirecTV Mpeg 4 Portland HD locals on will start broadcasting on Monday the 28th. For now, it is going to be ABC, CBS, NBC and FOX. No ETA on any of the others, especially PBS-HD.

My current guess is that they will be broadcasting from 103w [net14] on tp 25. If any of you have an AT-9 dish and an H20 HD receiver, check that transponder- if you are not getting in the 70s and 80s, you may have a problem. The max I've been able to dial in that signal is 94.

If you have any questions or problems, I'll check back often over the weekend and Monday.

I might upgrade to the HR20-700 as I still can't get decent signals on 8.1, 10.1, and 12.1 on my HR10-250. According to my tv (when bypassing the HR10-250) the signals are all over 85, but they are really low and all over the place when checking them on the HR10-250.

(edit) The HR20-700's do not have their OTA tuners enabled yet...so it's either a DVR with no OTA, or a non-DVR that can receive every channel. I'll wait for a bit and just get the antenna realigned.

mrock12

08-26-06, 03:45 PM

The Little League World Series national championship game is on ABC right now. All of the announcers' microphones say ABC HD, but KATU is not showing HD. Did they forget to flip a switch?

rbonzer

08-26-06, 03:47 PM

The Little League World Series national championship game is on ABC right now. All of the announcers' microphones say ABC HD, but KATU is not showing HD. Did they forget to flip a switch?

Anyone know the phone number to call?

mrock12

08-26-06, 03:48 PM

OK. It's now HD. Better late than never.

Schwinn

08-27-06, 06:46 PM

So you didn't spent hours on your roof futzing with your antenna trying get a half-decent picture from analog? My dad sure did. I was the one who stood in front of the TV saying "Better! Worse! No go back!" Then when he'd come down, we'd argue whether that was really a better picture or whether he had wasted a half hour up there.

And yes, reception came and went during the seasons where we were. We were surrounded by hills covered in deciduous trees and these caused ghosts and color smears during certain times of the year. These kinds of reception problems were what made cable (all ten channels of it) so appealing when it was first introduced. We were finally able to get our local channels consistantly.

If you're talking about COFDM, it does a little better (mostly because other countries' channels have one or two Mhz more bandwidth to transmit the same bit rate) but VSB-8 receivers have improved dramatically over the years. Antenna placement is much less critical now. The latest ATSC receivers are easier to use than COFDM recievers were in their original tests.

I'm not convinced that your reception problem can't be solved.

Yes, same story with my Dad and me! My complaint with Digital is that it is missing the snowy & smeared picture ! It's perfect or no signal message( sure there is the dropouts when signal is low but very small range) Yes it's way great to have the perfect picture but sometimes you just want to watch the news or your favorite show now and a subpar picture may not be as important as missing the show. I think this will be a major issue when analog is turned off. People who live on the fringes and watch a subpar picture as we did years ago will be out of luck.
I am lucky in that I can get a great picture on all Portland digital channels( I even get a great picture on analog 32 which surprises me as I've a long way from Salem) . I have one antenna direction for everything but 12.1 and another for 12.1 and some others . It took a bit of work to come up with that solution . I just don't think the public is going to be happy with the need to aim the antenna so carefully for digital.

hilladen

08-27-06, 08:01 PM

That is why the public by and large has cable or sattelite

edwardewilliams

08-29-06, 08:36 PM

My guess is the public is going to go nuts when analog is turned off. It will be great for cable and dish companies.
Well, it won't be great for the DBS companies as of right now - Echostar and DirecTV receive OTA analog here in Portland, encode it all in to one grand ASI stream and send it along to the uplinks in Wyoming and Colorado, respectively. We're assuming they'll start using the SD digital signal one of these days, but if we shut down analog today, the DBS viewers go away with it.

edwardewilliams

08-29-06, 08:45 PM

That suprises me, especially a major league baseball game. Heck, there are preseason NFL games in HD.MLB and NFL don't yet produce all their games in HD. So far, Fox's preseason NFL games have been, but you'll notice that the regionally produced Seahawks and Raiders games that we carry, which are not prodcued by Fox, are in SD. It's still a spotty world out there.

BTW - My Network TV, which premiers on PDX 49 on September 5, will be all HD right out of the box. The satellite tests look great so far here at the studio. Now you just gotta figure out if you WANT to see Morgan Fairchild and Bo Derek in HD :eek:

bpayne

08-30-06, 01:38 PM

rifleman69

08-30-06, 03:52 PM

Thanks for the update bpayne. Getting my antenna setup looked at on the 7th, and might have to make a choice after that. Rather not get the HR20-700 or even the H20 unless I absolutely have to.

skihoodoo

08-31-06, 11:41 PM

i guess comcast went ahead and updated our lineup on comcast.com and this will maybe be the new call sign for KWBP = KRCW - CW

123HDTV

09-01-06, 12:31 AM

i guess comcast went ahead and updated our lineup on comcast.com and this will maybe be the new call sign for KWBP = KRCW - CW

Yup it is. They also list it on the KTLA website as being part of Tribune. KTWB in Seattle is switching also to KMYQ.

cheon1971

09-01-06, 02:43 AM

Thanks bpayne!
Might be a silly question:
Which channels will be used (or were used for the brief moments) for local HD from DirecTV?
Since I am getting local HD OTA signals via H20 at 2-1, 6-1, and so on, I am wondering how they can resolve conflicts between OTA and satelite, if they are trying to use same channel numbers.
Or directv has some other designated channels for local HDs?

bpayne

09-01-06, 02:20 PM

Great question.

The Mpeg 4 HD locals should appear in the guide with the local call sign followed by the number and subchannel.

So you will see something like...

PO2 (SD Satellite)
2-1 KATU-DT
KATU 2-1 (Mpeg 4 HD)
PO6
6-1 KOIN-DT
6-2 KOIN-DT
6-3 KOIN-DT
KOIN 6-1
KOIN 6-2
PO8

etc. etc.

Bear in mind, initially we will only see the Big 4 networks- ABC, CBS, NBC and FOX. Some markets will never get every digital channel. I imagine we will eventually see PBS-HD but as for WB/CW... who knows?

BTW,

Has everyone noticed TBN-DT is now up and running? 5 sub-channels too. I wonder what power they're broadcasting at too because it comes in pretty good on my test system in my office.

togdon

09-05-06, 03:11 PM

Phantom Gremlin

09-06-06, 03:27 AM

Is everyone else able to get The Tube?
As of a few minutes ago, 32.1 had Sex and the City and 32.2 had Joe Walsh singing Life's Been Good.

This was the first time since The Tube went on the air that I switched my tuner to OTA instead of QAM. And the tuner had absolutely no problem immediately detecting 32.2. But nothing from Comcast yet.

Does your tuner support a program guide? In addition to direct entry via remote, I can select The Tube thru the program guide.

Schwinn

09-06-06, 04:14 PM

Is everyone else able to get The Tube? My Samsung (an 'older' TX-P3071WH) has no way of typing in subchannels on the remote, but I receive 6.2, 8.2, 10.2 (and the color bars at 10.3 for a bit), and all the religious broadcasting I could ever want (24.1-5 I believe), but no matter what I do I can't get 32.2. I've tried re-programming a half dozen times over the last week or two, moving my little Silver Sensor antenna until the reception bars are the highest when on 32, no dice.

If it's off the air until the switch to CW today, then I'll stop fretting. If not... any thoughts?

Many tuners will auto tune to the digital channels if you key in the UHF channel number on the remote. For example key in channel 33 which is the "real" UHF channel that 32 1/2 are broadcasting on and it will after a few seconds move to 32-1 and then you can switch to 32-2 by doing channel up on the remote. Worth a try. I then need to save this channel by going into menue mode on the remote otherwise need to key in 33 every time. Worth a try.
32-2 is up @ 1PM Wed Sept 6.
Are you sure CW starts today? I heard that The WB was going out on the 17th by showing the first ep of their hit shows.ie Buffy , Dawson's Creek etc anyone know for sure?

PS Yep, The WB goes out on the 17th of Sept with 5 hours of the Pilots of 4 hits shows. Buffy(2hrs) Felicity , Angel & Dawsons Creek. 5PM- 10 PM.
You were thinking of the New Fox Network called "My Network TV". In Portland it's on 49 and started the 5th of Sept. It's like 2 new night time soaps that run 6 nights a week very odd IMHO.

togdon

09-07-06, 03:18 PM

I've tried the 33 trick, no dice. It sees 32.1 just fine when I key in 33, no 32.2. I'll try the Guide thing, but I'm fairly certain that the Guide only adds channels that it knows about from auto-programming.

I figured with Katie Couric's debut, Fox debuting a handful of shows, and MyNetwork all on 9/5 that it was the day that CW would appear.

togdon

09-08-06, 11:17 PM

The Guide on my TV definitely only lists memorized channels. At full signal strength I'm still not able to pick up 33.2 (I've tried re-programming twice since I last posted). Pat, any ideas? Anyone else having problems? I get fairly strong signal strength with the Silver Sensor and my only occasional problem is multipath related stuff (when cars drive by or planes fly over) depending on the weather and amount of leaves on the trees...

michaelma9

09-09-06, 07:13 PM

Hey all,
Can anyone tell me why my new channelmaster (directional) antenna from Lowes attached to my chimney with 75ft of rg6 barely produces a viewable signal on my dish network HD box but my indoor siverstar sitting on top of my tv pulls in most of the stations?
I've tried different runs of coax, pointing the antenna in a few different directions (I've checked the angle per antennaweb), and just added another 7ft pole height to it with negliable effect.
Can the Channelmaster be defective? I'm only about 7 miles from the towers in the Garden Home area.

Thanks,
Mike

nater

09-09-06, 07:31 PM

It is just as likely the signal is too strong. Radio Shack has a variable attenuator that you can insert in the line to prove this idea. It was not too expensive and helped me on some channels.
Nater

Hey all,
Can anyone tell me why my new channelmaster (directional) antenna from Lowes attached to my chimney with 75ft of rg6 barely produces a viewable signal on my dish network HD box but my indoor siverstar sitting on top of my tv pulls in most of the stations?
I've tried different runs of coax, pointing the antenna in a few different directions (I've checked the angle per antennaweb), and just added another 7ft pole height to it with negliable effect.
Can the Channelmaster be defective? I'm only about 7 miles from the towers in the Garden Home area.

Thanks,
Mike

scowl

09-09-06, 11:57 PM

michaelma9

09-10-06, 01:09 AM

Thanks for the advice, I went by radioshack and a very helpful guy helped me realize I had the antenna pointed backwards....felt kinda dumb but now it works great.

craigpratt

09-12-06, 01:52 PM

Is anyone else having problems receiving KOIN since sunday evening?

My recordings of KOIN News were blank. I thought it was a problem with my box - until a guy here at work reported the same thing...

bigsmooth

09-12-06, 05:56 PM

Just FYI, the PDX HD locals came up briefly Monday morning and again on Tuesday but DTV engineering has taken them offline for a while. Newest info I have is that they will roll them out on Sept. 6. I'm not sure what's going on exactly, but I do know that the spot beam from available from sat 99 has been off and on for the past 48 hrs and that they've been alternating the 103 spot beam between transponder 6 and 25 on 103- so I believe it's a technical issue with the downlink and nothing on the DTVs uplink or the uplink from the broadcasters.
bpayne, any update on this? I switched to DTV from digital cable recently and decided to forgo an OTA antenna for now because I was told we'd be getting HD locals very soon. Now football season has started and they're still not live, which is very frustrating. I called DTV but the rep seemed fairly clueless, saying that we would be getting "NBC and FOX only, this fall" which I certainly hope isn't the case.

bpayne

09-12-06, 10:02 PM

ridgefamus

09-13-06, 12:00 AM

...Clearly, DTV missed their deadline last Wed.

I presume you guys are discussing DirecTV when you refer to "DTV", or am I wrong? In the AVS lexicon, DTV is defined as digital television. See here (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/faq.php?faq=d#faq_dtv) for the definition.

DirecTV has been lovingly referred to in these forums as D* in shorthand, as unspecific as that acronym is. :rolleyes:

Just so everyone's on the same page. ;)

bigsmooth

09-13-06, 12:02 AM

Dang it, I was hoping I would skate under the radar and no one would notice they weren't up...

Clearly, DTV missed their deadline last Wed. They said on a conf. call that they would delay it until the 13th (tomorrow). An hour later, I got an email stating they were delayed indefinitely. The sender may have been referring to Grand Rapids, Mich. which was scheduled to roll out along w/PDX and one other DMA.

I am hesitant to even guess if they'll be on tomorrow or not, but I'd wager it's a 50/50 guess...
Well, I certainly won't hold my breath. Given that I am a new customer and D* (better? ;)) apparently was promising me things without even having their facts straight, that's kind of upsetting. Not to mention the fact that the H20 HD receiver is inexplicably incapable of the "interactive" features, another chestnut I was not informed of before signing up. Assuming the channels don't go live tomorrow, I guess I will have to buy an OTA antenna in order to watch any of the new HD content we'll soon be seeing in primetime. Sigh.

bpayne

09-13-06, 01:01 AM

I presume you guys are discussing DirecTV when you refer to "DTV", or am I wrong? In the AVS lexicon, DTV is defined as digital television. See here (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/faq.php?faq=d#faq_dtv) for the definition.

DirecTV has been lovingly referred to in these forums as D* in shorthand, as unspecific as that acronym is. :rolleyes:

Just so everyone's on the same page. ;)

That was a very eloquent way of telling me that I was wrong. :)

I did not mean to imply that Digital Television had missed its deadline but I get your message loud and clear.

reindeerflotilla

09-13-06, 02:32 AM

And if you're only 7 miles away, your direcitonal antenna might be too directional to pick up both clusters of towers. I tried using a 5 element Yagi at about the same distance and I found that pointing it between the two clusters of stations got me almost no signal from any stations! Someone here advised me to put some of the outer elements back inline with the boom (disabling them) and I found that any more than two elements made the antenna too directional. At that distance, you don't need much gain at all!
Ok this may explain my situation...try to bear with the hopeless n00b here, but I've been screwing with my OTA setup all week with no improvement.

I'm only 3.5 miles SE from the Sylvan cluster. I started with the AntennasDirect DB2 on the floor next to my TV..yeah, no surprise that didn't work well. So I ran just under 75ft of RG6 to the chimney, and tried the DB2 there. Around 25-30% signal, I can't get KATU and KGW at the same time, and I can't get Fox at all.

Changed it out for a RadioShack 40" boom, 17 element UHF only. Even worse results...no three majors at the same time, lots of dropout.

Am I suffering from 'Too directional' or multipath issues? There's some trees and houses on the hillside above me, will those kill the signal that badly?

Thanks in advance for any help!

Phantom Gremlin

09-13-06, 03:37 AM

Am I suffering from 'Too directional' or multipath issues? There's some trees and houses on the hillside above me, will those kill the signal that badly?
You're very close to the towers. You may even be overloading your tuner. Or you may have very little signal at all, if there's a hill in between.

Try rotating your antenna until you get 1 channel at 100% (or close to it). If you can't accomplish that, there is probably something else wrong with your setup. A variable attenuator from Radio Shack (as mentioned previously) can help with diagnosing overload.

Once you get one channel, you will then probably find that you'll get all the other channels on the same tower at near 100%.

Next, rotate the antenna until you can get 1 channel from the other tower at 100%. What is the signal strength from the first tower? Still high? If not, then you're probably too directional.

I eventually gave up and went for $10 cable because of multipath, but you should certainly keep experimenting.

bpayne

09-13-06, 11:31 AM

bigsmooth

09-13-06, 12:17 PM

rifleman69

09-13-06, 01:22 PM

BTW,

MPEG-4 NBC and FOX are now up and running on D*. No word on CBS or ABC- I was kind of afraid that this would happen (not all 4 networks being launched) when I was assured that all 4 networks would on-line at launch. I'm waiting to hear back about ETAs for the missing networks.

Those are my two weakest of the major four networks, still debating on whether or not to buy a "blue boy" or the HR20-700 to receive all four major channels in HD.

I've just heard bad things about the HR20-700 so far (as in the OTA doesn't work as of now, and the lack of dual tuners). Do you have it bpayne or are you still just on the regular H20?

reindeerflotilla

09-13-06, 01:48 PM

rifleman69

09-13-06, 03:48 PM

UI is *much* faster than the HR10-250

Hopefully all of the speed issues with the HR10-250 get squashed when 6.3 is rolled out to us all (it's just about here!). A much more responsive H-DVR would make most of the shortcomings with the HR10-250 disappear in my eyes. I don't watch the Samsung S40 upstairs that often besides before bed, but adding season passes and recording single shows takes so little time, it is just reinforced when doing the same with the HR10-250. Hopefully we get 6.3 soon!

reindeerflotilla

09-13-06, 03:53 PM

You're very close to the towers. You may even be overloading your tuner. Or you may have very little signal at all, if there's a hill in between.

Try rotating your antenna until you get 1 channel at 100% (or close to it). If you can't accomplish that, there is probably something else wrong with your setup. A variable attenuator from Radio Shack (as mentioned previously) can help with diagnosing overload.

Once you get one channel, you will then probably find that you'll get all the other channels on the same tower at near 100%.

Next, rotate the antenna until you can get 1 channel from the other tower at 100%. What is the signal strength from the first tower? Still high? If not, then you're probably too directional.

I eventually gave up and went for $10 cable because of multipath, but you should certainly keep experimenting.
Ok, not sure why, but today I awake and have pretty good lock on the four majors, even KPTV12. HR10-250 is showing all of them at around 65-70 signal strength.

Question: I know the HR10 uses an algorithm to get that #. Is 65-70ish good enough to just leave it alone now? Or is that signal strength prone to easy dropouts and other unpleasantries?

bpayne

09-13-06, 08:51 PM

Those are my two weakest of the major four networks, still debating on whether or not to buy a "blue boy" or the HR20-700 to receive all four major channels in HD.

I've just heard bad things about the HR20-700 so far (as in the OTA doesn't work as of now, and the lack of dual tuners). Do you have it bpayne or are you still just on the regular H20?

I have an Sony HD300, 2 x Sammy TS360, RCA DTC210 and 2 x HR10-250s. As I type this at work, I'm looking at a test bench with an HR10-250, an H20 and an HR20-700. Oh, and an R15 too but I digress.

I'm much more impressed with the HR20 than I initially was with the HD-Tivo. Like most, the slowness of it was a turn-off at first. As an installer, I loved it because they were easy to set up. Don't get me wrong, I love the HD-Tivo and will cry when I can no longer use for my primary HD receiver. The HR20 is faster than I expected it to be, more stable than the R15 and will be capable of things in the future that the HD-Tivo just wasn't capable of. It is also an installer's nightmare to deal with.

The OTA is scheduled to go active on October 3. When you say "lack of dual tuners" you're talking about dual live buffering right? If so, that's the feature I miss the most over the HD-Tivo. A D* Home Services contact told me this is a feature they may add but is considered a low priority compared to VOD, interactive features, software stability fixes, bug fixes and future "external add-ons"- whatever that means.

I say this much, anyone who wants to get D* should just bypass the H20 completely and get the HR20; the more and more I use the HR20, the more I hate the H20 simply because it's just as slow as the HR20 but lacks both the InterActive and DVR functionality. It also will not be available in glossy piano-black like the HR20 will in Q4; my quest to return all my home theater to glossy black is almost complete.

bpayne

09-13-06, 09:26 PM

Ok this may explain my situation...try to bear with the hopeless n00b here, but I've been screwing with my OTA setup all week with no improvement.

I'm only 3.5 miles SE from the Sylvan cluster. I started with the AntennasDirect DB2 on the floor next to my TV..yeah, no surprise that didn't work well. So I ran just under 75ft of RG6 to the chimney, and tried the DB2 there. Around 25-30% signal, I can't get KATU and KGW at the same time, and I can't get Fox at all.

Changed it out for a RadioShack 40" boom, 17 element UHF only. Even worse results...no three majors at the same time, lots of dropout.

Am I suffering from 'Too directional' or multipath issues? There's some trees and houses on the hillside above me, will those kill the signal that badly?

Thanks in advance for any help!

You're too close with DB2- the viewing area isn't wide enough to pick up all the towers from the same point.

With the other antenna, you are overloading the HR10's tuner, which they are notorious for. Internally, there is an amplifier right before the OTA is split to the dual tuners. Less is definitely more- you need an omnidirectional antenna but you should avoid mounting it outside so that you can avoid as much multipath as possible.

reindeerflotilla

09-14-06, 12:55 AM

You're too close with DB2- the viewing area isn't wide enough to pick up all the towers from the same point.

With the other antenna, you are overloading the HR10's tuner, which they are notorious for. Internally, there is an amplifier right before the OTA is split to the dual tuners. Less is definitely more- you need an omnidirectional antenna but you should avoid mounting it outside so that you can avoid as much multipath as possible.
Yeah, I switched out the other antenna and messed with the DB2 on the roof today. I lined up everything with great signal except for KOIN, which goes from great signal in and out to nothing. It won't stay stable. I assume that's multipath.

I tried an atennuator from Radio Shack, it didn't help thus far. Maybe I'll try the DB2 down in the basement. After that, I'm thinking maybe of the SR8 indoor yagi or the Winegard SS3000 Sharpshooter.

earletp

09-15-06, 05:56 AM

I guess the lack of comments about KPTV dropping to SD tonight should probably indicate how well that new Brad Garrett comedy is doing, eh? :)

cheon1971

09-15-06, 08:21 PM

Quick question.
To see if those D* local HD's are up, do I need to reboot my H20?

BTW,

MPEG-4 NBC and FOX are now up and running on D*. No word on CBS or ABC- I was kind of afraid that this would happen (not all 4 networks being launched) when I was assured that all 4 networks would on-line at launch. I'm waiting to hear back about ETAs for the missing networks.

frederic1943

09-16-06, 01:15 AM

earletp

09-16-06, 11:44 PM

scowl

09-17-06, 03:14 AM

When I had my antenna outside instead of in my attic I once had trouble with some stations all of a sudden after some wind. It turned out that my antenna mast was a little loose and the wind had turned it a couple of degrees to the north. I thought I had tightened those bolts but I must have forgotten! :confused:

jfolliard

09-17-06, 08:02 PM

James in PDX

09-17-06, 08:36 PM

I in Beaverton and using an indoor Zenith Silver Sensor antenna and it works really well.

I do have some fallouts at times but I am shooting through basically two apartments. I do not use the HD receiver for tuning though, I use my TV itself. It works really well. Not sure if yours has a build in tuner.

Also to get some good antenna information on where to point it go to the site antennaweb[dot]org

On the side note, I just went to the DirecTV site and plugged in my zip and they say that channel 8 and 12 are in HD. But when I tuned in 8 to see the game this evening, it was not HD just standard and it doesn't show 8.1 any longer either. I am not sure if I need a different receiver, have an HD10, or LNB on my dish.

Things are finally looking up for us.

Budget_HT

09-17-06, 10:15 PM

newbie here - just got my first HD flat panel - Vizio GV 42 LCD. I live between Raleigh Hills and Sylvan just off Scholls Ferry. main service is Directv - I can get 2.1, 6.1, 8.1 and 12.1 but not the other locals - I have a relatively cheap and small indoor antenna hooked up to the coaxial input. Here's the kicker - I get great HD pictures on the locals that I do receive, but no sound! Could that be related to the antenna and weak reception?

Second question, any idea when Directv will give us the locals in HD via satellite?

Thanks, Jack

Jack
If you have an HD TiVo (DirecTV HR10-250) and if you are connected to your TV using an HDMI cable, you might need to change your sound option:

DIRECTV Central (menu)>>Messages & Setup>>Settings>>Audio>>Dolby Digital>>No, play standard audio

I have an HR10-250 HDMI-connected to a smaller Vizio HDTV, and I had to set the audio option this way to get sound from the TV speakers. This is because these TVs do not have Dolby Digital decoders. Non-SD channels are not sending DD audio and work fine with either audio setting.

rifleman69

09-17-06, 10:34 PM

jfolliard

09-17-06, 10:54 PM

You need the new dish to receive 8.1 and 12.1 from DirecTV via satellite (as well as have the H20 or HR20).

Which new dish - I just got a new one with 3 LNBs when they set me up for HD.

reindeerflotilla

09-18-06, 12:36 AM

Which new dish - I just got a new one with 3 LNBs when they set me up for HD.
You need the 5-LNB dish and a HR20/H20 receiver. I'm surprised they set you up with a 3-LNB dish this late in the game.

rifleman69

09-18-06, 01:02 PM

You need the 5-LNB dish and a HR20/H20 receiver. I'm surprised they set you up with a 3-LNB dish this late in the game.

I'm surprised as well, I've been offered the 5-LNB dish for no charge (with no purchase/lease of an HR20/H20) but don't want to be drawn into another two year contract as of yet.

bpayne

09-18-06, 01:05 PM

You need the 5-LNB dish and a HR20/H20 receiver. I'm surprised they set you up with a 3-LNB dish this late in the game.

If he has an H10, he has been set up with a 3-LNB for quite a while, maybe a year or more.

Quick question.
To see if those D* local HD's are up, do I need to reboot my H20?

Nope, the HD channels are repopulated into the guide automatically.

Also, for anyone interested- I took some rain fade data during the bad storm we had Friday. The bias is- with the weak, low power KA-band (17-23 Ghz) carrying the HD channels of the future for D*, they would be notoriously unreliable during times of inclement weather. For the Northwest, that's pretty much October through April, right? ;)

I watched the signals as the weather got worse- starting from a high of 100%, the signal slowly but steadily dropped all the way down to 31% (most receivers get severe breakup and totally lose their lock at around 40-45%). At 31%, there was just some minor artifacts on the screen, but no macroblocking or error messages. In comparison, I pulled up my HD-Tivo which was tuned in to an HD baseball game coming down from 119- which was getting severe breakup and intermittent message of 'SFSS'.

Needless to say, I was pleasantly surprised.

Of course, I don't think I'm going to take down my OTA just quite yet- which happens to be located in my crawl space and is pulling in 90%+ signal on all channels btw. /gloat

Konrad2

09-18-06, 01:16 PM

KPDX used to be 1080i, but has switched to 720p.
Does anyone know why they changed? Just curious.

Konrad2

09-18-06, 01:23 PM

> just got my first HD flat panel

> I have a relatively cheap and small indoor antenna hooked up to the
> coaxial input. Here's the kicker - I get great HD pictures on the
> locals that I do receive, but no sound! Could that be related to the
> antenna and weak reception?

Bad reception of digital stations would be dropouts, blocky artifacts,
glitches, etc. Great HD pictures and no sound is not a symptom of
bad reception.

Most likely something is configured wrong on your new tv. Read the
owners manual again and check all the settings.

scowl

09-18-06, 02:17 PM

KPDX used to be 1080i, but has switched to 720p.
Does anyone know why they changed? Just curious.
Since UPN merged with the WB, KPDX became an MyTV network affiliate which distributes their programming in 720p (they're owned by Fox).

bbroach

09-18-06, 05:40 PM

I'm surprised as well, I've been offered the 5-LNB dish for no charge (with no purchase/lease of an HR20/H20) but don't want to be drawn into another two year contract as of yet.

I was told by a D* CSR that the HR20 activation triggered a new service obligation term (although I think she said one year, not two), but that the AT9 installation did not.

regards, billb....

Arutha_conDoin

09-18-06, 11:50 PM

BTW,

MPEG-4 NBC and FOX are now up and running on D*. No word on CBS or ABC- I was kind of afraid that this would happen (not all 4 networks being launched) when I was assured that all 4 networks would on-line at launch. I'm waiting to hear back about ETAs for the missing networks.
I must be behind the times on this. I didn't noitice that Fox and NBC had HD going on D* until today. I am bummed the other local channels are not going HD yet, but hopefully soon. Atleast I will get a few football games in HD now and some shows that start up next week. Now if I can get an HR20 I'll be all set.

I need to start paying attention now to the local channels instead of watching all the other HD channels.

Phantom Gremlin

09-19-06, 03:45 AM

Also, for anyone interested- I took some rain fade data during the bad storm we had Friday. The bias is- with the weak, low power KA-band (17-23 Ghz) carrying the HD channels of the future for D*, they would be notoriously unreliable during times of inclement weather. For the Northwest, that's pretty much October through April, right? ;)
DirecTV can dynamically change the power for each local beam to punch thru any bad weather. However, I don't know if they're actually doing this yet. Plus, the satellite itself has a finite amount of power, so if there are thunderstorms *everywhere* in the country then something will have to give.

Dish alignment is very critical for the new satellites. Max error allowed is only about 1/3 or 1/2 that of Ku sats. Maybe your dish is mis-aligned.

But, since you didn't lose picture, maybe DirecTV increased power. Or maybe the forward error correction worked its magic.

I lost signal on Ku from 101 last week on the first day of rain. About 10 minutes downtime. This happens to me less than 5 times a year.

bpayne

09-19-06, 11:27 AM

Dish alignment is very critical for the new satellites. Max error allowed is only about 1/3 or 1/2 that of Ku sats. Maybe your dish is mis-aligned.
But, since you didn't lose picture, maybe DirecTV increased power. Or maybe the forward error correction worked its magic.

There's nothing wrong with the dish alignment. If there was, I'd probably be out of a job. ;)

Dynamically increasing the power on a downlink is costly and just not D*'s style. However, the transponders aren't power-balanced yet so the full "wattage" available on the satellite are being divided across just a few transponders. Even after a few more transponders come on line, the rain fade performance would still be in-line with I saw the other day.

cullenpdx

09-19-06, 01:31 PM

Anyone else having trouble with KOIN channel 6-1 (channel 40) the last few days? Before Tuesday Sept. 12th it was always in the high 80s, Wednesday night I was getting 20s & 30s for a signal, Thursday night was back to the high 70s, Friday was good for a while then dropping down to the mid 50s. Saturday at 8pm the signal was a peak of 37.

I've had trouble with KOIN more than any other channel. It has not been consistant either. During Rockstar Supernova two episodes had an in and out audio static for 2 weeks in a row. I wrote KOIN(got no response) and the following week things were fixed.

Both last week and this week Monday night has been a problem specifically on 6_1. Though I usually have issues with 6_2 at the same time. I've got a strong signal (97%) but I couldn't get a lock. This happened between 8pm and 9:45pm on 9/18. Other stations have been solid and the signal lock came back during New Old Christine.

BTW I'm up in Vancouver

I have a hard time believing these are environmental issues as they don't follow a weather trend, I have the same trouble tuning on different brand tuners all the other stations are in the clear, and it seems that each time the problem is different. There have been several times I've seen "Loss of input signal" with an over 90% signal and a lock on my end so I know that is from their end. I think, like the rest of Portland they are still going through digital puberty.

Lee Wood

09-19-06, 03:40 PM

It's apparently that time of year again. See:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=3667051&highlight=fall#post3667051

My 2002 second generation Zenith tube TV has been having reception problems, but my shiny new Sylvania LCD is rock solid. My ancient RCA DTC-100 tuner hardly ever fails either. There have definately been improvements in receiver technology, but it still varies wildly from manufacturer to manfacturer.

cullenpdx

09-19-06, 06:16 PM

It's apparently that time of year again. See:

My 2002 second generation Zenith tube TV has been having reception problems, but my shiny new Sylvania LCD is rock solid. My ancient RCA DTC-100 tuner hardly ever fails either. There have definately been improvements in receiver technology, but it still varies wildly from manufacturer to manfacturer.

I'd buy a weather explaination under different circumstances. For starters, on Monday 9/11/06 there was no rain nor had there been for days, the developers of my neighborhood systematically removed all the good trees and my small poll of people in Vancouver, Beaverton, and Oregon City had OTA issues with Channel 6 from Sunday night through Monday night . No other channels had an issue. This again happened on Monday the 18th which could have been weather effects, but again no other channel was acting up.

I am not an expert by any means, but mearly an observer.

Edit: That makes 3 Mondays in a row(9/11 9/18 9/25) that reception is bad on KION. No problems during the rest of the week. Very strange, most certainly not a weather problem.