...any idea why are they not -1's? "-1" is already being used to designate local channels received with OTA antenna, for D* receivers/DVRs that have OTA capability (AM21, H20 or HR20).

BTW, I've heard the LR spot beam is getting out all the way to at least to the Branson area. I also hear it's coming in fine here in Carroll County. ;)

EDIT: The LOUD audio problem on the LR SD locals (particularly KTHV), appears to have been tamed on the HD counterparts.



.

Getting my Locals also, I'm very happy at the moment. To save me a bunch of reading, can someone please explain about the sub channels. Will Directv offer the subs also? Or, do we just get the Main channels? And, will 38 & 42 be carried in HD later on for the LR market? And the most important question of all. How do I trick Directv into giving me the LR and FT. Smith locals?:D:D:D

I just noticed that when, in the guide on DirecTV, if you go to the left column where the channel name is, that the new versions from the sat all say "A3 Little Rock ...." next to them. Guess thats just how they are going to do it instead of putting DT or whatever next to the channel name.

You would need two accounts to get Little Rock and Ft Smith locals, using two different service addresses, OR find a friend in FT Smith, have him add a receiver to his account, add one to yours and swap em.

Forget subchannels, won't ever happen until they kill the SD Lil, then the MIGHT use that bandwidth for subchannels.

CW and MyNetwork aren't carried elsewhere in the county HD except a select few markets, I doubt they will add them here unless they add them everywhere...Just guessing tho.

No PBS-HD, no joy.

I thought that was part of the deal when they put the locals up that they HAD to carry all the subchannels? And I thought they had to carry all the other local channels like MNTV and CW or they couldn't carry any at all?? It would be a crying shame if they didn't carry CW. I mean, there are loads of people out there that love Supernatural, Reaper, and Smallville (me for the last two). It would just seem really odd for them to not carry them.

I am willing to bet that they said October on their website to give them enough time to work out deals with the few remaining stations that they didn't have deals with. I figure that they had planned all along to turn us on in September (remember Alison's post awhile back about going digital in September? http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=14385403#post14385403) to give us the main channels and then keep working on it until October to get the rest. It only seems logical.

I'm getting a lot of video and audio dropouts on KARK-DT via DirecTV but not OTA. Can anyone confirm?

fly

Yep, lots of video drop outs on KARK-Direct here as well. OTOH, KATV looks better on Directv than OTA...investigating the reason. Went to my parents and reprogrammed their DvR's and removed the rabbit ears.

CW's Chief engineer is on this forum occasionally, maybe he will shed some light.

Must carry for digitals is different than analog. Subchannels are not mandated, and Satellite is exempt I believe...due to bandwidth constraints. Might be wrong there, but satellite never carried all the analogs either. Ch58 for one. Check out the national list and see how many markets get CW in HD. Be nice to get it, and PBS, since those are the two channels I have to point the antenna away from shinall for. Kinda disappointed in Directv...I STILL have to choose between Redfield and Shinall....KWBF or KASN/KETS.
What a shame...dont throw out those antennas yet.

KARK-DT, KATV-DT, KTHV-DT, and KLRT-DT are up this morning on DirecTV.
It's after 9pm and I just noticed this too. However, KLRT seems to be squished instead of regular HD and the OTA version looks the same. What's with that?

I'm thrilled to get these channels in HD now, but please tell me they are going to carry KETS in HD too.

They said they were going to carry PBS, but nothing so far. They are supposed to carry PBS-HD national as well...

Yep, lots of video drop outs on KARK-Direct here as well. OTOH, KATV looks better on Directv than OTA...investigating the reason. Went to my parents and reprogrammed their DvR's and removed the rabbit ears.

CW's Chief engineer is on this forum occasionally, maybe he will shed some light.

Must carry for digitals is different than analog. Subchannels are not mandated, and Satellite is exempt I believe...due to bandwidth constraints. Might be wrong there, but satellite never carried all the analogs either. Ch58 for one. Check out the national list and see how many markets get CW in HD. Be nice to get it, and PBS, since those are the two channels I have to point the antenna away from shinall for. Kinda disappointed in Directv...I STILL have to choose between Redfield and Shinall....KWBF or KASN/KETS.
What a shame...dont throw out those antennas yet.

Dave, don't ever throw out your antenna, remember, that part except for up keep, is free tv. Besides, everytime I get a heavy rain coming from the south (75% of our strorms come from the south) my directv goes out, I then resort to my OTA while the dish is down. The only thing that gives me fits on OTA is lightning. IF its lightning between my location and the tower, I get pixeling and sudden drops. But, they dont last long and progarmming is usually still watchable. Of course bear in mind that I'm extreme fringe so I need that big antenna.

I'd never get rid of the antenna. I use it for Dx'ing...but for the DVR, it would be nice to have all the channels, since it can't turn the rotor, and no one ever included a disq command on the OTA ports to allow for two or more OTA antennas in multiple directions, which would be a perfect solution.

I'd never get rid of the antenna. I use it for Dx'ing...but for the DVR, it would be nice to have all the channels, since it can't turn the rotor, and no one ever included a disq command on the OTA ports to allow for two or more OTA antennas in multiple directions, which would be a perfect solution.

Yes, absolutely, two OTA ports would be nice. I could use that myself, LR to my East Ft. Smith to the West

But its (http://tvdxseark.blogspot.com/2008/09/tropo-returns.html)not KATV ;)

I'd never get rid of the antenna. I use it for Dx'ing...but for the DVR, it would be nice to have all the channels, since it can't turn the rotor, and no one ever included a disq command on the OTA ports to allow for two or more OTA antennas in multiple directions, which would be a perfect solution.
Why can't you guys just use a splitter to combine two antennas pointing each way into the one input? Wouldn't that work easier?

They said they were going to carry PBS, but nothing so far. They are supposed to carry PBS-HD national as well...Was that in a press release or other official announcement?

Why can't you guys just use a splitter to combine two antennas pointing each way into the one input? Wouldn't that work easier?
That is possible if signal levels are high enough. Might be worth a try for them.

The following is from:

http://www.hdtvprimer.com/ANTENNAS/merging.html

In summary, when a 2-way splitter is used as a combiner,
1. one quarter of the input power is reflected back towards the input,
2. one quarter of the input power is diverted to the other input, and
3. one half of the input power is forwarded to the intended load.
These numbers assume the splitter is 100% efficient.

They would lose more than half the signal (~3.5 dB) on all channels.

Nah, I doubt they would really lose that much. I put a splitter on my antenna line to run one to the HR20 and one to the TV. I saw no difference in signal levels on the HR20. My Philips plasma's tuner is crappy though, so I didn't get much of a good signal that way. In any case, I didn't see any drop in signal levels on the HR20's meter, so thats why I doubt they would lose that much of a signal just by using a splitter as a combiner.

@Steveken:

You are probably referring to some sort of signal "quality" level which is in some form or fashion what most devices report. They do label it as "signal level" on a lot of them. Perhaps I should have said signal strength. Whether quality drops or not depends on the signal/noise ratio and how high the signal strength was before the reduction. With a strong signal strength it is quite possible that it could be halved and still maintain the same or similar signal quality readings.

Those nasty laws of physics show (see previously cited link) there is no way around cutting the signal strength at least in half when combining 2 antennas pointed in different directions or by using a splitter to distribute the signal as you described. Whether that causes a reduction in signal quality depends on the resultant signal/noise ratio among other things.

dmatch

In my fringe area, little details like "not splitting" can mean the difference in getting your channels or not. Example: I did some upadating to my mom and dads rooms with tvs the other day. I had just set up a brand new LG 47" HDTV for them in the living room and was concerned about OTA signal levels which are fairly low in our area. I could pull in 4.1, 11.1 and 16.1 pretty good. There cabling and pre amp are mounted in their attic. From the power supply of the pre-amp, a RG6 was supplying a 4 way splitter, a radio shack special which was already feeding 3 rooms. I decided to just take a shot and change out that splitter which I figure had somewhere in the 7.5-9db loss per port. Because I needed to add a 4th room, I had a dilema. At first when I was thinking "3" rooms, I was gonna add a Regal low loss 3-way splitter, port one was 3.5db loss, I planned on running this to the living room for their HDTV, the other two ports were 7db loss, we could live with that in the bedrooms. However, like I said, I needed to hook up a forth room. So, I added a Regal low loss 4-way splitter but was not happy about it as I feared major signal loss, it would still be a better siganl than the Radio shack special was passing, but still, I wanted to really gain and the 4th room deal nipped that in the bud. So, I hookup the 4-way Regal, (BTW, these are teh best splitter for low loss that I've personally used, they are what lots of cable companies use for low loss) and what do you know, I was surprised to see that not only had the original 3 rooms gained signal strenght on the existing channels, but now we were locking 38.1 & .2 in the 75-80% range. Before, 38.1 would not lock and the signal hovered in the 40-50% range. Just giving their system 1-2db more siganl made a huge difference. I also ran into another problem that I figured out. While the living room and 2 bedrooms were receiving 38.1 at 75%, the 3rd bedroom continued to not lock 38.1 and it hovered still in the 40% range. BTW, the bedroom tvs are 4x3 analog sets all hooked up now on Insignia coverter boxes. So, I say, whats wrong with the last bedroom? Is it bad cabling, bad F connectors, Possibly a bend in the cable somewhere. So, I decide to think for a moment about the whole situation. I ask myself if all rooms are hooked up equally, my first answer is Yes, but I decide to look around in the last room just to make sure. Guess what I find? Instead of running the coax from the splitter in the attic straight into the insignia box( which it was originally when I hooked it up a few months back) someone had decided to hookup an old nintendo system, you know the ones with the RF adapter that you hook your incoming cable to then hook the adapter to the box or TV. They said no one hardly uses it so I took out the adapter and put the cable straight to the the converter box and 38.1 came right in just as strong as the other rooms:) So, said all that just to share some of my experiences with fringe areas, weak signals and the benefits and non benefits of splitting. Also to show how important it is to choose "good quality splitters which usually have a lower loss and are built better internally" over your run of the mill "cheap splitters" some of them with outrageous db loss. Splitters are not just splitters and they are not all created equally. I've learned or had to learn in a fringe area such as mine, you get what you pay for, and where a splitter might not make a noticeable difference in strong signal areas, it can be the difference between watching OTA tv or starring at a black screen.

@Steveken:

You are probably referring to some sort of signal "quality" level which is in some form or fashion what most devices report. They do label it as "signal level" on a lot of them. Perhaps I should have said signal strength. Whether quality drops or not depends on the signal/noise ratio and how high the signal strength was before the reduction. With a strong signal strength it is quite possible that it could be halved and still maintain the same or similar signal quality readings.

Those nasty laws of physics show (see previously cited link) there is no way around cutting the signal strength at least in half when combining 2 antennas pointed in different directions or by using a splitter to distribute the signal as you described. Whether that causes a reduction in signal quality depends on the resultant signal/noise ratio among other things.:(

dmatch

dmatch, I know exactly what your talking about. I used to experience this sometimes on my 10ft Cband Dish when I had 4DTV. You could be starring at a black screen, the singal would be reading 100% but he Quality might show 10%. Until you could get the quality up to 50-60%, you were out of luck. I really needed to realign my dish, it had been in use for 12 years and digital is just so darn touchy that even a big 10ft dish needs to be pretty much dead on arch and pitch. Fortunately for me, my system was still pretty close and I got most channels with no problems. I'll say this, Analog was so much easier in just about all aspects of the game. When tuning sattellites, you could find the SAT/transponder, start out snowy, and let the system lock it in clear as a bell, easy to find, easy to fine tune. Digital is a whole different game, either you lock it or you dont, it can be a major pain at times.

BTW, there are so many who dont know this. All of us who have had Big Dishes do know. The Quality of true full blown analog does put out an amazing picture in its own right. While most I knew watched tv on antenna and crappy cable systems, I enjoyed years of crystal clear quality that only a C-band system could provide. If analog was not going dead in Feb, I'd hook my old Toshiba TRX1500 receiver back up to the system, man did I ever watch the football on the C-band. I used to get a big kick out of ESPN Gameplan, I got everything they offered plus lots lost more free for almost 20 years on Saturdays and Sundays. And does anyone else here remember PPV for free:D.......Wrestlemainas, Movies, Sports events, Boxing.....it was a nice and exciting time to have such a set up that gave the normal guy like us so much freedom in the sky, it was great! I miss it pretty badly

My grandparents had a big dish like that. I remember playing with it. I remember what you were talking about going across the sky watching the signal go from snow to crystal clear. It was my first experience with stuff like NASA TV and SciFi (I think....or maybe it was some kinda scifi channel). That was in like 1987 or so I think, maybe earlier, I know I was pretty young. Never could get my parents to buy a dish. We always had cable or something like it. In Jonesboro we had the cable box in our backyard. I remember one time we went into it and got HBO for free. It was kinda neat. Then there was the old brown, push button cable box on top of the tv. Man was that crap. Anyway, just thought I would talk about it a little. I am not as old as you guys, but I am old enough to remember the early days of most so-called cable systems and playing with big dishes.

My grandparents had a big dish like that. I remember playing with it. I remember what you were talking about going across the sky watching the signal go from snow to crystal clear. It was my first experience with stuff like NASA TV and SciFi (I think....or maybe it was some kinda scifi channel). That was in like 1987 or so I think, maybe earlier, I know I was pretty young. Never could get my parents to buy a dish. We always had cable or something like it. In Jonesboro we had the cable box in our backyard. I remember one time we went into it and got HBO for free. It was kinda neat. Then there was the old brown, push button cable box on top of the tv. Man was that crap. Anyway, just thought I would talk about it a little. I am not as old as you guys, but I am old enough to remember the early days of most so-called cable systems and playing with big dishes.

Your probably not too much younger than me, I'm 38, I was 17 in 1987. My first experience with one was at my rich uncles house in 1983, I had never seen tv like that before. We had only recently hooked up to a new cable system in danville called Petit Jean Cable Co. Channels 2-13 and I thought it was awesome because all we had ever had was a Rooftop which got 4 and 11 from LR and 5 from Ft. Smith pretty well. Katv 7 was snowy but watchable, 2 was the same way. Channels 6 TBS, 8 TBN, 9 Nickelodeon, 10 ESPN, 12 Can't remember and 13 WGN were our cable channels. Man I thought we had it all until I saw my Uncles C-band dish system and all the free tv he was getting. I never knew so much tv existed before that. I watched Porkys 2 at his house and saw the blond Libararians tits and man all I wanted to do after that was go over to my uncles and see more big tities:D Had my mom and dad known, I'd been grounded for life:eek: I still remember the day I came in from school and they had installed our little wiener cable system, man I thought I'd done moved Up-Town. Still remember what it cost....$9/mo. The feeling didnt last long, once I'd watched C-band at my uncles, I moved back to the Slums and realized that he was the one living UP-Town....so I visited him a lot:D

Was that in a press release or other official announcement?

Yes, search dbstalk.com, they have the press release and a whole thread on it.

I tried combining two antennas in different directions..Works for some channels, not for others. if you got it right to add the multipath caused by the antenna pointed away from the transmitter, it would subtract from another channel, since the coax would be resonant on different channels. Might work on for combining/stacking, but not in a strong signal area.

Edit: Midnight 090608... Skip in from Texas... signal on 15 Dallas and North Texas DT's and KMSS at 100%. Only got to lock KWTX from Waco...Dallas stations all just below my lock level.

I tried combining two antennas in different directions..Works for some channels, not for others. if you got it right to add the multipath caused by the antenna pointed away from the transmitter, it would subtract from another channel, since the coax would be resonant on different channels. Might work on for combining/stacking, but not in a strong signal area.
ok, but that was with the two antennas at the same height? I would think that if they were at different heights, or possibly in two different locations on the house, then you might be able to get around the multi path problem. Especially if you can put them in two locations where each antenna only gets the channels you are wanting to get from that location (i.e. impossible to get the other channel), then you would have great separation and most likely no multi path. And would it work if you combined them further down the line than you normally might in order to keep the resonant frequencies apart?

Just pitching out ideas. I can imagine its a pain the way it is now to have to hold your tongue, ear, and left eye the right way to get a particular channel without turning the antenna. :)

It's great to finally have the local HD channels via Directv. Only problem is that for some reason KARK won't let us see golf in HD today.

If there is a problem with the feed, they should run an apology (something that is never seen anymore in LR television) to let the viewer know that it is not their fault. Since they aren't running an apology, I assume that it is their fault the program is not being shown in HD and someone is once again "asleep at the wheel."

You would think that a supervisor would be watching and call and wake them up.

Steveken: There is no where, no way, to find a spot anywhere, where there is no signal coming into the antenna here... I can rotate 360 and never loose signal on 12,30,32, and 44. I can get 0 quality, but always have signal. Tried combining at antenna, and receiver, no difference. signals bounce off buildings downtown and come in almost as strong as direct LOS. What they need to make, is a receiver with disq commands. Then you could add a 2, 4 or 8 port disq switch at the antenna...and hook say two antennas to port 1 and 2. Then on the receiver, for each channel, you tell it which port to use. When you switch to that channel, it sends the command to the switch, to select the port. No more rotors. Could have a monochannel yagi for each channel if you wanted that way. Its how my FTA satellite receiver works. I can use one dish and the receiver sends disq command to either turn the "rotor" or select from up to 16 dishes, or a combination of the two. Directv uses disq commands to control the BBC's, so the software is already there...all they would need to do is pass the command out the OTA port, and add a field in the menu to select a port for each channel. It could default to port 1 for those that don't use a switch.

Oh, ok. Like I said, just throwing ideas out there. Can't blame a guy for tryin. :)

I'm getting KSPR and all the other DTV's from Springfield MO (yes even KYTV so no KATV via KWBF-DT)...the bad news is KSPR is serving up the Cincinnati-Oklahoma game which is ABC's only SD offering this week.

Just got back from a short day trip from Lake Village...FM dial was filled with Jackson, Memphis, Little Rock, East Texas and even Southern Missouri en route and on the return.

OTA Rocks :D

Wow, skip is Rockin' tonight. WHNT-DT from Huntsville,AL and WBBJ-DT Jackson,Tn for two new digital states for me...Still can't break into Missouri from here for some reason. KMSS pegging the meter as usual. WOW...Just got KTMD-DT from Galveston,Tx.

Holy crap!! I am locking KARD 14.1 from El Dorado here tonight using that Philips indoor/outdoor amplified antenna just sitting by my window on my H20-600. All I did was tell it to do a channel scan. I am watching Friends. I was like, noone is supposed to be showing this! :)

Also got this channel labeled as WNTZ thats showing some black guy preaching. Macedonia Missionary Baptist Church, Alexandria, LA :)

This is amazing for me!!! I have NEVER gotten something from that far away....not even analog.

Another scan found KTVE's 2 channels and a 54-22 through -24. None of those are coming in at the moment though. Guess they are iffy. :)

Edit: Got KTVE-HD and -SD (Weather Radar) now. 54 is still tough.

currently locking in Waco, TX.... and Jackson, MS DTs at the moment.... as well as WLBT analog 3 from Jackson with a snow free signal down here in south AR. Haven't received anything to the north, yet. Been awhile since I've DXed... :)

Keith, what channel is showing a Tony Little demo'ing a filter/fan of some sort right now? I think you are in the area to get that channel.

NM, WJTV Jackson I think is what I saw on 52.23. Was a radar map.

I see an infomercial for a pillow on WJTV-DT in Jackson....and an infomercial for face cleanser on WAPT-DT in Jackson... but I don't see any infomercials on the Waco stations. The channel with the black guy preaching was WNTZ-DT, a FOX affiliate in Natchez, MS but services the Alexandria DMA.

Yeah, thats what it was, a pillow. Tony Little is his name. Hmm, KTVE-HD doesn't have a very sharp picture it doesn't seem.

If you know what channel you are on, check out:
http://www.w9wi.com/tvdb/index.htm
and it lists all the stations on that channel.

KTVE-HD looks great when they're showing NBC programming.... but their local inserts and programming always looks crappy. I wish they would do something with 10-2.... like a 24 hours news/weather channel. Their doppler radar isn't very sensitive, either... I'd hate to rely on it to tell me when a storm is coming!

Currently watching WMPN-HD, the Mississppi Public Broadcasting flagship station in Jackson... their HD looks pretty good for having two other subchannels... they keep the full 1080i signal, also... they don't downgrade it to 720p like AETN has started doing.

Dave, whats those numbers beside the callsign supposed to mean?

I think this is so cool that I am able to get these. 52 is just hard to get for me right now. Can't hold my tongue right for it. :) All of this is off an antenna INSIDE my house. :) On the north side of it. :)

City,State / Callsign / Transmitter power erp / Antenna Height AAT / polarity D=directional / Lat / Long / Lic type / Affiliation

Oh well, as fun as this is, I think I am going to have to go to bed now. I need to be able to be functional tomorrow afternoon for my son's birthday party. :)

Edit: Natchez, MS WNTZ 1.000 51.00 31°30'33"N 91°24'19"W DS-STA Fox/My

That means they are transmitting 1KW??? Or 1MW? If its KW, then how in the hell is it making the trip all the way up to here? :) Thats funny.

West Monroe, LA KARD 5000. 572.0 -dH 32° 5'41"N 92°10'39"W TV-LIC Fox

So, the 5000 would mean KW as well? Interesting.

El Dorado, AR KTVE 316.0 605.0 - H 33° 4'41"N 92°13'41"W TV-LIC NBC

Another low power one. Hmm, I am getting it almost the best.

Yeah I'm having a hard time keeping WAPT (21) and WJTV (52), as well.... Still hanging onto WMPN (20). steve, that's cool that you're able to get the Jackson stations with just an indoor antenna! Jackson is almost 300 miles from Little Rock... I'm just about 150 miles from Jackson and I'm having a difficult time locking them in with a CM 4228 and a preamp 25 feet up in the air! What else have you been able to lock in tonight besides Jackson and KTVE, KARD and the Natchez station?

Where are you at Keith? I've got everything from Jackson TN to Galveston Tx tonight...broke the coax connector rotating it to much, had to climb up there and crimp a new one on :). I'm getting ch 14 now, but to weak to lock. I'm pointed 74 degrees from LR...any idea?

Steveken: 1.000 would be 1 KW. Some stations are listed in several catagories, make sure you are looking in the USA DTV Stations: list. 316KW would be a ch 7-13 full power analog license. 100KW would be a full power analoglic on 2-6. Full power analog UHF is 5000KW. DTV full power is 1000KW, but stations are running all sorts of power from 21KW to full power.

I'm down in El Dorado.... also down in a bit of a valley, so that may be why I'm not able to lock in Dallas or Houston... although I've locked them in once before but it's been two years or so. From my location, the most common visitors are East Texas, Central Louisiana, and Jackson, MS.... Little Rock is as far north as I've locked... with the exception of some Springfield analogs last year, and that was a one time occurrence. I couldn't tell you what the channel 14 is....notice on the station list, there's a DT on channel 14 in Memphis.... could that be it? It doesn't list a network... so it has to be some kind of independent...

Thought it might be, but not getting any other memphis now (was earlier), and its real low power. Its weird, I'm getting some stations out far, but not ones clser in on the same direction...Almost like a duct rather than tropo. Wormhole as it were :)

I've noticed the same thing tonight. Right now, all I'm getting are my usual channels including the Shreveport ones (KMSS, KTBS, KTAL) and KWTX-DT from Waco. The Waco station is stronger than the Shreveport ones, and I'm getting nothing from the Tyler-Longview area which is over 100 miles closer than Waco! I've had a ping or two from San Antonio and Beaumont... but not enough for a lock....

Well I guess I'm off to bed.... I hope there's some good in store for later today... I can't get the DX forecast page to load up. Have a good one, Dave!

Just a note from yesterday on what could be a policy change at KATV. After the Raycom game ran late they joined the MISS vs WF ABC game in progress. They didn't throw the HD switch for a couple of commercial breaks though. I wish they wouldn't have the Raycom game and the ABC games on the same station at all, but this would be a lot better than a SD tape delay.

fly

Still getting WNTZ-DT and KTVE-HD KTVE-SD and KARD (barely) right now. Haven't looked at the signal strength on anything though. All I know is that I am not getting or any of the 52's right now. Hehehehe, can't get 4.1 or 7.1 (well, kinda get 7 and the 42's, but not real well), but I can get those others where this antenna is sitting.

Using my Vizio's tuner, I am getting KALB now along with KTVE and WNTZ. I just can't believe I am able to get this many distant stations so well. How can KALB have both NBC AND CBS??? 5-1 is NBC, 5-2 is CBS. Its weird.


Whelp, that didn't last long. The 5's are now gone.....at least for now. Maybe they will come back.

KALB has this encoder that's sold as capable of doing two HD feeds. From what I hear, it looks like crap, but they convert the CBS to 720p and then transmit both with about the bitrate that KWBF gives its two HD feeds, but it's much more dynamic than KWBF's bitrates so there's more bits to shuffle around.

- Trip

I am now getting WKNO and WMPN (well, not enough to display, but evidently enough to lock while scanning). WKNO's channel's are strong.

I take it this is not normal?

Normal for the spring and fall. A little unusual for this month. Check out 53...WHBQ Memphis. Its running 100% here.

Can't get 53....direct tune and it says theres nothing there. Even WKNO is in and out.

Still getting Jackson, tn at 100% and Just locked Huntsville ch 41 WZDX, and finally locked 28 WREG from Memphis over the top of the low power analog 28 downtown. This is the longest lasting tropo event I can remember in a long time.

It is pretty cool. I still think its kinda funny I can get a New Orleans station, but I can't get KETS. :) I know its cause this antenna isn't tuned to go down that far, but I still think its funny. :)

You guys may find this DXing exciting, and it is for me also, sort of. However, it's a good thing I really don't want to watch TV. TSReader is locking 12 non-local channels here and they are killing or degrading some locals. 14 seems to be trying to stomp on 12, probably due to n+2 interference, 31 has 30 and 32 somewhat subdued due to n+1 interference, and 43 has zapped 44. Something, I guess n+7 interference has clobbered 18 also. I wondered what was wrong with these channels last night, now after reading about it here and doing a scan I see what was going on. I sure hope this is not as common an occurrence as was implied in an earlier post. If it is, the FCC has really screwed up the OTA for spring and fall for some of us.

dmatch

Where do you get TSReader? And can I use it with my tuner cards that are in my machine?

BTW, this is how I'm getting the stuff I am talking about. http://www.flickr.com/photos/skendel/2836613786/

KALB has this encoder that's sold as capable of doing two HD feeds. From what I hear, it looks like crap, but they convert the CBS to 720p and then transmit both with about the bitrate that KWBF gives its two HD feeds, but it's much more dynamic than KWBF's bitrates so there's more bits to shuffle around.

- Trip
I guess what I was asking was how are they able to have two competing networks with the same callsign on the same channel? Isn't that like against the rules or something?

I think KTWN-18 is off...Havent got a peep from it since yesterday. I've actually watched the whole Fox News Sunday show on Memphis' Fox sta :). This usually only occurs between 7 and 10pm, and again in the early morning til about an hour after sunrise.... This one (strength and length) is a one or two time a year event. Wait til we get a "duct" event... You'll get stations from 700-1000+ miles so strong they will override the locals. Had one in Blytheville. Was getting Milwaukee, Chicago, South Bend, and Detroit... Every channel, full strength (analog then), and couldn't get locals at all...It was great. I talked to a guy in Milwaukee on their 31/91 ham repeater using my 1watt handheld...

What the heck? Why is KATV showing "Pulaski Heights Methodist Christmas Eve Service"? Do the not have a current one for today or at least something more up to date? That's from 2000 it says in the info.

Where do you get TSReader? And can I use it with my tuner cards that are in my machine?

BTW, this is how I'm getting the stuff I am talking about. http://www.flickr.com/photos/skendel/2836613786/
The short answer is you can probably use it with your PC tuner if it came with a BDA driver or if TSReader recognizes it. More info can be found at the homepage for the software. There is a free version available.

http://www.coolstf.com/tsreader/

On about the second page down there is a link to supported hardware.

I have a Pinnacle (spits on floor) USB tuner stick that has a BDA driver.

Edit: Down to only 5 extraneous channels now.

dmatch

Gotta figure out how to use it now. I got it to tune 11's channels, but don't know how to get it to pick up others yet. I wonder if it has a scan function. Damn it, changed the Hauppauge thingy from ATSC to DVB and now I can't get it back cause I don't know what freq I can put it on to actually get data. Guess I will have to uninstall and reinstall.

14 seems to be trying to stomp on 12, probably due to n+2 interference

Umm... if you're referring to KTHV-DT 12, that's impossible. 12 is on VHF and 14 is on UHF. n+2 can't a factor because the spacing between them isn't 6 MHz like all the UHFs. Other things are probably killing 12, possibilities include KETZ-DT, WMAE, WJTV, KSLA.

I guess what I was asking was how are they able to have two competing networks with the same callsign on the same channel? Isn't that like against the rules or something?

No, there's plenty of stations doing it in more rural areas. Up here where I'm living, Gray Communications owns one full-service analog-only station (CBS), one low-powered analog-only LP (ABC), and one Class A station with a digital companion (Fox). They multicast (all in SD, of course) ABC, CBS, Fox, MyNetworkTV, and WeatherNOW.

Check out WNKY in Bowling Green KY, for example.

Gotta figure out how to use it now. I got it to tune 11's channels, but don't know how to get it to pick up others yet. I wonder if it has a scan function. Damn it, changed the Hauppauge thingy from ATSC to DVB and now I can't get it back cause I don't know what freq I can put it on to actually get data. Guess I will have to uninstall and reinstall.

Hold CTRL as you open it, it'll ask you for the source again. To change the channel on the Lite version, you have to quit and re-open the program. On the Full version, Alt+R will do it.

- Trip

Gotta figure out how to use it now. I got it to tune 11's channels, but don't know how to get it to pick up others yet. I wonder if it has a scan function. Damn it, changed the Hauppauge thingy from ATSC to DVB and now I can't get it back cause I don't know what freq I can put it on to actually get data. Guess I will have to uninstall and reinstall.
Do as Trip suggested. Hold down on Ctrl while clicking on TSReader Icon. Also, there is a scan function on the entry screen....bottom right.

@Trip:

I wondered about the switch in channel designations from VHF to UHF and now that you mention it, there is probably something else going on with some other channel. There's certainly plenty to choose from. Anyway this is quite a mess this morning. One man's treasure is another man's junk.;)

dmatch

KARD's video of the TB v NO game looks like its got a little more bandwidth to it or something. When I watch 16, I see the grass blur up when you get any motion. On KARD, it doesn't happen.

EDIT: Ahh, I see why now, KLRT is running 4 Mbps lower than KARD.

I'm finding it hard to believe that KARD looks better than KLRT. All Fox stations use the splicer, and it passes the HD untouched from the Fox network. The stations aren't allowed to modify the signal from Fox in any way, even to run crawls (though that's more an issue with the splicer not supporting it rather than them not allowing it).

I'm trying to figure out what might cause a difference like that and I'm coming up blank. Anyone else have ideas?

- Trip

I enjoy Dx'ing as much as anyone, especially late at night when theres really nothing else on to watch. However, its hard to watch football right now with all the drops. I watched 16.1 go from 80% -0% up and down like a bouncing ball. I'm scanning now pointed at LR to see if I might lock something up from Memphis.

Last two days have been amazing with the DX from all directions. Didn't get a chance to log much this morning due to work....Congrats Steveken on your DX catches. I've not had time to come in here or update my DX blog yet..hope to this evening.

Hey dmatch, could you do me a favor and fetch me some TSReader data for some of the DXed stations, if you're receiving them? When you get some spare time, of course, not while you're watching stuff. :D

Thanks.

- Trip

Well, no extras from the East. I'm done Dxing for now, time to watch the football game. My signals seem to be returning to normal. When I used to live at Atkins, I used to get all the memphis stations in october or november each year. They would completey over ride the LR stations. Where I currently live, I used to get some from the west, but amazingly, when my Ant was mounted 20 ft above the roof, I could get Channels 3 from Oklahoma city, and channels 6 & 8 from Tulsa year round and watchable. I dont remember what was what now, except for channel 8 which was ABC. I remember it because I watched football on it pretty often. That was analog though and not digital.

yeah, looking like its gone

Umm... if you're referring to KTHV-DT 12, that's impossible. 12 is on VHF and 14 is on UHF. n+2 can't a factor because the spacing between them isn't 6 MHz like all the UHFs. Other things are probably killing 12, possibilities include KETZ-DT, WMAE, WJTV, KSLA.


Trip, in the 3+ years I've lived here and actively DX'ed DTV, I've never logged KETZ-DT...not one stinking frame. And I've logged up to Wichita (for a brief few seconds thinking I had KHBS before my surprise), San Antonio, DFW, Houston, St Louis and Columbia MO and NW Florida to the South and NOLA/South Louisiana.

Just arrived home and trops have calmed down some...going to watch some football.

Just be thankful that we don't live in the Sherman/Ada market, or Alexandria LA. Two DTV's carrying 5 networks (KXII and KTEN) full of multicasting blur in "Texoma" or the NBC-CBS one channel/twin 1080i subs of KALB.

For the gentelman asking about lack of HD on NBC golf yesterday, I checked just now on both KTVE and KARK-- HD on both, must have been a relaying issue with D*'s feed or KARK operator malfunction. I got home after the ND game started yesterday so couldn't verify if OTA KARK was HD for golf.

Hey dmatch, could you do me a favor and fetch me some TSReader data for some of the DXed stations, if you're receiving them? When you get some spare time, of course, not while you're watching stuff. :D

Thanks.

- Trip
The only one I was able to get a stable picture on was WKNO and then only for a short time. All the others were there enough to scan but otherwise were useless. That's the rub with this barrage of signals...All the problems with nothing positive (like a stable picture) to gain.

I think KTWN-18 is off...Havent got a peep from it since yesterday. .... Snip
It's there it's just getting clobbered. I can see the signal with TSReader but can't get a stable picture.

dmatch

Ok, I usually get 80% on it, and haven't gotten anything but 0 today.

I wonder if theres a way to get TSReader to do clearQAM. I just wanna see what Comcast is pumping out. Think it might be interesting. I also wonder, if that is possible, how I would differentiate the two cards I have that do that function. I think I could just put in a 1 when I choose the source, but I am not sure since I haven't tried it. So far I am trying to interpret what all the numbers mean that TS spits out. Kinda interesting stuff to see how much the bit rate fluctuates and what that means to the picture.

@steveken:

I see a lot of references to TSReader doing QAM, so I guess it does but have never tried it. No cable here.

BTW, the Lite version of TSReader does about all I need.

dmatch

It was not HD on KARK-DT OTA so must have been operator malfunction. Man, I just wish they would ride herd more over their operators these days.

It was not HD on KARK-DT OTA so must have been operator malfunction. Man, I just wish they would ride herd more over their operators these days.
What was not HD? Could you let us know which post you are referencing? Thanks.

Golf this past weekend.

I thought that might have been it, but I wasn't sure. I didn't turn it on Saturday for very long, so I didn't notice. But, when I turned it on yesterday, it was in HD. I watched it for a while with my son.

I just saw an ad for the DirecTV HD Extra Pack. They mentioned something about Paladia? Anyone know what that is or what channel its on?

I stuck the sidecar from the 110/119 antenna on the main 99/101/103 antenna, since I didn't care if I got 110 or 119 anyway now, and I couldn't believe it... 90's on 110 and 96-100 on 119...and I'd swear it was pointed right into a tree... as another anecdote, I wanted to test what would happen if I couldn't get those two, so I taped cardboard over the lnb and still got 90's... put two socks over them, still got 90's....black tape...still 90's... What the hell? Guess the only way to kill em is tape a leaf over it.

Paladia is MHD renamed...channel 332. Mix of MTV, VH1, and CMT concerts and specials.

LOL, thats pretty funny that you still get those. The only thing we get from those now are the SD locals? Its been so long since I tried to look it up, I don't remember what the heck is on those. I guess if you can get them no matter what, you shouldn't worry with it and just leave it be? :)

Thought KETS was going to run HD at night? Running 4 480i channels tonight again. Maybe since they got diss'd by Directv they said hell with it.

I was thinking the exact same thing when I was messing with my zenith box. I saw -2 and was like "umm, thats supposed to be off right now".

The show that's on right now, was originally shown in HD... I'm watching Nova on PBS-HD now...KETS sucks.

I have no idea whats on KETS anymore. I don't even try to turn it on for myself. I just flip it to like 2-4 for my son and leave. :) I set all the stuff I want to see up to record in GB-PVR off PBS-HD. Since I got us good listings, its real easy to do.

After a few little hiccups at the hub, I finally got my U-Verse service up and running today. My line is operating at about 43% and pulling 25 meg. 10 meg of that is allocated to internet; the rest to my TV service. (If a customer gets VOIP, that amount is further divided.)

Internet is great. Getting a consistent 9.5 meg down, according to speedtest.net. The ping is a little slower at 90 ms. Not sure how that will affect my gaming just yet. I only signed up for the 6 meg service, so it may not matter which tier you get since 10 meg is allocated to internet, no matter what level you purchase.

But I am sorry to say that the HD service is poor. I'm really not sure how to describe what I'm seeing in words, other than I am experiencing very obvious and unwatchable compression artifacts. There are two parts to it: first, motion is blurred and "macroblocked" in some cases; I feel like it was a little crisper on Comcast, though they have their own macroblocking issues as well. Second and worse, the entire image experiences what I can only describe as a slight jittering and blinking...especially noticeable in still shots and solid colors (i.e. walls, grass fields, etc). It is almost unbearable to watch. And this occurs rhythmically...I would say twice a second in a steady "beat".

In some cases, you can make out the lineations and macroblocking of color change instead of being smooth and resolved. As much as I despise being a Comcast customer, their HD service is better after my initial comparison. I'm calling AT&T tomorrow about it, but I'm not optimistic. If I'm getting 25 meg and 10 is for internet, that means only 15 is allocated for TV. And THAT is shared by 2 HD streams and 2 SD streams at once, if desired. Not sure there is anything they can do short of turning up the bitrate, so to speak.

Will keep everyone posted.

That's less than one ATSC channel. If you want HD, there is only one choice at the moment, and that's Directv. Since they added the Little Rock network stations in HD now, I can only think Fios would be any competition to them, and its not available here yet...although I'm hoping Verizons buyout(?) of Alltel will bring it to town soon.

I had IPTV for one month with Arkwest Communications (Formerly known as Yell County Telephone) in Danville last year. The package was called "Triple Play", which stands for tv/internet/phone service. They used Amino STB's from Europe. All of their STB's only had composite hookups. They did also offer a DVR which had component 480i, which I also tried. I must admit that on still pics, the picture was almost very good, somewhere between SDTV and HDTV, I guess 480p DVD would be a good comparison on PQ, maybe a bit clearer than DVD's. But, when it came to fast moving pictures...oh boy ,what a nightmare. I noticed that on 4x3 standard analog sets, none of this was a problem because the 480i sets do not require near the information a HDTV does to fill the screen. When you hook up these boxes to a HD tv that can display all those pixels, well ,thats what you get a lot of ,pixelations. Boxing was completely unwatchable on it. Football was good until they threw a long pass. My best description of it would be "very inconsistent". I personally could not stand it and after month #1 I canceled. I felt bad about it too. Arkwest is a local owned compnay and they try to give us hicks in the sticks the latest greatest technologies, we've been Fiber Optic for over 5 years now, they do try hard to satisfy their customers and are very high tech. Still, I could not take the pixeling any longer and ordered directv. One of the techs for Arkwest told me that they were looking into getting HD boxes soon. Thats been a year and as far as I know, they still dont have them. For these IPTV setups to work properly, they must have a High bit rate at all times. When they first installed the IPTV in my home, the picture would freeze up on two tvs' being fed by the same modem. They tested and found it to be delivering 8-9 bitrate, they said that was way too low at the modem and their had to be a problem at the box outside. They said 30 mbps was their goal and would prevent these type problems. 1 modem would feed two tv's, we had two modems hooked up feeding 4 tv's in the house. Finally when they got everything squared away my system was delivering 38mbps to the modems, but apparently it still was not enough for the HDTV's in the house to overcome problems. The nice thing about our service was that it operated on the same base principal as Cable companies. You could have each room hooked up at no extra charge. With Arkwest, you can have "6 STB's and 3 modems installed in your home for no extra charge. After that, the 7th will carry a fee. The DVR's were extra $3/month at the time, they may be more now. I had hoped for the best, but bitrates just werent getting it and no HD was offered, had no choice but to move on. The only other strange thing I didnt like was that they offered VOD(good) but "No PPV" (bad)

Thought KETS was going to run HD at night? Running 4 480i channels tonight again. Maybe since they got diss'd by Directv they said hell with it.
I assumed that the HD was offed because they are in a locally hosted beg-a-thon right now and can't do local HD. Maybe they'll go back to their new format when that is over.

dmatch

That may be the case, but I noticed the few times I tuned in to KETS over the last couple of weeks that they were upconverting and zooming local content. I personally would rather they went back to the way they did it before, but changing the schedule a bit to show more HD network content. I mean, they actually shuffled their daytime schedule a bit, which included moving Sesame Street from 7 am to 10 am, but they are still not showing it in HD.

Arkansas @ Texas on Saturday (Sept 13th, 2:30pm) will be SD only (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=14627560#post14627560).

Arkansas @ Texas on Saturday (Sept 13th, 2:30pm) will be SD only (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=14627560#post14627560).
Depends on your idea of bad news. LOL

In all actuality, I think the game will be canceled because thats right about when Ike is going to be coming on-shore and causing hell for that area. I wouldn't even get in the car to go down that way. You will most likely have nothing to go to. Thats just my thoughts on what I am seeing now.

For those interested, I have put up a few pics of progress on KATV's new tower site.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/skendel/2846173790/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/skendel/2845341201/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/skendel/2846174186/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/skendel/2845341609/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/skendel/2846174588/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/skendel/2845342037/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/skendel/2846175052/

I was rolling along when I took these, so hopefully they are sharp enough for you. I didn't want to go too slow or spend too much time up there. Even shows the location on the map thanks to my iPhone 3G's built in GPS. Anyway, thought it was interesting and you guys might wanna know.

Depends on your idea of bad news. LOL

In all actuality, I think the game will be canceled because thats right about when Ike is going to be coming on-shore and causing hell for that area. I wouldn't even get in the car to go down that way. You will most likely have nothing to go to. Thats just my thoughts on what I am seeing now.

TWC projects Ike to be a Cat 3 at landfall. We'll probably see remnants in parts of Arkansas on Monday.

Weather could force the game to be canceled or postponed. LSU moved their game against Appalachian State to 10AM two weeks ago because of Gustav.

For those interested, I have put up a few pics of progress on KATV's new tower site.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/skendel/2846173790/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/skendel/2845341201/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/skendel/2846174186/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/skendel/2845341609/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/skendel/2846174588/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/skendel/2845342037/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/skendel/2846175052/

I was rolling along when I took these, so hopefully they are sharp enough for you. I didn't want to go too slow or spend too much time up there. Even shows the location on the map thanks to my iPhone 3G's built in GPS. Anyway, thought it was interesting and you guys might wanna know.

Thanks for posting links of the pics. I forwarded them to a LR broadcaster stationed in Iraq. This will help him connect back to home.

Channel 7 HD on Directv has the audio about 5 seconds ahead of the video. My cable feed of that channel is OK and I can't get it OTA. Anyone else seeing this?

I just turned it on and don't hear anything at all.

KATV-DT OTA: Audio is there and in sync currently.

dmatch

Guess I should have said on DirecTV. :) Sorry about that. I figured OTA was there, so I didn't even bother checking it. In any case, how embarrassing for KATV not having ANY audio at all on the satellite!

Oh, wait, you can only be embarrassed if you actually give a sh*t about what people think about your channel and the programming on it. ;)

Postponed till Sept. 22nd for all you folks that care about the Hog game Saturday. I don't know what will become of the party I am supposed to go to Saturday. Probably will still happen.

Anyone got sound back from DirecTV for KATV? I am still not hearing anything. Funny thing is it recorded "According to Jim" last night (the one with the pool) on my HR20 and it had sound. Wonder if I need to reboot my H20 in here.


EDIT: Okay, the HR20 has sound. Sounds like reboot time for the H20.

EDIT EDIT: Hmmmmmmm, even after a reboot, I still have no audio on 7 on my H20-600.

Well I had another technician out. He saw what I was pointing out about the picture quality. After fixing up a few things on my line, it was still there. His opinion: "This may be as good as quality as we offer." I told him if that is the case, I would not be keeping it. The average HD consumer may not see this and *think* they are getting HD, but it is not HD when motion turns into blocks and solid colors seem like they are shifting rhythmically.

Also, the TV set top box has what I can only assume is a firmware issue. The HDMI cable is not passing Dolby Digital to my receiver. I tested this by plugging in an optical line. DD lit up on my receiver. Went back to HDMI--no DD. So that's another issue.

Gonna keep it for my free month, but I'm not likely keeping the TV side of U-Verse. as much as I hate Comcast, their HD is better quality. As far as internet, I'm pulling 9 mbps down and 1.4 mbps up, with a consistent 90 ms ping.

Why go with Comcast at all?? You can get HD from DirecTV. In fact, you can get MORE. Plus, in my opinion, it looks better than Comcast did. The only thing Comcast can offer you is all 4 feeds of KETS and PBS-HD (at least that I am aware of). Other than that, you can get it all on DirecTV. Oh, wait, Mojo isn't on DirecTV. :) Anyway, I would think you would be happier with DirecTV if you would go that route. Well, as long as you get a good installer that will take the time to peak the dish so rain-fade doesn't affect you. :)

Well I had another technician out. He saw what I was pointing out about the picture quality. After fixing up a few things on my line, it was still there. His opinion: "This may be as good as quality as we offer." I told him if that is the case, I would not be keeping it. The average HD consumer may not see this and *think* they are getting HD, but it is not HD when motion turns into blocks and solid colors seem like they are shifting rhythmically.

Also, the TV set top box has what I can only assume is a firmware issue. The HDMI cable is not passing Dolby Digital to my receiver. I tested this by plugging in an optical line. DD lit up on my receiver. Went back to HDMI--no DD. So that's another issue.

Gonna keep it for my free month, but I'm not likely keeping the TV side of U-Verse. as much as I hate Comcast, their HD is better quality. As far as internet, I'm pulling 9 mbps down and 1.4 mbps up, with a consistent 90 ms ping.

You may want to try and elevate this to a supervisor. I am not seeing issues like you are describing on my sets. I have watched several football games and the IndyCar race in Chicago without issue. All of the locals look good on U-verse in HD and even the SD pictures look good on my HD sets, something that is a departure from what I was used to with Dish. I also watched both of the MNF games on ESPN and saw no issues. Tuesday night I ran the DVR recording 2 HD and 2 SD at the same time while viewing another recorded HD program and saw no issues.

Just my two cents, but other than the install I have been very pleased with U-verse. Oh, the DVR does leave a little to be desired compared to my 622 from Dish but I assume it will get better as the service matures.

E

Anyone got sound back from DirecTV for KATV? I am still not hearing anything. Funny thing is it recorded "According to Jim" last night (the one with the pool) on my HR20 and it had sound. Wonder if I need to reboot my H20 in here.


I called the Directv trouble line. The lady there looked up something and said they have audio dropouts logged as a problem and were working to correct. My H21 in the bedroom wouldn't display anything, but the HR21 had a picture with lipsync problems.

anyhow, by noon today they had it mostly working. We'll see how long that lasts.

Well, damn comcast Internet has been down here for almost an hour now. Have to use my iPhone to surf the web. Glad I am paying as much as I am for service that goes down as often as this does with no explanation at all. :(

Postponed till Sept. 22nd for all you folks that care about the Hog game Saturday. I don't know what will become of the party I am supposed to go to Saturday. Probably will still happen.

I think its been moved to September 27th.

I think you meant Saturday, September 27th. We play Alabama in Fayetteville Saturday, September 20th. September 22nd is on a Monday and is my wifes birthday
yeah I just typed in what I thought I heard on the news. Guess they didn't enunciate very well or I didn't hear it very well. Thanks for correcting that for me, I appreciate it.

Also, the TV set top box has what I can only assume is a firmware issue. The HDMI cable is not passing Dolby Digital to my receiver. I tested this by plugging in an optical line. DD lit up on my receiver. Went back to HDMI--no DD. So that's another issue.

.

HDMI specs do not support passing Dolby Digital, only Analog L and R audio. You need to hook Toslink for DD.

@steveken and arkyman:
Post removed: Tried to be funny but it wasn't going to work.

dmatch

Steveken, and anyone else with a H20-600... Directv advised me today, that the H20-600 is on a proactive recall/replacement schedule...they have had so many failures (mine this week), that they are replacing them all across the board. While I had him on the phone, I talked him into a new HR22 for $99 to replace it. Should have been free, but hey, beats an old used up refurb DVR. I'm afraid they are going to insist on a "professional" install, which means Ill probably lose DNS, but I can get most of them direct on the other dish anyways...

So, get ready for the call to swap out your receiver soon.

@steveken and arkyman:
Post removed: Tried to be funny but it wasn't going to work.

dmatch

at least you tried:D:)

KATV-HD on Directv is looking good tonight. Audio in sync, and seems the bitrate is up....

Sounds like you wanted to find something wrong with my post because I corrected an error in yours. In a case like this I would have replied ...."yeah, I typed it wrong, I meant the 27th, thanks for the correction" Everyone says "we" play when rooting for a certain team, if you dont when 99.9% of society does, then I agree with your own accusation of yourself that your weird. Bottom line, dont be a smart "A" dude, I was just trying to help those who might actually want to watch or attend the game. Then, you went off on the word "we"! ....Instead of saying, "yeah thanks, I got the date wrong", you decided to write a paragraph about the word "WE" and how I'm somehow using it incorrectly.......Wow, I mean, c'mon:confused: BTW, dont use smilies when your being sarcastic and dont mean it! And for the record, I like you just fine, I enjoy reading all your post, look forward to reading them in the future. Maybe I took it wrong, but your reply seemed vendictive over nothing more than a simple date correction.

Sorry about that. Was not trying to find fault with anything you said. I seem to mid-hear things on TV every now and then. I seriously thought they had said that and didn't bother to look at the date so it was my fault entirely. Wasn't meaning to be a smartass at all. Wasn't trying to go on a tear about we, just my observaiton on the use of it, which will be contained in the future. I was trying to be a little sarcastic about it but shouldn't have. Was not trying to be vindictive either. I can accept when I was a bonehead. If I am pissed at all, it's because I am STILL without Internet because they are "working on it" and it will be back up "sometime tonight".

HDMI specs do not support passing Dolby Digital, only Analog L and R audio. You need to hook Toslink for DD.
You sure? Seems like they would WANT to use it for DD with it being such a superior connection standard.

Steveken, and anyone else with a H20-600... Directv advised me today, that the H20-600 is on a proactive recall/replacement schedule...they have had so many failures (mine this week), that they are replacing them all across the board. While I had him on the phone, I talked him into a new HR22 for $99 to replace it. Should have been free, but hey, beats an old used up refurb DVR. I'm afraid they are going to insist on a "professional" install, which means Ill probably lose DNS, but I can get most of them direct on the other dish anyways...

So, get ready for the call to swap out your receiver soon.
so I should wait on them to call or should I go ahead and call? What will they give me as a swap for it? Hope it's equivelant in value cause I paid $100 for it not that long ago. Would be nice if I could get a DVD out of them, but I may just accept what they give me. Anyway, guess it's good they are wanting to do this on their own.

You sure? Seems like they would WANT to use it for DD with it being such a superior connection standard.

Well, I shouldn't have said the SPEC doesn't support DD (it doesn't, but does support discrete 8 channel audio with speaker assignments)...

From Chapter 7.3 of the HDMI spec found at http://www.hdmi.org/pdf/HDMISpecInformationalVersion.pdf

If an HDMI Source supports an HDMI audio transmission, then it shall support 2 channel L-PCM using an IEC 60958 Subpacket structure, with either 32kHz, 44.1 kHz, or 48 kHz sampling rate and a sample size of 16 bits or more.

It DOES have specs for 8 channel audio, as an option. but both the transmitter (DVR) and receiver (TV) would specifically have to support it, as HDMI reclocks everything to its own standard, hence doesn't allow for a "passthrough" mode. I know of no 8 channel HDMI sources for consumers, nor have I seen any monitors claiming to support it. Most just use the 2 channel minimum spec.

In any case, to support Dolby digital 5.1, the dvr would have to decode it into discrete channels, reencode it to HDMI specs, and pass it to the monitor, which would have to support 8 audio channels.

If its working, I'd wait til they call you...the longer you wait, the newer replacement you should get. I imagine they are sending out their remaining H20 non-600's first, then will probably send H21's. No charge for the swapout. I asked for the upgrade to another DVR (the 500Gb hard drive HR22 which he gave me for $99) which is $99 plus the $100 I already paid for the H20...so basically full price, but neither of us are losing anything.

HDMI specs do not support passing Dolby Digital, only Analog L and R audio. You need to hook Toslink for DD.

You sure? Seems like they would WANT to use it for DD with it being such a superior connection standard.

Well, I shouldn't have said the SPEC doesn't support DD (it doesn't, but does support discrete 8 channel audio with speaker assignments)...

From Chapter 7.3 of the HDMI spec found at http://www.hdmi.org/pdf/HDMISpecInformationalVersion.pdf

If an HDMI Source supports an HDMI audio transmission, then it shall support 2 channel L-PCM using an IEC 60958 Subpacket structure, with either 32kHz, 44.1 kHz, or 48 kHz sampling rate and a sample size of 16 bits or more.

It DOES have specs for 8 channel audio, as an option. but both the transmitter (DVR) and receiver (TV) would specifically have to support it, as HDMI reclocks everything to its own standard, hence doesn't allow for a "passthrough" mode. I know of no 8 channel HDMI sources for consumers, nor have I seen any monitors claiming to support it. Most just use the 2 channel minimum spec.

In any case, to support Dolby digital 5.1, the dvr would have to decode it into discrete channels, reencode it to HDMI specs, and pass it to the monitor, which would have to support 8 audio channels.

I recorded the same show tonight on AT&T's box and Comcast's box. Using HDMI on AT&T's box, my receiver did not display Dolby Digital. I switched to the Comcast box and played the same show...Dolby Digital showed on my receiver. Both are connected via HDMI into the receiver. So there is something definitely not there technologically in the AT&T box.

You may want to try and elevate this to a supervisor. I am not seeing issues like you are describing on my sets. I have watched several football games and the IndyCar race in Chicago without issue. All of the locals look good on U-verse in HD and even the SD pictures look good on my HD sets, something that is a departure from what I was used to with Dish. I also watched both of the MNF games on ESPN and saw no issues. Tuesday night I ran the DVR recording 2 HD and 2 SD at the same time while viewing another recorded HD program and saw no issues.

Just my two cents, but other than the install I have been very pleased with U-verse. Oh, the DVR does leave a little to be desired compared to my 622 from Dish but I assume it will get better as the service matures.

E

I wish I could see someone else's. The technician definitely saw what I was describing. I guess I can try again, but with the information I have and know about the transmission of HD signals, the amount of compression providers do, and the bitrate limitations...I really do believe I've got "as good as it gets" with this service. Which isn't good at all...

I recorded the same show tonight on AT&T's box and Comcast's box. Using HDMI on AT&T's box, my receiver did not display Dolby Digital. I switched to the Comcast box and played the same show...Dolby Digital showed on my receiver. Both are connected via HDMI into the receiver. So there is something definitely not there technologically in the AT&T box.

Home Theatre receiver or Monitor receiver?

Sorry about that. Was not trying to find fault with anything you said. I seem to mid-hear things on TV every now and then. I seriously thought they had said that and didn't bother to look at the date so it was my fault entirely. Wasn't meaning to be a smartass at all. Wasn't trying to go on a tear about we, just my observaiton on the use of it, which will be contained in the future. I was trying to be a little sarcastic about it but shouldn't have. Was not trying to be vindictive either. I can accept when I was a bonehead. If I am pissed at all, it's because I am STILL without Internet because they are "working on it" and it will be back up "sometime tonight".

Its no biggie Steve, like I said, I still enjoy visiting with you on here. I've had a long hard day here on the farm, I probably came accross more harshly than I shoud have or meant too, I apologize for that. I'm gonna delete my above post. Just two guys having rough days, basically just a misunderstanding, no big deal:)

Well, I shouldn't have said the SPEC doesn't support DD (it doesn't, but does support discrete 8 channel audio with speaker assignments)...

From Chapter 7.3 of the HDMI spec found at http://www.hdmi.org/pdf/HDMISpecInformationalVersion.pdf

If an HDMI Source supports an HDMI audio transmission, then it shall support 2 channel L-PCM using an IEC 60958 Subpacket structure, with either 32kHz, 44.1 kHz, or 48 kHz sampling rate and a sample size of 16 bits or more.

It DOES have specs for 8 channel audio, as an option. but both the transmitter (DVR) and receiver (TV) would specifically have to support it, as HDMI reclocks everything to its own standard, hence doesn't allow for a "passthrough" mode. I know of no 8 channel HDMI sources for consumers, nor have I seen any monitors claiming to support it. Most just use the 2 channel minimum spec.

In any case, to support Dolby digital 5.1, the dvr would have to decode it into discrete channels, reencode it to HDMI specs, and pass it to the monitor, which would have to support 8 audio channels.
Wow, you really do your homework on this stuff. :) I had no idea that it was like that at all. I just assumed that it passed the signal just as it was received and it was up to the receiver to translate the signal to what it could handle. Does this apply to situations where you plug the HDMI cable into a stereo with HDMI inputs........oh wait, silly me, those jerks that design stereos make it where it only passes through the video and ignores the audio altogether. :)

I recorded the same show tonight on AT&T's box and Comcast's box. Using HDMI on AT&T's box, my receiver did not display Dolby Digital. I switched to the Comcast box and played the same show...Dolby Digital showed on my receiver. Both are connected via HDMI into the receiver. So there is something definitely not there technologically in the AT&T box.
Ahh, but how do you have the audio from the Comcast box connected to the receiver? I would guess you have an alternate audio hookup to the receiver. HDMI connections on MOST receivers do not do ANYTHING with audio. They completely ignore it, instead requiring you to hook up alternate lines to it. Most receivers are merely expensive switches for multiple HDMI connections. Unless you paid big bucks and got a good receiver that is.

Oh, and as you can see, I got my internet back up. Turns out it should have been up for a while now. I had a splitter in the line (3.5dB on the output ports) that has been working for months, but sure enough when I took it out it came back up.

Another funny thing is that the readings the tech was seeing on his system were in the red by quite a bit. He said it was probably around 10dB total loss from where it should have been. Before committing to sending out a tech, I asked him if I could try another modem I have (an old SurfBoard SB3100 I had lying around).

Once we FINALLY got that darned thing to show up in his system, he saw the signal levels rise dramatically....said that usually never happens by just switching out a modem. So, we decided to leave the "newer" modem on and activate it. Seeing decent speeds now, but not quite the 6Mb I was seeing before...could just be traffic on the 'net.

I still don't see the speedboost stuff though. I have never gotten the quick burst for the first little bit of traffic even though its provisioned on my line. Oh well.

Speedboost works for me, once...then forget it.

If Comcasts box actually outputs multichannel audio on its HDMI port, I'm gonna have to give comcast more credit than I do. None of Directv's stuff does, that I know of, but my aquos doesn't support DD, and my Denon doesn't have HdMI inputs, didn't see any reason to spend the extra money, since I use optical for audio...and don't need video switching.

I can't remember if I got DD out through HDMI to the TV then to the receiver or not on the Comcast box I had. I think I always went straight from the box to the stereo using optical. I just prefer that better. Get a cleaner, truer sound from it that way. Unfortunately, I don't have the HDMI nor the optical cable hooked up from my HR20. I have those reserved strictly for the PS3. :)

I see the TV guide shows KETS-2 SIGN OFF and Celine Dion in HD....When in reality, Celine is in Fuzzy vision non-Dolby, and KETS-2 is showing BBC news... So much for the best laid plans of Little Rock actually getting a PBS station...And its a pledge drive too...gonna call em and pledge $100 as soon as they show more than a pittance of HD each week.

Hell, go one more on top of that and pledge $500 if they can increase the power on their P.O.S. transmitter AND start showing more HD. Explain to them that people aren't willing to give them their money if the stuff they show is not of the quality people want to see. You have to make your customers happy before they will pay for your goods.

KLRT @ 12 Noon

Giants @ Rams


KTHV @ 12 Noon

Raiders @ Chiefs

KTHV @ 3pm

Patriots @ Jets

Home Theatre receiver or Monitor receiver?

Ahh, but how do you have the audio from the Comcast box connected to the receiver? I would guess you have an alternate audio hookup to the receiver. HDMI connections on MOST receivers do not do ANYTHING with audio. They completely ignore it, instead requiring you to hook up alternate lines to it. Most receivers are merely expensive switches for multiple HDMI connections. Unless you paid big bucks and got a good receiver that is.

I have the Comcast box going to my Onkyo 605 receiver the same as the AT&T box.

Directv channel 361...KHOU-DT in Houston/Galveston is on live.

Directv channel 361...KHOU-DT in Houston/Galveston is on live.

Thanks, Davenlr, this coverage is really good from what we have seen.

Thanks, Davenlr, this coverage is really good from what we have seen.

For those without Directv, coverage is also free on XM radio channel 247, and on KU band satellite AMC5 11828 V 3979 33/34/41.

I have the Comcast box going to my Onkyo 605 receiver the same as the AT&T box.
The Onkyo 605 has two pass-through HDMI connections if I am not mistaken. So, if that is the case, you have to have another connection from the receivers to the stereo to get the audio out because the Onkyo will just ignore the audio portion and only pass the video out to the TV.

What I am figuring is that you have the Comcast box hooked up with an optical audio cable or something else that is capable of handling DD and you have the AT&T box hooked up with maybe just the l/r rca cables.

Maybe pop a picture of your setup and put it up on flickr or something and give us links so we can see? I think we can get you the audio you want if we can just have a better idea of the setup.

You all with mobile phones, check this out, or go to Youtube and search on "ike bear"...It will have you crying...
http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=AKwMiExUKXg&client=mv-google&warned=1&gl=US&hl=en

Thats pretty funny

Didn't Teri Okita use to be on like CNN or something? I ask cause I see her on that Houston channel on DirecTV right now.

I'm not sure if this is the first week, but it appears that the UAB/Tennessee game from Raycom on KATV-DT is in HD. I say appears, because it's pretty soft and had some pixelization, but that's normal with their bandwidth limitation being subchannel of KWBF right now.

Raycom games on KATV this fall are going to be in HD (this from station management).

Cool, I hadn't seen any announcement of that.

Not that it matters with 4 weather channels preempting programming...

One thing I noted..KATV has the network game in PIP and radar in PIP and main weather alerts in another larger PIP. By far the highest tech and coolest setup I've seen. This would be excellent if they had the capability to do this in 16:9 widescreen HD. It looks ok in 16:9 stretch, and you can actually watch the game and the weather at the same time. Hopefully after Feb 2009 they will get it happening in HD from their new kick butt tower and ch22 transmitter.

Honorable mention to KTHV and KLRT who also has PIP (also in SD).

Boo to KARK who is spending more time apologizing for interrupting the football game than covering the weather. and NO PIP at all.

Not that it matters with 4 weather channels preempting programming...

One thing I noted..KATV has the network game in PIP and radar in PIP and main weather alerts in another larger PIP. By far the highest tech and coolest setup I've seen. This would be excellent if they had the capability to do this in 16:9 widescreen HD. It looks ok in 16:9 stretch, and you can actually watch the game and the weather at the same time. Hopefully after Feb 2009 they will get it happening in HD from their new kick butt tower and ch22 transmitter.

Honorable mention to KTHV and KLRT who also has PIP (also in SD).

Boo to KARK who is spending more time apologizing for interrupting the football game than covering the weather. and NO PIP at all.

Actually, I saw them, like two times today, running the ND/Mich game in a 19" or so window in the bottom right hand side of the screen. The problem was, they only did it a few times then dumped the game and hogged the whole screen for weather. I think KARK has let some of their weather coverage go to their heads.

Well, they (KARK-DT) are off the air now (Directv and OTA). KARK analog still on. KTWN just dropped out too... KATV analog is out. Digital is on. KLRT analog and digital are off but Directv HD feed is on. 42 analog s off, Digital is on. Wind is 25 sustained and 47 peak gust right now.. weird....must be needing some generators or something..

Well, they (KARK-DT) are off the air now (Directv and OTA). KARK analog still on. KTWN just dropped out too... KATV analog is out. Digital is on. KLRT analog and digital are off but Directv HD feed is on. 42 analog s off, Digital is on. Wind is 25 sustained and 47 peak gust right now.. weird....must be needing some generators or something..

must be. You'd think that no more wind than we've had (gusting good but nothing serious) the signals would still be up and running.

11:20 am and KARK-DT and KLRT-DT are still out. I woke up to the largest tree in my backyard down, taking out a portion of my fence. Fortunately I've already got some material to fix it with, I'm just not looking forward to the cleanup.

Lucky it didn't take out your house! I was worried about that all night, but fortunantly, everything survived.

Don't know what's going on with the Shinall Mt stations... Hope no towers fell over, and its just a power or misaligned microwave dish problem.

Both grids that feed the mountain are down. That is a very unusual situation. Both being down hasn't happened since the grids were tied together with auto-switch gear 7 or 8 years ago. Entergy estimates late today or tomorrow.

I live in the about the center of downtown little rock and yesterday I was able to see NBC KARK-DT 4.1 and FOX KLRT-DT 16.1 channels perfectly.

Now there is no signal. Is there something wrong with the transmission
towers on Shinall Mt. ?

Nakedrobot: Yes, there is no electric up there. If the station doesn't have generator power for their transmitter, they are off (see post above).

Ike strikes again.

BTW, Kark 4.1 is back on. Only digital station down right now is 16.1. Analog is another story, but everyone should be using digital by now...Just take this as a Feb 2009 training exercise :)


And welcome to the local forum..dont be a stranger.

KLRT-DT and its analog signal off.

KARK analog visible here (@ full power), but DTV is lower power (won't lock). Swung toward Greenwood to see if signal was from WABG (and KARK off the air).

KTHV-DT and analog on. (thankfully CBS has the late afternoon game).

KATV analog off, KWBF-DT low power relay business as usual (dropouts, with stretchovison on 42-1, 7-1 w/ only KATV OTA service).

Redfield stations unaffected.

still good to be back home this afternoon, after a stressful work weekend.

Davenlr said that the signal for KARK-DT 4.1 is back on.

I do not think it is yet.

I live in downtown Little Rock and I am still not able to see the digital channels for NBC KARK-DT 4.1 and FOX KLRT-DT 16.1.

I have reprogrammed my LCD TV at 5:15pm am got no reception
on KARK-DT 4.1.

NBC 4.1 is on the air (digital 32) but apparently running reduced power. I'm locking it with a 92% signal, usually its 100%.

What kind of antenna do you have Nakedrobot?

I was getting KARK briefly today but it went away for some reason, it may be back up now.

Dave...where is the best place to get antenna mast in central arkansas? I was going to check Radio Shack but wondered if there was something better.

Well, if you need interlocking sections, Radio Shack or Lowes... If you need a 10' or smaller mast, don't buy the overpriced antenna mast, buy a stick of 1.25" x 10' EMT conduit. It costs about 1/3rd as much and is thicker and won't bend as easy as the more expensive antenna masts.

NBC 4.1 is on the air (digital 32) but apparently running reduced power. I'm locking it with a 92% signal, usually its 100%.

What kind of antenna do you have Nakedrobot?


I'm going to watch the NBC game on KTVE-DT (27) El Dorado since KARK-DT is QRP. Nice to have a spare NBC OTA affiliate, even if seldom viewed.

You don't have Directv Haley?

You don't have Directv Haley?

No D* here, E* at present. (contract runs out in November, and I'll weigh options at that time). Hated missing the local hurricane coverage from WDSU and later KHOU.

KTVE-DT is blasting in even pointed at the LR Shinall transmitters OTA.

I live in down town Little Rock.

I purchased the PHILIPS Indoor/outdoor amplified flat panel MANT940 UHF Antenna. Now I have to say this thing has been incredible. Flawless reception.
I plugged it in programed the LCD tv and it found every local channel for Little
Rock and two from Pine bluff. I bought this for 38.00 from Walmart - like I stated before this has been a great antenna so far because I have Comcast and the channels come in perfectly consistent with 720p high def signals from the local stations when actual HDTV broadcasts are available from the affiliate. Crystal clear reception with this thing; however, that compressed garbage that Comcast is piping out is terrible. Comcast is almost like looking a blurry picture the quality is so bad. I unplugged the Comcast coax and am keeping this antenna.

Ok so I was watching Saturday Night Live with it last night then this morning woke up and there was no reception for KARK-DT 4.1 and KLRT-DT 16.1.

This still dose not explain why some people are receiving the KARK-DT 4.1 signal and I am not if I am in the down town of little Rock. I should be getting this thing just fine as I was watching the channel for a week prior for no problems. I do not think the KARK-DT transmitter is at full power or some other issue?

Its not. To get it with them running low power, you probably need to make sure your flat panel in pointed west, and is as high as it will go...perhaps in a window if one is available. If not, they will be back tomorrow when the power is restored.

Haley: KHOU helicopter flying over the peninsula east of Galveston... There is NOTHING left....looks like Hiroshima after the atomic bomb... I sure hope no one tried to ride out the storm there... I love this storm coverage idea Directv had... worth the subscription just to watch this one channel. Haven't changed channels since Friday. Have two friends in Houston proper, and got a txt from one saying he would NEVER stay again :). Haven't heard from the other friend.

I am currently getting 16.1 here in Yell county. 4.1 is still a no go. Both were off for most of the day, 16.1 is finally back on. Wonder what KARK-DT's deal is? If I read this thread right, once the panels were fired back up they both should have come back on:confused:

If 4.1 was running on low power, someone will have to go up to the transmitter site, and retune the transmitter back up to full power. Don't know if they have someone up there all the time or not.

Sad fact is that KARK is just another McStation for Nexstar.

I'm a huge Terminator fan so I am looking forward to watching that
720p HDTV FOX Termnator Sara Chonnor Cronicles show.

I watched last weeks episode of that new Fox series Fringe in stunningly clear HDTV on a new 42 inch Philips LCD. That show is cool although a lot of it reminds me of a rehash of the X-Files. Its hard to come of with new stuff, seems like a lot of themes have been over produced.

Anyway, I read FOX spent 10,000,000 million dollars on the pilot episode of Fringe because everything in HDTV has to be made to look more real. Production value has gone up because we can see everything so much more clearly in HDTV.

Something that I wanted to bring up before but forgot. I do have local channels from Comcast cable. Previously I mentioned that the over the air antenna broadcast programing that I am recieving looks much better than the comercial version of what Comcast offers.

I was wondering if I ordered the Digital channels from Comcast if that would improve them enough to be of similar quality to the Free local antenna signal.

It seems so deceptive of Comcast to offer lower inconsistant teared signal quality - basic, then a clearer digital siganal, and finally High Definition 720p HDT.

I'm a huge Terminator fan so I am looking forward to watching that
720p HDTV FOX Termnator Sara Chonnor Cronicles show.

I watched last weeks episode of that new Fox series Fringe in stunningly clear HDTV on a new 42 inch Philips LCD. That show is cool although a lot of it reminds me of a rehash of the X-Files. Its hard to come of with new stuff, seems like a lot of themes have been over produced.

Anyway, I read FOX spent 10,000,000 million dollars on the pilot episode of Fringe because everything in HDTV has to be made to look more real. Production value has gone up because we can see everything so much more clearly in HDTV.

Something that I wanted to bring up before but forgot. I do have local channels from Comcast cable. Previously I mentioned that the over the air antenna broadcast programing that I am recieving looks much better than the comercial version of what Comcast offers.

I was wondering if I ordered the Digital channels from Comcast if that would improve them enough to be of similar quality to the Free local antenna signal.

It seems so deceptive of Comcast to offer lower inconsistant teared signal quality - basic, then a clearer digital siganal, and finally High Definition 720p HDT.
I have the same antenna as you do and I agree, its great.

Now, what you are describing that you are seeing from your Comcast connection sounds a lot like their analog service. If you take that cable from the set top box (I am assuming you are using one) and plug it into your Philips directly and let it tune digital channels, you will get ALL the local stations in digital format in the clear. That means when there is HD programming on a network channel, like Terminator on Fox, you will see it clean and clear.

Comcast's analog service is pure garbage with noise and other crap in it that makes it not worth watching, BUT the HD service is usually pretty good. I will NOT, however, pay for their full digital tier service because 1) they don't carry enough HD and 2) it is wayyyyy over priced.

If you are just wanting to watch 4, 7, 11, 16, 38 in HD and don't give a crap about any other HD channels, do NOT pay for Comcast digital. If you already subscribe to their analog service, you automatically get the digital versions of the locals FREE!! Including PBS-HD which NOONE else carries. They have some great stuff on there.

If you do want to watch other HD channels that are only on cable or satellite, do yourself a HUGE favor and get DirecTV. They have outstanding service, the locals in HD now, and a hell of a lot of other HD channels. In fact, if you do want to try out DirecTV, let me know...I would LOVE to have you put me down as a referral. :) Would give us both $50 off our bills. :)

Anyway, again, welcome to the group. I know there are a LOT of pages of stuff on here and its hard to read it all. If you ever get bored, try running back a ways and reading some of the other posts on here. Might turn out to find that there have been things discussed here that you were wondering about and just forgot to ask. :) We have been rambling on and on here for a long time about ALL things HD. :)

BTW, there has already been a full season of Terminator on Fox. You are going to be jumping into a show after a LOT of stuff has already been established. I would suggest looking into finding ways to get Season 1 so you can get up to speed without missing anything.

Looks like KARK might still be running at lower power? Not getting it very well on the computer room TV with the set top antenna.

Yeah, Looks like they are still at low power. Usually, get them in the 90% signal quality range here and today they are only showing about 40-50% quality. All others appear to be back to normal so what davenlr intimated may indeed be the case:
If 4.1 was running on low power, someone will have to go up to the transmitter site, and retune the transmitter back up to full power. Don't know if they have someone up there all the time or not.

dmatch

WABG-DT 32 came up for air here briefly. Any word on when KARK-DT will be at 100% power?

KETS is back to running upconverted and cropped 480i material with -2 turned off. No detail in the PQ at all. Sad. Hopefully a live fed network HD show will look better.

KETS is back to running upconverted and cropped 480i material with -2 turned off. No detail in the PQ at all. Sad. Hopefully a live fed network HD show will look better.

Is AETN's begathon over?

BTW, AETN is having a Commission (board) meeting today at Batesville. Details here (http://www.aetn.org/pressroom/releases/foi_notice_aetn_commission_to_meet_916).

Discussion on the Fayetteville board (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=14667619#post14667619) about the Arkansas@Texas game on September 27th. ABC will be broadcasting that game and three others regionally in that time slot.

A few questions regarding channel 7, especially for those of you having both DirecTV and an OTA antenna...As you know, DirecTV recently turned on the Little Rock locals in HD (at least some of them). I have noticed on channel 7 that both the Raycom telecasts at 11:30 on Saturdays and the Saturday afternoon ABC games are experiencing picture quality problems on KATV. Since it is happening on both DirecTV and my rooftop antenna, I assume the problem lies with KATV. Anyone else seeing this?

Are we to presume that things will improve when KATV completes the new tower? And if so, will that also improve the feed to DirecTV?

On another KATV subject, what a disaster the PPV of the Arkansas-ULM on DirecTV was. Anyone else see that?

A few questions regarding channel 7, especially for those of you having both DirecTV and an OTA antenna...As you know, DirecTV recently turned on the Little Rock locals in HD (at least some of them). I have noticed on channel 7 that both the Raycom telecasts at 11:30 on Saturdays and the Saturday afternoon ABC games are experiencing picture quality problems on KATV. Since it is happening on both DirecTV and my rooftop antenna, I assume the problem lies with KATV. Anyone else seeing this?

Are we to presume that things will improve when KATV completes the new tower? And if so, will that also improve the feed to DirecTV?

On another KATV subject, what a disaster the PPV of the Arkansas-ULM on DirecTV was. Anyone else see that?

Welcome to the forum Andy,

KATV isn't that well regarded among the HDTV community in Central Arkansas for a myriad of reasons (please read the archives and see). KATV does not currently have its own DTV transmitter and tower (it was destoyed with the tower collapse) and its DTV/HDTV service is relayed OTA by KWBF-DT 44 (http://www.fcc.gov/fcc-bin/FMTV-service-area?x=DS1046964.html) (using virtual channel "7-1") which carries not only KATV programming (ABC shows that are HD), but also that of KWBF ("42-1") and also of KKYK ("42-2").

Because KWBF runs an "HD" signal (mostly stretched upconvert of 4x3 programming), KKYK (RTN) and *also* the KATV relay, due to multicasting bandwidth alloted to the KATV stream is very limited and comes at a cost of PQ (macroblocking, very visible during sports).

The PPV game: I won't comment since I refuse to pay $30 for a SD PPV of any sort and therefore didn't watch.

IF KWBF had ANY sense at all, they would scale back their "HD" offerings on 42-1, for instance, taking it off the stretched out 4x3 and kicking down the signal to maybe a 480p signal (because, honestly, does Hawaii 5-0 really NEED to be sent out at 720p or better???) and turn of 42-2 when HD content is on KATV, then that would help IMMENSELY. But we all know that just won't happen. There are many different combinations they could do to get the PQ better on KATV that just won't happen.

I wonder how much Nicholson is paying KWBF to get their signal retransmitted on 42-3? You would think they would have enough pull to get a better signal put out than what is going out now.

I really would have rather seen KATV-DT use the backup transmitter they are using for analog channel 7 to transmit Digital (if that's technically possible)... I mean, now that they are on Directv, how many views actually watch analog? It would be interesting to note how many callers they had when analog 7 went off the air for a day this weekend... I'm not sure the fcc would allow them to do digital on ch 7 tho.... Its all BS.

On the bright side, KATV looks better than KETS.

IF KWBF had ANY sense at all, they would scale back their "HD" offerings on 42-1, for instance, taking it off the stretched out 4x3 and kicking down the signal to maybe a 480p signal (because, honestly, does Hawaii 5-0 really NEED to be sent out at 720p or better???) and turn of 42-2 when HD content is on KATV, then that would help IMMENSELY. But we all know that just won't happen. There are many different combinations they could do to get the PQ better on KATV that just won't happen.

I wonder how much Nicholson is paying KWBF to get their signal retransmitted on 42-3? You would think they would have enough pull to get a better signal put out than what is going out now.

Actually, KATV is getting the first subchannel of KWBF---do a manual scan/channel input and KATV is first one to show up. In a normal station, there would be someone to flip the switch but it appears KWBF is just using the stretch mode as a form of laziness in lieu of having someone switch from the HD MNTV feed and local ads, etc. Some converters and DTV receivers/TV's won't correct this problem on the fly or at all.

Isn't Nicholson rumored to be retiring soon? It can't happen soon enough.

On the bright side, KATV looks better than KETS.

OMG, AETN has gone Wild (no pun intended) with this cuttin' 'n upconvertin'. I took a look-see at "2-1", "ch2" via E* and (cough) analog ch2. Program playing at time of check is Wild (why not Nova in pattern?)

DTV 2-1 is a cropped/up converted version of analog 2. The AETN bug is cropped at the bottom.

KETS via E* is a cropped version of the cropped DTV signal. just a small corner of the AETN bug is visible.

KETS 2 analog looks normal with all the picture there.

This so called "HD" is a step backwards---it doesn't increase any actual HD programming. Analog can't end soon enough so I can pick up WMAO-DT 25 from Mississippi Public Broadcasting (which at least has PBS-HD in hd lite)

I seriously doubt the FCC would allow KATV to operate digitally on channel 7. If they were to ask to discontinue their analog under any circumstances, I'm almost sure KETS-DT would complain if KATV was allowed to operate digitally there. Plus we don't know what kind of analog transmitter they have, it may not even be convertible into digital.

Also, the data I have shows KATV on the third subchannel.

http://www.rabbitears.info/screencaps/ar-lra/37005-0_0.htm

- Trip

OMG, AETN has gone Wild (no pun intended) with this cuttin' 'n upconvertin'. I took a look-see at "2-1", "ch2" via E* and (cough) analog ch2. Program playing at time of check is Wild (why not Nova in pattern?))

I sure wish I knew. I'm watching "Einsteins Big idea" right now (special 2 hr Nova) in HD, and its awesome. I'm so glad I invested in a big dish. AETN is proving to be a stepchild more and more each week... E=MC² !!!

A few questions regarding channel 7, especially for those of you having both DirecTV and an OTA antenna...As you know, DirecTV recently turned on the Little Rock locals in HD (at least some of them). I have noticed on channel 7 that both the Raycom telecasts at 11:30 on Saturdays and the Saturday afternoon ABC games are experiencing picture quality problems on KATV. Since it is happening on both DirecTV and my rooftop antenna, I assume the problem lies with KATV. Anyone else seeing this?

Are we to presume that things will improve when KATV completes the new tower? And if so, will that also improve the feed to DirecTV?

On another KATV subject, what a disaster the PPV of the Arkansas-ULM on DirecTV was. Anyone else see that?

Andy, the PQ problems must be KATV. I see the same thing you do, 7.1 ala 42.3 looks low bitrate, also KATV uplinked to Direct looks horrible in HD when running the Raycom games. Looks like you start and pause, start and pause constantly, low low bitrate, has to be. To the contrary, at my location I also get 40.1 KHBS-DT, the ABC affiliate in the Fort Smith market...I'm so lucky:D. They run the Raycom games in HD and it is beautiful. Nearly Perfect, no artifacts, clear as a bell. Looks like you could just reach in and take the guy in 5th rows popcorn and coke:D So, it has to be KATV all the way, KHBS on my OTA looks great.

I seriously doubt the FCC would allow KATV to operate digitally on channel 7. If they were to ask to discontinue their analog under any circumstances, I'm almost sure KETS-DT would complain if KATV was allowed to operate digitally there. Plus we don't know what kind of analog transmitter they have, it may not even be convertible into digital.

Also, the data I have shows KATV on the third subchannel.

http://www.rabbitears.info/screencaps/ar-lra/37005-0_0.htm

- Trip

I agree. All of my tuners bring KATV in on 42.3 which is the 3rd sub, sometimes it remaps to 7.1 and sometimes it shows (42.3 KATV)

Andy, the PQ problems must be KATV. I see the same thing you do, 7.1 ala 42.3 looks low bitrate, also KATV uplinked to Direct looks horrible in HD when running the Raycom games. Looks like you start and pause, start and pause constantly, low low bitrate, has to be. To the contrary, at my location I also get 40.1 KHBS-DT, the ABC affiliate in the Fort Smith market...I'm so lucky:D. They run the Raycom games in HD and it is beautiful. Nearly Perfect, no artifacts, clear as a bell. Looks like you could just reach in and take the guy in 5th rows popcorn and coke:D So, it has to be KATV all the way, KHBS on my OTA looks great.

When I first saw it on a Raycom game, I thought it might be a Raycom PQ issue but when the same thing happened on the ABC national game, and was on both DirecTV and rooftop antenna, I thought it had to be KATV. While I did pay $29.99 for the DirecTV PPV, they refunded $10.00 even though it was not their fault. I e-mailed both Dale Nicholson and Jeff Long during the telecast. No response from Nicholson but I have had 2 e-mails from a VP at ISP Sports, who recently contracted with UA for the media rights.

I just hope KATV gets it all straight when they get their new tower/transmitter.

BTW, Arkyman, I see you are in Yell County. I grew up in neighboring Scott County.

BTW, Arkyman, I see you are in Yell County. I grew up in neighboring Scott County.

I have family that lives in Waldron and Mansfield

Actually, KATV is getting the first subchannel of KWBF---do a manual scan/channel input and KATV is first one to show up. In a normal station, there would be someone to flip the switch but it appears KWBF is just using the stretch mode as a form of laziness in lieu of having someone switch from the HD MNTV feed and local ads, etc. Some converters and DTV receivers/TV's won't correct this problem on the fly or at all.

Isn't Nicholson rumored to be retiring soon? It can't happen soon enough.
Yeah, its really on the third sub. 42.3.

As far as HD MNTV, there is such a thing????? What is it that they show that is HD? I have never seen anything....of course I never spend any time there because its just crap half the time.

I sure wish I knew. I'm watching "Einsteins Big idea" right now (special 2 hr Nova) in HD, and its awesome. I'm so glad I invested in a big dish. AETN is proving to be a stepchild more and more each week... E=MC² !!!
I'm glad I invested in a tuner card for my computer that can get Comcast's ClearQAM version of PBS-HD. Definitely cost a LOT less than what you shelled out for your big dish. :) Oh, and a LOT LOT smaller too. hehehehehehe

I get the Raycom HD feed directly from the same satellite KATV does, and its pristine.

KATV has exhausted all options as I understand it, and is pretty much stuck as a 2nd HD subchannel until Jan/Feb 2009. As Directv takes their feed OTA, what we see OTA is what directtv will see. I was hoping KATV could wrangle up a fiber link to the directv receive site at KLRT or just use the Comcast cable feed (which I'm pretty sure is already fed with Fiber), before the new season starts, but I'm not holding my breath. Right now, I get both Raycom games and Nascar races directly from the main feed sats, so I'm not hurting...but I don't know what's gonna happen when Ugly Betty starts up...Pretty much need to use the DVR for that, as Primetime is when my big dish is pointed at PBS-HD.

Right now, I get both Raycom games and Nascar races directly from the main feed sats, so I'm not hurting...but I don't know what's gonna happen when Ugly Betty starts up...Pretty much need to use the DVR for that, as Primetime is when my big dish is pointed at PBS-HD.
Redo your Nova recording period for the 10pm showing or another showing while you are at work. That would solve that problem of getting your Primetime shows on the big dish.

Redo your Nova recording period for the 10pm showing or another showing while you are at work. That would solve that problem of getting your Primetime shows on the big dish.

It would if it was on the same satellite. While my system has the capability of turning the dish by channel, I set it up manually, so the dish wouldn't jog back and forth when I surf and search. Sage will automatically record the 10pm showing if I have it recording say, ABC-HD, but I'd have to be here to turn the dish for it. I do all my local network recording with Sage and the hauppage HD tuner USB stick for OTA, and PBS-HD off AMC3..Use Directv for the rest (usually a baseball or football game).

Nice suggestion tho. Worst case, Ill hook the sat receiver to the dish motor, and get a eSATA drive for it...as it has PVR capability.

Yeah, its really on the third sub. 42.3.

As far as HD MNTV, there is such a thing????? What is it that they show that is HD? I have never seen anything....of course I never spend any time there because its just crap half the time.

I think there's been a handful of shows in HD, but I seldom watch. MNTV is mainly offal from Fox Reality channel, old movies (half the time in SD 4x3), etc. I just run across KWBF OTA (when they do lock in) and see the h u g e stretched picture on "local programming" and pass on by.

As far as HD MNTV, there is such a thing????? What is it that they show that is HD? I have never seen anything....of course I never spend any time there because its just crap half the time.

Sometimes their Thursday and Saturday movies are HD, but not always. Last season they had a concert series that was in HD, I watched the Lenny Kravitz episode (I think that's the only time I've actually DVRed/watched an entire MyTV show) and of course "In the House" the Flava Flav sitcom. Smackdown moves from CW to MyTV in October, I would think it would remain in HD.

Equity has also managed to score a pretty impressive line up of syndicated shows lately, most notably Lost. But no HD of course. Anything local from Equity is either in Stretchovision on 42-1 or looking like it was recorded from YouTube on 42-2. I will give them this though, I tuned into the pilot of Lost Sunday night and used the picture mode on my Sony HDD250 to unstretch the picture, and it looked better than Lost ever looked on KATV's analog signal.

Equity has also managed to score a pretty impressive line up of syndicated shows lately, most notably Lost. But no HD of course. Anything local from Equity is either in Stretchovision on 42-1 or looking like it was recorded from YouTube on 42-2. I will give them this though, I tuned into the pilot of Lost Sunday night and used the picture mode on my Sony HDD250 to unstretch the picture, and it looked better than Lost ever looked on KATV's analog signal.

The Zenith DTV converter will squeeze KWBF's 42-1 stretched picture, and that of KTVE's 10-2 radar. E*'s furnished box (vip211) will not though.

The Zenith DTV converter will squeeze KWBF's 42-1 stretched picture, and that of KTVE's 10-2 radar. E*'s furnished box (vip211) will not though.

Yeah, I've also got the Zenith hooked up to my HDTV for back up. I've had the Sony DVR for 2 and half years, and just now figured out that it would squeeze HD content. Like steveken, I don't have much reason to ever tune in 42.1, but at least now, I can have a halfway decent picture out of it if I do watch it. There ain't much you can do to improve 42.2 though.

a couple of off topic questions...

i have directv and we have a sunroom that we have an extra tv and receiver in, we never use the tv, but would like to be able to, is there any way to take the access card out of the receiver in our bedroom and get it to work on this receiver?


also, has anyone else had problems with the new local hd channels cutting in and out? when the storms blew over the hd channels lost signal as soon as the clouds came in. the sd channels were still working at this time. would having my dish realigned help since it was installed before the latest satellite launch?

a couple of off topic questions...

i have directv and we have a sunroom that we have an extra tv and receiver in, we never use the tv, but would like to be able to, is there any way to take the access card out of the receiver in our bedroom and get it to work on this receiver?


also, has anyone else had problems with the new local hd channels cutting in and out? when the storms blew over the hd channels lost signal as soon as the clouds came in. the sd channels were still working at this time. would having my dish realigned help since it was installed before the latest satellite launch?


I may be mistaken, but I believe the access card is married to your BR receiver. A possible option would be output from the BR receiver to the sunroom tv and use a RF remote in the sunroom. Of course, in doing that, the BR and sunroom TVs would be seeing the same program.

Hello again to everyone - new member here in the last few days. I know everyone is roiled up over this KATV-DT issue. Lets face it KATV-DT is having problems getting their old NTSC formated programming reformatted for a digital broadcast. This could be do to several factors and I really do not know why. If I had to guess I would say it has to do with money and well to be perfectly honest laziness. The new KATV-DT tower will be completed soon so they dont want to invest in a broadcast that they know can not broadcast the real fully pumped out signal of what they would all really want us to be seeing on all these new 720p capable tv's that we have. Also lets not forget that a lot of people still have the old analog signal and do not care yet. However, I did watch that game over the weekend and noticed all the artifacting everyone was previously referring to in previous posts.

I know this is a long way off but I think in the near future and this would be very cool. I think in the near future, about 3 to 4 years, you will see usb digital recorders that can be hooked up to the internet and then you will be able to dust download the program to your digital recorder hook it into an hdmi port and watch the show in full 720p or EVEN BETTER full 1080p.

Please here me out! this would work great because it will have all the commercials and even perhaps more types of capabilities, forgot this before,
it could be a bluetooth wireless node that you would attach to the tv's hdmi port so you would not have to connect and reconnect stuff all the time.
I see this as a factor of the new Solid State Disc drives coming down in price and the thumb drives. What do you all think? We all know that downloading movies and perhaps non major network programming is going to happen!

Ok you will have this happen because there is a market for it right now in music so why not get people connected to more broadband and then get them to buy the programing that they just want each month.

I will be honest if I get this all in HDTV 1080p quality and it was around 20 bucks a month I would be happy to pay for a more top quality programming.
Look the producers of shows need the viewers of shows and not the cable companies and dish companies. Thats why the phone companies that own most of the spectrum for backbones for IP fought so hard to keep Google from buying that huge wireless spectrum. We know that in the future that the internet wireless 3g or 802.16 WIMAX wireless technologies will bring High definition programming to the masses without the cable companies, big networks or the major movie producers.

There are devices right now that bring programing from Youtube to your high def tv with a broadband connection and can watch a movie from netflix with the thing as well.

So if I could buy and Digital recorder and carry it like my IPOD and then hook it into any output screen I wanted I think that is the business model I would choose. I can download a high def program from fox right now and put it on the laptop and watch on my LCD tv right now but its a lengthly process and somewhat complicated to do for the average person.

Please here me out! this would work great because it will have all the commercials and even perhaps more types of capabilities, forgot this before, it could be a bluetooth wireless node that you would attach to the tv's hdmi port so you would not have to connect and reconnect stuff all the time. I see this as a factor of the new Solid State Disc drives coming down in price and the thumb drives. What do you all think? We all know that downloading movies and perhaps non major network programming is going to happen!

Bluetooth doesn't have the throughput to handle HD. I get your point, but it won't be Bluetooth doing it.

We know that in the future that the internet wireless 3g or 802.16 WIMAX wireless technologies will bring High definition programming to the masses without the cable companies, big networks or the major movie producers.

You're aware that the companies behind 3G wireless are the cell phone companies, right? And that Sprint along with a group of cable companies have all put money into the one, single WiMax rollout?

I don't see your vision coming to pass for a very long time. Cable companies have a vested interest in you not having the ability to bypass their TV programming.

- Trip

Comcast just implemented a 250gb/mo download limit on broadband. I can promise you, I record well over 4x that much off satellite in a month....It would be technically possible, but you wouldn't be able to afford it, unless comcast WANTED you to afford it. I don't see DSL as being fast enough for real time 1080p at this time either. Wireless HD to the computer would be nice, but again, $$$. Also, don't forget any non-network content, such as movies, sports, syndicated programming, etc, will be hdcp encrypter if sent over the net in any form, so you could watch it live, but forget recording it to anything.

Things change tho, so anything could happen.

JP1979: You can't switch access cards.... If you want, you can either carry the bedroom receiver into the sun room, or call and have the sunroom receiver authorized at $5.00/mo on your bill.

HD and Locals (both on KA band) dropped out lots this weekend. Check the radar when the signal fails, if there is orange or red on the radar to your south in the 1 to 5 mile range, its not your dish. If there is only green and yellow south of you, you might have a probem. Check you signal on sat 99 and 103 (the ones that give you readings on all transponders) and if your average is 80 or higher, a realignment will not help. If its in the 70's or lower, you need it tweeked. Directv won't realign a dish unless you have signals below 60 I believe...unless you pay for it.
If you are around town here (LR area), PM me, and I can swing by and align it if its where I can get at it.

4.1 is back up and running here in Yell county. I noticed it back on last night about 11pm. I guess they went back to full power. However, I was only getting an 80% lock on 4.1. Before it went down, it was always 87% or higher. I know my antenna is in the correct location. I tuned 38.1 to its strongest point, that is also where I get my best signal on the rest of the LR channels. Over and out from Yell County:D

Yeah, its really on the third sub. 42.3.

As far as HD MNTV, there is such a thing????? What is it that they show that is HD? I have never seen anything....of course I never spend any time there because its just crap half the time.

Twilight Zone is on KWBF in HD right now.

JP1979: You can't switch access cards.... If you want, you can either carry the bedroom receiver into the sun room, or call and have the sunroom receiver authorized at $5.00/mo on your bill.

HD and Locals (both on KA band) dropped out lots this weekend. Check the radar when the signal fails, if there is orange or red on the radar to your south in the 1 to 5 mile range, its not your dish. If there is only green and yellow south of you, you might have a probem. Check you signal on sat 99 and 103 (the ones that give you readings on all transponders) and if your average is 80 or higher, a realignment will not help. If its in the 70's or lower, you need it tweeked. Directv won't realign a dish unless you have signals below 60 I believe...unless you pay for it.
If you are around town here (LR area), PM me, and I can swing by and align it if its where I can get at it.

thanks Dave, maybe it was just this last weekend and not a permanent thing. i will check the signal and radar and see what is going on... thanks for the realign offer, hopefully it won't have to be done, but i will definitely hit you up on the offer if it is needed!

Comcast just implemented a 250gb/mo download limit on broadband. I can promise you, I record well over 4x that much off satellite in a month....It would be technically possible, but you wouldn't be able to afford it, unless comcast WANTED you to afford it. I don't see DSL as being fast enough for real time 1080p at this time either. Wireless HD to the computer would be nice, but again, $$$. Also, don't forget any non-network content, such as movies, sports, syndicated programming, etc, will be hdcp encrypter if sent over the net in any form, so you could watch it live, but forget recording it to anything.

Things change tho, so anything could happen.
Are you sure about that? And are you sure its for around here too? Can you provide any links to sites where it is saying that?

Anyone interested in following my U-Verse saga, I called back tonight--insisting on Tier 2 support--to describe the low quality HD reception. (See my earlier posts in this thread.) I got another "this is as good as it is right now" response. After the call, I read in the "HD Programming board" that they are actually "cheating" their compression further by the way they encode, which "allows" them to send the channels out at 6-8 mpbs. Believe me, it shows! They gave me a 12 month discount to keep me, but frankly, as critical an eye as I have, I don't plan on keeping it. Coupled with their audio issues over HDMI and optical, this isn't worth it.

Hate being a customer of Comcast. Wish E* had local HDs. Their TurboHD is a great deal. D* has them, obviously, but there's really no cost savings over Comcast that I can see. Surely if D* has them, E* can't be far behind...

Anyone interested in following my U-Verse saga, I called back tonight--insisting on Tier 2 support--to describe the low quality HD reception. (See my earlier posts in this thread.) I got another "this is as good as it is right now" response. After the call, I read in the "HD Programming board" that they are actually "cheating" their compression further by the way they encode, which "allows" them to send the channels out at 6-8 mpbs. Believe me, it shows! They gave me a 12 month discount to keep me, but frankly, as critical an eye as I have, I don't plan on keeping it. Coupled with their audio issues over HDMI and optical, this isn't worth it.

Hate being a customer of Comcast. Wish E* had local HDs. Their TurboHD is a great deal. D* has them, obviously, but there's really no cost savings over Comcast that I can see. Surely if D* has them, E* can't be far behind...

Just spring for a CM4221 or CM4228 if you decide to switch to E*, their receivers still have OTA capability (including DVRs). D* has the locals of course but only KARK, KATV, KTHV, and KLRT--no KASN (CW). KETS and KWBF's HD offerings are few and far between at this time.

It sounds as if U-Verse still needs some bug fixes.

Are you sure about that? And are you sure its for around here too? Can you provide any links to sites where it is saying that?

It was in an Email, advising me of a change is TOS. I probably deleted it, but Ill look.

Costs being the same, why would you choose Comcast over Directv which has like 4 times more HD channels, and a lock on HD sports packages? Just curious...

It was in an Email, advising me of a change is TOS. I probably deleted it, but Ill look.
I never got that email. *shrug*

JP1979: You can't switch access cards.... If you want, you can either carry the bedroom receiver into the sun room, or call and have the sunroom receiver authorized at $5.00/mo on your bill.

HD and Locals (both on KA band) dropped out lots this weekend. Check the radar when the signal fails, if there is orange or red on the radar to your south in the 1 to 5 mile range, its not your dish. If there is only green and yellow south of you, you might have a probem. Check you signal on sat 99 and 103 (the ones that give you readings on all transponders) and if your average is 80 or higher, a realignment will not help. If its in the 70's or lower, you need it tweeked. Directv won't realign a dish unless you have signals below 60 I believe...unless you pay for it.
If you are around town here (LR area), PM me, and I can swing by and align it if its where I can get at it.


i am having the same problem now.

99 (c)
1-8 - 0,41,22,46,0,42,24,43
9-16 - 0,42,24,46,0,40,n/a,n/a

103 (C) is in the 40's and 50's across the board

so this is an alignment issue?

I got a phone call today from D* advising me that I will be losing NY HD DNS around October 24, becase (some of) the LR HD locals have been added. I say "some" because katv's 720p station is not watchable on D*, and likely won't be, until katv gets their new tower on the air and they get off of Equity's multicast hell.

Costs being the same, why would you choose Comcast over Directv which has like 4 times more HD channels, and a lock on HD sports packages? Just curious...

Outages during storms still kinda worry me...if it was cheaper, I might be willing to deal with it. Stupid logic, but there it is...

I got a phone call today from D* advising me that I will be losing NY HD DNS around October 24, becase (some of) the LR HD locals have been added. I say "some" because katv's 720p station is not watchable on D*, and likely won't be, until katv gets their new tower on the air and they get off of Equity's multicast hell.

I got the same phone call arxaw.:(

Anyone interested in following my U-Verse saga, I called back tonight--insisting on Tier 2 support--to describe the low quality HD reception. (See my earlier posts in this thread.) I got another "this is as good as it is right now" response. After the call, I read in the "HD Programming board" that they are actually "cheating" their compression further by the way they encode, which "allows" them to send the channels out at 6-8 mpbs. Believe me, it shows! They gave me a 12 month discount to keep me, but frankly, as critical an eye as I have, I don't plan on keeping it. Coupled with their audio issues over HDMI and optical, this isn't worth it.

Hate being a customer of Comcast. Wish E* had local HDs. Their TurboHD is a great deal. D* has them, obviously, but there's really no cost savings over Comcast that I can see. Surely if D* has them, E* can't be far behind...

How far are you from your U-Verse box? I got U-Verse about two weeks ago and I love it and as an HD-snob, I can BARELY tell a difference between DirecTV and AT&T U-Verse. Plus, I love having all the HBOs, Cinemax, and Showtimes that DirecTV charges for but doesn't air.

i am having the same problem now.

99 (c)
1-8 - 0,41,22,46,0,42,24,43
9-16 - 0,42,24,46,0,40,n/a,n/a

103 (C) is in the 40's and 50's across the board

so this is an alignment issue?

Serious alignment issue.

I got a phone call today from D* advising me that I will be losing NY HD DNS around October 24, becase (some of) the LR HD locals have been added. I say "some" because katv's 720p station is not watchable on D*, and likely won't be, until katv gets their new tower on the air and they get off of Equity's multicast hell.

Yea, waiting for my call next. Been fun while it lasted....Looks like its back to obnoxious weather maps covering 1/4 of the screen again.

Outages during storms still kinda worry me...if it was cheaper, I might be willing to deal with it. Stupid logic, but there it is...
But if you have your dish aligned properly, you have nothing at all to worry about. We rarely get storms bad enough to cause a problem. I am talking about maybe losing, oh, maybe one or two hours TOTAL over the past year or so that I have had HD from them. If its bad enough outside to take out the signal, then you probably have better things to be doing inside than worrying about TV. :)

It seriously takes quite a thick cloud to knock it out for me. And in those times during storms I did lose it, thats why I have an OTA as a backup as well as my ClearQAM Comcast that I have into my computer to look at. Remember, that part is essentially free if you are paying for a cable modem and don't have filters on your line.

Anyway, DirecTV is still vastly superior to Comcast in regards to HD content any day of the week in my eyes.

KATV is broadcasting the AR-AL game from Raycom in HD. It's a miracle. However, it's very compressed. Macroblocking all over the place. Is Jefferson Pilot in HD now, too?

This is HD?

This is HD?

You can put lipstick on a pig but....

I'm on lunch hour @ home and the even the E* SD feed is showing macroblocking from KATV (likely E* is using the DTV feed from KWBF-DT). DTV OTA from KATV (via KWBF-DT) too weak to decode even with the Zenith box.

On the bright side, at least Dave Rowe isn't doing color :D

I went into AT&T's flagship store over in Shackleford Crossing today. I was just curious about what all was in there. I also wanted to look at the U-Verse setup. I was NOT impressed. The video was on Discovery HD when I got there and I got about 4 feet from it or so and I could see it was blocky as hell. I then went about looking at what was on the other channels and when it showed the video in the lower window of what was on that channel, it was just ridiculously blocky and an embarrassment if I were AT&T. If bpeacock22 is seeing what I saw, I completely understand why he is upset. It would NOT be something I would want to pay for.

Sorry for intruding from Virginia, but I'm home on a quick visit to check in with the parents. They purchased a small HDTV for their kitchen. Due to some obstruction they can't run coax from their existing antenna. So they need smaller rabbit ears to do it. They are in the Wingate area (Markham and Mississippi). They got a pair of Philips when they purchased the TV, but can only get 11.1 and up solidly - 2, 4, 7 are challenge. I checked antenna web and of course found that there are different directions. Any suggestions given the limitations?

I should add I know little about HD OTA - I'm a Verizon FiOS subscriber in the DC area. Just wait until FiOS arrives in LR - your mind will be blown away by the quality and offerings.

Thanks for the help.

Thanks
Kevin

Sorry for intruding from Virginia, but I'm home on a quick visit to check in with the parents. They purchased a small HDTV for their kitchen. Due to some obstruction they can't run coax from their existing antenna. So they need smaller rabbit ears to do it. They are in the Wingate area (Markham and Mississippi). They got a pair of Philips when they purchased the TV, but can only get 11.1 and up solidly - 2, 4, 7 are challenge. I checked antenna web and of course found that there are different directions. Any suggestions given the limitations?


Are you sure your parents scanned for *digital* channels? The TV by default may be set for analog cable. This can be accessed by the menu.


Here are the channel assignments in Central AR...at present with tower locations.
VHF channels in itallics. Low power stations in bold

KETS-DT 5# ("2-n") Redfield
KARK-DT 30 ("4-n") Shinall
KATV-DT 44* ("7-n") Shinall, subchannel of KWBF-DT
KTHV-DT 12 ("11-n) Shinall
KLRT-DT 30 ("16-n") Shinall
KTWN-LD 18 ("18-n) north of Cabot
KVTN-DT 24 ("25-n") England
K27JP-LD 27 ("27-n") downtown LR
KASN-DT 39 ("38-n") Redfield
KWBF-DT 44*("42-n") Shinall

#KETS-DT moving to ch 7 after 2/17/2009.

*KATV's native DTV assignment is 22--will be active with new Shinall tower late 2008/early 2009

But if you have your dish aligned properly, you have nothing at all to worry about. We rarely get storms bad enough to cause a problem. I am talking about maybe losing, oh, maybe one or two hours TOTAL over the past year or so that I have had HD from them.

But if that two hours came during LOST there would be some fisticuffs in my neighborhood... :D

I went into AT&T's flagship store over in Shackleford Crossing today. I was just curious about what all was in there. I also wanted to look at the U-Verse setup. I was NOT impressed. The video was on Discovery HD when I got there and I got about 4 feet from it or so and I could see it was blocky as hell. I then went about looking at what was on the other channels and when it showed the video in the lower window of what was on that channel, it was just ridiculously blocky and an embarrassment if I were AT&T. If bpeacock22 is seeing what I saw, I completely understand why he is upset. It would NOT be something I would want to pay for.

Hmmmm....I wonder if we were there at the same time. Read my post below. But yeah, I saw the same blocky as hell TV too. My first thought was they didn't have their TV setup correctly because I don't experience that much macroblocking at home. More of a noise issue. But the noise wasn't on theirs... Which segways into my post:

(For those just tuning in, just search my user name in this thread for details of my installation history and problems.)

I went to the AT&T store today to get a comparison of their HD signal vs. mine. It was markedly better. So that told me there HAD to be something going on at my home to get this poor quality of TV. I put in another call to tech support. Asked to be immediately transferred to Tier 2. Enter Dustin. If blessings do indeed come in even small places, Dustin is the prime example of it. He shares my affinity for home theater and offered ideas that no other technician has. I have enough expertise that I was able to work through the things he described without having a technician come back out. And between the two of us, the picture quality was improved VASTLY over what I had been getting. No comparison. And along the way of this 90 minutes support call, we chatted about different TVs and surround sound options and this and that. It was great! Like talking to a friend! I was so impressed by his level of service, I asked for his manager's contact info so that I could commend him. Too often managers only get angry correspondence, but I wanted to make sure he got the accolades he deserved. He made me feel valued as a customer and has most likely saved me from having to be a Comcast customer for a long while.

There's still an audio issue...the HDMI firmware is not allowing surround sound to pass. So I'm going through an optical cable, but it has its own issue with sound going in and out. No work around presently, but at least he knew about the issue. No other person has.

Three in-home technicians; several phone support calls...and HE was the first and only one to work out a fix.

Is the picture quality BETTER than what I have with Comcast? It's debatable now. But one thing is for certain, all the people I badmouthed this service too, I'm going to have to go back and tell them that AT&T stuck with me to the end. Be patient with the new service/technology and eventually a livable quality will be reached. For the money, this will do.

So what did you and Dustin do to improve your PQ?

That is just it though do big cable companies have the power to stop media that is being delivered through the internet to the masses?

Two very good answers to this question.

The first one has to do with the hardware. Second is the speed of the internet.
We see the broadband capabilities of a country like Korea or Japan and have to ask ourselves why we pay 50 a month for a 8 mb connection when they are getting a 100 Mega Bits in both these countries for 20 American us.

The point I am trying to make is this. Lets say you produce a big movie ok. And lets say in the near future not like 25 years from now the average US household has a 25Mb connection. And lets say that you just filmed the latest
whatever version of Ironman movie and every kid in the US wants to see this thing with out having to leave to home on a HDTV of sorts in 1080p.

And lets say that on any given night 20 to 50 million people world wide can download this brand new movie and watch it right in their home for 5 dollars.
So are telling me that a movie that would cost 50 million to produce could take in 100 million easily on the first day that you sell it with out any other distribution costs....we do not need the Cable companies because cable companies know nothing about producing content. There will always be multiple tiered providers for broadband. Hollywood knows this they are already in talks with hardware vendors like Intel Amd....etc.... to figure out best how to create digital rights distributions like this.

So what did you and Dustin do to improve your PQ?

It was a combination of a small re-wire, re-grounding, and trying out about a billion different combinations of settings on my TV (Sony KDS60A3000). Bit by bit we got less and less noise until finally it was eliminated to my eye.

Oh, noise...I thought he had a magical setting to eliminate visible macroblocking. Sure wish someone would come out with a magic box that was as quick as my eye, to notice defects, and employ on the fly,frame by frame filters to fix it.

Are you sure your parents scanned for *digital* channels? The TV by default may be set for analog cable. This can be accessed by the menu.


Here are the channel assignments in Central AR...at present with tower locations.
VHF channels in itallics. Low power stations in bold



Yes I did a digital scan and picked up 7-1 and 11-1 and 16-1 and a couple further up. The basic question is anyone using a good set of "rabbit ears" that they've had success with in Little Rock?

Thanks for the other info.

Rabbit ears work for me, but have to be moved for each station. Lots of reflections and multipath in West Little Rock. I highly recommend a small outdoor uhf/vhf antenna if possible, or a bow tie uhf antenna with some high vhf capability...An attic mount would work in their location. A rabbit ears will be problematic at best...Unless you just get real lucky and find a hot spot. One of those clip on UHF bow ties they used to send with new tv's would work if taped to a wall in a hot spot, probably better than a rabbit ears.

Oh, noise...I thought he had a magical setting to eliminate visible macroblocking. Sure wish someone would come out with a magic box that was as quick as my eye, to notice defects, and employ on the fly,frame by frame filters to fix it.

There was a "small line error", which when I fixed with his leading, took care of quite a bit of the macroblocking. It is still there, but no worse than what I am used to with Comcast.

Deep into my TV's advanced settings under Custom (which I had set up when I bought the thing), there was an option for "MPEG Noise Reducer". I had gone through the manual soon after the install but must have missed this. When I turned it on "high," the other artifacts were eliminated.

I am now noticing a slight ghosting off the edges of people in the shot. I'm working through the things we changed to see if I can back something down. It's not that bad though.

For those also experiencing the optical in-and-out and the HDMI no-surround-sound, which do you go for with no work-around? It's like, which is less annoying?

I use the TV itself for video switching (3 hdmi and two component, and one VGA), and use my Denon for audio switching using a mix of optical and coax, as well as one coax to optical converter. Then I use a Harmony 880 remote to switch both inputs at once . I just feel like its cleaner to keep video and audio separate, rather than feeding video through an audio amp.

I have the following hooked up this way:
1 dual tuner satellite dvr
1 XP HTPC w AC3 USB sound and HD Recorder
1 ATSC/FTA HD PVR
1 Sage Media Extender
1 DVD Recorder w/component IO

The one remote controls everything , or a combination of several together. Was complicated as hell to set up, but easy as it gets to operate. With the addition of a Component video/analog audio switcher, I can record from any of the HD sources in H.264 video, to the HDPC.

FWIW, Changing the "noise filter" on my Aquos has no noticable effects on the PQ, although I don't have any noise to begin with. Ringing (or mosqitoe noise) around peoples faces and text, seems to be a fairly common HD artifact, and varies widely from channel to channel. Don't know what causes it. Noticed it on ATSC, Directv and FTA...Although it seems to occur less on channels with ample bandwidth (PBS-HD for example).

Glad you are getting it worked out. Use optical, you will never have any problems with it.

I live in Pottsville and have had my antenna up in the attic for about 1 year. Yesterday I decided to move it outside. I have up about 20ft off the ground with an amplifier. My signal strengths are:

In attic - Outside

KARK 75-85% - 90%
KATV 0% - 0%
KTHV 85% - 90%
KLRT 60-70% - 90%
KASN 65-70% - 0-59%

Any reason why KASN would drop moving it to the outside? I spent 2 hours twisting it today, and all I could get it up to was 67%. However, it won't hold the lock for more than a couple of minutes. I bounces from no signal to 59% most of the time. Any ideas?

The only obvious explanation is location. KASN is at Redfield and the others are at Shinall, but if you were getting it before moving it, there may be more to it than that. You might try adjusting the direction, and see if you can get it to lock in, but you run the risk of losing the others. Do you have a rotor?

No rotor, I twisted and turned it and the direction I have it going now is the best I can get. the only thing I can think of is in the attic the antenna was pointing up at a little bit of an angle, outside on the pole it is level, would that make much of a difference?

That's called beam tilt, something built into new hi gain yagi UHF antennas. Yes, it can make a difference. In your case, find the correct direction for highest signal, the raise or lower the antenna on the mast by 1' increments while maintaining the same direction. UHF has "hot spots" and "dead zones". They usually are separated by a wavelength. See if that helps.... If not, did you change anything? The length of coax between the antenna and amp perhaps?

What kind/brand antenna and amp are you using? In the direction you are pointed, how far to the nearest hill/ridge higher than your antenna?

I'm using a radioshack vu190. Not sure what the amp is. The length of the cable between the antenna and amplifier has changed.

Try, if possible, to put the old length of coax back between the amp and antenna. Might be just the right length now to cause a null at ch 39. There are so many variables. VU190 should be doing good on the roof tho. How did you even fit it in the attic? Can't believe you don't get ch 44 digital with it in Pottsville.

Had 44 this morning with a new channel scan, lost it this afternoon. KASN seems to be holding its lock now at around 62-65%; the daytime sun have anything to do with the fluctuating signal?

Might. Signals on UHF are usually higher after the sun goes down due to tropospheric bending...the temperature inversion in the morning and evening cause the signals to hug the ground rather than fly off into space.

Thanks for the help. It's just frustrating knowing that all other channels are locked in at higher signals and this one (KASN) did better under a roof!

Your problem is exactly why KATV decided to move their transmitter to Shinall Mt instead of rebuilding in Redfield. FWIW, I don't get a solid lock on 39 either, and I'm only 20 miles away. Problem being, My antenna is pointed toward the Little Rock stations, and has a -45db front to side...enough to about null out 39.

Steveken: Can you see if your contact at Tribune can add 3ABN and KTWN (digital 27.x and 18.x) to their database, so Directv can add them to the OTA locals list, so my DVR's can tune them?

JCK77. I live in Belleville, I get KASN at 65-80% lock all the time. I have a CM3671 crossfire Antenna, rotor system and CM7777 dual VHF/UHF pre-amp. You should get 38.1 at your location. My bro-inlaw lives at Oak Grove between Atkins and Hector, he gets it at about 85% all the time and his Ant is in his Attic. I suggest you try lowering or raising your antenna another foot or so. I have my antenna mounted outside at 18 feet, its my hot spot. If I go up to 20 feet or down to 16 feet, I lose 38.1 and 42.1. You might try this, I definitely works for me and I'm probably 15-20 miles farther from KASN's tower than you are. Good luck:)

Attention Guys, I need some help

I'm thinking of erecting a tower for my antennas. I'm thinking 60,70 maybe even 80, 90 or 100 feet. I have a friend who has worked all over the USA erecting all kinds of Huge towers of 1,000 - 2,000 feet. He knows his stuff, I was gonna get him to actually put the tower up for me. I'm wondering what would be an acceptable height to receive signals from all over? I used to have my Ant mounted about 35 feet up and I received Stations from just about every direction. From the west my farthest stations were received from Tulsa and Oklahoma City, these were on all the time here, but only real watchable during the fall and winter months, they faded pretty badly in the spring and summer. To the South I got Elorado CBS ch 10 and I think it was channel 12 from Shreveport Louisiana. These were also occassional stations. From the North West, I'd get channel 19. Still only got LR stations from the East and of course I got most of the Ft. Smith Stations. Anyway, thats the reception history at 35 feet here. That was using the Channel Master Quantum 1160A, it has the on board cartridge Amp, I think the 0100C. Anyway, what are you guys thoughts on my possiblities at say 60 feet? Also, how high can you go before you have to have a flashing light to warn aircraft? How would one ground a tower to prevent lightning from running in (yes I know grounded or not, lightning can still get ya) on the system? I'm sure a 60+ ft metal tower might become lightning prone at some point in time. Any of you guys been there and done that? IF so, whats the better towers? ROHN, TACO, AMERICAN? Appreciate any advice. BTW, I would run RG11 coax. because I figure I'd have about a 200+ ft cable run on such a set up. The cable would definitley eat some of the db along the way.

I had a 70' Rohn 25G. I just kept adding 10' sections til I was clear of trees by a good 20'. I picked up Memphis at 140 miles every morning and night, during the day it was in and out. Channel Master Quantum UHF yagi at the time...No amp, and RG6. Didn't have a VHF antenna on the tower.

Dig a 3' square hole... Chop a little out of the side of the hole vertically. Drive a hard copper 8' pipe down that into ground about 4 feet, and pack dirt back around it so the concrete won't touch it leaving 6-12" above ground. Set your tower (I insulated the tower base mount from the electrical ground and painted it with tar to keep concrete from corroding it), add granite gravel to the bottom of the hole for drainage, pour your concrete. When dry, bond the bottom tower leg above ground to the copper pipe with copper or aluminum braided strapping. If lightning hits the tower, it will go through the strapping (probably melting it) to the copper pipe, and not blow out the concrete. You can then replace it. I used 3 sets of 3 guy wires, at 20, 40, and 60 feet. Never had any problems with wind...Maintain the guys annually... Guy anchors should be set in concrete deep enough to prevent the wind from pulling them out. I used a Ham II rotor, which was rated for 4x the windload of the antennas I had up there... (a 3 element Triband ham antenna, and the TV antenna and a two meter 11 element vertical yagi) on a 10' thickwall 1.5" EMT conduit pipe.

thinking about doing the same here at this house to clear the ridges all around me which are 60-100' higher.

Don't think you need lights unless you are within a mile of an airport. If its a concern, I'm sure one of the station engineers could tell you where the rules for that are.

Have a dx blast...and make sure you add the tower/antenna as a line item on your homeowners to make sure they cover it.

My location is surrounded by trees, except for a clear opening to the North-Northwest. Since its a quarter mile to the nearest tree there--a cow pasture--, its very optimal for the LR locals.

A tower is very tempting, but I would likely use it for ham radio primarily, but I could "sidejack" a 4228 to a tower leg :D Currently, I'm up about 15ft with a small rise which puts me about 20ft AGL from the back fence-row.

Edit: Spinning my antenna and found KTWN-LD with subs18-1, 18-3 // (weather maps/radar with audio of KWCK 99.9), AETN on 18-2, and some old movie on 18-4. PSIP time is still off 1 Hr, 20min.