Please post what you are getting and where abouts you are in this area.

I am currently receiving the following:


yellow WUNJ-DT 29 PBS Wilmington NC Now Live 313° 39-1 through 39.5
NO HD content over 39-2 unfortunately even though titan says its being transmitted i get a blank screen with 75% signal strength.

* yellow WSFX-DT 30 FOX Wilmington NC Now Live 355° About 30%

* yellow WPXU-DT 34 PAX Jacksonville NC Now Live 53° NOPE
* yellow WWAY-DT 46 ABC Wilmington NC Under Review 278° Yes, If i completely i rotate antenna manually...do not have roter at this time :(

* yellow WECT-DT 54 NBC Wilmington NC Under Review 324° Dont think its on air at this time!

* lt green WILM-DT 10 CBS Wilmington NC Under Review 17° Dont think its on air at this time.

I picked up a CM3018...Lowes selection was kinda limmited. They had CM Stealth, cm3016, 3018 and 3020. $35,59 and 99 respectively.

I dont know if i picked up the right type of amp or not. I purchased the CM3044. THis is a signal amplifier. Probally not what i needed right? Funny thing is i can build computers with my eyes closed but when it comes to antennas i am clueless.

I have the antenna just kinda lying in the attic at this time cause im not willing to go there with the HOA at this time. Noone else in my neighborhood has one and i am attempting approval for a garden shed at this time so its not an option to place outside. I did attempt to mount the antenna with CM hardware. It didnt look very sturdy at all when completed. The mast doesnt sit flush. Mast came from lowes in antenna section.

Should i have a bowtie antenna instead. I am about 4 miles past monkey junction heading towards carolina beach.

Does home depot have better selection of antennas perhaps? If someone is familiar with my area please assist. I am using the MIT MY_HD DTV card for my hdtv tuner needs and displaying everything on Mits 65311. At this point i am not liking OTA lol.

One last thing. Can anyone confirm any stations in wilmington passing on HD content. not SD digital. I spent 120 bucks at lowes last night and if this is not what i really need i wanna exchange this stuff.

can anyone comment on this area at all. There were a few residing in wilmington, nc. however they are not speaking up.


thanks

Seems there aren't too many Wilmington people on this board, could be we don't really have squat for OTA too...

I've been speaking with all the station engineers off and on for the past few months--they're all nice guys and generally know each other's business too...

UNC-PBS probably won't have HD content for another month or so...

I get ABC-DT sporadically (and the transmission itself is sporadic), with same issue as you probably, I don't want to re-aim my antenna, otherwise I'll lose Fox, since Fox is coming from their studio on Oleander at a massive 5kw effective radiated power.

NBC, because they applied for and got a channel change, has a reprieve on the FCC deadline to go live, so they won't be up until maybe June or July... they claim they'll be HD from the start...

I also get good signal strength from PAX in Jacksonville. I left a voice mail for their engineer, but no response--pretty christian of him, huh? I suspect they are only xmitting carrier, or their bitstream is messed up...

Who cares about CBS--sorry... I get the NY HD feed on Dish... I like to call them the poor ******* step-child of WRAL--they just aren't getting any money...

I have a Channel Master also, 3016? It's a combined VHF and UHF (yagi directional). Eventually all the stations will be xmitting from the south-west general area, so I think a directional will be ok eventually. If you want something better though, all the engineers pretty much agreed that the Channel Master 4 bay UHF is the way to go-not nearly as directional as the yagi. Oh yeah, forgot, I've got a Radio Shack amp on the antenna too...

I live maybe a 1/2 mi north of Monkey Junction... we are definitely a minority around here. While speaking to one station engineer, after telling him I could get Fox, said I must be the one Wayne (egr for UNC-PBS) was talking about... ha ha... They all like to get feedback about their signals...

The egr at NBC was a butt head though--at least in my conversation with him--they didn't really buy Fox I guess, but will have a contract to run the station? There's no telling when they will broadcast in "hi resolution"--Fox doesn't have the equipment. Oh well, it'll be too late to see the rest of 24 anyway... And ABC won't be HD until Alias is over too...

Well, I think I've answered most of your questions amid my rambling...

By the way, the HOA cannot restrict antennas unless they are a safety hazard, or if you're in condos, it can't be mounted on common property (which is usually the exterior of condo buildings)--the specific FCC rules are out there if you do a search. I didn't even ask if I could put dishes on my house (although they are almost completely hidden from view)--and we've got an HOA...

Marc,

Pbs is definately the strongest.

Im using the MyHD card and getting fox at about 28-34% strength. and its using the silver sensor for that with signal booster. oposite of that, I am using the cm 3018 for abc. Are you getting serious gamma problems with ABC????

That antenna although not powered is receiving PBS fully as well. Both ABC and PBS are around 45-55% signal strength. Im sure this is because of attic situation. I am on vacation until ...May 16th.

We are obviously in same general area. Perhaps i pass you on the way to work or have cut you off on the hwy at some point or another. hehe

I was thinking of going to home depot today to check out the antennas. Lowes dissapoints me or what they have right now.

I do not get pax at all. although i can see signal strength at 34% sometimes.

keep the talk going back and forth and tell the engineers Josh will be calling soon too next time you talk to em. lol. Sad that their arent more HDtv peeps in our area if you think about it.

Found out a couple of things today.

1. Neighbor has HD 4:3 set and is thinking about antenna on roof eventually. Good news for me. :) We can help each other install em


2. I took back the signal amp and got the CM preamp deal from lowes. Only one they had. I plan on ordering the one from warren or stark 7778 i think. This one made a world of difference as i now get PBS at 95-100%. Fox at 55-60. Still have to rotate antenna for ABC at this time.

3. Im thinking of takeing the 3018 back. Way too big for the attic. and trying the CM 4221 4 bow antenna.


Hoping more people from wilmington come out of the woodwork soon.

HD 4:3--now really, that's a contradiction in terms...;) I have a friend that opted for that route though, he's got a 65" 4:3 that does the squeeze for HD/DVD material...

I think I might have to finally go the 4221 route also... tonight I've got to re-aim to get Fox for 24.

What exactly is the gamma issue you referred to? ABC digital picture wasn't all that special Sun night for Alias--actually looked kinda crappy for digital...

I've got the Dish 6000 for HD and OTA--I guess it's only about a second generation receiver compared to the Samsung SIR series...

How do you like your MyHD card? At some point I might consider that option in order to record OTA HD--still can't get too excited about Tivo and the like, especially the subscription fees... OTOH, since my computer is so far from the tv, don't know how I'd solve that problem...

Now that my antenna is pointed towards ABC, PBS is very strong, I'm getting 75%+. Much below that and the picture is unstable. I also have the highly regarded (now discontinued) Radio Shack double bowtie, I've tried before to wire that together with the other antenna, but it didn't seem to help (or hurt either)--I guess it's hit or miss when wiring multiple antennas.

Well, eventually FOX will be on one of the towers toward the west...

I don't care if you cut me off, just make sure you go the speed limit!!!

:eek:

marc,

i have MYHD card residing in an xp2000 right now upstairs. I am currently building the HTPC beast.

I have the kanam htpc case, myhdcard, p4pe mobo, 512mb pc2700,

two 120gb maxtors i robbed from office depot for about 80 each. 8mb cache editions. I just ordered the vga to 5 bnc with rca adapter cable for my mits 65". I only need to order the cpu now. I figure as long as i am waiting to get the cpu the 3.02 will drop. I passed on a 2.8 deal for 225.

This will make you laugh. I was at best buy on the sale weekend they had 50% off all dss boxes for new and existing subs. They had the ts160 ota, dss hd box for 250 which was 50% off the sale price. It didnt have a remote and i thought it would run 80-100 for that remote. they looked everywhere. You have to understand, i just received my hd card and case that week. so i didnt think i wanted the box ...with the htpc project in the works. So I passed. wondering if i made right decision but with superdish news. i think i might have. I have 3 dtivos in my house as well. 2 series 1 and 1 series II. I love em. but i am craving some hd material. all i have are some ts, tp clips on the pc. well if you wanna chat i am nc88keyz on aim. be good to talk to someone local for a bit.

my brother in law and i ran cat 5 downstairs preparing for future applications. So far i have xbox, two dtivos and soon the htpc will be added to the 8 port switch. Im currently thinking how to route antenna wire through existing wires. since charter installed a outside box i may run down there and loop from a wall outlet in the FROG and run that back in to a splitter. of course with the preamp before the splitter. Should be fun.

All the outlets and panels for cat5 coax etc. are available in the electronics section of lowes or home depot. LMK if you need some advice

lmk

Im gonna do some experimenting this weekend.


Got the following on the way from warrenelectronics.


CM 7777 vhf.uhf preamp. was only 3 bucks more than 7775

CM 4221

some rotor cable

CM remote rotor coming. I should be able to get a 45 degree spread on fox and pbs, abc with this thing. If i dont need a rotor it will go back or i will sell it.

Should be fun trying. They were out of tripods. Still deciding what to do there.

ill keep ya posted. Sounds like fun. I left a pull wire to fish some rg6 and rotor wire and whatever else through a mid wall in the living room. :)

Hi Guys.
I own a shop in Newberry, SC and I sell and install outdorr TV antennas, as well as the HDTV televisions and tuners.

I have read you posts tonight with interest, and would like to say a few things:

First, the channel master 9521 remote controlled rotor is one of the best inventions ever made. They work great.

Second, the 4-bay antenna really does have a lot of gain. However, installing any antenna inside the attic will reduce signal strength to the antenna by about 50%. I always try to install an antenna outside. A small antenna outside will work better than a larger antenna inside!

The 7777 is a great preamp. Ditto the 0064 and 0068 units.

And, if you really need a tripod, I have the channel master in stock. Let me know if you need it, and I will ship it to you.

Happy viewing,
Corey Brazell
Audio Video Electronics

Got the cm 4221 today. Its night and day as far as pinpointing signals. Its definately less directional. I evennfound a sweet spot in the attic getting all three channels for now. the amp seems to work just as well as the other one. I took the stuff back to lowes today. dont grab an open box 3018. you might not like what you buy lol. it was hard getting it back in the box. Anyways, I know i need to get the thing on the roof, just not looking forward to the HOAs dirty looks. lol


Im now getting 95% on pbs
70% on abc
55% on fox.

I can get stronger on fox but i will lose abc because of the spread. I am anxious to get it outside the attic. I just wanna haul it up on the roof just to see what i am missing....knowing im not gonna wanna move it down.

I am one step closer as i purchased roofing clips tonight for the coax.

4221 vs 3018.


We have a clear winner in my neck of the woods :) 4221 all the way!!!!

Originally posted by nc88keyz
... We have a clear winner in my neck of the woods :) 4221 all the way!!!!
FWIW, if you need to make the 4221 blend in better with outdoor surroundings, you can spray paint the antenna a different color. It will not affect the signal strength, according to a tech at ChannelMaster.

Eventually Fox will have their antenna in the same area as the other stations... "eventually"...

For the relatively low cost, I think I'll end up with the 4221 also...

Have you tried checking for NBC yet? I haven't lately... don't know what channel antennaweb has listed for them, but it did change to something like 45... can't remember, I wrote it down somewhere...

Any updates on when NBC-DT will come on the air??????

Originally posted by ecparks
Any updates on when NBC-DT will come on the air??????

The FCC just approved their channel change and gave WECT-DT authority to proceed May 5, 2003.

WECT-DT filed another extension Monday, June 2 since their previous extension was to run out in July. According to the supporting documentation submitted to the FCC, the transmitter building construction is underway and the transmitter is being constructed by the manufacturer and when completed shipped to the site. WECT-DT is saying to the FCC that they hope to be on air by September 30th.

Originally posted by foxeng
The FCC just approved their channel change and gave WECT-DT authority to proceed May 5, 2003.

WECT-DT filed another extension Monday, June 2 since their previous extension was to run out in July. According to the supporting documentation submitted to the FCC, the transmitter building construction is underway and the transmitter is being constructed by the manufacturer and when completed shipped to the site. WECT-DT is saying to the FCC that they hope to be on air by September 30th.


Nothing like waiting another 3-4 months. Thanks WECT_DT. Let us know if you need we...the public to wait anylonger. Feel free file for another extention with the FCC should any of you need to take a vacation. :(

Originally posted by nc88keyz
Nothing like waiting another 3-4 months. Thanks WECT_DT. Let us know if you need we...the public to wait anylonger. Feel free file for another extention with the FCC should any of you need to take a vacation. :(

In all fairness, after looking at the FCC records, it is clear that RayCom has been pushing to get this channel change done and the FCC has dragged their feet and just green lighted them to start on May 5. FCC Rules state that UNTIL you get the OK, YOU WILL NOT START building or ordering ANYTHING in lieu of loosing the authorization. It takes 30-60 days to build the transmitter, another 30-45 days to install and check out. This takes us to August, which was beyond the July date of their current extension. The fact that they have stated to the FCC their desire to be on by Sept 30 and not Dec 30 shows that they are moving as fast as can be.

Now I am in no way connected with ANY station in the Wilmington Market, but I DO know what it takes to build a station and how long it takes and if they are asking till Sept 30, that is moving pretty good from first of May go a head. This time line is based on no problems, which NEVER EVER happens. Murphy has a field day with fast projects like this, but hopefully the TV gods will smile on them.

so fellas, i bought the samsung d* 160. i get nothing from OTA hd as of now. i get pbs 39.2 at 77%, but its just blank. when will we get hd content from this thing? i bought the silver sensor at circuit city on sale for $21.99.

i am looking forward to espn on july 1st. maybe that will hold me over till we get something off the ground in wilmington.

any info to pass along?


edit: channel 39.2 says HDTV demo on my D* tv guide. just getting a blank screen though. grrr.

Originally posted by paul watkins
any info to pass along?


edit: channel 39.2 says HDTV demo on my D* tv guide. just getting a blank screen though. grrr.

None of the UNC stations are sending any HD OTA. They are sending HD on the fiber links to the cable companies though. I have personally emailed them and called their "help" number and the lady had no information and someone from their Engineering Department was to call me back and they didn't and still have not heard when the second channel is to be activated.

Wilmington will have local DSS feeds with addition of 119 lnb and oval dish. This shold be happening in just a few months. If you go to the website it says available now, but the affiliates are not listed. I called directv and they said maybe around august or september. I could deal with locals over sat to tie me over as i am still perfecting my htpc box. I did finally run a lead to the multiswitch antenna input for the OTA antenna.

PBS is blank on myhd tuner as well.

ABC was working last i checked.(few gamma problems and oversaturation) and fox is working just fine. All SD digital.

None of the UNC stations are sending any HD OTA. They are sending HD on the fiber links to the cable companies though. I have personally emailed them and called their "help" number and the lady had no information and someone from their Engineering Department was to call me back and they didn't and still have not heard when the second channel is to be activated.

that second channel you refer to is 39-2? also no unc channels will be in hd OTA,only on TW cable?

what about PBS WUNJ-DT, is that the same channel as 39-2? its listed as channel 29 on antennaweb.org but i get nothing.is it in HD?

It is my understanding that 39-2 will be in HD once the network is complete between all the locations for UNC-TV in North Carolina. Please correct me if i am wrong. I believe i read that on their website sometime back.

Wilmington will have local DSS feeds with addition of 119 lnb and oval dish. This shold be happening in just a few months. If you go to the website it says available now, but the affiliates are not listed. I called directv and they said maybe around august or september. I could deal with locals over sat to tie me over as i am still perfecting my htpc box

will those local channels carry an HD signal via sattelite? if so i will drop TWC all togeather. or at least hold out until i see if they get fox sports HD. tarheel's bball in HD will be the greatest thing ever. i'm sure espn will do dook vs. unc in HD next year, but fox sportsnet carries about seven unc games a year.

As far as i am aware....no HD locals over sat at this time. with exception to CBS feed on Dishnetwork. Again correct me if I am mistaken.

Originally posted by nc88keyz
It is my understanding that 39-2 will be in HD once the network is complete between all the locations for UNC-TV in North Carolina. Please correct me if i am wrong. I believe i read that on their website sometime back.

You are correct. The network was completed in March. Asheville was the last site to go up.

Originally posted by paul watkins
that second channel you refer to is 39-2? also no unc channels will be in hd OTA,only on TW cable?

The DTV channel is remapped to the analog number. In WUNJ-DT's case, the actual channel is 39 but the PSIP data is sent as 29 so you the viewer do not have to remember the analog channel and digital channel numbers. Technically the virtual channel nomenclature is this:

Analog - Major channel number (29 in this case) and minor channel number - 0 ex - 29-0 or just plain ole 29
Digital - Major channel number (29) minor channel number -1 through as many as the station wants. example 29-1 through 29-xx

UNC uses the following as minor channel numbers for all 11 UNC stations:
-1 as a simulcast of the analog
-2 will be the HD channel
-3 is PBS Kids
-4 is PBSYou
-5 is CPB-Annenberg Channel


Currently PBS HD is only available through TWC and will sometime be available OTA. That is the date I have been trying to find out to no avail.

When UNC starts to do HD programming on the second minor channel, at least 2 of the three other minor channels will have to be turned off or put into a "barker mode" where their bandwidth is turned down to the point that only a visual announcement is left to keep the receivers from locking up since there is a definitive bandwidth limit of 19.39 mps and HD needs at least 10 mps to be usable. The -1 channel can use as little as 3.5 mps. It will be interesting to see how UNC divides up the bandwidth among the minor channels.

UNC-HD looks really good on TW since it's full bandwdith, I hate to see what it'll look like OTA. In any case, it's not going to be pretty :(. Speaking of your receiver "locking up", mine already freezes for a few seconds if I put it on 58-2 (WUNG). They need to at least put some sort of video even if it's just color bars so your receiver has something to display instead of freezing, or people could think their receiver has a problem.

Originally posted by jmccurrytech
UNC-HD looks really good on TW since it's full bandwdith, I hate to see what it'll look like OTA. In any case, it's not going to be pretty :(. Speaking of your receiver "locking up", mine already freezes for a few seconds if I put it on 58-2 (WUNG). They need to at least put some sort of video even if it's just color bars so your receiver has something to display instead of freezing, or people could think their receiver has a problem.

My personal opinion is that UNC will only have 2 channels up when they do HD, -1 and -2. At this time I do not think UNC is sending a stream on -2 at all, just the PSIP data telling your receiver there is suppose to be something there and some receivers don't like being lied to so to speak. My Sammy 160 doesn't mind but I know other receivers do. I get WUNC-DT 59 (analog 4)and WUNL-DT 32 (analog 26) here in Greensboro. WUNG-DT 44 (analog 58) doesn't decode here, but I see the weak signal strength on it.

How is everyone doing in Wilmington, NC OTA Land. Yeah thats what I thought....Waiting for the big day.

I got an antenna feed ran from the roof to the diplexor on my dish. I really would like to see the HDtivo come soon. I cant justify buying a directv hd box for hd that i cant record.

At this time i have my htpc up and running and picked up T2 extreme in wm9. Looks great on a 2.8 p4, 8500 aiw, audio authority transcoder. Ive also ordered 5x8 switch for dss purposes cause locals are coming real soon. and i want to go ahead and get satc kit to prepare for hdtv over sat.

Thought I'd say Hello to some neighbors. I'm south of Monkey Junction near Ashley High School. I just finished reading throught the thread and ran up on my roof to re-direct my roof-top antenna. (It's an anti-cable monopoly kinda thing). No problems with my HOA.
I've had a rca DTC100 for a while now and gave up on getting any Digital OTA signals. I'd thought the local broadcasters were going to continue getting extensions forever and I'd never be able to justify my receiver to my wife.
I am excited to finally get the following:
PBS and ABC(wway).
I had pbs @ 94% but ABC was @ 23%.
I now get ABC @ 84% and PBS dropped to 64%. I am not getting anything else (but channel 8 now?). Any recommendations will be appreciated.
I'm truly looking forward to more DTV and eventually HDTV. Especially football. Talk about taking small steps in technology. Come on Wilmington, It's a new century lets get with the digital age.
Keep in touch
Incus

Incus if you use aim ...msg me.. We gotta be neighbors or something. Did you hear my weed eater about 30 minutes ago lol.


nc88keyz on aim

39-2 is broadcasting SD now. Didnt look too hot but not too bad either.

I just rescanned channels in MYHD

so whats the lasted on local HD channels here. were less than 2 months away from NFL and i want monday night football in HD. is it going to happen? any news to pass along?

Your guess is as good as mine. I have attempted emailing some people at the stations. I received a few replies of who to contact...The email address was invalid. emailed back- still invalid. Im not sure if she knew how to spell the name. I emailed PBS as well asking when they were gonna send out some HD content OTA...not just Time Warner...BTW im on charter...so i believe that is a lost cause for HD at this time. Charter isnt really together around here and I dont think wilmington is on the "todo" list. I am thinking about dss every day...but honestly would rather sit tight for the HD tivo box. Its not that important to me at this time to dump that money on a HD capable receiver. I would hope that one of the networks wants to be the 1st. That would say something for em in my opinion. But from what I understand in these parts ...they are owned by same group. Cant remember the specifics but remember someone posting about that.

Anyways, keep the thread alive:o

Hey Incus, does ABC digital look all washed out and too bright? Mine does... I'd think it might be my amp, and too strong a signal, but PBS looks great...

I was optimistic earlier this summer when I saw some channels come online digital, but I've since cooled off quite a bit.

NBC got an extension because they changed their channel to 44--I spoke with an engineer there yesterday, and they are just now pouring a cement pad for their xmitter facility, and they still don't have all their equipment. Target date is early Sept possibly. The bright side is that they expect to go full power and pass HD from the start.

I couldn't get ABC last night at all, otherwise I have a strong signal (I live just north of Monkey Junction in Crosswinds)--although I do have an amp on my antenna, a Channel Master 4221 up in my attic.

Fox is ok, hell, they're only about 5kw effective radiated power, takes a while for my Dish 6000 to lock in, but fairly stable after that.

PBS comes in great--I just wish they'd get some HD content. I call the station in Chapel Hill, and am in touch with Wayne Esterbrook, their chief engineer, asking about HD--maybe by fall...

Yep, one of these days we'll be all caught up with the big boys...

ABC washout and oversaturated colors is not your amp. We all get it as far as I know. It looks like crayola sometimes lol

I'm not in Wilmington(actually just 10 miles west of I-95 Lumberton) But I usually pickup ABC WWAY-DT 3 each morning and evening. I to notice it's overly bright and either the gama or saturation is also off bad. I haven't gotten even a flicker of a signal for a little over 24 hours. I had been getting around 40% to 70% signal from them. I'm not sure if this bad weather past couple days is due to no signal strength or if their digital is off the air. I would think even with the weather I'd still get some kinda signal even if it's week but I'm getting nothing. Maybe their off trying to correct the picture or hopefully about to go 1080i.

Dear Wilmington area DTV viewers;
Please be advised that UNC-TV will begin HD broadcasting on the 39-2 channel beginning 8 PM August 3, 2003 and will have HD broadcasting every evening from 8PM to 11PM. The first show will be an original UNC-TV HD production "Carolina Preserves". I think you will enjoy the excellent HD video quality. 3 of the SD channels 39-3, 39-4, and 39-5will go away when we come on with HD.
Thanks for watching UNC-TV Digital !
Wayne Estabrooks, Chief Engineer - UNC-TV

Wayne, you lurker!

Sorry I got your last name wrong...

Great news about HD!!

I'll be watching.

Thanks for keeping us posted.

Marc

RE: ABC--that's a great explanation--"crayola". I left a voice mail for their engineer, but didn't hear back. Still no signal as of 1/2 hour ago. We all need to call and let them know the picture quality is poor...

Hmmmm, kewl! I'm sure these guys(& ladies) appreciate the heads up.

I think Lumberton WUNU-DT 25.2 is getting ready to start broadcasting HD also. For nearly a week now they have been showing the same thing on both 25.5(UNCNC Annenberg?) and 25.2(UNCHD Annenberg?). 25.2 had previously been blank ever since they started broadcasting(accept for 1 week a few months ago).

WWAY-DT 3 was back on air lastnight but there didn't seem to be any improvement in the picture. But today it looks a little better, not as bright and the color is closer to normal but still not right. I'm looking at Maury right now and its colors look good but the commercials colors need help. Oddly though my signal strength right now is rock solid at 100% on my DST3000. You think they raised the power?

Watching WWAY-DT now... it does look better, but still uneven, some commercials are bad, and the news studio shots are still too bright and now seem undersaturated, but the news story clips look pretty good.

Maybe Ken (station engineer) is listening to the messages I leave, even if he doesn't return my calls... If Ken would call me back, I'd invite him to my house to see the picture.

Disclaimer--I'm watching on a 20" tv, not my 58" RPTV--so it may look worse blowed up real big...

Hello Marc, Daryl, Paul Incus, Daniel and any others on this thread;
We are still on go to begin HD on Sunday evening August 3, at 8 PM
Daryl, thanks for the heads up on our Lumberton station, the 25-2 that you are getting Annenberg. It is not supposed to be there it should only be on -5. I am a little confused with your post as we broadcast from Lumberton Digital on RF channel 25 but it is supposed to identify its virtual channel as 31-1 31-2 etc. In Greenville we broadcast digital on channel 23 and it should identify as channel 25-1 etc. since our analog NTSC is channel 25.
I would be happy to hear any reports or complaints good or bad as to the DTV signals.
We will check into this stuff that Daryl reported. Thanks again for the info and thanks for watching..
Wayne Estabrooks, Chief Engineer westabrooks@unctv.org

Wayne,

I e-mailed clarifying that I am getting Lumbertons RF channels 25-x remapped correctly to 31-x. Sorry for the confusion. And that Annenberg isn't only on 31-2(25-2) but that its being duplicated on both 31-2(25-2) and 31-5(25-5) at the same time.

As for WWAY-DT 3(46-1), I think may may have raised their power. Up till 3 days ago their signal here ranged between 40% and 70% morning and evening and dropped to low to see during the afternoon. For the past 3 days their power has been 50% and 80% during the afternoon (depending on the weather) and at 100% in the morning and evening.

My responce from UNCTV on Friday.....Its great looking at the screen waiting for them to flip the switch. I wonder if they feel like chevy chase in Christmas Vacation right about now. lol Timestamp is 7:36 PM Sunday August 3rd. I was there :)

Hello Josh,

You will be happy to hear that UNC-TV on WUNJ Ch.29 DT, will begin
transmitting a regular HD schedule starting Sunday Aug 3, 2003. This will
be in the 1080i format.

UNC-TV will broadcast HD programming on a regular daily schedule starting
every night at 8pm.

The first program to be aired this Sunday is "Carolina Preserves".

Enjoy the programming and the HD programming.

Thanks for watching UNC-TV.



Jayme Hanzak
Special Projects Engineer
jhanzak@unctv.org
www.unctv.org

WE ARE LIVE!!!!> ONTIME TOO!


MYHD is in full force.


Carolina Preserves I think is what is on right now


Lets hear it for wilmingtons first HD OTA broadcast on UNCHD

I kinda felt that way last night too... my first OTA HD reception!!!

Signal/image was fairly decent, although I got a lot of strange effects when the camera panned on all those trees/leaves, kinda a shimmering. Don't know if that's just normal 1080i movement artifact, or some other compression issue... although I will say that the Dish HDNet race broadcast was really nice, and no issue with all that race car motion, nor any effects on the background as they followed the cars around the track.

Wayne, what's the bitrate on the HD broadcast? I hope it's higher than what Dish is sending...

ABC still doesn't look consistantly good, although overall it seems better than in the past.

Fox had audio but no video the past few days?

Marc,

Thanks for the report. To answer your question, we run a fixed bit rate on UNC-HD of about 13 Mb/s. 384 kB/s is for audio 3.8 mB/s is for stream -1 UNC-TV most of the rest of the 19.39 mB/s for PSIP. This HD rate is probably more than the Dish HD. I do not know what the native display format of your monitor is but we operate in the 1080i mode. If you have a 720p monitor then it is converted in your set and that may cause artifacts also. There are naturally going to be compression artifacts in broadcast, satellite or Cable HD due to the severe compression. Remember that uncompressed HD is approx 1.5 Gb/s so it is compressed over 100 times. The artifacts I most notice in MPEG compression are fades to black and scenes when there is a lot of detail accompanied with fast motion. This will get better as equipment and algorithms advance. Thanks again for your report:)
Wayne Estabrooks, Chief Engineer-Transmission UNC-TV

I was thinking of the fade to black explanation also--only in this case there was a lot of green on the screen rather than black, maybe 2/3 was leaves, so instead of fade to black, there was a fade from green? It's basically a fade from one color that occupies a large portion of the screen...?

I was assuming your bitrate was higher than satellite, so possibly expecting a better picture... I'm running my OTA through the Dish 6000 receiver, output at 1080i, with my RPTV at 1080i.

Looking forward to watching more PBS!

+++++++
Hey Daryl--just spoke with Ken at WWAY, they did up the power last Thurs night, up to 800kW. The best he could do for now re signal quality is to look at the analog signal being fed to his Harris Transflex Encoder (what the hell is that?). He doesn't know what adjustments are available on the encoder, he may call Harris to find out. Also, they may go HD on network programming by next month...

Let me know if your image still looks too bright and saturated--I'll check again tonight, then call him Tue with a report...

MarcS,

Thanks for the info. LOL sounds like WWAY just hooked the encoder up and turned it on without tweaking anything. Wonder if they opened the user guide? HEHE. As for going HD by next months sounds nice. Sometimes the weather prevents me from catching ABC WTVD-DT 11 hd feed out of Raleigh and ABC WPDE-DT 15 out of Florence isn't hd yet either.

As for the image, looking at it now it still looks the same as last I reported except the color is a little closer to normal. Both the digital and the analog channel seems to have a cloudy look to them now though. I think they just need to adjust the Contrast and Brightness and it would look good.

Originally posted by MarcS
The best he could do for now re signal quality is to look at the analog signal being fed to his Harris Transflex Encoder (what the hell is that?).

It is a combo MPEG-2 encoder, rudimentary NTSC upconverter/HD switcher. It has two inputs, one is the analog NTSC signal for upconversion and an HD input for network.

foxeng--any suggestions? Seems like most of the station engineers around here talk to each other, especially about installing/operating all this new DT/HD equipment--do you think the ABC engineer would take offense at a viewer offering suggestions on how to fix his DT signal?

Can you clip a video signal similar to audio? What would the picture look like? Do you think the encoder needs adjustment, or is it the source signal? If the analog looks good, but the DT looks bad, what's to blame?

Also, tried to get to your website listed in your profile--can't connect. Got any stuff that our corporate firewall won't pass?

==== other reports ====

I can't get Fox anymore, played with my antenna--is it down?

ABC-DT still looks bad, same problems...

Some programming on PBS-HD last night was 4x3, since other stuff was HD widescreen, can I assume the 4x3 was intentional? It wasn't a case of needing to "flip a switch"?

Marc S.;
I didn't get to watch much last night. I did watch some of the 8:30 program, Crown of The Continent, Alaska's Wrangell-St. Elias. It was in widescreen standard definition. There will be several shows that will be standard definition widescreen. I hope to watch the travel show tonight. I will check on the 4X3 program I don't know as I didn't see it. Do you know which show it was? Some portions of HD widescreen shows are in 4X3 especially when they use archive footage. As for WWAY sounds like they have an encoder setup problem. If the video level is too high it will exceed the A/D converter and run out of bits before reaching maximum white and video will have a pasty look. I am not able to see it here.
Wayne E.

Ah, that would explane the picture quality in the Alaska show--it didn't look HD... Can't remember what program was 4x3, I was in a major channel surf mode last night... :)

Can't you put up a matrix of antennas to pick up WWAY-DT? We're only about 150 miles away! ;)

When you say the video level may be too high, you are referring to the analog signal into the encoder? That could also explain the higher audio level?

Sounds like the solution is to cut the level of analog signal?

MarcS,

LOL, your second last post looks like a pop quiz, essay style, hehe. Lets hope WWAY gets their encoder setup correctly and switched to HD soon because MNF looked and sounded great in HD dd5.1 lastnight on WTVD-DT 11 out of Raleigh atleast untill the game was called off in the 3rd quarter due to rain. :)

Daryl, where do you live again? Lumberton area? How do you manage to pick up WTVD? How many miles is that? The towers are SW of Raleigh so a bit closer to you?

Spoke with Ken this morning (WWAY engineer)--he said it may take a few days to get out to the transmitter so he can diagnose the problem. He will look at the signal coming out of the encoder in addition to the signal going in--I assume something obvious will stick out that's causing the image problem...

Originally posted by MarcS
foxeng--any suggestions? Seems like most of the station engineers around here talk to each other, especially about installing/operating all this new DT/HD equipment--do you think the ABC engineer would take offense at a viewer offering suggestions on how to fix his DT signal?

I do not know any of the engineers in the Wilmington area. I grew up in Fayetteville and lived in Lumberton in the early to mid 80’s, but I have no idea now. I can give you some info that you can use to determine how you want to proceed on that idea. My uninformed opinion would be to give them some time to get it all figured out before you start raising cane. Calling them and telling them you have suggestions may not go over well. You might call and suggest that you would like to be a part of any OTA testing they might do. Let them stay in charge and you just offer reception reports, not fixes.

Stations in smaller markets like Wilmington do not have large staffs, much less large Engineering staffs. Not only is DTV a financial drain on capital and operating funds, but on manpower as well. The DTV transmitter is not high on very many commercial stations engineers mind and as long as it is putting out power and there is some kind of signal on the air, most are happy. They take this attitude for two reasons, one, there is no real audience yet for the DTV side (particularly in small markets) and two, there are things to do on the analog side, the side that is paying the electric bill to run that DTV transmitter, the side that is buying that DTV equipment and most importantly, the side that is paying salaries. Add to the fact that DTV is all new technology, and most if not all smaller market engineers are not as well versed in it and the learning curve is a 90 degree wall. When we went on with DTV April 2002, I spent the first 6 months trying to figure out what I had and how I could keep it from crashing all the time. I spent the next six months trying to get the transmitter stable enough for people to watch it; all 50 of the them. I have spent the next six months trying to improve the quality of the signal and now just as I gotten 480p down, I am now learning about 720p and how it works and doesn’t work compared to what I already know with 480p. I have the benefit of a large corporation behind me for any questions or problems I might have. Most of the smaller market stations are not owned by mega billion dollar companies and they have it much tougher to get problems or questions answered. The “cliff effect” takes on a whole new meaning in this vain.

But don’t feel sorry for us. We adapt fairly fast. Just think of DTV in this stage as a backstage look into broadcasting. You are seeing things that the rest of the viewers will never see since by the time the mainstream viewers come on line, these problems will be solved and it will all being boring, just like analog is now. But remember, in the early days of TV, analogs equivalent of the DTV problems were watched by early adapters then. How often do you see “Technical Difficulty” slides these days. Hardly ever, but just 20 years ago, it was common.

Can you clip a video signal similar to audio? What would the picture look like? Do you think the encoder needs adjustment, or is it the source signal? If the analog looks good, but the DT looks bad, what's to blame?

Yes you can. Either do a screen capture if you have a DTV tuner card in your computer or you can take a picture of your screen with either a 35mm camera or digital camera. As far a DTV PQ, it could be several things and yes it could be the encoder is not set to a large enough bitrate or the analog to digital converter has problems or needs a tweak, or if the transmitter is not tuned correctly, it could cause pixalization or loss of picture all together.

Also, tried to get to your website listed in your profile--can't connect. Got any stuff that our corporate firewall won't pass?

Shouldn’t be hanging at a gateway. It just asks for on site cookies to keep up with your security level. I do not do tracking at all. I am opposed to site tracking. I run the NCHDTV.com site only. The Triad site is run by another person and I have no say over that site.

I've been trying to get WWAY since they started broadcasting digital. I'm about 4 miles south of Ocean Isle beach and cannot get any sign of a signal. I'm there quite a bit, anybody else close by getting anything?

I have a outside antenna, pre-amp, ect.. can get the PBS stations no problem, low 90's signal. I can also get 16 and 20 out of Florence, sometimes even WBTW. Actually I can get everything I'm suppose too..

I got a e-mail from the manager at WWAY yesterday saying they were at 80% power, so, if thats true then I should get it,, or IMO should have been getting it the whole time.

Anybody got any ideas what might block it? Its that RCA DTC-100.. I don't remember everything I've read about such problems. I've yet to even get it to say its a digital signal on 46,, picked up some kind extremely weak analog channel a few times.

Maybe they aren't really beaming the signal in that direction right now? Anybody else getting it with the RCA?

MarcS,

Actually WRAL-DT CBS 5(53-1), WTVD-DT ABC 11(52-1), WRAZ-DT FOX 50(49-1), WLFL-DT WB 22(57-1) and WRDC-DT UPN 28(27-1) are all on the South East side of Raleigh. I also get WNCN-DT NBC 17(55-1) and occasionally WNCT-DT CBS 9(10-1) also but not sure were their tower is located. I live in Pembroke(10 miles west of I-95 & Lumberton). I'm aproximately 77 miles from Raleights towers(just over 10 miles past the event horizon).

Also get WFPX-DT PAX 62(36-1) 24/7.

I use a Channel Master Crossfire 3671 antenna with length: 173" = 14.4' Width: 110" = 9.2' and an anntenna mounted Channel Master Titan 7777 amp. I use a 22 ft. mast supported against the A roof with a channel master rotor on it and a 5 ft. mast on the rotor with the antenna and amp atop it. So given my distance and with the help of the weather and tropospheric ducting I pickup Raleighs station around 75% of the time in evenings and mornings(occasionally afternoons). Plus I get WRAL, WRAZ, WTVD & WNCN's SD & HD on TWC.

And now that WWAY-DT ABC 3(46-1) has raised their power to 800kw I lock onto them 24/7 as well. No idea were their tower is either. I was under the impression they were at a temp place. Not sure.

I'm much closer to Florence(~55 miles) so I get WBTW-DT CBS 13(56-1), WPDE-DT ABC 15(16-1) and WWMB-DT UPN 21(20-1) 24/7 when their not off air. I'm in a pretty good location DTV wise. :)

Larry J,

Try to find out if their using a direction transmitter pointed away from the beaches.

Originally posted by Larry J
I got a e-mail from the manager at WWAY yesterday saying they were at 80% power, so, if thats true then I should get it,, or IMO should have been getting it the whole time.

Anybody got any ideas what might block it? Its that RCA DTC-100.. I don't remember everything I've read about such problems. I've yet to even get it to say its a digital signal on 46,, picked up some kind extremely weak analog channel a few times.

Well you probably are receiving the signal, it just isn't displaying for some reason. The DTV receivers "signal strength" meter isn't really a strength meter. It is a combination of signal strength/bit error rate meter. You can have a 100 signal and the meter will show 0 if it isn't decoding the data. It is misleading. I would suspect you have so much ghosting (or multipath as we engineers like to call it) that the receiver is not able to pick up enough usable data. You might need to go with either less signal (since more makes whatever ghosting you have worse) or you will need more signal by using a preamplifier on your antenna or if you are using an indoor antenna, you may need to go to an outdoor antenna to either receive more usable signal or reduce ghosting that might be in your house.

Well, it could be something like multipath I'm sure, but it would be the only one. Looks like I would have a problem with PBS is that was the case, but who knows.

The antenna is outside with a pre-amp. The manager said he would forward my mail to the engineer. Personally, though I don't know how exact directing the signal can be, I think it could be its not directed low down toward the coast at this time. When they were low power I assume the were just trying to cover Wilmington.

I guess I'll have to wait and see if the engineer saids anything or until they actually go HD.

Alright! We're really getting some traffic for lowly Wilmington...

Wayne-- I caught part of the Italy travel show--looked great. Also saw a portion of a show on a NJ beach talking about tiny stone figurines--also looked quite good.

Now, on to my question, related to my earlier query about signal bit-rate. I made the assumption that a higher bit rate should result in a better signal, or at least it could have less compression, so OTA HD, with a higher bit rate should look better than Dish (or other satellite)?

But, last night I again saw compression artifacts, especially in the scenes with grass in the Italy piece (shimmering), and in the shots of the ocean off the NJ shore (blockiness). <edit> I should add that I'm watching on a 58" Pioneer--maybe these effects are less visible on a small direct view set?

I have rarely (can't think of a time) seen compression artifacts in any Dish HD material (Showtime, HBO, CBS New York)--maybe I've just been lucky...

I'm sure this has been discussed ad nauseum in other threads--but in this case we can hear directly from the master of the electrons for the station... :D What do you think is going on?

foxeng--points taken and understood. The part about number of viewers is especially true here, very very few getting OTA-DT let alone our meager HD. If cable started to carry the DT signal though, and it looked like crap, then there would be some action I suppose... I only call the engineers maybe once a month or so for status on HD feedthrough, or in the case of our NBC station, a status on transmitter activation. My approach is one of giving feedback on signal quality, and asking questions...

I'll bet our cable will carry local DT and HD before anyone even knows they could use an antenna--then all of a sudden viewership goes way up, then the stations will probably care a bit more...

Anyway, I'm looking forward to the Fall season of network programming, and finally being able to see it in HD........

Marc & others
Excellent words of wisdom from foxeng, he- or she is right on the mark. I completely agree with him. The small market local commercial station is usually working with only one or two technically knowledgeable engineers and they have priorities. News is one of those priorities and everything related to keeping the analog side of things going. With the added work and financial burden of putting a digital station on the air he has his hands full and priorities have to be set. Digital is a new frontier and I am learning a great deal about this every day.
As for bit rates and pixellization etc. I see motion artifacts all the time in Dish network and DirecTv programs as well as most OTA dt broadcasts. It may be that I am sensitized to this as this is my field of work. Some shows exhibit more than others. I watched 2 of the shows last evening and a couple of minutes of the History Detectives. I did not see the shimmering Marc is talking about but I have a direct view 34 inch wide screen Panasonic. I sincerely enjoy reading the excellent exchanges on this forum.
Wayne Estabrooks Chief Engineer - Transmission UNC-TV

Originally posted by Wayne Estabrook
Marc & others
Excellent words of wisdom from foxeng, he- or she is right on the mark. I completely agree with him.

Quite he. (and my wife is damn glad of it too! ;)

As for bit rates and pixellization etc. I see motion artifacts all the time in Dish network and DirecTv programs as well as most OTA dt broadcasts.

DirecTV has really dialed down the bit rate. On a 480i 4:3 SD only TV you don't see it much, but with my 34" Sony XBR800, I can really see how much they have dialed it down. Also you may be seeing the 1080i motion artifacts that people talk about in the 720p v 1080i debate.

Wayne, come over the HD Programming and there if you are a broadcaster, you are part of the Evil Empire that is holding up 24/7 HD. It is a hoot sometimes, but you better have a tough hide for other there! :eek:

Wayne, when you say you see motion artifacts on Dish, are you referring to other than their HD programming? I was referring strictly to Dish's HD content where I haven't seen, or rarely see artifacts--not DT programs in general.

To be honest, I've ended up concentrating my viewing on the HD sources, so haven't really been watching much else. Now for a while, Dish did something funny with their compression scheme (or at least that's the current opinion--even though Dish won't admit to anything) and many channels had tons of artifacts, the Food channel being one of the worst--the least bit of motion would would be very blocky--but they fixed it.

I've never seen any artifacts on the HD demo loop either.

I was just curious as to why I would immediately notice a lot of artifacts with OTA-HD, with it's higher bitrate, compared to my Dish HD programs. I've been watching Dish HD for almost a year, so if I was used to seeing artifacts you'd think I wouldn't notice them so readily in the PBS programming. Maybe it's the equipment on my end? Maybe my OTA module in my Dish 6000 receiver? I have no idea... Just trying to get a handle on the differences between programming quality...

Wayne,

On your HD/SD switching are you guys doing Trickle Stream or Program Splicing?

I am looking for screen caps of the DTV stations to put on the NCHDTV.com website. If you have any you would like to share, please feel free to contact me either here or PM me and I will be happy to post them.

There is a nice collection that has begun, but it is mostly the Raleigh environs. Feel free to check it out.

I'll try to take some pictures--do you have any specific requirements? Size, resolution, etc... I've got ABC and PBS digital, PBS HD, can't get Fox DT anymore... I've got a 3 megapixel camera...

I think the problem I have getting to your website from work is that www.w4cl.net is using port 8090 (is that your host?), and I'm sure our firewall is blocking anything except port 80... I'll have to try at home.

ABC picture is still bad--even their analog seems to be worse, washed out and too bright. I've removed my antenna amp and receive PBS and ABC in the 80-100 range--with my attic 4-bay Channel Master. Probably why I can't get Fox anymore, with their 5kW or so power...

PBS HD programming looks good, lately though I've seen a glitch where the image disappears for a second, then comes back--the screen just goes black, like an edit cut with no image...

Marc,PBS HD programming looks good, lately though I've seen a glitch where the image disappears for a second, then comes back--the screen just goes black, like an edit cut with no image...I noticed the same thing also. I also noticed that the station logo is still showing when the picture goes black.

foxeng,

Sorry but I have no way of capturing any screenshots.

Foxeng,

I have a MYHD card, Audio Authority transcoder and a mits 65311 HDTV set. I can get some clips for you if you like. Ive already recorded some stuff actually from PBS> ABC is looking washed out. I call it the :crayola people channel:

LMK what you want and I will see what i can do.

Originally posted by MarcS
I'll try to take some pictures--do you have any specific requirements? Size, resolution, etc... I've got ABC and PBS digital, PBS HD, can't get Fox DT anymore... I've got a 3 megapixel camera...

I can resize them so that isn't really a problem. The more res the better though.

I think the problem I have getting to your website from work is that www.w4cl.net is using port 8090 (is that your host?), and I'm sure our firewall is blocking anything except port 80... I'll have to try at home.

AH! You may be correct. It is true. There are multiple domains running on that box and port assignment is the only way to get them all on one box and the NCHDTV.com site is using port 8090.

WWAY-DT 3 has been off the air all morning. Wonder what their up to? Their analog channel was off air for a short period early this morning also.

Originally posted by nc88keyz
Foxeng,

I have a MYHD card, Audio Authority transcoder and a mits 65311 HDTV set. I can get some clips for you if you like. Ive already recorded some stuff actually from PBS> ABC is looking washed out. I call it the :crayola people channel:

LMK what you want and I will see what i can do.

If you don't mind, you can send what you have to hdtv@w4cl.net.

Thanks

You have mail . Enjoy

I noticed ABC-DT off the air also--their analog picture continues to look worse I think... makes me wonder what the cable re-broadcast looks like. I'm hoping this means Ken is looking at the signal...

Did anyone watch Juliard on PBS last night? I had pretty bad audio synch, once in a while it seemed to get closer, but would drift off again. Also had the black screen pop up frequently. On a good note, artifacts were very infrequent, although the content wasn't too taxing for encoding I guess...

Im not sure if its the weather in ILM tonight but WWMB-DT is coming in on a channel scan with PSIP data at 50%

Perhaps ABC could call them up and ask them how they got rid of the crayloa people effect. :D

MarcS,

You said WWAY may be going HD by next month. Maybe that's why they have been on and off air for the past week or two. We can hope.

Any idea if WECT will be using the same tower as WWAY? If so, that could be the reason. WECT according to antenna.ord and titantv.com should go digital Sept. 20th. But that could change as it has many times before.

Friday Night HD...>THings that make you go hmmmm:o

Originally posted by Daryl L
MarcS,

Any idea if WECT will be using the same tower as WWAY? If so, that could be the reason. WECT according to antenna.ord and titantv.com should go digital Sept. 20th. But that could change as it has many times before.

Daryl, Marc & others in Wilmington viewing area
FYI;
WECT has an agreement with UNC-TV to use the new WUNJ DTV tower in Delco and their building is under construction there. Their antenna and transmission line has been installed on the tower. It doesn't look like they will make their Sept. 20 sign on date unless a miracle occurs. As for poor lip sync on some UNC-TV HD shows, I have noticed that also. I will discuss with our encoder / digital gurus to see if there is a fix. It is a complicated issue.
WWAY is nearing completion of their tower modifications and DTV antenna installation that they started last September. That is the reason they and we have been off the air a lot over the past few months so as to provide for the safety of tower workers climbing by our analog channel 39 transmit antenna. I hope you have enjoyed some of the HDTV shows on UNC-TV
Regards;

Wayne,

Wow, thanks alot for the info. Its just really kewl knowing kinda whats going on behind the scene. I'm in no way in a rush about these stations. I'm more or less just a curious dude. If I were a cat I'd been killed by curiosity long ago. :) Besides I get ABC SD out of Florence SC, ABC, CBS, PBS and FoxSD OTA and on Cable out of Raleigh area and HBO, SHO, DiscoveyHD and soon InHD on cable so I'm all set for HD viewing. WFXB-DT 43 Fox out of Marion SC I think is scheduled to go live Sept, 1st. We'll see Monday.

Well, WFXB-DT 43 Fox out of Myrtle Beach didn't make teir Sept, 1st date to go live unless their at low power on their local stations 200ft tower. Antennaweb.org changed their status to Unnder Review.

I e-mailed the General Manager of WWAY-DT 3 (46-1) mentioning about their digital channels brightness and color. He replied and a few minutes after replying their digital channel came back on the air and the color looks better now and the brightness looks correct.

He also said they should go HD in a few weeks that their installing the equipment now as Wayne Estabrook said earlier in a post. He thanked me for my help on this and said it’s good to have a viewer out there they can get feedback from. I've spoke with him several times before but it has been a few months ago.

Color issues corrected. Crayloa people have been sent back to Toys R. Us

Signal seems a little stronger now, I will not know for sure until the antenna goes up.

Someone stop me from getting the Zenith 420 STB/DSS combo box as it is sooooooooooo tempting at Circuit city for $449. Heck...I can even get 12 mo. no interest min payments if I really wanna sink 449 in a box Still have a few connections at the city from way back when. , however i would much rather sink it into an HDtvio box. When will the waiting end

Beat me to the punch--ABC looks ok now, if a bit soft... but I know that's the source material most likely... The audio level is still higher than the analog signal. Good news about HD coming on-line in a few weeks, plenty early for the new season...

Wayne--yes, I've enjoyed the programming on PBS-HD. Still some audio synch problems--seems to be program dependent...


WECT is really dragging their feet. Of course I couldn't say for sure, but it seems that their request for a new channel number was intended to allow them to "reset" the FCC deadline for being live (I believe they were originally assigned ch 55, but now have ch 44)... ;)

Well, WWAY-DT's fleshtones and browns still look a little on the yellowish side. I just e-mailed the GM about it. If I get a reply I'll let you know what it menntions abbout the color.

nc88keyz,

I want to replace my old toshiba DST3000 with a new HD box with better reception too. But alas I cann't afford that right now. New laptop this August drained me dry. :D

Dang! He replied in under five minnutes. Here's his reply.This is great information. Thank you for taking the time to let us know how we look. I’ll forward your message to our engineering staff.

Ok ya'll. I think the colors are looking better today. What do ya'll think? I took the liberty of going ahead and sending the GM a e-mail today thanking him and the engineer for listening to and replying to my e-mails. Also for improving the picture quality this week from what it had been like before this week.

Granted it is a bit soft but thats to be expected from a analog signal being converted to digital then our STB's upcoverting it to 1080i with inexpensive converters.

Originally posted by MarcS

WECT is really dragging their feet. Of course I couldn't say for sure, but it seems that their request for a new channel number was intended to allow them to "reset" the FCC deadline for being live (I believe they were originally assigned ch 55, but now have ch 44)... ;) [/B]

Marc,
I have some information about WECT and wanted to set the record straight, they were not actually dragging their feet. WECT was originally assigned channel 54 or 55 by the FCC for DT. The channel is "out of core" which means that these channels go away after the NTSC analog is turned off. Stations that build on an out of core channel will have to move to "in core" (Channels 2-51) at some point in the future when analog NTSC goes away. The cost for this change could easily be $200,000 or more for a new antenna and transmitter modifications so a station would like to avoid this cost if possible. UNC-TV was originally assigned channel 44 for the Jacksonville station and I petitioned the FCC for a change in the rules to allow me to use channel 18 as my analog is on channel 19 and this means we could use 1 antenna to broadcast both channels. The tower was not capable of supporting both digital and analog antennas and transmission lines. The process is quite lengthy to change channels but when we were finally granted this, then channel 44 (in-core) became available. Then WECT decided to use channel 44 and had to do the required engineering studies, and petition the FCC for a similar change in the rules and table of channel allotments. Again a lengthy process. Until this is granted, a station by law cannot begin construction or purchase equipment for this channel. WECT was only recently was granted the rule change and then they had to file for a FCC construction permit, this takes awhile also. Anyway they received all the FCC permissions and have their antenna up and the building is nearing completion. They will have to install their transmitter which could take 1 to 2 months.

Wayne Estabrooks, Chief Engineer - Transmission UNC-TV

Thank you Wayne for all the valuable information you've given us!!!
It is much appreciated!!!

Hey fellas! Another guy from Wilmington here. Getting a MyHD card today so I should be enjoying some DT & HD soon. Anyways, I wanted to let you all know that I am working on a website dedicated to Wilmington OTA signals. It'll have a forum, a faq, what to buy, how to get started, signal strength, screencaps, etc. and I'd love it if you guys would contribute to it. I'll be going out of pocket on the domain and hosting as I don't intend to make money on it, just would like to make it easier for those out there who don't know where to look for information. I thought maybe we could all sort of Mod it together and make it a great little community for us Wilmingtonians. I know it was hard finding even you guys and there are others out there but they are spread all over the place. I'm up for any suggestions so please feel free to email me at nunvuru@hotmail.com if you have any. If there isn't much interest then I won't bother with it so it's up to you guys. Hope to talk to you soon.

Sounds like a plan. Keep me posted. Modding is fun!

Thanks Wayne for the info--I did have a ;) in my message--I was just jabbing a bit, especially since the engineer at WECT has been the least friendly of all the locals--at least in my experience in speaking with all of them. But what about the timing issue? Are you still constructing facilities for Jacksonville, or did you request the change way before the FCC deadline to be live? Did WECT know way in advance that 44 was the only channel they wanted? Was it the only one available? Did they know in advance that they had to wait for Jacksonville to get their new channel, thus freeing up 44?

I guess part of what I was getting at is that many stations are doing anything and everything possible to drag their feet and delay implementation of DT. I understand the financial issues--but contrast that with stations across the country that have jumped on the DT bandwagon early, surely not 100% of them have more money than WECT?

I left a message for the engineers at WWAY thanking them for improving the signal--I'm definitely with Daryl, gotta give praise and thanks when they take our observations seriously, and then do something about it... :D

And thanks again to Wayne for taking the time to participate in this forum.

Just curious what the latest info is on ABC going HD.

Has fox said anything about doing 480p for shows like 24. I would really like to see some primetime HD soon.


Cant wait for HDTvio .....4 tuners....my god what were they thinking hehe


Supposively $799.99 MSRP

Keep the thread alive.

This morning I was getting a weak signal lock on WECT 6 digital channel number 44-1. It was to weak to get any audio or video though. I'm not sure if it was from WECT Wilmington testing or some other distant station from somewhere else traveling far with the help of troposheric ducting. Anybody in Wilmington notice anything on 44-1?

Originally posted by Daryl L
This morning I was getting a weak signal lock on WECT 6 digital channel number 44-1. It was to weak to get any audio or video though. I'm not sure if it was from WECT Wilmington testing or some other distant station from somewhere else traveling far with the help of troposheric ducting. Anybody in Wilmington notice anything on 44-1?

WUNG-DT Concord is also 44.

WUNG-DT Concord is also 44.That's possible. There's been ocassions when I picked up Charlotte stations before. Heck twice I picked up two Jacksonville FL. digital stations early in the morning due to tropo obviously.

Just heard back from the WWAY-ABC manager (thanks Daryl for your positive feedback on your contacts with him)--

He's hoping that Monday Night Football will be in HD tonight!!!!!!!!

Of course, barring any unexpected problems...

"Our engineers are in the final stage of hooking up the ABC HDTV pass
through in our Master Control. Once that is complete we will broadcast
in full High Def. I just checked with our engineering staff and they
are trying to have this complete in time for tonight's Monday Night
Football game.

However, we've found many obstacles during this installation so that may
or may not happen.

Tune in tonight and let me know how it looks."

Guess we'll have to wait until next week for Alias in HD...

:) :) :) :) :)

YAH! thanks for the good news. i live near the airport. will my zenith silver antenna be suffice for the hd signal? where is the tower located?

Thanks for the info MarcS. That's exciting news. I noticed they've been off the air for nearly a week now. I kinda figured it was due to work on the HD upgrading. Let's hope for MNF football. If not atleast we know they will be going HD any day now. :D

Luckily I get WTVD-DT 11 out of Raleigh so I watched all off ABC's HD premieres lastnight. Alias was fantastic. Still a tad bit to grainy in low lighted scenes compared to NYPD Blue and some HD shows but it's a great show. Really good lastnight but kinda confusing. Alot of unanswered questions.

Paul, haven't we emailed about ISF calibrations or something?

I think they're xmitting at about 800kW, you shouldn't have problems picking them up. You can go to www.antennaweb.org to get their compass direction from your specific address. I'm using a Channel Master 4 bay in my attic and have no problems... Now if I had Daryl's tower, I could probably get them even when not transmitting! ha ha...

I checked at lunch today and they weren't on yet...

Anyone still getting Fox-DT on 30? Since I've changed antennas I can't seem to get them anymore, or if I orient it toward the xmitter I lose another station--haven't experimented too much lately since I pick up their regular signal ok...

I taped Alias (yuck, VHS) in order to watch other HD stuff...

Anyone have a solution for recording OTA HD? I mean I know they exist, just wondering if anyone has something working well... TIVO doesn't do HD does it? Is the only solution a PC with HD card?

LOL, Daryl's tower is a 20ft mast, a rotor on top, then a 5ft mast and channel master crossfire 3671 and a Titan 7777 amp. Always pointed East. Oddly thats the only direction I can pick up the Raleigh DT stations with it. :D

Unfortunately I can't get Wilmingtons Fox-DT channel (too weak). I'm not too familiar with HD reccorders yet. Still on VHS myself. Actually one of my two vhs vcr's died last week and ordered my first S-VHS vcr as a replacement.

I am not getting any audio/video on WWAY-DT yet but I have a good signal strength of 50% to 60% (average for the afternoon). 3:15 is the first time I've looked for a signal strength today.

LOL not even 30 seconds after my last post WWAY-DT's video came on but no audio and it's still SD so far.

no hd so far. 9:06 pm.. :(

sound is not too good either.sounds muffled,not very clear sounding.also seems only like its coming from the center channel.

marcS, you know i never did get my tv calibrated, ive tried emailing greg from lion isf about when he plans to come this way again,but have not received anything back from him. last time i talked to him was april and he was preparing for a baby. oh well.

depressing no HD football. I was getting my hopes up ....maybe after halftime lol

I guess Murphy's Law got a hold of WWAY's HD plans yesterday.

I emailed the station manager this morning--haven't heard back yet...

Told him about the sound problems, but that the picture looked good, even though not HD...

Checked it out at lunch, still looked SD, sound didn't seem as bad as last night, but still distorted. There was a soap on--don't know if it was supposed to be HD or not...

I think I'll check on WECT-NBC later today for progress....

I spoke with the engineer at NBC/FOX (still getting over them being owned by the same company here) and he said NBC are all set to install their transmitters on Oct. 8th with a projected broadcast date of November 1st. He said they would be at full power from the get go and passing all of NBC's HDTV signals. I asked him about FOX but he said he didn't know anything about that.

I also talked to the engineer at ABC. He said that they had hoped to broadcast Monday Night Football but ran into some problems and they can only fix it during a time when HDTV is coming in from ABC (8-12 I guess) so they are having a time with it. Now I could be wrong about that last sentence but that's how I took it. Anyways, he said they hope to have it up for next Monday's game. I'm all about Alias so I hope it's up before then but I guess we'll see.

On another note, my site for Wilmington and surrounding areas High Definition news and discussion is done except for content, I could use some help from you guys. PM me if you can lend a hand.

Thanks.

Thanks MarcS and nunvuru for the info.

nunvuru,

I'm not in Wilmington but if I can help I'll try.

Here is a quote from an e-mail on Sept, 2nd from David Carfolite, the VP & General Manager of WSFX 26 of Wilmington and WFXB FOX 43 of Myrtle Beach.Because our area of the country has not been quick to adopt DTV, let alone HDTV, we have elected to go low power. Our full power DTV wil run about $8,000 to 10,000/mo. to run and will cost several million just to "pass through." For about a quarter million we have installed a low power DTV that serves our city of licence; Myrtle Beach. It throws out a signal for about 10-15 miles for about $800/mo. At this time we don't have plans to deliver a DTV signal into the Pembroke area,He told me the same thing a few months back about WSFX 26 so you can bet he has the exact same plans for WSFX 26.

has anyone talked to a "tech" or engineer this week about monday night HD?

I did, just today in fact. Said they are still trying to get it going but are having a time with it cause whoever sent the equipment didn't send them any prints to test with. He says that he has the equipment in the rack upconverting everything to HD right now and has been since Friday but I told him when I last checked (last night for alias ) it wasn't HD but instead I was getting the regular SD signal albeit with very loud audio. Anyways, he was a real nice guy and said he's doing everything he can to get it working but won't be sure of anything until the prints come in, which could be any day now (even today). It also appears that the equipment they have to test it with isn't widescreen so that's not helping matters much either. I guess it's just a matter of time now. Hope soon though. Alias is going to rock in HD!

On another matter, i'm using a MyHD card for reception and the engineer told me that I should be receiving them on DT 46-1 but it comes up as DT 03 I think (i'm at work right now so I can't be sure). Anyone else have this problem? Is it because of virtual channels or am I actually tuning to the wrong channel somehow even though i'm getting the SD signal. I receieve PBS on 39-2 which is right even with virtual channels on, so i'm confused. Anyways, could use some help if anyone knows. Thanks!

They may be converting to HD, but not xmitting it...

For a while over the weekend during the day the sound seemed normal, but then later that night it was too loud and distorted.

I'm locking on 46-1...

I wonder though, are stations going to broadcast a digital SD signal in addition to an HD signal? Do they figure that if someone is going to receive digital, it'll probably also be HD?

I'm thinking of PBS that broadcasts SD programming on 39-1 simultaneously with a different program on 39-2...

Sigh, once again taped Alias while watching Carnivale in HD.......... I want more network HD, but OTOH, I don't have a way to record competing programming yet...

oh well, maybe next week. we're getting closer to OTA. i hope.

I am depressed as well as I am really hoping for HD OTA signals soon from primetime shows. On a side note I did talk to a drone at sears at the mall today. Asked him about VOOM HDTV DBS System. He said he didnt know much about it...SHocking that it is rolling on Oct 15 reportedly. He did hand me his sales brochure that teaches sears reps how to sell the system. It tells them how to pitch the system pricing structure. Seems interesting enough. I am gonna sit on Voom till June 2k4....That is when their DVR box will debut according to their trainig literature.

As for now its back to the tivo with no networks. :(

Directv DBS networks are coming soon as the page states still. I would still prefer to watch in HD obviously.

N -

The reason you get WWAY on #3 is virtual channel mapping. Check that out in the MYHD setup.

Hello everyone my name is danny lanier and i live over on murrayville rd in northern new hanover county . i just wanted everyone to know i have been a member of this forum for about 4 months but do not post alot.well here goes the following is a list of channels i receive. wway dt 46-1 100% wunj dt 39-1 thru -5 100% wsfxdt30-1 77% wpax 35-1 100% witn dt 7-1 nbc from new bern 100% night 65% day wcti-dt12-1 abc from new bern and upn 12-3 from new bern 100% most of the time wral dt 5-1 from raleigh sometimes siginal 50-100% 11-1 from raleigh abc most of the time siginal 50-100 % i just wanted to pass along some of the channels i receive. the abc 12-1 and nbc 7-1 from new bern pass the hd siginals every night from 8pm till 11pm.

type of equiptment toshiba dst3000 sat receiver toshiba 57hdx82 tv channel master 4221 4bay bowtie antenna with the channel master rotator and remote, sony strde895s av receiver ,philips dvdr985 dvd recorder

Dannyboy--did you just invite us over to your house to watch network HD???????????????????????????????

Since you receive so many channels???????????

:) :)

How high is your antenna?

Where abouts is murrayville road? Im around Monkey Junction area as is nunv.....How high is that antenna to be pulling in NewBern and Raleigh at times.

I also have same antenna, Remote Rotor, and CM7777 Preamp i think. Can I look forward to mounting that antenna on the roof. ?

I'm around Monkey Junction also--maybe we need a subgroup for us...?

I've got the 4221 in the attic and pick up PBS and ABC with no problem without an amp--but I've lost Fox. I've still got a directional up there also and may experiment with it to pick up fox (definitely needed an amp for that). But if Fox isn't going to pass through the hi-res programming, then the regular UHF signal works fine...

Isn't Murrayville Rd. somewhere basically in the NW part of the county?

I am thinking it is near murry farms. New subdivision off Gordon Rd. Those are my thoughts. I was thinking there is a lowes grocery nearby it as well. Almost bought a house over there..>But we like the south end better. Less Clutter

Murraysville Rd. is about 1.3 miles up N. College St Hwy 132 from where I-40 ends. It is on the right off 132 and goes out about 3 miles or so and crosses I-40 along the way. It almost goes over to Hwy 17.

Wayne Estabrooks, Chief Engineer - Transmission UNC-TV

thanks for the clarification. Who wants to have an antenna raisin party :)

I wanna get this thing on the roof...restrictions in the attic :)

Ugh, It looks like rain for the next few days. NBC's transmitter install may be delayed further. :(

Originally posted by Daryl L
Ugh, It looks like rain for the next few days. NBC's transmitter install may be delayed further. :(

Only if they installed it outside of the building! :D

Originally posted by nc88keyz
I am thinking it is near murry farms. New subdivision off Gordon Rd. Those are my thoughts. I was thinking there is a lowes grocery nearby it as well. Almost bought a house over there..>But we like the south end better. Less Clutter

That's why I live in the south end of town--what more could you ask for in the area between College Rd, Oleander, Independence, and Carolina Beach Rd.?

We've got Super Walmart, Lowes Home store, and restaurants proliferating in the Monkey Junction area, the mall, etc....... all within the bounds of those 4 roads...

Although I'm not sure about the "less clutter"--at least for traffic... Monkey Junction is really getting built up...

foxeng,

LOL I may sound like an idiot but my assumption is that the transmitting not only goes outside of the building but also up on a ~2000ft tower. :)

Are you joking? LOL now you have me thinking I don't know jack after 6 years of hdtv interest and reading. :)

Originally posted by Daryl L
foxeng,

LOL I may sound like an idiot but my assumption is that the transmitting not only goes outside of the building but also up on a ~2000ft tower. :)

Are you joking? LOL now you have me thinking I don't know jake after 6 years of hdtv interest and reading. :)

If I remember correctly when I read their application for the last extension they said the antenna was installed and they were waiting for the transmitter. If that is true, then 95% can be done inside or under cover.

DOH! Apparantly I don't know jack. Actually as I was saying transmitter I was thinking antenna. My mistake. :)

Wayne is right about my location murrayville rd is in northern new hanover county.i live in quail woods if you no where that is.my antenna is mounted on top of my house on a old direct tv pole.the roof peak is about 22 feet off the ground then the pole is about another 1 1/2 feet then the antenna.so i would say i am about 26 feet off of the ground. i know wayne and have talked to him when pbs first came on the air if he remembers who i am.i quess i am lucky to get all of the channels i get .If anyone out there needs any help trying to help get more channels i would be glad to help if i can.as far as the tv 3 hd stuff ken and billy are having a little trouble getting the hd feeds to work .i talk to them almost everyday day giving them reports on weather the hd feeds switch over or not and so far they still dont work as of tonight.i quess you could say i am a beta tester for wway tv3 as well as wect tv6. wayne if you read this please give ken or billy a call and see if you can give them a hand.i think there whole problem lies in the hookup the are using a harris flexcoder with the mastercontrol plus module and can not get it to switch from sd to hd.the engineers at wcti in new bern told me thats what they use but could not get it to switch automaticaly so the installed a manual toggle switch in the master control room and it works flawessely now. so mabey thats what they need to do.how do you have the pbs stuff hooked up?I also know elliot hunter who works for tv6 and they are on the same tower that you are on. so, i am sure they will get it up right from the get go.well i quess i have typed enough for now so talk to everone latter. DIGITAL DAN!!!!!!!!!

interesting that you are pulling in that stuff in wilmington with antenna not so high....am certainly looking forward to getting mine on the roof. I think I might be in for a treat!

sorry about all the mispelled words.

Hmmm, we've been quiet lately.

I hooked up my old Dynaco 410 amp between my antenna and receiver in hopes of picking up ABC HD--do you think it's a problem that my Dish receiver started to smoke? I did get ABC HD out of Atlanta though--see if you can top that Daryl!!!

:eek: But seriously, I'm joking...

Anyone been in touch with the engineers? ABC was off-line last night--is that good news (getting HD to work?)?

News on NBC progress with xmitter?

What kind of amp is a Dynco 410?

I picked up two Jacksonville FL dtv stations two mornings about a year ago. The truth. Was a troposheric fluke though.

I notice WWAY-DT go on and off a few times late afternoon yesterday. I figured they were trying again to go HD for MNF. But apparently Murphy was standing by waiting to screw something up. :) Their still off.

No word on WECT NBC. I'm hoping WWMB-DT UPN of Myrtle Beach will come on in HD for Enterprise and Jake 2.0 tomorrow evening. WWMB-dt &WPDE-dt have been off air for a month or two correcting a transmition line problem and supposedly upgrading from SD to HD (I was told by the Manager by phone) a month ago.

The Dynaco is a really old audio amplifier--late 70s early 80s? Built it from a kit, although it was far from the Heathkit type, it already had completed circuit boards... It weighed so much it had to be shipped in two pieces. Output of 200 w/ch...

My Dish 6000 call-out modem seems to be dead, I rarely plug it into a phone line anyway (haven't heard a word about it from Dish), but for fun decided to test it last night---no dial tone. Called tech support--not much help.

Out of warranty, so it'll cost about $70 to fix it--I tried to convince the tech that they should upgrade me to the 921, or at least the 811... :) Or, I won't do anything.......

I'm getting closer to switching back to cable or DirecTV and picking up a terrestrial receiver for OTA HD (if needed at all with cable)...

we are moving in to our new house at Kure Beach next Wednesday and getting excited to hook up our new hdtv. It is still in the box and our samsung ts 160 hd receiver is on the way.

I am very curious how the signals will fare down on Pleasure Island! I am getting confused about what stations will be DTV and what Hd broadcasts will come thru.

I am reading thru the OTA equipment y'all are talking about and taking notes but can anyone give me a synopsis on that I will need minus the hdtv/receiver for OTA?

also, my wife is in sales over at wect and she is fishing around over there trying to figure out when and what they will be offering. something about 30 days till dt is up?

Regarding WWMB-dt &WPDE-dt , I was told by email about a week ago, they were off the air because of creating interference. They said someone from the network was suppose to come and inspect the situation around the end of Oct.

They hope to be back up sometime around the 1st of Nov. and have WPDE DT in HD sometime in Feb. 04.. They said nothing about WWMB and HD.

Thats what they told my by email anyway, but WWAY has been saying they should be HD in 2-3 weeks since April of last year, by email, and too tell them how they look.

So, whatever.....

Hello Wilmington Viewers. I am an engineer at WWAY and I was recently pointed to this forum by some of you and thought I would hop on to offer up any info that may help you understand where we (WWAY) are with our HD feed.

We have been working on our passthru system for a couple of weeks now, but other (higher) priorities have pulled us away from it time and time again. I am going to personally roll my sleeves up next week and hit the rack to try to get us up on HD. We had made several attempts in the past week or so, but found out that we were not receiving the HD signal from ABC. This was due to Telstar-4 satellite going down, and our ABC HD feed rack was not switched over to the new location. It has been now, and we received a test signal from ABC just this week, and we are now getting HD into our passthru rack. Now, it is up to us.

I assure you we will make every effort to be transmitting HD ASAP, but other problems tend to pull us away from it. It is very important to me and our Engineering staff here to give you a high quality signal.

Thanks to those of you who have contacted us and reported to us what our SD signal has been doing... we have no way to monitor it other than with a standard tv set hooked up to a HD/SD tuner. We will be installing our antenna soon as well so we can pick up the signal at our station better. I will make it a point to check here often to get some feedback from all of you.

Thanks,

Billy_Stratton,

Welcome to the forum! It's always great to have a insider from the networks involved in our discusions here. I'm from the Pembroke viewing are. I thinlk I've corresponded with you a couple times by e-mail and a couple times with James Smith GM about the SD's (46-1) signals brightness and color. It by the way looks great. :)

We don't always know the in's and out's of the networks workings but we try to learn and offer our perspective of the video and audio quality. We do understand that the analog stream is still for now the money maker for the networks and that takes priority. We just like to know what's happening with the digital side as well. We do know WWAY's been working to get HD going and figured Murphy's Law was the hold up. :)

I guess most here are considered early adopters. I got my first HD-ready tv in Oct, 1999 and my first HD cable box in Jan, 2000 just in time to catch my first HD broadcast (the Superbowl on CBS WRAL). I got my personal HD settop box in Feb 2000 (toshiba DST3000). So I'm not entirely new to the HD or digital scheme. There are many other engineers and other network business people who post on this forum in other threads hear like Bob Ross of CBS's NY office, Marc Cuban (owner of the Texas Mavericks and HDnet & HDnet Movies HD channels) among many others who offer their advice and much information. I even remember an engineer posting somewhere here how to setup the dolby encoders to auto switch between the DD2.0 DPL feed and the DD5.1 feed over the DD5.1 signal. There's alot of information passed along on all the threads of this forum. Anyway, welcome, thanks for the hard work and come back as often as you can.

Daryl L :)

Did anyone try to watch PBS last night? Did it suck for you too? I had 90-100% signal strength (never a problem) but had horrible artifacts, and the sound was pulsing when it wasn't dead. Sometimes the entire signal would go away, then come back and sound ok, but within seconds go bad again. The strange thing was that the narrator (FL water supply show at 9pm) sounded ok, but the music was warbling and pulsating.

If I remember correctly, I think the Rudy Maxa travel show was ok--for the parts I caught...

Good to have another engineer on board...welcome...

Sorry MarcS but I didn't catch PBS lastnight.

Billy_Stratton,

When you get the HD going will you also be passing the DD5.1 feed also or will it be the same audio signal we're receiving now? If it's the same as now if you get a chance could you check the audio on the digital channel? It's much louder than the analog channel and has a faint grainy/distortion sound. :)

Daryl L I talk to billy almost everyday and yes when they get the dolby digital encoder and decoder hook up ,it will be able to pass the dolby digital 5.1 audio siginal if it is avaliable from abc.The reason the audio is so much louder on the digital channel is because they are imputting a dolby digital mono siginal for right now .Billy was supposed to work on the audio siginal yesterday ,and last night the audio sounded like the audio outputs had been turned down to a more normal level , and sounded much clearer. well time to go do some work,talk to you later DIGITAL DAN

dannyboy162,

Thanks for the info. I did notice lastnight it was not quite as loud as it had been compared to my other channels. I noticed just now that its not distorted either. Great going Billy. :) Don't work too hard Dan. ;)

your welcome daryl L. Let me pass along a little more info that i just received from elliott hunter , who is a engineer for wect tv6 in wilmington.I am a beta tester for them and he just told me that they would be going live in about a week or so.they will be on the air about 18 to 20 hours a day when they go live and will be doing full hd with 5.1 surround if the feed is avaliable from nbc .He is supposed to let me no a date and time later next week when all of this is supposed to happen.So,as soon as i know more information i will pass it on.also, they will be transmitting at 1 million watts of power. the same as pbs and on the same tower as them also .but about 200 feet lower with there antenna.


WWAY TV3 46-1 UPDATE

I talked with billy-stratton earlier this morning and thanked him for getting the audio straight.He also said that they were going to be at the tower all day working on the transmitter and trying to get the dd 5.1 encorder and decoder hooked up soon.so hopefully we will be able to enjoy high definition and all of its glory real soon from them.I will pass along future updates as i receive them. so for now may the force be with you-----------DIGITAL DAN!!!!!

Originally posted by dannyboy162
also, they will be transmitting at 5 million watts of power. the same as pbs and on the same tower as them also .but about 200 feet lower with there antenna.

Don't you mean 1 million watts? 5 million is the max for UHF analog and 1 million is the max for UHF DTV.

dannyboy162,

WOW! That's alot of incouraging info. I hope their plans aren't delayed, but I always allow time for Murphy (Murphy's Law) to interfere. :)

Sorry foxeng typo error ment 1 million watts instead of 5 million watts

Damn! And here I was thinking I could get rid of my 4221 in the attic and just use my FM wire antenna to pick up WECT--being at 5MW and all...

;)

Well, of course the proof will be in the pudding--when we finally see an HD signal from WECT...

The next big question, since they (WECT) are managing FOX, are they doing anything about the antenna location? Will it be co-located by any chance? Will they finally pass through the "hi-res" signal?

I have to be honest, I've watched no new (or old for that matter) network programming this season except for CBS, since I get CBS in hi-def through Dish. Well, I have taped the last 3 Alias's. With CBS, PBS, SHO and HBO, I've got enough hi-def sources to keep me busy without watching the other networks.

So--it will finally be good to see them broadcasting in HD... I might even watch MNF... and I'm no football fan...

I don't know if any of you can pick up WPDE-DT 15 ABC(16-1) & WWMB-DT 21 UPN(20-1) Florence but they turned their digital channels back on sometime early this morning. But their still the SD digitized analog channels. :(

Welp, WPDE-DT 15 ABC(16-1) & WWMB-DT 21 UPN(20-1) Florence is back off again today.

Well, still no HD...

Anyone know anything? Status? Progress?

PBS fixed their audio problems...

Geez, I remember last season hoping Fox would be passing through the hi-res programming so I could see 24 in all it's glory. Now here we are in the next season, 24 premiering tomorrow night, and.........I'll probably just tape it, like Alias, and watch something in HD........:confused:

I haven't heard anything new about WWAY or WECT. I just noticed that WPDE-DT 15 ABC(16-1) & WWMB-DT 21 UPN(20-1) Florence is back on the air again today. Still SD though.

here's an email i received from time warner. i asked about INHD so i could watch HD basketball in demand.(NO info received about that)


"Thank you for your recent email regarding HD programming. We have recently launched WWAY-TV's digital channel on channel 905 and UNC-TV's high defintion channel on 944. Currently Time Warner Cable is working to bring you more High Definition channels as they become available.
Should you have any additional questions please do not hesitate to contact me."
Best Regards,
Kristen M. Samson
Marketing Manager
Time Warner Cable
1949 Dawson Street
Wilmington, NC 28403
(910) 772-5815
fax (910) 772-5767
kristen.samson@twcable.com

I think we have our HD signal going out now, but the MNF will not be in Hi-Def since they are moving the game to Tempe, AZ. So, we will be sending our usual digital signal, converted to HD for now. You guys let me know how it looks. We will be getting the audio piped out this week as well, barring any other emergency.

BTW... we are on 46-1 SD /// 46-2 HD


Thanks !

sweeeeet! thanks billy.

Yes! Good news.

I asked a few weeks back if they were going to broadcast HD on another sub-channel... need to delete then re-add for the Dish 6000 box...

Billy_Stratton,

That's fantasic news. Way to go Billy, thanks alot. I'm picking you up on 46-2 here in Pembroke just fine. In stretch mode. I'm guessing it's not set to remap to 3-2 yet. 46-2 looks slightly darker than 46-1 but that may be due to the upconversion. Other than that its looking good. :)

Kinda funny that the day WWAY gets their HD channel going MNF isn't being broadcast in HD. :D Looks like Murphy's still messing with you. :)

Im getting ABc from Florence. Wow! 25% and not even choking on MyHD signal. Cant wait to get antenna on roof and out of attic. UPn is bouncing from 0 to 20% ...No picture. Cant pick up 46-2 yet.

iTS hAPPENING!...46-2 WAS TRANSMITTING HD A SEC A GO...NOW BLACK SCREEN ON CHEVY COMMERCIAL :(

Back on ...Hehe.. I love it. Billy, pull the plug again. Reminds me of the runway lights in Airplaine. that the idiot keeps pulling the plug on.

Apparently some experimentation going on this evening. The show at 8pm was not in HD there was a commerical right before it that certainly was. It was beautiful. Then gone as soon as the Chevrolet spot came on. Interesting evening. Coming up on 9pm

is 46-2 transmitting from the same location(direction) as 3-1. i ask cuz i have a directional silver sensor and im not able to pick it up when i scan on my samsung ts-160.

Several times last night I deleted ABC-DT, then added it back, but never picked up 46-2... Tried to get through to master control to see what was going on, but after hours the phone system is automated, the best I could do was leave a message for Ken.

Anyone else using a Dish 6000? I understand they are extremely sensitive to bad PSIP information.

I'll try at lunch when I go home...

For all of you hd lovers out there last night wway was upconvertting sd to hd .The true test will be tonight when all of the programs from 8:30 pm to 11 pm will be in true 720p not upconverted 720 p.Any way its glad to see them making progress.job well done billy.!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!DIGITAL DAN.

marC I am not sure how your receiver works but the toshiba dst3000 works fine with 46-2. check you local program guide and make sure you have check marks in the analog channel numbers, if you do the the digital channels will automatically add them self .at least that is the way it works on my receiver . also,check and see if you have a wilmington zip code in. sometimes these receiver will not lock the channel unless you have the right zip code infornmation dont know why but strange things happen sometimes.!!!!!!!DIGITAL DAN.

The Dish 6000 receiver might be considered 2nd generation, closer to first probably...so it's not too swift when it comes to channel tuning I suspect...

When I manually added WUNC-DT, it picked up all 5 sub-channels with no problem.

As long as I know your HD channel is broadcasting, I know it might be an issue at my end, and I'll keep trying. When I go home at lunch, I'll try tuning it with a channel scan instead of a manual addition method...

But...even though my receiver doesn't process or quite understand the PSIP stream, I understand that a "faulty" PSIP can still mess it up. So if I could tune WUNC with no problem, I still wonder if there is a possible anomaly in some part of your signal that gives my receiver fits?

I'll report back this afternoon...

Hello everyone i just talked to billy at wway tv 3 and he is trying to get the aspect ratio correct, can any one out there report back to the forum if the aspect ratio is any differant from last night.thanks in advance DIGITAL DAN . billy changed it first thing this morning.

Aspect Ratio is wide screen or stretched now. No Borders. It was 4:3 last night on my Mits 65" I have all sorts of settings for stretch and fill in my MYHD software but it looks just like pbs aspect ration now. WIll know more this evening with HD Programming. :)

Billy, were you aware the Digital signal was significantly delayed on 46-2 last night ....and perfectly in sync on 46-1. Wish I could test more for you today but Im off to work.

Just checked audio. Seems in sync this morning. Apparently this was tweaked.

Billy, can you confirm that a test clip ran a few seconds before 8 pm last night in HD. Looked like something with some water and some buildings. Didnt know if it was wilmington or not. Couldnt tell. What i did notice is that it was extremely sharp and did not look like it was a scaled signal. Was this a test HD stream for about 10-15 seconds. As i recall it has 5.1 sound as well ....Little blue light lights up on my reciever when it is getting 5.1. LMK Will be home this evening around 7 for the festivities.

As of 10:41 today 46-2 is still stretched. The picture looks good though. There seems to be some kind of jitter or shudder in the first moments of any movement. Audio sync is much better today but still slightly out of sync but thats probably a byproduct of feeding the same audio to both the SD and HD channel. WNCN-DT 17 has the same problem with their SD channel(55-2), they sync the audio every day or two and it drifts out of sync because their feeding their HD channels audio to the SD channel.

I agree tonight will be the true test. NYPD Blue is one of, if not the best looking tv shows in HD on ABC (MNF don't count, it's not a reorded TV show).

If you look at the scrolling on both 46-1 and 46-2 thats on right now you can see the jitter/shudder I refered to on 46-2 HD. Also 46-2 is slightly darker than 46-1 and analog channel 3.

Thanks for the input guys! We are still learning as we go here!

As for the ratio, I will set it back to where it was last night. This morning at around 8AM I changed it to "Full Width" which took care of the squatting effect, but it also chopped to top and bottom off the picture. I put it back to where we were at last night around 10am. I will leave it there for tonight and see what it looks like.

As for the jitter... that is more than likely due to the bandwidth we are using now. Since we are simulcasting both our SD and HD signal, our Harris Flexicoder has pretty much gave us all she has. We are set at 14.5MBps instead of the preferred 19MBps or so. Not sure yet if that is the problem or somthing to do with our conversion, but we will get it worked out.

Now... if I only had an HD TV at home. :(

Thanks!

No luck at lunch time. Still can't tune the HD sub-channel.

Something has changed since HD started broadcasting. Previously, when adding channel 46, my program guide indicated 46-1. Now it maps to 3-01 instead.

Nothing I did would get the receiver to pickup, or add the HD sub-channel. Direct tuning to the channel via remote didn't work...

Again, I suspect something with the data stream, and possibly an interaction with my Dish 6000. But WUNC-PBS works just fine...

I'm stumped...

Originally posted by Billy_Stratton
Thanks for the input guys! We are still learning as we go here!

As for the ratio, I will set it back to where it was last night. This morning at around 8AM I changed it to "Full Width" which took care of the squatting effect, but it also chopped to top and bottom off the picture. I put it back to where we were at last night around 10am. I will leave it there for tonight and see what it looks like.

As for the jitter... that is more than likely due to the bandwidth we are using now. Since we are simulcasting both our SD and HD signal, our Harris Flexicoder has pretty much gave us all she has. We are set at 14.5MBps instead of the preferred 19MBps or so. Not sure yet if that is the problem or somthing to do with our conversion, but we will get it worked out.

Now... if I only had an HD TV at home. :(

Thanks!

Billy,

What kind of aspect ratio converter are you using? From what little I have read here, it sounds like ABC may be doing what FOX does, sends a 16:9 picture all the time and adds black bars for 4:3 material. (I don't know since the ABC station here has no intention of running HD anytime in this decade, so they keep saying so I am running blind here, sorry)

We run the Teranex Xantus One and we have to switch aspect ratio when we change from SD upconvert to network ED.

Have you considered that?

Charles Layno
Transmitter Supervisor
FOX8 WGHP/WGHP-DT 35
High Point

Marc,

I have no idea why the dish receiver won't lock on 46-2. you said you tried manually tuning to 46-2. I'm guessing you mean you pressed 46-2 on the remote instead of 3-2 because yesterday 46-2 wasn't remapping to 3-2.

Billy,

To be honest I have no problem with any stretch mode you use on 46-2 with local upconverted material because I can easily turn to 46-1 to view local daytime programming 4x3 non-stretched. And from what I could tell lastnight, ABC broadcasted a 1 hour special from 8pm to 9pm called Fat Like Me: How to win the weight war as 4x3 in HD with black bars inserted nationally and the aspect ratio looks correct on 46-2. So tonights national HD broadcast should look correct. Can hardly wait. :)

I could be wrong and probably am but I don't think the jitter is caused by the bandwith because others using that bandwidth don't have the jitter. I think it's the upconversion because the jitter was absent during the 1 hour special lastnight as far as I could tell but there wasn't alot of movement on the special either.

After re-reading some posts on the dbstalk forum, I'm slowly convincing myself that there is a problem with the PSIP data stream. I think other receivers are less sensitive to it--let's face it, the 6000 is pretty old, except for the overall integration factor, if I had it to do over again I probably would not have purchased the OTA module and just gone with a Samsung...

Billy--any ideas from your end? Comments on your PSIP?

I really would like to be able to get your HD signal...

Billy,

May I ask why you want to use a stretch mode for upconverted 4x3 material rather than inserting black bars like most other stations do with upconverted local programming? ESPN-HD is doing the stretch mode with their upconverted 4x3 material also and their viewers really hate it. Look at mostly any ESPN thread on the forum.

Let me try to answer what questions I can... I'm not kidding myself here, you guys probably have been dealing with HD alot longer than we have here... so we should be asking you the questions!

Foxeng > We are using the Snell & Wilcox HD5200 High Definition Upconverter. From what I have been able to learn about it, there is no "16:9" ratio setting in that terminology anyway. What I have to change is "Full Width" which takes away the squatting while upconverting, "Full Height" that gives me the black inserted bars on the left and right, "Anamorphic" which gives us the 16x9 look, but has the video squatting effect.

Daryl > The biggest reason why we won't be inserting bars, at this point anyway, is that we don't have qualified personel here during the network HD feeds to make sure that it is changed back during that time. So to be on the safe side, we will probably leave it "stretched" or "squatted" until we can figure out a better, and safer way to switch it.

MarcS > I will look into our PSIP and conversion settings to see if I can find out if we are producing any errors. At first glance at out Flexicoder, we are not... but a terminal connected to the equipment will be more in depth. We are in the process of getting our permenant terminal connected today, and hopefully we can look at that for you. Again, You guys know more about your end of this than I do. One thing that comes to mind is that with our HD tuner (DirecTV sat receiver) it will not show our DTV channel now on 3-1 like it was before we went HD yesterday. Now it will only pick it up on 46-1 or 46-2. But, I can say that I have not had but a couple of minutes to play around with it, so I don't know if that is an indication of anything, or just the result.

I hope I have answered some of the questions you might have had... if not, feel free to post them. Maybe I created more? We have not had a chance to connect our Dolby audio yet for our upconversion. Not sure how that will sound anyway, since we are a mono station... but the network feeds should come through with whatever audio they send us. Let me know how it looks tonight!

Thanks!

Thanks Billy...

What's odd is that I always did receive 46-01 and now it has changed to 3-01. Maybe that's a key in why my receiver can't find the HD sub-channel?

I've posted over in the DBSTalk Dish forum to see if they have any ideas.

Last thing to try is power down, pull the OTA module, reinstall, power up, and see what happens...

You're a mono station??

Originally posted by Billy_Stratton

Foxeng > We are using the Snell & Wilcox HD5200 High Definition Upconverter. From what I have been able to learn about it, there is no "16:9" ratio setting in that terminology anyway. What I have to change is "Full Width" which takes away the squatting while upconverting, "Full Height" that gives me the black inserted bars on the left and right, "Anamorphic" which gives us the 16x9 look, but has the video squatting effect.


One thing to remember here is that you have to start thinking in 16:9 terms and not 4:3. I think I heard you say that you don't have any way to monitor the signal and I also take that to mean you have no 16:9 monitor nor way to letterbox 16:9 on a 4:3. If not, and you haven't really seen what happens when these different modes are engaged, then I can fully understand your confusion here. Been there. Done that! You are NOT alone.

Let me see if we can get on the same page of terminology. If I am understanding correctly:

"Full Width" is standard 4:3 in 4:3
"Full Height" is a true 16:9 frame with a 4:3 picture with sidebars
"Anamorphic" is where a 16:9 picture is sent in a 4:3 frame.

OK. If this is all correct, here is what you should see in each mode on a 16:9 or 4:3 letterboxed | normal 4:3 monitor

Full Height - Stretched - a circle that is fatter than taller | normal 4:3 on 4:3 - a round circle in 4:3
Full Height - normal 16:9 - circle that is round | Circle that is tall and skinny on a 4:3
Anamorphic - normal 16:9 - round circle | circle that is tall and skinny

Now, what we did here to keep people from manually switching 4:3 and 16:9 was to tally off the master switcher (we have a GV Master 21 analog switcher) to a Evertz 4 source SDI router and to the Teranex GPI for 4:3 16:9 port since FOX duplicates the programming on both analog and digital receivers. When master hits net on the Master 21, it also triggers the network input on the SDI router and triggers the 16:9/4:3 GPI on the Teranex. When we switch off net, it triggers the Evertz back to the upconvert input and triggers the Teranex back to the 4:3 mode. This way we never have to worry about aspect ratio on net verses everything else. Our tentative plan for when FOX goes 720p next year is to run the Teranex in 4:3 with side bars all the time and just switch the output of the upconverted 480i to 720p with the network 720p signal dropping the aspect switch on the Teranex since the HD encoder stays in 720p 16:9 mode 24/7.

If any of that helps, feel free to use it, Billy. If you would like to talk to me directly then feel free to PM me and I will give you my phone number and if I can help, I will be happy to.

Good Luck.

Billy,

Thank's for the info, it's really appreciated. :) We know this HD stuff is new territory to you. We'll be patient. We also want to help by informing you of what outcome your hard work is displaying. Foxeng has been fiddling with this stuff for sometime now and has offered us plenty of knowledge and I'm sure he's willing to offer his engineering tips (for a good price :) just kidding) on this digital transmition stuff. Although he works at a FOX network I think he mentioned he's been upconverting their national feed to 720p for a little while now. I'm sure he's learned a few tricks during his learning (trial & error) period.

Now, what we did here to keep people from manually switching 4:3 and 16:9 was to tally off the master switcher (we have a GV Master 21 analog switcher) to a Evertz 4 source SDI router and to the Teranex GPI for 4:3 16:9 port since FOX duplicates the programming on both analog and digital receivers. When master hits net on the Master 21, it also triggers the network input on the SDI router and triggers the 16:9/4:3 GPI on the Teranex.Hold on a moment, let me get my Klingon Translator out. :D LOLOLOLOL Just Kidding. Don't worry about me understanding that. I'm sure Billy understands it, and that's the important thing.

Billy, take the info these experience HD/digital engineers here offer the members and your boss with consider you a genious (not saying your not) and there might be a raise around the corner. :)

Thanks Foxeng... that is what we will be doing as well, with the GPI switch, but our poor little MC switcher was made before electricity! We are in the works to get a new GV switcher, and the Concerto router that will complete our digital Master Control, and allow our GPI to work, along with automatic switching between network and local programming. In other words, it will take the "thinking" out of it.

I'll look at our upconverter more tomorrow, and I may drop you a pm to see if you would mind offering some more advice.

Hey daryl... I know I will get tons of help here, and maybe be able to help someone else out in the process.... that's why I'm here now! This forum is a great aid to us "new to HD" people.

BTW... we had a problem with audio again today. Seems we padded our audio to help with the level of our DTV signal, but it also padded our analog audio. I have "messed with" our A/D converter, and think we may have it fixed for both now... could you guys let me know what the audio is sounding like tonight?

Thanks!

I just listened at 6:10pm as I switched between ch.3, ch.46-1 and 46-2. They all seem to be of equal volume level or very close. :)

im having trouble here. i have a samsung ts-160 (directv). i cannot get 46-1 or 46-2 to scan,and i can't manually put them in. all i get is 3-1 digital (80%). i've moved my antenna around with no luck.

also when i manually put in 46-1,46-2 it says channel not available on my tv.

any one else have the same model receiver? any suggestions?

sounds like marcS and i have the same problem.



.

doesn "t look like the hd siginal is working .46-2 looks nothing like 12-1 from new bern so i wonder if something is wrong or did the operator forget to flip the switch? I guess i will have to call billy tomorrow morning.oh well at least they are making progress.

Well i guess some how billy got the message about the siginal.the hd works now and looks great aspect ratio has changed to 4X3 in sd and 16x9 in hd.this is the way hd should be.still having problems with audio went to commericals and some how they had the wrong audio with the wrong commericals.but at least they have the hd working.

Looks like everything is going good, maybe i'll get to watch some Alias this weekend (crosses fingers). Loved the PQ on NYPD Blue, very clean and the audio sync was pretty close.

Anyways, just wanted to let you guys know my site dedicated to Wilmington (and surrounding areas) High Definition is up. I have a few more things to add and a lot of ideas but it should be suitable for now. There is a forum waiting to be filled so everyone join up!

http://www.ilmhd.com/

NUNVURU ,I just joined the new forum thank you for starting one DIGITAL DAN!!!!!!!!!!!hope billy stratton, darylL,foxeng,paul watkins,marcS,nc88keyz,and anyone else out there in the wilmington and surrounding areas joins the forum this is going to become a great resouce for all of us. thanks to everyone in advance DIGITAL DAN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Still no luck last night getting 46-2. Again, all I can tune is 3-1.

Tried unplugging the Dish 6000, remove module, power up, view tv, power down, insert module, power up, use scan to add digital channels (I even deleted all digital channels first). It picked up WUNC fine, all 5 sub-channels, but would only get 3-1 for ABC...

Haven't checked the DBSTalk forum yet for ideas...

I'm surprised the Samsung has similar problems.

**Calling Wayne Estabrooks** (did I get your last name right?)

Do you have any ideas about how the PSIP might be causing this problem? I can't find any other suggestions in other forums that point anywhere else...

Marc,


I scanned for Channels last night several times. One out of 4 times it picked up 46-2....In the process I lost florence 15-1 but thats ok for now. I expect much better things when i get the antenna on the roof line. try unplugging the dish 6000 ...delete all channels in the guide for OTA and rescan for PSIP data. Good Luck.

The only thing I haven't done is delete ALL channels, I did delete just the ABC analog and digital, and last night deleted all digital channels, and unplugged the 6000........all to no avail...

I'll try deleting all channels and then let it scan for new ones to see if that works.

But considering people with different receivers are having problems seeing 46-2, I'm still thinking bitstream problems..........

I did a search in the hardware section for "Dish 6000" and found this interesting comment:

"I have no idea how the box would treat a remodulated signal but when stations in my area screw up PSIP info and drive Samsung and Dish 6000 receivers crazy, the Hughes boxes have no problems."

Are Paul and I the only ones with Samsung and Dish boxes? Apparently they are extremely sensitive to "anomalous" PSIP data...

Hey Billy--is there a way to do a "reset" on the PSIP stream? It seems I remember someone else talking about it, maybe even related to when WUNC started HD broadcast here in Wilm... I have no idea what that might do, if even possible. Just throwing stuff out, stabbing in the dark...

MarcS.. I will look at it today and see if we can get you hooked up.

I was beginning to wonder if Billy forgot to set the system up to switch to the HD feed since the HD programming started at 8:30 but atleast it changed for NYPD Blue. It looked great. Although the audio was slightly out of sync when it switched to HD. LOL I had WTVD's dd5.1 audio playing on my receiver off cable while I watched WWAY in HD of my hd stb. Was pefectly in sync. :)

I compared WWAY's HD signal to WTVD-DT ABC 11(52-1)'s HD signal and they look practically identical picture quality wise. I have to give the award to WWAY due to their color. WWAY's flesh tones look more natural and realistic and brown wood looks brown were as WTVD's flesh tones are on the pinkish side and browns look on the cherry side. I don't have red push because I have and RF attenuator on my red(Pr) component input and used a color decoder test pattern to adjust the reds to 0% on the attenuator after adjusting the color and tint on the tv with test patterns. WTVD just has to much red in their picture.

Also Billy, as soon as it switched from upconvert to HD at 10:00 pm the jitter/shudder went away so I guess that means the jitter problem isn't due to the bandwidth being used.

nunvuru,

I'm going to your site after I leave here and sign up.

MarcS,

Monday when I did an auto scan I picked up 3-1 and 46-2. Yesterday I did it again and only got 3-1. I had to manually tune to and add 46-2.

Thanks Billy--your efforts are much appreciated. I know we HD people are very far and few between, especially here in Wilmington... but vocal, eh?

I think you said you don't have an HD set? I'll extend an invitation if you want to see what it looks like--I've got a 58" Pioneer calibrated by Gregg Loewen... might help you understand why we're so enthusiastic...
:D :D

I'm not so interested in some HD programming, but damn!, it sure can look good...

I won't be able to report back until this evening on whether I can pick up 46-2...

==

Daryl--I tried manually tuning, but it didn't work... Not sure the 6000 will let me tune to something that hasn't already been added to the program guide. Also, I may not have tried adding the channel after 8:30 last night...

MarcS, I have the Samsung TS-160 ! I'm having the same problems!!!

Here are a bunch of excerpts from posts in the hardware section--I did a search on "psip problems"...

Unfortunately, it seems that some receivers are more prone to problems with anomalous PSIP data, and because this whole area (DT & HD broadcasting) is new, it's possible PSIP data doesn't get as much attention as say picture or sound quality...

Also unfortunately, no one seems to have any specifics on exactly what the PSIP stream should contain for our receivers to work properly...

++++++
The locking up issue has not only been identified but corrected. But let me explain a bit more. The Samsung engineer brought along his development TS-160 along. Also a laptop computer. Together, he was able to correct the software problem. But wait til you understand what was the cause.

OTA Broadcasters running digital use some data called the PSIP. It is where guide info/channel info is broadcast. It is updated by some broadcasters all the time. Others ignore it except for the bare minimum. If you were in an area where the broadcaster updated the information frequently then you were an unhappy camper. The TS-160 was doing a check on this data and if it was different the program went into an infinite loop which caused the audio/video output to not appear. That explains why some people reported no problems while others were seeing it all the time.

By the way, in 1999 when I got my RCA HDTV with integrated receiver (PS61000), RCA sent their head of field service to my house twice to attend to problems that turned out to be issues with PSIP that ws being sent from OTA digital stations. They then made trips to the stations in NY city and set them up with free DTC-100's so they could make sure their output signals were DTC-100 compatible which might explain the sucess of the DTC-100 today!

The lock up issue is determined entirely whether the PSIP data has changed or not since the last time the receiver was tuned to that station. If the data was not updated by the station then you would not have a problem. If the data was updated by the station then you would. Simple as that. PSIP data is that portion of the digital data stream which defines, in part, not only the virtual channel number but also any guide information.
+++++

Let me take the PSIP discussion a step further. We as broadcasters have a LARGE latitude in how the PSIP is set up. A broadcaster can set the PSIP data in the encoder and in the multiplexer, which is a device that multiplexes multiple encoders together, if he makes one typo, the receivers will not know which data bit to use.

Each program stream (subchannel) is assigned PID groups or Program ID groups. They are usually in the same hex group. In each PID group is the ID bit for the video and audio. I can attest that we broadcasters have NOT been well versed in how all this is suppose to work. It is pretty clear to me now how all this works, but 18 months ago, it was pure Greek. What seems logical isn't and a lot of engineers have fallen in this trap because it is all virtual and we broadcast types are not used to working in the virtual world.

You have program init numbers which are the stream number and each stream is a different number, but this number does not have to correspond to the channel minor number but the PIDs are kinda linked to this. If a station has 2 subchannels then they may designate the HD as program init 1 and SD as program init 2. The way the PSIP protocol is written, PID group x000h and x010h are reserved for God knows what (I haven't looked, all I know is that is reserved) and PID group x020h is the first video program stream. Those of you with WINTV-D and HD cards on your dianosic screen can see what PIDs the stations are using and I would bet you would find many use x010 for the first program stream. It works, but on some receivers if screws it up. We have a station in my market that uses x000h for the HD stream and x010 for the SD and not many receivers will lock on the correct stream, if they do at all.

So the video on the first program stream (HD in this example) should be on x020 and the first audio stream should be on x024h and the second audio stream (SAP channel for instance) should be on x025h if the station is sending it. Most don't though, but PBS seems to do it. The second stream or the SD subchannel should start with x030h with the video being x030h and the audios x034h and x035h and so on. Now this all leaves the 2 encoders and travels to the multiplexer where the two separate streams are now combined into a single stream to be transmitted.

In the multiplexer (or MUX as we call it) we can say, take program init 1 and in the PSIP table call it subchannel -2 and program init 2 call it subchannel -1 (there is a station that does just that,. Why I don't know) so when you hit the x-1 on your receiver it shows up as the SD channel and not the HD and vise versa. Now if the MUX is not setup correctly to translate all those PIDs correctly, it sends data to the receiver and the receiver looks for those PIDs and depending on the type receiver, they may search to find the right PIDs (since the protocol says the video is x0X0 and the audio is x0X4h) or might just give up and not display anything. (the PSIP table said that Z data was on PID xXXXh but it isn't there so I will do nothing.)

If any of the PID data isn't correct, the receiver doesn't know how to put all the data back together and you have problems.

So not only does the encoder have to be set correctly, but the MUX has to be told what to do too and if a station is doing something fancy like swapping program streams for subchannels, that just makes it more likely something bad will happen when all this translation is entered in the MUX.

So ends "PSIP For The Layman 101."

yeah,what foxeng said... im hoping this is something that can be fixed. the samsung ts-160 is a somewhat new box i thought. oh well, im not alone.

did a scan last night during NYPD blue with no luck. will try again tonight.

marcS, my sammy has locked up about five times since i've owned it. the only way to correct it is to unplug it from the wall and reset. glad to know that is the problem,thanks.

help us billy.your our only hope.....

C'mon, tell me something I don't know!!

;)

Just kidding--thanks foxeng for that detailed explanation--don't know what it all means, but I'll re-read it a few times...

Still can't tune 46-2 as of 6 pm...

I'll try later tonight to see if something changes...

Hey Foxeng.. are you looking for a small market Engineering position?

I didn't get a chance to look at ours today, but I will do it tomorrow if at all possible. I think I actually understood a small bit of what Foxeng said, and that is probably exactly what we have done. I know we have our SD as prog1 and HD as prog2... but I don't know what we assigned each one.

Thanks for the help!

Billy,

You want to borrow my Klingon Translator? HEHE :D j/k. I kinda understand it. I read some of that stuff awhile back but didn't really try to digest it. But here's a great pdf on it and a couple good links.

http://www.sarnoff.com/products_services/government_solutions/psip_tutorial/psip.pdf

http://www.sarnoff.com/products_services/government_solutions/psip_tutorial/index.asp

http://www.nab.org/scitech/psip/default.asp

Don't forget ya'll. 10pm tonight in HD on ABC, Karen Sisco. :) I know their HD lineup starts at 8pm but I don't watch My Wife and Kids, and That 70's Show season premiere is tonight at 8pm, and King of Queens and Beckers has my attention from 9 to 10. :D

Originally posted by Billy_Stratton
Hey Foxeng.. are you looking for a small market Engineering position?

I grew up in Fayetteville watching WWAY, as well as WECT and the Raleigh stations (and my own station when it was on Fayetteville cable in the late 60's/early 70's) and my first full time broadcast job was in Lumberton for WAGR/WJSK in the early 80's. I still miss that area though (but my wife HATED IT!).

Knowing some "buzzwords" does not make me an expert! But thanks for the thought. Who knows, I might need that position sometime! :)

Audio sync is way off tonight. Unless someone can confirm otherwise Im not touching my soundcard drivers. Im running straight out of the MY HD card SPDIF out. Ive also had it connected with passthrough to Optical out on Motherboard. ??


How is sync with everyone else.???


Please Move to Wilmington, NC Thread. Sorry for the error.

Has everyone joined up at wilmingtonhd.com or ilmhd.com yet? This forum was started yesterday and is deicated to wilmington and surrounding areas so go check it out and sign up if you haven't yet.>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>DIGITAL DAN.

For Billy and foxeng...

First--it's really great to have some engineers participating in the various forums--I'm sure we all really appreciate your efforts to keep us in the loop...

I was wondering, what's your typical day like? How much work does it take to keep the station running? Is it really a constant hands-on affair? What uses up most of your time (other than responding to our questions)?

Thanks...

Yep the sync sintuation was a trip but the programming in HD looked great. :)

Hey foxeng when are you going to join up at wilmingtonhd.com?

Hey nc88keyz when are you going to join up at wilmingtonhd.com?

The reason I asked Is because just about everyone from the trend have signed up at wilmingtonhd.com and started posting there Instead of here.the new site belongs to nunvuru from this trend.Well hope the new membership drive goes well.................DIGITAL~DAN

Originally posted by MarcS
I was wondering, what's your typical day like? How much work does it take to keep the station running? Is it really a constant hands-on affair? What uses up most of your time (other than responding to our questions)?

Every day is different. That is one of the reasons why I like what I do. Since I am the Transmitter Supervisor, I have a 8:30 to 5:30 schedule, but I am on call 24/7 to run to the transmitter if trouble develops. We have engineers that work from 4AM to 1 PM and 2PM to 11PM and your "9 to 5" workers. We have a shop of 7 engineers. We run 7 hours of news a day so sometimes I have to do things with the newscasts or other maintenance issues.

Today I got in at 8:30 and prepared for tecs from Time-Warner Cable. They are running fiber optics from our studio to their headend so if we loose the transmitters (analog and DTV), we will still be on the cable system. We have 80% cable and sat penetration in our market so we have good back up. The tecs got there at 9 and we finished up the connections and checked out the fiber link. We are doing some work on our news set and so I helped in some demolition on the Sports area. Ate lunch and then went to the transmitter where I have been doing some changes with some internal wiring after we added our new digital microwave and then had to pick up some equipment stored at the transmitter and took it back up to the studio. Met with my boss on some ideas I had for emergency conditions to be able to stay on the air and then it was time to come home, 5:30.

Some days are more hectic than others like if there is any transmitter maintenance (we have 2 transmitters so I can shut one down to work on the other one in the middle of the day) then I do that until it is finished, but since November sweeps started today we do not do anything that might effect our on air signal so for the next 4 weeks, it will be mostly light maintenance and meetings and log paperwork.

9/11 was the strangest. I had a dentists appointment at 9:30 so I was at home when the towers were stuck and I just happen to be watching FOX News Channel with it happened. I went on to the dentist and told them I needed to get in and get out. They hadn't heard about the attack and they got me out in 20 minutes! A record! On the way to the station, (the second tower had just fallen) my boss called on the cell phone that FOX wanted all Transmitter people at the transmitters and to lock ourselves in and to report any strange activity.

I got to the transmitter about 20 minutes before the second tower came down and watched TV just like everyone else the rest of the day. Of course the only info I had coming in was our rebroadcast of FOX News Channel.

After that, we started beefing up the back ups and we added a DirecTV receiver at the transmitter so that we can take our off air signal we send to DirecTV on the air if we lost our microwave link and if we didn't have a microwave truck to send the studio signal to the transmitter or if we lost the studio, we could put FOX News Channel on the air from the transmitter, stuff like that. FOX is very big in back ups and we talk constantly about how we can make things better.

It isn't your normal 9 to 5, but I have been doing broadcasting for 25 years and have been at the TV station for 11 1/2 years. I can't see doing anything else. Ah, the life!

Originally posted by dannyboy162
Hey foxeng when are you going to join up at wilmingtonhd.com?

I am about to now.

Have you signed up at nchdtv.com? :D

foxeng,

Is nchdtv still planning to continue the old HDTV@fortmills.com mailing list? By the way, been a nchdtv.com member since you started it. :)

Foxeng, just wanted to let know I have linked to you in my FAQ. Your site was one of the first sites I found on my way to discovering this thread and I consider it the definitive source for North Carolina HDTV. Just wanted to show some appreciation.

Originally posted by Daryl L
foxeng,

Is nchdtv still planning to continue the old HDTV@fortmills.com mailing list? By the way, been a nchdtv.com member since you started it. :)

Yes. I have been tardy in getting it up and running with work and some family things. I have the list from the fortmills site and Bruce emailed me earlier in the week and I haven't had a chance to get back to him. I am going to try and put a concerted effort to get it running this weekend.

Originally posted by nunvuru
Foxeng, just wanted to let know I have linked to you in my FAQ. Your site was one of the first sites I found on my way to discovering this thread and I consider it the definitive source for North Carolina HDTV. Just wanted to show some appreciation.

Aw, stop it! You are making me blush! :cool:

With most all the stations on the air now, it is tougher to have state news, so I have had to go to national news. That is why having WWAY start HD is a good thing. Gives me some "local" stuff to talk about!

I am still looking for screen caps of the stations over there. nc88keyz sent me the UNC HD channel and I got the SD channel of WWAY from a person in VA, but if anyone else has screen caps of the other stations over there that I don't have in the gallery, I would love to have them to post for everyone to see. I am trying to post all the subchannels offered on the stations so to get the HD channel of WWAY with some HD on it would be sweet. I like to get screen caps with some form of ID or bug on it for validation purposes, but for some of the smaller stations, they don't do that so if you don't catch them at the top or bottom of the hour, you miss it.

In early September on a band opening I caught WRPX-DT 15 out of Rocky Mount and they were running a paid program so they didn't have the bug up and I haven't seen them since so I had to go with that cap. Some times you just can't help it. Anything you guys have would be appreciated.

Originally posted by foxeng
Yes. I have been tardy in getting it up and running with work and some family things. I have the list from the fortmills site and Bruce emailed me earlier in the week and I haven't had a chance to get back to him. I am going to try and put a concerted effort to get it running this weekend. No problem foxeng. I was just curious, no rush. :)

foxeng,

There is one thing I am curious about, maybe you can clear it up. FOX's national feed. I've read it's 480i widescreen and I've read it's 480p widescreen. I know local station send it out in the format of their choice. My local Fox WRAZ-DT 50(49-1) sends it out upconverted to 1080i.

Is the national feed Fox sent to the local stations 480i or 480p?

Originally posted by Daryl L
foxeng,

There is one thing I am curious about, maybe you can clear it up. FOX's national feed. I've read it's 480i widescreen and I've read it's 480p widescreen. I know local station send it out in the format of their choice. My local Fox WRAZ-DT 50(49-1) sends it out upconverted to 1080i.

Is the national feed Fox sent to the local stations 480i or 480p?

It is actually a 480i anamorphic. The 16:9 signal is sent in a 4:3 picture and the station "stretches" it back out. The black bars that are on network feeds are generated by the receiver and not from network. So the receiver is always outputing 16:9 no matter what the source AR is. It is a pretty slick system. Film is sent with 3:2 pull down from network and most AR boxes have a way to deal with the 3:2 pull down and when it is sent out at 480p, it looks like 480p which is why the live stuff isn't quite as good as the film stuff.

Also I noticed yesterday that WRAZ-DT has changed their HD channel from 1080i to 720p. I don't know how long that has been like that, but I am sure it is in anticipation of FOX going 720p next year. I think I heard Bob at WCCB say they had also changed from 1080i to 720p, but don't hold me to that one. I just don't remember. My brain is a little mushy right now.

After the manufacturer alerted me to a potential problem this morning and finding ONE programming mistake in our HD encoder related to that problem (which I wasn't experiencing), I just had to dump all the settings and completely reprogram it from scratch from the front panel without the aid of a programming software. That took about an hour, but it now (I hope) meets the manufacturers spec.

Guess I will finish my lunch now and go down to the transmitter.

Just another day in paradise!

Originally posted by foxeng
It is actually a 480i anamorphic. The 16:9 signal is sent in a 4:3 picture and the station "stretches" it back out. The black bars that are on network feeds are generated by the receiver and not from network. So the receiver is always outputing 16:9 no matter what the source AR is. It is a pretty slick system. Film is sent with 3:2 pull down from network and most AR boxes have a way to deal with the 3:2 pull down and when it is sent out at 480p, it looks like 480p which is why the live stuff isn't quite as good as the film stuff.Thanks for clearing that up for me. This is the first that I remember of hearing it being anamorphic. I noticed the bars were from the receiver because on 4:3 stuff on WRAZ you can see that they are covering black bars with grey bars with a pattern on them (sometimes blue bars).Also I noticed yesterday that WRAZ-DT has changed their HD channel from 1080i to 720p. I don't know how long that has been like that, but I am sure it is in anticipation of FOX going 720p next year. I think I heard Bob at WCCB say they had also changed from 1080i to 720p, but don't hold me to that one. I just don't remember. My brain is a little mushy right now.Thats kewl. I wasn't aware WRAZ had switched from 1080i to 720p. That may be why the terrible motion artifacting I use to see during the football games stopped about a month ago. They have virtually no motion artifacts at all now on WRAZ.[/quote]

I can now receive ABC-HD !!!

Thanks Billy!

I'm getting 46-1 and 46-2. The audio was out of sync on the 8pm show, then seemed ok on the 8:30 show (sorry, don't remember the names...). It was actually kinda funny when out of sync, like a badly dubbed kung fu movie...

Great job!

Originally posted by dannyboy162
Hey nc88keyz when are you going to join up at wilmingtonhd.com?


Well lets see. I was the second member to sign up on that board.


I am none other than 1080i


:D

ok nc88keyz i was the third digital dan

audio sync is off for saturday night movie.

Is it even in HD Paul?


I obviously stopped watching too early if it is. Cause it looked very grainy to me.

it was listed as HD on the ABC website. it was 4x3, and yes it was very grainy.

Hey guys,

Just wanted to drop a not here for all the Monkey junction boys. I live next door to you guys from what I can tell from your descriptions. I am off River Road behind Ashley High School.

Looking forward to getting my HD TV right before christmas. Already have MY HD box form Time Warner setting beside me. However here there are only the 2 channels and somtimes UNC-TV.

Just wanted to find out what you are receving over the antenna and any recommends for antennas. I heard good things about the bowties and would love to keep it in the attic (even though I will lose much strength).

Thanks
chris

You might want to try posting to http://www.ilmhd.com/ , we're all over there now, although it has been a bit slow of late...

Both WWAY and WUNC are so strong that a bowtie will probably work in the attic without an amp--I've got the Channel Master 4 bay in my attic with no amp and it pulls in just fine (I'm just north of Monkey Junction).

The only way I could get Fox digital was with a directional and an amp--but the quality wasn't really much better than analog, and since they aren't passing through their hi-res signal, it doesn't matter anyway...

Thanks Marc

I have joined the ilmhd.com

chris

Is there any new news regarding Wilmington HD availability? I am considering purchasing an OTA tuner for my brother, but don't know if it would be worth it.

Also he'll probably be moving in less than a year and would not want to mount an antenna. Would a RS double bowtie on top of TV likely pick up anything - he lives about 2 miles south of where 74 joins 17, just west of the river.

BUMP

Originally posted by CPanther95
Is there any new news regarding Wilmington HD availability? I am considering purchasing an OTA tuner for my brother, but don't know if it would be worth it.

Also he'll probably be moving in less than a year and would not want to mount an antenna. Would a RS double bowtie on top of TV likely pick up anything - he lives about 2 miles south of where 74 joins 17, just west of the river.

WWAY is on the air with ABC HD and WECT is about to go on the air and they are saying that they will have NBC HD when they go on and UNC TV has their HD channel up from 8pm to 11pm. CBS HD via D* and E* are available in the Wilmington market as well since the CBS station there has no digital channel allocated since it is not a full power TV station.

(are you the same CPanthers95 on the vnet/yahoo group Panthers list?)

Originally posted by foxeng


(are you the same CPanthers95 on the vnet/yahoo group Panthers list?)

I am CPanther95 on Yahoo, however, I do not recognize that particular group.

I live down at Holden Beach. Just about 40 miles south of Wilmington. Can I get HD over the air this far down here? I know DirecTV is suppose to be getting local channels in April. Will these be in high def?

You should be able to get UNC-TV DTV just fine at Holden beach with a simple 4 Bay bowtie antenna. I was able to view a very strong signal from UNC-TV - DTV station when I was in Shallotte recently. UNC-DTV broadcasts from Delco, NC with 285 kilowatts Effective radiated power.
UNC-TV broadcasts HD 7 days a week from 8 PM to 11:00 PM every evening.
Unfortunately DirecTv will not be providing any HD from the local Wilmington stations. They for the near future will not have enough bandwidth for the HD or DTV broadcasts from the local stations.:)

Regards,

Wayne Estabrooks

I had Voom installed yesterday (2 receivers) my own omni HD Antenna.

Everything works good.

One strange thing though. I can not receive WECT, WSFX, or WUNJ digital signals.
They were my strongest analog stations, along with WCTI.

I receive in perfect video and audio the following stations.
WITN-7(NBC) WNCT-9(CBS) WCTI-12(ABC) WUMN-19(PBS) and WPXU-35(Pax)

My antenna is oriented for strongest gain toward the Wilmington area Stations.

I have changed the orientation of the antenna to check and those three will not come through in any position yet.

I have tried an attenuator with no change. When Radio Shack has another inline amplfier in stock, I will try more gain on OTA.

Official Wilmington, NC thread

I live in Oak Island and recently purchased a Sharp HDTV. With the Silver Sensor I can pick up the WWAY DT stations fine but do not get any signal at all for the others. WECT, WUNC, and FOX all are broadcasting from the same direction according to antennaweb but I get no signal.

Does anyone have information on what power these stations are broadcasting at?

I am a longtme DirecTV user with two Microsoft UTV receivers but I am using Time Warner at present for HDTV.

Dear Oak Island Beach Bum,

WUNJ-DT and WECT-DT broadcast from a 1013 ft. tower in Delco, NC. It is about 27 miles from Oak Island. Last I knew, the Fox station was broadcasting from downtown Wilmington on very low power.
WWAY-DT broadcasts from a 2000 ft tower in Winnabow, NC which is only about 16 air miles from Oak Island.
WUNJ-TV (Analog NTSC) broadcasts from the Winnabow tower.

I can receive WUNJ-DT (UNC-TV) very well in Shallotte, NC which is about the same distance away from Delco as Oak Island but I was using a 4 Bay Bowtie antenna which has substantially more gain than the Silver Sensor antenna. Probably with a little better antenna you could pull in WECT-DT and WUNJ-DT.
WUNJ-DT presently broadcasts with an effective radiated power of 287 kilowatts.
WUNJ-DT has a construction permit to increase power to 700 kilowatts.
I can look up the other stations power levels on the FCC database and let you know.

Regards,

Wayne Estabrooks

Wayne...I can't get Fox HD from Wilmington either. I have DirecTV and it just says "No Signal". I was told in the summer that one of the Hurricanes tore the Fox tower down and were fixing it. But still......it is not workng....and I have never seen it work. Any info on this??

SurfHB
In researching the FCC records, I see that Fox WSFX is presently licensed at 2.19 kilowatts, that is 2,190 watts from the Winnabow tower.
They used to be at 5 kilowatts from a short tower in Wilmington.
Fox, WSFX has a construction permit to go to 547 kW or 547,000 watts Effective Radiated Power (ERP) for their Digital station.
WWAY is licensed at 800 kilowatts ERP.
WUNJ-DT (UNC-TV) is as I had reported previously broadcasting at 287 kilowatts ERP. They have a construction permit to go to 700 kilowatts ERP and will build out before July 2006.
I will be talking to the Director of Engineering fr the station that owns WSFX this week and I will ask him when Fox will increase power.

Hope this is accurate.

Wayne Estabrooks

Hey Guys,

I currently live in Greensboro NC, but may be moving to Wilmington at the beginning of the year....I was wondering what local stations are broadcast in HD through Time Warner Cable....Here in Gboro I get everything except ABC...Thanks for the help.

In Wilmington I think on cable it is just WWAY, ABC and WUNJ PBS. WECT, NBC is just SD and Fox is low power SD.
CBS is not dt. The nearest towers outside of wilmington for HD are Florence SC and Greenville NC. With an antenna you should be able to get one of those.

WWAY in Wilmington NC was recently down over and week and came back up with new software. Ever since I have been experience bad pixelization and audio dropouts making channel 3.1 and 3.2 un-watchable...I have had to start watching ABC on channel 15.1 in Myrtle Beach. WWAY's signal strength is still 90-92% and I do have some periods where their picture is ok, but most times it is un-watchable. All my other off-air channels are fine...6.1 in Wilmington, 15.1 in Myrtle, 21.1 in Myrtle, 39.1 PBS, ec. Is anyone else having issues??????

I saw the same thing on WWAY-DT on Time Warner Cable but for the last few days I have not noticed it. Hopefully the problem is now fixed.

Thanks. I have been in contact with their chief engineer and passed this along to him.

BeachStrat -

Where are you located in relation to the stations and what antenna are you using?

Gene

I am on Sunset Beach island. I have two 9 element yagi's, one pointed to the WWAY tower, the other pointed to the Myrtle Beach tower. I get a signal strength of 92% on WWAY. My lowest signal is WPDE in Florence/Myrtle which is 80%. I am currently using a RAT Shack line booster, but I may move up to the Channel Master pre-amp. I did try to eliminate one of the antennas and also the booster, just to rule out multipath signaling from WWAY. BeachStrat

WWAY-HD & DT are down on Time Warner today. I assume the OTA is also out. Does anyone have any insight into the problem?

They are also down OTA on channels 3.1, 3.2 and 3.3. They went down on Sunday and are still down Monday evening.

hello out there! just bought a new HDTV and am itching to see what it can do.
i have a PT-47WXD64 HD tv set that has an internal ATSC digital tuner. i subscribe to TWC's digital cable and have a digital cable box. i'll soon be getting a HD cabable digital STB that TWC will bring and set up.

i read on another forum that some people in other TWC areas can just plug in their cable and manually enter the digital channel and get some hd broadcasts.

if i did not subscribe to digital cable (but just the regular TWC lineup to channel 70 or so) and just connect a coaxial cable to the wall jack, will/can i get broadcasts in HD? (for example, ABC shows that are sent out OTA in HD like 'Lost', and ESPN when they broadast a game in HD)

i'm not interested in an HD antenna, but would like to try and receive any/all HD broadcasts with as little equipment and cost as possible.

thanks a million.