Thanks, tstolze.

The threads relating to speed issues sound similar to what I'm seeing, though I've only had a couple of times where websites timed out. It's more a problem with listening to streaming audio, which goes stuttery any time I access pages. In the past, this was never a problem. I'm sure this is a direct result of diminished bandwidth/speed.

I'm less confident it will be fixed any time soon. Probably a good time/reason to check again to see if AT&T is available here yet.

Of all the problems I've had with Charter (mainly my Moxi box) my internet has always been stable and fast. I'm near the Webster/Brentwood line and haven't had any recent issues.

Is anyone else in Illinois have problems with Charter Internet ...

I have been having issues as well since I tried to upgrade my speed from 10 to 16 Mbps. I assumed my variances in speed were do to my modem which turned out to be incompatible with the 16 Mbps speeds.

Since I called to request the upgrade on Friday, I have had 2 outages and speeds anywhere from 3-10 Mbps.

I'm in St. Peters, MO.
Hopefully they will figure something out.

Good luck,
Token

Here's an interesting take on Blu-ray (http://blogs.zdnet.com/storage/?p=365&tag=nl.e539) at ZDNet. The author makes the case that Blu-ray is in a death spiral because disc prices are too high (expensive licensing fees and high production costs) and because of inordinately high costs for players that are "junk."

It's an interesting read and points to a lot of the reasons HD DVD should have been the winner, although the format is not mentioned much in the article. I'm of the opinion that the quality advantages of Blu-ray will make it a success in the long run, but the article makes a compelling case for the format's failure unless they get their act together soon. He's quick to point out, however, that Sony's track record with new technologies is not the best ("Remember Betamax? SACD? Minidisk?"). It may just be wishful thinking on my part that Blu-ray will succeed.

The bigger problem with Blu-ray, I think, is that there just hasn't been much compelling content released since HD DVD threw in the towel. Everyone seems surprised that the format hasn't sold better, and they're equally surprised when Iron Man sells really well on Blu-ray. 2+2 usually equals 4. Offer people something they want to see, and they're going to be more willing to buy.

Production has to be a huge problem. Blu-ray requires new production facilities. HD DVD required inexpensive retooling of existing facilities. The industry and the consumer were offered some pretty glasses of Kool-Aide and we drank it. They are working out the problems with Blu-ray, but HD DVD machines were full specification when the format debuted.

I for one hope Blu-ray figures it all out. I want to see it succeed. I have trouble watching DVDs anymore. Just look at the success of low bitrate MP3s over CDs, though, and the "quality will prevail" argument pretty much goes out the window.

Here's an interesting take on Blu-ray (http://blogs.zdnet.com/storage/?p=365&tag=nl.e539) at ZDNet. The author makes the case that Blu-ray is in a death spiral because disc prices are too high (expensive licensing fees and high production costs) and because of inordinately high costs for players that are "junk."

It's an interesting read and points to a lot of the reasons HD DVD should have been the winner, although the format is not mentioned much in the article. I'm of the opinion that the quality advantages of Blu-ray will make it a success in the long run, but the article makes a compelling case for the format's failure unless they get their act together soon. He's quick to point out, however, that Sony's track record with new technologies is not the best ("Remember Betamax? SACD? Minidisk?"). It may just be wishful thinking on my part that Blu-ray will succeed.

The bigger problem with Blu-ray, I think, is that there just hasn't been much compelling content released since HD DVD threw in the towel. Everyone seems surprised that the format hasn't sold better, and they're equally surprised when Iron Man sells really well on Blu-ray. 2+2 usually equals 4. Offer people something they want to see, and they're going to be more willing to buy.

Production has to be a huge problem. Blu-ray requires new production facilities. HD DVD required inexpensive retooling of existing facilities. The industry and the consumer were offered some pretty glasses of Kool-Aide and we drank it. They are working out the problems with Blu-ray, but HD DVD machines were full specification when the format debuted.

I for one hope Blu-ray figures it all out. I want to see it succeed. I have trouble watching DVDs anymore. Just look at the success of low bitrate MP3s over CDs, though, and the "quality will prevail" argument pretty much goes out the window.

It's been 10 months, I think we can stop talking about the format war.

Here's an interesting take on Blu-ray (http://blogs.zdnet.com/storage/?p=365&tag=nl.e539) at ZDNet. The author makes the case that Blu-ray is in a death spiral because disc prices are too high (expensive licensing fees and high production costs) and because of inordinately high costs for players that are "junk."

I for one hope Blu-ray figures it all out. I want to see it succeed. I have trouble watching DVDs anymore. Just look at the success of low bitrate MP3s over CDs, though, and the "quality will prevail" argument pretty much goes out the window.

Quality will indeed prevail if the difference is easily discerned. In the cases of both DVDs/Blu-ray and mp3/CD, however, this is imply not the case. The average listener/viewer cannot easily tell the difference. And even of they do it's not worth the difference in price for the small improvement in quality.

Quality will indeed prevail if the difference is easily discerned. In the cases of both DVDs/Blu-ray and mp3/CD, however, this is imply not the case. The average listener/viewer cannot easily tell the difference. And even of they do it's not worth the difference in price for the small improvement in quality.

I agree if we're talking about normal sized screens and normal viewing distances. The differences don't matter as much for average viewing. The numbers don't lie, though, when it comes to 1080p Blu-ray being clearly better than 480p DVD.

Blu-ray pixel count: 1920x1080=2,073,600

DVD pixel count: 720x480=345,600

The Blu-ray resolution advantage over DVD is 6x. HDTV has other advantages, too, over typical NTSC television. The improvement in picture quality is far from small. It's just that most people sit too far away from their smaller screens to see it.

I think what has to happen is that the manufacturers have to decide that they can't charge an excessive premium for Blu-ray players and discs. I think what they saw was an opportunity to use the same tired tactics they've used in the past - charging too much for new technology and expecting the quality difference to lead people to buy Blu-ray at a rate comparable to DVD's acceptance rate. But DVD, as a technology, is "good enough" for most people. Blu-ray may be a victim of that fact. I hope not.

Has anyone seen any evidence that KMOV may have tested a channel 24 signal overnight recently? I saw a piece of evidence, want to confirm...

EDIT: I suppose now that I think about it, it could have been DX from KCTV-DT 24...

- Trip

Has anyone seen any evidence that KMOV may have tested a channel 24 signal overnight recently?
There have been some low-level signals on Ch24. I cannot confirm whose they are.

I got to playing with a spectrum analyzer recently and recorded the attached chart. The red numbers are channel assignments. Double-spiked traces like 33, 38, 46 will be analog stations -- I guess the two spikes are the video and audio carriers. Wide packages of nearly continuous distribution like 26, 31 and 43 will be digital transmissions.

The bulletin board software shrinks the image and creates compression artifacts. I'll put a better copy at http://ee.stlcc.info/UHFSpectrum.png.

The numbers don't lie, though, when it comes to 1080p Blu-ray being clearly better than 480p DVD.

Blu-ray pixel count: 1920x1080=2,073,600

DVD pixel count: 720x480=345,600

With respect, you make my point Joe. The numbers may be there but the perception is not. I'm telling you that I can barely tell the difference in quality when viewing a 480P DVD vs a 1080P Blu-ray disc. And I am not alone in my perception. Videophiles and audiophiles always go by the numbers and, in my opinion, convince themselves that they perceive the differences. Joe-six-pack and I do not see enough difference to justify the higher cost of both the hardware and the media.

Again, you can throw all the numbers around you like. I don't see it and neither do most average users. We discuss this a lot where I work and this is the main reason Blu-ray is not selling more. I'm not going to pay $30 for the Blu-ray version of Ironman when I can pay half that for the DVD version and be perfectly satisfied with the picture quality.

With respect, you make my point Joe. The numbers may be there but the perception is not. I'm telling you that I can barely tell the difference in quality when viewing a 480P DVD vs a 1080P Blu-ray disc. And I am not alone in my perception. Videophiles and audiophiles always go by the numbers and, in my opinion, convince themselves that they perceive the differences. Joe-six-pack and I do not see enough difference to justify the higher cost of both the hardware and the media.

Again, you can throw all the numbers around you like. I don't see it and neither do most average users. We discuss this a lot where I work and this is the main reason Blu-ray is not selling more. I'm not going to pay $30 for the Blu-ray version of Ironman when I can pay half that for the DVD version and be perfectly satisfied with the picture quality.

I did agree with you about the perception of the average viewer with the average screen. That's why Blu-ray has an uphill battle to gain market share.

The area where I would disagree with you is your implication that videophiles and audiophiles are somehow delusional ("...always go by the numbers and, in my opinion, convince themselves that they perceive the differences"). It's not at all hard to see the differences between DVD and Blu-ray from a distance of several feet with a big screen. It's also not hard to see the differences on a small screen from a short distance. I can demonstrate that to anyone with relatively decent eyesight.

I do agree that there are a lot of people who use numbers (like manufacturers' contrast ratio numbers or "Deep Color" numbers) to "prove" a point about a particular product that is, in fact, meaningless. It is a mistake, however, to generalize that all numbers in home theater (video and audio) are meaningless, or that one's own perception is a general proof.

There have been some low-level signals on Ch24. I cannot confirm whose they are.

I got to playing with a spectrum analyzer recently and recorded the attached chart. The red numbers are channel assignments. Double-spiked traces like 33, 38, 46 will be analog stations -- I guess the two spikes are the video and audio carriers. Wide packages of nearly continuous distribution like 26, 31 and 43 will be digital transmissions.

The bulletin board software shrinks the image and creates compression artifacts. I'll put a better copy at http://ee.stlcc.info/UHFSpectrum.png.

Dan, are you getting this on top of the Hawthorne Building?

Videophiles and audiophiles always go by the numbers and, in my opinion, convince themselves that they perceive the differences.

Some people even apply that rule to Macintosh computers:D

Joe-six-pack and I do not see enough difference to justify the higher cost of both the hardware and the media.

Is that a POLITICAL comment;)

I did agree with you about the perception of the average viewer with the average screen. That's why Blu-ray has an uphill battle to gain market share.

The area where I would disagree with you is your implication that videophiles and audiophiles are somehow delusional ("...always go by the numbers and, in my opinion, convince themselves that they perceive the differences"). It's not at all hard to see the differences between DVD and Blu-ray from a distance of several feet with a big screen. It's also not hard to see the differences on a small screen from a short distance. I can demonstrate that to anyone with relatively decent eyesight.

I do agree that there are a lot of people who use numbers (like manufacturers' contrast ratio numbers or "Deep Color" numbers) to "prove" a point about a particular product that is, in fact, meaningless. It is a mistake, however, to generalize that all numbers in home theater (video and audio) are meaningless, or that one's own perception is a general proof.

I would also argue that Blu-ray also has to fight consumer perceptions due to the increasing tendency of cable and satellite providers using compressed signals that somewhat degrade picture quality.

A properly remastered DVD can be very comparable to the picture on some lesser HD networks who don't insist on full signal strength, air mediocre HD upconversions, and/or only broadcast in 720p.

Seeing a properly remastered DVD and what they think is full HD from the cable/satellite company, I'd suspect many aren't willing to pay the Blu-ray premium.

Perhaps the relative cheapness upconverting DVD players is to blame, but since I've never actually seen one in action, so I can't really comment on it.

Yeah, the broadcasters (both satellite and OTA) are doing HD a real disservice by degrading the signal with bit-starved signals. Reducing the bitrate can make some HD signals look *worse* than a good DVD. That's especially evident in sports, or anything with a lot of fast motion. This is where the numbers lie. The marketers can make claims about full HD/1080p/"digital quality"/etc. until our eyes and ears bleed, but if the bitrate is too low, it's all just marketing double-talk. A good analog signal can look much better than a low bitrate digital signal.

Up-converting DVD players can make DVDs look really good, but all fixed-pixel panels (like plasmas and LCDs), or their projector cousins, have to upconvert DVD signals to fill the screen. What the upconversion does is to fill in missing pixels with what it "guesses" the information there should be. All it takes to see the difference, though, is a small section of the screen that has text or other easily distinguishable detail. Look closely at small text on an HD screen and it's easy to see that the best upconverting DVD player turns words into ashes.

Yeah, the broadcasters (both satellite and OTA) are doing HD a real disservice by degrading the signal with bit-starved signals. Reducing the bitrate can make some HD signals look *worse* than a good DVD. That's especially evident in sports, or anything with a lot of fast motion. This is where the numbers lie. The marketers can make claims about full HD/1080p/"digital quality"/etc. until our eyes and ears bleed, but if the bitrate is too low, it's all just marketing double-talk. A good analog signal can look much better than a low bitrate digital signal.

Up-converting DVD players can make DVDs look really good, but all fixed-pixel panels (like plasmas and LCDs), or their projector cousins, have to upconvert DVD signals to fill the screen. What the upconversion does is to fill in missing pixels with what it "guesses" the information there should be. All it takes to see the difference, though, is a small section of the screen that has text or other easily distinguishable detail. Look closely at small text on an HD screen and it's easy to see that the best upconverting DVD player turns words into ashes.

Honestly, I think most people care about money and delivery methods more than picture quality. Netflix. Roku. Tivo Netflix. People are couch potatos and if the can push an OnDemand button for "HD MOVIES!!!!!!!" they will do so. BluRay does look nice. My PS3 is a better upconverter than my old Oppo was. I still get a lot of my video materials from "non-traditional" sources, hehe. I only own 3 BR movies, because they are expensive, and I do not think the format will last very long ... digital delivery is the future, whether its true HD or not, its all about profit. Videophiles can't keep a market alive.

I think you're right in the long run - digital downloads are the future. However, it's going to take a few years to get there. Our Internet speeds just aren't fast enough in this country to allow most people to get HD anytime soon. Talk about bit-starved - that's what most Internet delivered "HD" content has to be to work at all at this point.

I think even Sony sees the writing on the wall, though. I read something in which a Sony exec mentions 10 years as their window of opportunity with Blu-ray. I think it depends on how quickly the high speed Internet infrastructure can be deployed. There are lots of things that could stall that.

Honestly, I think most people care about money and delivery methods more than picture quality.
I appreciate PQ, in movies or in still photography. But there also comes a point where I watch the movie, not the equipment. I have enjoyed Casablanca on a small screen fed by a VHS tape.

Now, where's that sale on 60" plasmas...

My $.02 on Blu-Ray

I have a Sony Blu-Ray player and if someone asks me about the format, I tell them to
stay away. The player is overpriced and under functioning and the movies are also over
priced. These people aren't videophiles either, that is why I try to talk them out of it.

It takes forever to "turn on" and then even longer to be ready to play a disc.

Upgrading the firmware is a PITA also. I liked the HD DVD ethernet capability for upgrades.
Having to download the firmware to a computer, burning it to a disc and then
waiting for the stupid machine to be ready for a disc is just ridiculous.

If DirecTV and Microsoft wouldn't throttle the ability to download movies so that I could
actually watch them within the hour, or heck even day, I wanted to watch them, I would
probably just download movies.

I appreciate PQ, in movies or in still photography. But there also comes a point where I watch the movie, not the equipment. I have enjoyed Casablanca on a small screen fed by a VHS tape.

Now, where's that sale on 60" plasmas...

Its true. I can enjoy a good TCM late night movie on my SD tube tv in the bedroom more than a HD piece of crap Hollywood blockbuster on my Home Theater.

The Playstation 3 is the way to go if you want to watch Blu-ray movies. It loads movies almost before I can get back to my chair and it's easy to upgrade if you have it connected to the Internet. It has been upgraded consistently to take advantage of the latest Blu-ray features, unlike the regular Blu-ray set top boxes. Blu-ray was not even close to being ready for general release when it came out. They were simply being pressured too much by HD DVD's maturity as a product. They were forced to release it before they should have. The only drawback, IMO, to using it instead of a regular set top box is the remote situation. It doesn't come with a remote - it's a $25 option, and it's Bluetooth. I use my Harmony with it, but I needed an adapter so the PS3 could understand IR codes. It's also the cheapest of the fully capable Blu-ray players on the market. Even some really high end (that is, expensive) players like the new Denon are not fully capable of all Blu-ray features. That's just stupid.

Its true. I can enjoy a good TCM late night movie on my SD tube tv in the bedroom more than a HD piece of crap Hollywood blockbuster on my Home Theater.

I think for me the test of any medium for playing back movies is how much it gets in the way of enjoying the film. Sure, I can enjoy Casablanca on VHS, but I enjoy it a lot more in HD, because it's that much closer to what it looked like in the theater. The really great thing about home theater today is that, often, it looks even better than a film print in a traditional theater. It also almost always sounds better in my home than it does at Wehrenberg or AMC venue. None but the best of the local cineplex theaters can beat what I have at home, and home sure is a lot more comfortable.

One of the most absurd arguments I ever heard against HDTV was in the pages of Discover Magazine. The author made the case that HDTV was undesirable because it was too real, and that SDTV was better because it forced us to engage our minds more. The hyper-reality of HDTV, according to this argument, made us more passive because it left less for our imaginations to engage the content.

First of all, until Jessica Alba is standing in my living room as a 3D hologram, I'm not going to have any trouble telling the difference between HDTV and reality. Taking that same argument in the other direction, I suppose the author might believe my imagination would be even more engaged, and my cognitive abilities further stimulated, if I were to watch Casablanca as a 160x120 Web video. There's even less "reality" in a video of that resolution to get in the way.

I think for me the test of any medium for playing back movies is how much it gets in the way of enjoying the film. Sure, I can enjoy Casablanca on VHS, but I enjoy it a lot more in HD, because it's that much closer to what it looked like in the theater. The really great thing about home theater today is that, often, it looks even better than a film print in a traditional theater. It also almost always sounds better in my home than it does at Wehrenberg or AMC venue. None but the best of the local cineplex theaters can beat what I have at home, and home sure is a lot more comfortable.

One of the most absurd arguments I ever heard against HDTV was in the pages of Discover Magazine. The author made the case that HDTV was undesirable because it was too real, and that SDTV was better because it forced us to engage our minds more. The hyper-reality of HDTV, according to this argument, made us more passive because it left less for our imaginations to engage the content.

First of all, until Jessica Alba is standing in my living room as a 3D hologram, I'm not going to have any trouble telling the difference between HDTV and reality. Taking that same argument in the other direction, I suppose the author might believe my imagination would be even more engaged, and my cognitive abilities further stimulated, if I were to watch Casablanca as a 160x120 Web video. There's even less "reality" in a video of that resolution to get in the way.

Meh, the more we all sit on a couch and consume media of any kind, the less imagination we'll end up with :)

But I agree with you.

And I second the PS3 post. Of course I still game too, so for me its a win/win situation, and the machine has an excellent DVD upconversion and can be used with many media servers for other content. I like it.

I just entered the BD market by purchasing an $89 read-only drive for the pc( thanks for the link, Bob) as well as some discs, and the pc ethernet connection allows for updates. I should be able to use my Creative Soundblaster Audigy remote with the help of a program called Intelliremote. This is exciting.

Adrian

Has anyone seen one of the new JVC RS10 or RS20 front projectors anywhere close to the St. Louis area? I'd really like to check out the high contrast JVC D-ILA models, but I don't know anyone around here who has one. If anyone does, I'll bring some brews over for a look see.

Joe,

I haven't seen one of the new JVC projectors, though I have worked on one of the RS2 models for a client in Chicago. I also have a client in town here who has either an RS1 or an RS2 (I think it's the RS1). Although I've calibrated three other displays for him (and seven others for his parents), I haven't done the JVC.

I suspect that you're probably more interested in seeing the newer models, but if you don't have any luck and would like to see one of the earlier projectors, let me know. I might be able to set that up for you.

Thanks, Doug. I'm actually not sure if the new newest JVSs are generally available yet. But, I've heard such great things about the native contrast of these projectors, I'd really like to see one. I understand the newer models have much better calibration controls than the earlier ones. I couldn't live with inaccurate colors that couldn't be tamed.

Ready for another assault on OTA HD picture quality? Well, the FCC has an idea (http://www.tvpredictions.com/2008/11/fcc-diversity-plan-could-hurt-hd.html) you'll be interested in.

Just what we need.

I've been reading about this technology (http://blogs.zdnet.com/BTL/?p=10669&tag=nl.e589) in different forms for years, but here's a video from 60 Minutes that shows a monkey controlling a robotic arm with its brain. We talk about technology here all the time, but this, to me, is the most exciting area of technological advancement I've ever seen. It's going on a year now that my Godfather died, and during the last years of his life his mobility was slowly taken from him. Technology that could have helped him is far more exciting than any HDTV to me. Even more exciting are experiments in allowing paralyzed limbs to be moved by the brain without robotics.

Last time I checked, Missouri still hadn't counted all its votes for the presidential election. Anyone know why we seem to be so tardy all the time in these contests? It just might have something to do with the guy who was at my precinct table yesterday. Most people had to point out their names to him in the book. Apparently, alphabetical order was a little beyond his grasp. That, and the fact that he seemed intent on making each of his initials a meticulous work of art.

Last time I checked, Missouri still hadn't counted all its votes for the presidential election. Anyone know why we seem to be so tardy all the time in these contests? It just might have something to do with the guy who was at my precinct table yesterday. Most people had to point out their names to him in the book. Apparently, alphabetical order was a little beyond his grasp. That, and the fact that he seemed intent on making each of his initials a meticulous work of art.

I dunno, but this is a TV forum :p

1.5TB drives for $150 at TigerDirect today. (http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/searchtools/item-Details.asp?EdpNo=4138742&sku=TSD-1500AS&SRCCODE=WEM1749MH&cm_mmc=Email-_-Main-_-WEM1749-_-compo) Perfect for expanding the UnRAID server I just rebuilt (old mobo died).

Finally silence at the house, I can turn the phone and recorder back on! :D

I also have read that Dish may be launching some new National HD soon....Hopefully today, as Wed. has been the traditional launch day, with Friday filling in on occasion...:)

1.5TB drives for $150 at TigerDirect today. (http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/searchtools/item-Details.asp?EdpNo=4138742&sku=TSD-1500AS&SRCCODE=WEM1749MH&cm_mmc=Email-_-Main-_-WEM1749-_-compo) Perfect for expanding the UnRAID server I just rebuilt (old mobo died).

$154.99 at Newegg with free shipping..My server has 9TB capacity and is ~ 60% full. I think I am alright on storage at this time...;)

1.5TB drives for $150 at TigerDirect today. (http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/searchtools/item-Details.asp?EdpNo=4138742&sku=TSD-1500AS&SRCCODE=WEM1749MH&cm_mmc=Email-_-Main-_-WEM1749-_-compo) Perfect for expanding the UnRAID server I just rebuilt (old mobo died).


Joe, did you read the reviews? Seems these drives have problems.

Walt

Well, thanks to Joe(my hat's off to you) I'm up and running with a pc that is handling BDs just fine. I'm having to watch them on a Pioneer 53'' crt rptv in 1080i only, but I'm just happy to be in the game now. The video connection is being made through vga, supplied via the analog part of one of the dvi outputs on the back of the ATI 2600 video card. What a great card.

Joe, the quality isn't what I saw over at your place, even when you set the rez to 1080i, but I believe there's quite a bit of tweaking that can be done. I also have to bear in mind that the vga input on the tv was not the one that Doug calibrated. I need the video 1 component input for that. Bob, can you help me figure that out? I look forward to seeing full 1080p glory through hdmi on a pj in my house one day. Heck, even 720p would look awesome. So far, I've only tried digital sound through the SPDIF coaxial output. Man, the Twister BD file sounded wonderful, due to the higher bit rate of regular DD 5.1 channel sound. I don't know if I could take the HD lossless formats in here, but I'm headed that way.

It would be great to go for that hdd deal you posted, Joe, but you know what kind of car situation I'm dealing with now. There will be other deals later for me. Thanks again!!

Adrian

Joe, did you read the reviews? Seems these drives have problems.

Walt

You know, all I really read were performance reviews, which put the drive in the same league as the 1TB drives for the most part. I've since read about some problems with caching. I've not had any problems that I am aware of, but the drives have been in my UnRAID server for only a short time. It's hard to beat the price/performance for a media server, but it won't be worth it if the drive has long term reliability issues. I'll just have to wait and see, but I think I'm going to add one more drive to max out my UnRAID box. The warranty is good.

The video connection is being made through vga, supplied via the analog part of one of the dvi outputs on the back of the ATI 2600 video card. What a great card.

Joe, the quality isn't what I saw over at your place, even when you set the rez to 1080i, but I believe there's quite a bit of tweaking that can be done. I also have to bear in mind that the vga input on the tv was not the one that Doug calibrated. I need the video 1 component input for that.Adrian

I have an adapter that I think works with the 2600 to provide component output from a Din connector on the backplane of the card. When I come over, we can check that out.

$154.99 at Newegg with free shipping..My server has 9TB capacity and is ~ 60% full. I think I am alright on storage at this time...;)

Thanks again for the deal on the CPU for my UnRAID upgrade, Tom. It's working great. I have about 7.5TB on that UnRAID box right now and I think I'll add one more 1.5TB drive to ratchet mine up to 9TBs, too. Then, I'll wait for the price to drop a little more (and gauge the drive's longer term reliability) before I think about replacing any of the 500GB drives that make up the majority of the storage in the system.

Thanks again for the deal on the CPU for my UnRAID upgrade, Tom. It's working great. I have about 7.5TB on that UnRAID box right now and I think I'll add one more 1.5TB drive to ratchet mine up to 9TBs, too. Then, I'll wait for the price to drop a little more (and gauge the drive's longer term reliability) before I think about replacing any of the 500GB drives that make up the majority of the storage in the system.

Hopefully we won't get into a my Unraid is bigger than yours war! :cool:

Glad the cpu worked out!

I purchased 3 of the WD TB drives early on, I had to RMA 2 of them as they were DOA. Now I have 10 total with no problems since the original purchase.

Hopefully we won't get into a my Unraid is bigger than yours war! :cool:

Glad the cpu worked out!

I purchased 3 of the WD TB drives early on, I had to RMA 2 of them as they were DOA. Now I have 10 total with no problems since the original purchase.

It's hard to know, especially with manufacturing happening all over the world, what to expect with hard drive reliability. I used to read all the time about WD drives being unreliable, so I avoided them. That changed and I've bought several without issue in the last few years. It's a crap shoot, I'm afraid.

The nice thing about RAID systems like UnRAID is that you have some fault tolerance, so that if one drive fails you don't lose your data. That wasn't the case with the RAID0 that I used to run in my systems (no data security if you lose a drive with RAID0).

I was pretty lucky with RAID0, but it's nice to know that UnRAID keeps my files secure. I changed out the old CPU, motherboard, RAM and video card, plugged the drives back in and all my data was just sitting there waiting for me. It did a parity check and was up and running (not quite that simple, but as far as UnRAID was concerned, it was). I did sacrifice a lot of the speed I had with RAID0, but the advantages of UnRAID made it worth the trade off.

Here's an explanation (http://gizmodo.com/5076663/how-the-cnn-holographic-interview-system-works) of how CNN pulled off their "hologram" of reporter Jessica Yellin on election night.

Apparently, it required 35 HD cameras and 20 computers, and it was a hologram in the same sense that the moon is green cheese - that is, it wasn't. Had it been a true hologram, I was ready to give it "cool" rating. As a fuzzy Matrix rip-off, I'd give it C-. I do applaud them, though, for the technology they used in the coverage. Overall, I thought it added more than it detracted (with the "hologram" firmly in the distraction-rather-than-addition department).

Joe, I have an adapter that has vga on one end and component on the other(actually I have a couple). Do you think that would work? I'm guessing that the output signal itself needs to be changed from pc RGB to video/component on the card.

Adrian

Joe, I have an adapter that has vga on one end and component on the other(actually I have a couple). Do you think that would work? I'm guessing that the output signal itself needs to be changed from pc RGB to video/component on the card.

Adrian

Maybe, but I think the adapter I have has a better shot at working. The MyHD can work with a VGA to component adapter, but you need to make a change in the software so it outputs the correct video signal. The adapter I have is made to work with ATI cards' Din ports.

Hopefully we won't get into a my Unraid is bigger than yours war! :cool:



Heh, heh... I'll get into some of that action.....

Finally! :D

Sci-Fi will have Battlestar Galactica Friday, January 16 with BSG: Essential Elements, a half-hour special on Sunday, January 11.

Battlestar Galactica Props Hit Auction Block (http://blog.wired.com/underwire/2008/11/battlestar-gala.html) :(

WPXS-DT 21 (13-1) filed a license app with the FCC a few days ago for a 350 kW signal. Can anybody receive this signal? It's on what appears to be a cell tower (or a tower of similar height, which is to say it's very short) about half-way between Mount Vernon and St. Louis, with a directional pattern that puts power only in the direction of those two cities.

Can anybody receive this signal? If so, are they airing anything besides the normal analog programming on subchannels or whatnot?

EDIT: I just checked another filing and it looks like they filed their license app before the station was put on the air? It says they now expect construction to be finished "in mid-November" though in that case they should not have filed to license their new transmitter yet...

- Trip

Finally! :D

Sci-Fi will have Battlestar Galactica Friday, January 16 with BSG: Essential Elements, a half-hour special on Sunday, January 11.

Battlestar Galactica Props Hit Auction Block (http://blog.wired.com/underwire/2008/11/battlestar-gala.html) :(

Thanks, Mo. I'm really looking forward to this.

A friend of mine got the first season of BSG on HD DVD, but all the discs were scratched and he returned it. Anyone know if it's going to be released on Blu-ray?

WPXS-DT 21 (13-1)I have not been able to receive any signal, but I have only a Silver Sensor indoors. I'll try later with a rooftop antenna. They will have to get their antenna higher than 91 meters if they hope to reach Saint Louis.

Wikipedia says:

WPXS
Mount Vernon, Illinois
Branding St. Louis' RTN
Channels Analog: 13 (VHF)

Digital: 21 (UHF)
Translators KUMO-LP 51 St. Louis
Affiliations RTN
Owner Word of God Fellowship, Inc.
(operated by Equity Media Holdings Corporation)
(WPXS, Inc.)
First air date March 1983[1]
Call letters’ meaning Pax TV Southern Illinois
-or-
Pax TV St. Louis
Former callsigns WCEE (1983-1998)
Former affiliations independent (1983-1998)
Pax TV (1998-2004)
Transmitter Power 302 kW (analog)
350 kW (digital)
Height 302 m (analog)
91 m (digital)
Facility ID 40861
Transmitter Coordinates 38°32′37.7″N 88°55′27.9″W / 38.543806, -88.924417 (analog)
38°41′19.4″N 89°33′37.3″W / 38.688722, -89.560361 (digital)

Is anyone else seeing wide signal strength swings with ch 4.1? I live in Creve Coeur, where all my other stations come in at 100 on my E* receiver via an OTA antenna. KMOV used to come in at 100 as well but is now hovering in the low 70's and even briefly drops out from time to time.

I don't want to climb the roof unless I have to...........

AT&T Customers Connect Faster With New 18 Mbps U-verse High Speed Internet Service (http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/ATT-Customers-Connect-Faster-With/story.aspx?guid={D59AD70B-E884-4114-A99F-20E80CEC8884})

I wonder what the real world speeds would be for this package.

I just upgrade to the Charter 16/2 Max plan and the best I have seen is 12/1.8.
Customer service said they only guarantee 75% of the plan max.

Thanks,
Token

AT&T Customers Connect Faster With New 18 Mbps U-verse High Speed Internet Service (http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/ATT-Customers-Connect-Faster-With/story.aspx?guid={D59AD70B-E884-4114-A99F-20E80CEC8884})

I wonder what the real world speeds would be for this package.

I just upgrade to the Charter 16/2 Max plan and the best I have seen is 12/1.8.
Customer service said they only guarantee 75% of the plan max.

Thanks,
Token

Real world will be very close the the 18 advertised, when the bandwidth is available. This is part of the 25 total allocated for your TV and internet usage. So if you are only watching 1 HD channel, you should still get close to the 18, if you are consuming more than 1 channel your internet will start to throttle down.

Joe,

Good news for me. I did some begging last night and the AV guy at my church may let me babysit one of the 2 pjs that the church owns. I think the unit he's thinking of is an lcd, and you know I'm a dlp guy. However, if the unit is decent, and atleast has 720p rez, it might be fun to have around. I hope to pick it up later tonight, so it should be here when you come over tomorrow. I'm just excited to possibly get my big image back again. The catch for the deal is that I'll have to give it up whenever he needs it for the church, but I can worry about that later.

Update: just found out that it is the Sony VPL-AW15. I think it's cool that the pj has my initials AW in the name. It was purchased not too long ago, and they got it really cheap from a local Best Buy. There is a huge sticky in the $3,000 pjs and under section on this unit. I've got a lot of reading to do. I've got to go teach, then I'll pick up the toy.

My pastor is considering buying my older Optoma H31 for his own personal use at home. I'm letting it go for almost nothing, especially since it needs a new bulb.

Adrian

Is anyone else seeing wide signal strength swings with ch 4.1? I live in Creve Coeur, where all my other stations come in at 100 on my E* receiver via an OTA antenna. KMOV used to come in at 100 as well but is now hovering in the low 70's and even briefly drops out from time to time.

I don't want to climb the roof unless I have to...........

this happens to me in the winter too.

my signal is too strong and overloads.

i use antenuetor (sp?) from radio shack to knock a few db's off and I'm all good.

this happens to me in the winter too.

my signal is too strong and overloads.

i use antenuetor (sp?) from radio shack to knock a few db's off and I'm all good.

Have you actually seen the attenuator INCREASE signal strength by say, 25 points? Sounds strange, but possible in the DTV world.

Have you actually seen the attenuator INCREASE signal strength by say, 25 points? Sounds strange, but possible in the DTV world.
Could it be that it really indicates signal quality rather than strength? Certainly an overloaded amplifier would distort and affect quality, especially in such complicated modulation schemes as VSB and QAM.

Perhaps someone here will know the technical details of the "signal strength" indicator.

Anyone here belong to the Blockbuster Online service? I'm trying one of their plans for about $15/month (free for 2 weeks). I joined last week on Monday. The first movie didn't ship until late Tuesday, with a delivery date projected for Friday. It arrived on Thursday. I took it back to a local store after watching it that same day. They noted later that day that it had been returned and said the next movie would ship "soon." No movie has shipped yet (Sunday). I can't remember Netflix ever taking this long to ship once they say they've received a title.

The attractive thing about Blockbuster is that with this plan, you get 2 free in-store exchanges a month. It's gotten to the point that Netflix never gets enough of the new Blu-ray titles. I can't get them for weeks after they come out. Blockbuster has them in the store right away.

So, the question is, how many movies a month is one likely to receive from Blockbuster Online if you take them back to the store yourself? It's looking like they're stalling so that I end up with about one a week, even if I get them back promptly. I might have to cancel before this trial is over.

Anyone here belong to the Blockbuster Online service?

Joe, I have been with them since early this year, I believe February. This is my last week, I am taking a break for a few months. I have received 199 movies in that time. I am on the $15.99 a month for 3 movies at a time, mail only. Probably 85% of the movies they send arrive in 1 day, 3 days is rare for a mailing. Typically they arrive a day faster than they estimate, returns are 99% next day. You do have to stay on them, I have received many wrong/ damaged movies. I just received a sd dvd of Chill, it was supposed to be a HDDVD of Animal House. :p Report any damaged, wrong, late disc immediately, if done early enough in the day, say before 11am they will get another out that day. I did learn not to send the bad disc in until I received the replacement. I actually marked some disc that were to scratched to play, just to receive them back in two days with the same damage on them. :eek: Keep alot of movies in your que, if many near the top say anything more than a short wait, move them down. They never went further than 8-10 movies down my list to ship. Also sometimes they don't ship on Mondays, or do limited shipping. I was told they are overwhelmed with returns on Mondays, common sense tells you the busy day would be Tuesday. ;) Now that I have rambled! I better summarize and get some breakfast!

On a scale of 1-10 I would say a 6 or 7, just for the quantity of Blu-Ray/HDDVD I have received for the price. When I had serious problems, for example, one week I couldn't access my Que at all. I called and received 5 free rental coupons sent to my email. Went to the local store and rented 5 Blu-Ray's at the same time. :)

Could it be that it really indicates signal quality rather than strength? Certainly an overloaded amplifier would distort and affect quality, especially in such complicated modulation schemes as VSB and QAM.

Perhaps someone here will know the technical details of the "signal strength" indicator.

Dan, You're correct. As far a I know the "signal strength" is actually bit rate quality. So you could have a strong signal with a lot of multipath and a non recoverable signal.

Joe, I have been with them since early this year, I believe February. This is my last week, I am taking a break for a few months. I have received 199 movies in that time. I am on the $15.99 a month for 3 movies at a time, mail only. Probably 85% of the movies they send arrive in 1 day, 3 days is rare for a mailing. Typically they arrive a day faster than they estimate, returns are 99% next day. You do have to stay on them, I have received many wrong/ damaged movies. I just received a sd dvd of Chill, it was supposed to be a HDDVD of Animal House. :p Report any damaged, wrong, late disc immediately, if done early enough in the day, say before 11am they will get another out that day. I did learn not to send the bad disc in until I received the replacement. I actually marked some disc that were to scratched to play, just to receive them back in two days with the same damage on them. :eek: Keep alot of movies in your que, if many near the top say anything more than a short wait, move them down. They never went further than 8-10 movies down my list to ship. Also sometimes they don't ship on Mondays, or do limited shipping. I was told they are overwhelmed with returns on Mondays, common sense tells you the busy day would be Tuesday. ;) Now that I have rambled! I better summarize and get some breakfast!

On a scale of 1-10 I would say a 6 or 7, just for the quantity of Blu-Ray/HDDVD I have received for the price. When I had serious problems, for example, one week I couldn't access my Que at all. I called and received 5 free rental coupons sent to my email. Went to the local store and rented 5 Blu-Ray's at the same time. :)

Thanks, Tom. That's all good information to have. Actually, your plan sounds like a better one than the one I picked. I also didn't have enough titles in my queue, I guess. I've fixed that. The process looks very much like Netflix, but in practice it's a little different.

As far a I know the "signal strength" is actually bit rate quality. So you could have a strong signal with a lot of multipath and a non recoverable signal.Thank you, that's good to know. And, it is certainly a more useful measurement for the consumer.

Thanks, Tom. That's all good information to have. Actually, your plan sounds like a better one than the one I picked. I also didn't have enough titles in my queue, I guess. I've fixed that. The process looks very much like Netflix, but in practice it's a little different.

I've been both a Netflix and Blockbuster subscriber in the past.

I'm currently with Blockbuster, because of the in-store exchanges, and a good selection of Blu-Rays at my local store.

My issue with them is that they never send you the top movie off of your queue, just what is easily available from your Top 30. If you are just planning on watching some random movies that come out, it's not a big deal.

However, if you were trying to watch a TV series on DVD, and you didn't get the discs in order, this would be a big issue.

Circuit City announced filing for bankruptcy protection today:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20081110/ap_on_bi_ge/circuit_city_bankruptcy;_ylt=AgoqJuGZ05bEOPB5IqSLMBys0NUE

//rant = ON//

As an ex-employee, I can say it's only a matter of time before this one goes under. Since I started there, I was taken off of commission (I missed that round of layoffs by $0.22 per hour), saw numerous friends get laid off, watched as the company struggled to make a dent in BB's market, survived two more rounds of layoffs, watched the company launch a "geek squad" of their own in an attempt to profitable off of labor ($30 for recovery disks?! come on!), was finally promoted to manager and six months later subsequently laid off because we had too many managers in the store. During my tenure I also saw an investment company offer to buy the company at $17 a share (go see what it is now...). After I was laid off, they laid off another round of 3000 of the highest paid and most knowledgeable associates, the ones who actually drove the business for the stores they were trying to save. That didn't pay off and so they attempted to hire most of these employees back. Recently, Blockbuster (!) offered to buy the company for a cool billion, but had to back out when they couldn't raise the cash. Last week they announced the closing of almost 20% of the stores and the complete withdrawal from KC, Atlanta, and Phoenix markets (The north St Louis County store got axed locally). And finally the announcement today.

First, I'll say that getting laid off from that job was probably the best thing that's ever happened to me. I've moved on to much greener pastures.

Secondly, I feel really bad for all my friends that still work there, despite the writing on the wall and my repeated warnings. Especially so close to the holiday season...

Unfortunately, I think this is going to be another CompUSA thing, and I for one am looking forward to the liquidation sales.

//rant = OFF//

Sorry about the length, had to get it out.

Thanks for your perspective on Circuit City, Matt. I'm not surprised to see this happen, either, although I was just a casual observer. I hate to see the loss of competition this means, but I have gone to CC less and less over the last few years and almost never buy from them. If you get word of any really great deals, let us know. You may get the word sooner than most because of your contacts within the company.

Sometimes it takes getting let go from a place to realize you can do a lot better. Congrats.

In St. Peters, we had a Best Buy and an Ultimate Electronics nearly right next door to each other, and there was nothing but a vacant lot between them.

So where did Circuit City decide to relocate its St. Peters store? Right smack dab in that vacant lot!

I remember wondering at the time "What the hell are they thinking??????"

Your story of Circuit City reminds me of my experiences at Venture when that company was going to hell in a handcart. CC didn't happen to hire a lot of Venture's ex-executives, did it?

How Circuit City came undone, courtesy of hardocp.com:

http://www.hardocp.com/image.html?image=MTIyNjM1Mzc2NFJpMUlvdVR5YW9fMV8xX2wuanBn

Just my two cents on the Circuit City demise...

While the timeline graphic is useful, it really needs to go back to 2003 or 2004, which is the first time CC laid off their highest-earning salespeople. This, in my opinion, was the seeds of the company's destruction. While we all know that Circuit City and Best Buy are generally useless in terms of product expertise, the people laid off in 2003/2004 at least knew how to sell -- after all, they were the most successful/highest paid salespeople. I think it's reasonable to say that CC never recovered that sales ability again, and to boot they lost whatever momentum they had from having people at that time who actually had success in selling the products CC stocked.

So, when the company hit the hard times again in 2007 they tried virtually the same thing, only this time the highest paid were less highly paid and the actual savings totaled something less than $2 million annually when it was all said and done. Basically, that is a rounding error when it comes to a company the size of CC. There's no way the savings could justify the loss of knowledge and ability, even at what was probably a below-industry average level. This is clearly one of those instances where the failure of a company can be laid completely at the feet of management.

While the loss of competition may hurt a bit in the short term, the fact that the economy is now audibly screeching means that competitors won't really be in a position to exploit CC's problems to the extent they could have 2 or 3 years ago.

To back this up, the Display Manufacturers Association announced this week that flat panel sales growth in the 3Q fell to 20% from 40+% the previous six quarters. While it's true that there wasn't any hope of sustaining 40+% flat panel sales growth forever, that's a pretty sudden and steep cliff down to 20%. And that doesn't even figure in the full effect of financial market meltdown, which only really hit during the first week of October.

http://news.cnet.com/8301-17938_105-10093153-1.html?tag=nl.e703

Hey Doug...any Christmas specials this year? I'm looking at buying a TV Tuneup for some family members.

Bill,

There's no holiday specials, but like other previous customers of mine, you do qualify for a 20% discount on calibration of any additional or new TVs, and I'd definitely extend that to you for family members.

To put that in some perspective, the price list cost of calibration for most HDTVs (excluding projectors and non-CRT rear-projection sets) would be $400, so your discount would in most cases bring the fee down to $320.

FYI -- I've recently changed my pricing for calibration tune-ups for previously calibrated displays to $225 if they're done with 18 months of the previous calibration, or $275 at any other time. In the past, calibration tune-ups were usually charged at $325, though this depended on the type of display (some more and some less). The new re-calibration pricing applies to all display types and all projectors. FWIW, this is the only change I've made to prices in 7 years...

Drop me an eMail or give me a call if you'd like more details or if you'd like to get something set up. I do actually have holiday gift certificates... :)

Just a heads up for Veterans Day - Ponderosa is offering a free buffet for vets today. Good til the end of the day, if I understood correctly.

What's the funniest action/comedy on network TV?

Chuck.

OK, Bones is pretty good, but Chuck rocks. And it has the best comedy duo since Abbott and Costello - Chuck Bartowski and Morgan Grimes. I haven't seen such good comic timing in a long, long time.

If you haven't been watching, you're missing a really fun show. And last night we found out why Chuck still hasn't gotten over his ex Jill after over 5 years. Jill is played by the daughter of Sports Illustrated Swimsuit model Maria João, Jordana Brewster. :eek:

Thought I'd stop for a second to reflect on the state of our local stations a couple of months into the broadcast season.

Disappointing.

Although I was starved for network TV with last year's writers' strike, and I'm fairly pleased with the shows I watch (story wise), the locals seem no better technically, and in some cases worse than they've been in years past. Last night was a good example. Chuck (NBC) was interrupted several times, going into and out of HD. Sarah Connor (Fox) has recurring audio problems that they have yet to fix. Smallville (the CW) has both audio and video issues that make it all but unwatchable (although the plots of late make it all but unwatchable, too). Channel 9 (PBS) is still multicasting hell, and I've written it off completely in terms of hoping for technical improvement.

Jim at KDNL (ABC) is the only light in this dark, dark tunnel that is local St. Louis OTA DTV. Eli Stone is quirky and fun, and it's great eye candy. KDNL's 720p is head and shoulders above the digital mess that is most of the rest of our local broadcasts.

My only hope is that when they make the switch completely to DTV in February (if that indeed happens on schedule), they will devote more time and energy to solving these problems. I'm not putting any money on it, though.

Oh, BTW, Season 1 of Chuck was released on Blu-ray today. I don't have it from Blockbuster yet, but hopefully it will be here by the end of the week.

Season 3 of Supernatural also came out on BluRay today... man, have I got some catching up to do!!!!

Hey Joe, you forgot the other piece of good news in the otherwise mediocre HD situation around here. Since KMOV finally restored full bandwidth to the main channel. their 1080i signal has rivaled KDNL's 720p. The Unit has been nearly flawless in PQ and AQ this season.

I hope the pedestrian sound of Sarah Connor this season isn't indicative of Fox in general. For the last six years, 24 has been the best sounding show on TV, bar none. No other show makes my speakers disappear and creates a 3-D soundfield like 24 does. It'd be a shame if KTVI hosed that this year...........

Joe,

No surprise that I agree with everything you've said about our local stations, in particular as it relates to Jim at KDNL (and "quirky fun" perfectly sums up "Eli Stone"). I also agree on "Chuck," though my favorite is Adam Baldwin (who was also high up my favorite list from "Serenity.")

On the other hand, kSDk seems to go well out of its way to find things to piss me off. Last night, twice during "Chuck" they ran a crawler at the bottom of the screen promoting some sort of kSDk Jobs Bank. While I'm sure that a Jobs Bank (assuming it's not a car industry Jobs Bank) is a good and noble thing, surely the station could find better, more appropriate and less distracting ways to promote their good works.

As Butch Cassidy repeatedly asked The Sundance Kid, "Who ARE these guys?"

BTW, anybody here watch True Blood on HBO?

I have several episodes recorded but hadn't gotten around to watching. This week after reading in the HD programming thread here about how wonderful the show is, I watched the first episode last night.....

Snooooooooooooooooooooore..................

Hate to say it (because the minute I do, kSDk will find some way to make it back to the top of the list again)...

But lately kSDk hasn't been pissing me off anywhere near as much as KraPLR has. I haven't heard ANY 5.1 sound at all from that station since they moved their newscast to 7PM... and far too often, they're showing 4x3 upconverts instead of HD on CW programming.

BTW, anybody here watch True Blood on HBO?

I have several episodes recorded but hadn't gotten around to watching. This week after reading in the HD programming thread here about how wonderful the show is, I watched the first episode last night.....

Snooooooooooooooooooooore..................

I've watched since the beginning of the season. I am pretty disappointed overall, but the show has its moments. I'll finish watching the season I guess.

I wish Breaking Bad on AMC hadn't taken such a long break.

Also, "Little Britain USA" on HBO was a HUGE let down ... The original series from the BBC were so much funnier, they really ruined it doing a crossover.

WPXS-DT 21 (13-1) filed a license app with the FCC a few days ago for a 350 kW signal. Can anybody receive this signal? It's on what appears to be a cell tower (or a tower of similar height, which is to say it's very short) about half-way between Mount Vernon and St. Louis, with a directional pattern that puts power only in the direction of those two cities.

Can anybody receive this signal? If so, are they airing anything besides the normal analog programming on subchannels or whatnot?

EDIT: I just checked another filing and it looks like they filed their license app before the station was put on the air? It says they now expect construction to be finished "in mid-November" though in that case they should not have filed to license their new transmitter yet...

- Trip

no such luck.

according to wikipedia, they began broadcasting in the middle of october for the digital station.

That channel is weird....even for analog. I believe I live closer to WPAX (13), yet I can only pick up the other one (channel 51, KUMO-LP)...go figure.

I'm OTA-only...so I'm really looking for this one and mytv to come in and get a few extra programming options (some re-runs on RTN are okay). I have to watch mytv and rtn as analog...if I watch them at all.

Season 3 of Supernatural also came out on BluRay today... man, have I got some catching up to do!!!!

Hey Joe, you forgot the other piece of good news in the otherwise mediocre HD situation around here. Since KMOV finally restored full bandwidth to the main channel. their 1080i signal has rivaled KDNL's 720p. The Unit has been nearly flawless in PQ and AQ this season.

I hope the pedestrian sound of Sarah Connor this season isn't indicative of Fox in general. For the last six years, 24 has been the best sounding show on TV, bar none. No other show makes my speakers disappear and creates a 3-D soundfield like 24 does. It'd be a shame if KTVI hosed that this year...........

I didn't mention Ch. 4 because I don't watch anything from CBS on a regular basis. I had intended to ask those who do about their quality. That's good news about both the sound and video. 1080i needs all its bandwidth for consistently good picture quality.

Joe,

No surprise that I agree with everything you've said about our local stations, in particular as it relates to Jim at KDNL (and "quirky fun" perfectly sums up "Eli Stone"). I also agree on "Chuck," though my favorite is Adam Baldwin (who was also high up my favorite list from "Serenity.")

On the other hand, kSDk seems to go well out of its way to find things to piss me off. Last night, twice during "Chuck" they ran a crawler at the bottom of the screen promoting some sort of kSDk Jobs Bank. While I'm sure that a Jobs Bank (assuming it's not a car industry Jobs Bank) is a good and noble thing, surely the station could find better, more appropriate and less distracting ways to promote their good works.

As Butch Cassidy repeatedly asked The Sundance Kid, "Who ARE these guys?"

Channel 5 is a little like those "JESUS" signs along the side of the highway - a good message delivered in the wrong way at the wrong time, and you feel as though you might be misunderstood if you criticize it. The last thing I want is for "JESUS" to slap me in the face while I'm driving, or for Ch. 5 to slap me while I'm watching Chuck.

Disclaimer: my comments should not be construed as a criticism of Christianity or religion (they are not), but instead as discomfort at a particular use of media for delivering ideology. I would not be upset if you construed these comments as a criticism of Ch. 5.

Here's a JVC MiniDV camcorder for $130 at Woot. (http://www.woot.com/) It's not HD, so it won't be on my list, but at this price it's a great gift for a 9 year old wannabe filmmaker. Plug it into a Firewire port on a PC or a Mac and send that 9 year old off to make the next "Sex, Lies and Videotape." Wait, maybe not, but you get the idea. And let me know if you need some lightly used miniDV tapes. :)

Has anyone here done any business with this place - AutocentersFlorissant.com? (http://www.autocentersflorissant.com/)

Any feedback would be appreciated.

We were talking about these Seagate 1.5TB drives (http://blogs.zdnet.com/hardware/?p=2986&tag=nl.e539) the other day. Apparently, Seagate has acknowledged a problem with some of them and is working on fixes. I ordered 3 more and will check the serial numbers. They have a 5 year warranty and are only $150 with free shipping from Newegg. (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822148337)

I'll second that comment Bob made about 24 having the best sound I've heard from broadcast tv. I guess our hopes will be dashed or confirmed when they run the 24 movie coming up.

Joe,
I hadn't been watching Chuck, as I'm so far behind on lots of shows I've recorded, but now you've got me curious. I also have the first season of Eli Stone to watch. I have made a new rule for myself this season. I will no longer record any shows that I'm not caught up on, so that I can make an attempt at catching up on the huge stacks of unwatched shows in my house. When or if I do, I'll use Netflix or giganews for what I don't have, and hopefully things might be available on BD. BTW, I picked up the other pj, which is the Sony HS51A. I think it has pretty good black levels(as good as the H79) and much better shadow detail than the AW15. It also has a more romantic, canvas like look on my screen, at the cost of being slightly less sharp than the AW15. This might work for me. You should see it.

I'm not giving KSDK any credit for anything. I just wanted to get that out first. However, I have been keeping up with Knight Rider. I expected this to bomb like crazy, and be off the air in no time. It has surprised me, and has now become a kind of guilty pleasure, to use Bob's words. Yes, there is brainless action, fast cars, hot women, etc., but there is humor, wit, and sexy tension between characters that's fun to watch. The picture and audio quality have been about as good as you can expect from KSDK, minus the signal interruptions.

Adrian

I've set up to record Knight Rider from now on. I wasn't that impressed with the pilot they aired on NBC last year, so I have doubts it will grab me.

Bones continues to impress. It's still one of my favorite shows. David Boreanaz shows so much more range than they usually let him exhibit in Buffy or Angel. Only when he was the evil Angelus did he get to show his chops.

I have mixed feeling about the new Knight Rider, but it has managed to suck me in as well. It's on the top of my list of shows to quit watching if I feel I have to cut something out due to time constraints. I thought it could be a show I could watch with my son, kind of like how I used to watch the original with my parents. This is not your father's Knight Rider - no way would I watch this with my kids. The hot women and the fake technology keep me interested, but it's all so over the top. I supposed that's what makes me keep watching it. However, I'll be surprised if it lasts more than one season.

http://www.eonline.com/uberblog/b67968_knight_rider_goes_into_shop_avoid.html

Knight Rider gets a redo

Can't believe I beat Joe to this one, but slickdeals shows that inetvideo.com has some crazy closeouts on HD-DVD's.

I grabbed the Mission Impossible 3 pack for $20...

Guess I'll still be using my Xbox HD drive for a while longer ;)

http://search.inetvideo.com/search?p=Q&srid=S11-6&lbc=inetvideo&ts=custom&w=hd%20dvd&uid=142174349&method=and&isort=price&view=grid&srt=0

Taking Matt's deal finder to the other extreme, here's a look at what's supposed to be a Best Buy Black Friday deal (day after Thanksgiving):

A 60" 1080p DLP TV for $999.99. (http://www.tvpredictions.com/bestblack111308.htm)

This almost has to be a Samsung or Mitsubishi rear projection unit, although I've never seen either in that size. Samsung has a 61" model. If that's the one, you could do a lot worse for a decent sized screen. I don't know of any 1080p projectors in that price range.

You guy may have a simple answer for me on this one...If I hook up my Xbox drive to my laptop (Vista) will I be able to play vid's with media player or do I need PowerDVD?

You guy may have a simple answer for me on this one...If I hook up my Xbox drive to my laptop (Vista) will I be able to play vid's with media player or do I need PowerDVD?

I'm assuming you mean HD DVDs, right? There should be support for the HD DVD drive in Vista, but you can't play HD DVD discs without something like PowerDVD. (Other playback solutions are probably out there, but I don't use them.) Problem is, the latest version of PowerDVD no longer supports HD DVD playback - just Blu-ray. The last version of PowerDVD to support HD DVD playback is version 7.3, which I don't think you can get anymore. You might be able to find it with a search.

In general, support for HD DVD is really drying up fast. Of course, the original HD DVD players still work with the discs, and I picked one up on Woot recently for a spare bedroom HDTV. PC support, though, will be increasingly hard to come by.

Not to beat a dead horse, but HD DVD had a much better possibility of success than Blu-ray. It was a mature technology at launch, whose infrastructure would have supported a quick and relatively inexpensive transition to HD with existing DVD manufacturing plants. Blu-ray, though, is having problems with all the things those in the know said it would way back then - need for new plants and processes for manufacturing, an immature standard at launch (that's STILL having growing pains), greater manufacturing costs.

IMO, the format war helped push back the window of opportunity for an HD format to gain momentum and succeed, before online downloads become a viable delivery method. I still think that window is going to remain open for some time, because the infrastructure in this country is going to take several years to mature to a point where that becomes feasible. Even then, I think there's going to be a market for Blu-ray, since some people, like me, are collectors. I've never cared for the pay-per-view model - think Circuit City's Divx, a proprietary DVD format that flamed and burned in a quick, well-deserved death. They just have to get the manufacturing in place and the prices down - both of which are made harder by the adoption of Blu-ray instead of HD DVD.

Don't you just love the smell of beaten dead horse? :D

Yeah I'm looking to take the drive to work and use it for background noise on my personal laptop...I'll try to find old PowerDVD...If anyone's got a copy, let me know.

This whole HD DVD death, Blu-ray dying thing struck a real chord when I read an article on my phone today about the resurrection of some old lunar photos taken in the 60s. Apparently, photos taken from lunar orbit and transmitted to Earth were stored on some old tapes, playable only on extremely expensive machines that eventually were given away to one of the people working with NASA. She hoped to be able to use them one day. In an abandoned MacDonalds restaurant, they managed to get one working machine from 4 that had been salvaged. The photos, when they were finally retrieved and restored, proved better than anything we have today, well over 40 years later.

I have several old Amiga and PC floppy discs that contain the code for a computer game I worked on in the late 80s and early 90s. Literally hundreds of hours of my life are represented by these discs, that I may never be able to get at again (though nostalgia is the only real reason I might want to).

Point is, how much human effort and history will be lost one day to standards "wars"? AVI, Mov, JPEG, MPEG, Divx, mkv, mp3, AFLAC, wav, HD DVD, Blu-ray, VHS, Laserdisc, floppy discs, IDE hard drives, SATA hard drives, SCSI CD-ROM drives, cassette tape recorders. It's time to take stock, store all those things you value in the latest, most widely accepted digital format while you can. Then, revisit those things in a few years and make sure that format isn't on its death bed. While you're at it, make sure the format you've chosen hasn't started to deteriorate. Even with your best efforts, you may be in for some loss. Photos, home movies, papers and letters, music you've written or bought. Valuable stuff.

Think of all the films stored in Hollywood vaults that may have degraded beyond repair, or those historically irreplaceable lunar photos that were saved only because one NASA person had the foresight to hold onto "ancient" technology.

Man, am I feeling old today! :(

I just began testing ArcSoft TotalMedia Theatre (http://www.arcsoft.com/products/totalmediatheatre/).
It worked well playing a HD DVD under XP.

If you want to download the trial use this link (http://www.arcsoft.com/products/totalmediatheatre/).
For some reason the current link is not working.

Good luck,
Token

Thanks, token. Does it work with HD DVD folders, or just iso files? PowerDVD removed support for HD DVD and Blu-ray folders on the hard drive.

I was in Best Buy today (couldn't wait for Chuck to get here via Blockbuster online). They did have a Mitsubishi 60" DLP rear projector - normal price $1500, on sale this week for $1300, slated for a Black Friday price of $1000? Last I checked with DropTheRemote, he said "Mitsu is poo" in terms of calibration. Still of that opinion, Doug?

The cheapest online price I could find was $1100 at TigerDirect, so the price sure is right. And it's 3D ready, so you can watch all those 3D movies out there. Wait a second... there aren't any. :D

If there was any way I could convince my parents they need HD, I'd jump on one of these Black Friday deals. :(

Joe,

Yes, I agree that the movie pilot for KR was not very interesting, but the series seems to have a bit more sparkle. Let me know what you think. Would you guess that some of the titles released on HD DVD will eventually be available on BD?

Adrian

Joe,

Yes, I agree that the movie pilot for KR was not very interesting, but the series seems to have a bit more sparkle. Let me know what you think. Would you guess that some of the titles released on HD DVD will eventually be available on BD?

Adrian

Oh, yeah, of course. There have already been several titles that were originally HD DVD only but that now are on Blu-ray - several of the Universal titles, for instance.

I read today that Knight Rider is getting a make-over because of low ratings. I think 3 or 4 of the main characters are history, but I can't remember which.

Good thing I ordered some more 1.5TB Seagate drives the other day. One of my UnRAID servers' drives died today and I immediately put in one of the Seagates when UPS arrived this afternoon. It'll take a little while longer to rebuild the dead drive, then I'll be up and running again. Good timing. That drive, BTW, was Hitachi, and the first drive I've had die in a long, long time.

I tried to follow the KR link further up, but didn't find the article. Joe, I'm glad that you'll be able to rebuild things with the new hdd.

Adrian

Has anyone here used the Hauppauge HD PVR-1212? (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16815116030) It's a box that allows for the capture of programs in HD from a satellite box (analog only - component). I have several things on my Dish 622 that I'd like to capture to the computer, but I didn't set up to record from either MyHD or the R5000 (such as CNN's coverage of the election of our first African-American president). I'm about ready to buy, but I thought I'd check here to see if anyone has tried it.

Saw the new James Bond flick Quantum of Solace last night at the Galaxy Mega Screen. My attitude going in: I couldn't wait to see it. There's a lot of reviews of this film, and they're all over the map. Here's the most accurate one:

http://www.thedigitalbits.com/#qs2

I agree with the Bits 100%. MGM has reinvigorated the James Bond franchise much the same way Warner did with Batman... by getting rid of the stupid, campy crap, going back to the basics, and starting over. Move over, Jason Bourne... Daddy's back and boy, is he pissed.

This film picks up minutes from the end of Casino Royale, with Bond out to avenge what happened at the end of that story. There's no convenient recap, so if you haven't seen it already, I suggest watching that flick before going to this one. The Bits review is correct... this isn't the "second movie," it's the second HALF of the first movie.

A few other random thoughts....

There were homages to other classic Bond movies here and there... shots duplicated from Goldfinger and From Russia with Love... and probably a few more that I didn't catch. Pretty cool.

Daniel Craig has cemented his position here as the best 007 since Sean Connery. He's a cold, calculating killer without the annoying Roger Moore one-liners.

A few of the action scenes were admittedly a bit hard to follow in spots. All were done with LOTS of quick cuts. During the opening 10 minute car chase, I don't think a single camera shot lasted more than three seconds! But overall... fantastic.

Several critics have complained the movie's too short... at an hour forty-five, it admittedly is the shortest Bond movie ever. But I didn't come out of the theater thinking "that's it?" I also never looked at my watch during the movie to see how much longer it would be. So that makes the running time about right in my book.

I was a bit disappointed in the Galaxy's presentation. This is supposed to be the best and biggest DLP digital screen in the St. Louis area. It's the biggest all right, but where's the digital sharpness? The picture didn't seem that much sharper than plain ol' film. I know they're capable of better... Dark Knight on the same screen was razor-sharp a few months back. And unlike other theaters, the Galaxy did NOT have the new Star Trek trailer before the movie started. WTF?

Anyway, Quantum of Solace rates on the Blob-O-Vision scale: **** out of a possible *****. A must-see!

Here's a list of the expected Black Friday deals at Circuit City (http://www.tvpredictions.com/circuitblack111408.htm), including a 65" DLP rear projector for $1200 and lots of LCDs and Plasmas.

Thanks, token. Does it work with HD DVD folders, or just iso files? PowerDVD removed support for HD DVD and Blu-ray folders on the hard drive.

I haven't tried playing any ripped HD DVDs yet.
I have only played them from the DVD Drive.

I may try ripping and testing one this weekend.
How much space do you think I would need?

Thanks,
Token

I haven't tried playing any ripped HD DVDs yet.
I have only played them from the DVD Drive.

I may try ripping and testing one this weekend.
How much space do you think I would need?

Thanks,
Token

It should require the same space as the disc itself. In other words, lots. :)

It should require the same space as the disc itself. In other words, lots. :)

HDDVD's usually run 20+ gigs for me, Blu Ray runs from 25-45+. Average of all my movies is a bit over 30 gigs each.

Wal-Mart may have a Magnavox Blu-ray player for $128 (http://www.tvpredictions.com/blu111908.htm) on Black Friday, according to TVPredictions. It can't do all the really cool interactive things Blu-ray does - such as... wait, let me think... wait... Does anyone really use those really cool interactive features on Blu-ray? Most of the players already sold (except the PS3) can't do them anyway.

HDDVD's usually run 20+ gigs for me, Blu Ray runs from 25-45+. Average of all my movies is a bit over 30 gigs each.

It seems to me that the newer discs are getting closer to the maximum size of the Blu-ray disc than the initial titles did. I think that's the natural inclination - to fill something up and not leave a lot of empty space. Unless we're talking about movies (or TV shows) that I really love, I don't spend a lot of time with extras. Most of the time, I just watch the main content.

I've been playing around with Google's new Chrome browser the last few days. Although I'm not ready to chuck Firefox quite yet, it's speed has given me a case of whiplash. It's really small, installs in a few seconds and pages are up so fast you can't blink or you'll miss the screen refresh.

I've read about the security issues, and add-on's are lacking, but I'm going to keep my eyes on this one, folks.

I've been using Chrome at home since the public beta started. I haven't had much trouble with it. I don't do any "secure" transactions, so I'm not too worried about the security. the main reason I switched was so I didn't have to log in any time I went to check my yahoo.(wife also has a yahoo account and I don't like switching users).

Yeah, I haven't used it enough to find out too much about compatibility, but for the stuff I do every day, it's speed makes it very attractive. It's also a completely open architecture, so the add-ons will come. Chris Pirillo has a good piece on it in the December CPU magazine.

Greetings! Does anyone have any experience with long HDMI runs? I am contemplating an E* DVR run with a 100 foot cable and I wonder what are my chances for success. Such lengths are available at various price points. Hopefully, someone has some experience with this before I take the plunge and wind up with 100 feet of expensive "rope".

Greetings! Does anyone have any experience with long HDMI runs? I am contemplating an E* DVR run with a 100 foot cable and I wonder what are my chances for success. Such lengths are available at various price points. Hopefully, someone has some experience with this before I take the plunge and wind up with 100 feet of expensive "rope".

Although not the 100' you are shooting for, I did have a 75' cable that I used with success. This was from a pc to my Denon AV receiver. Make sure you check out monoprice.com for your cable. Just a quick check, looks to be about $100.

Greetings! Does anyone have any experience with long HDMI runs? I am contemplating an E* DVR run with a 100 foot cable and I wonder what are my chances for success. Such lengths are available at various price points. Hopefully, someone has some experience with this before I take the plunge and wind up with 100 feet of expensive "rope".

I've got a 50 foot run from a switcher through the walls to my TV. All monoprice equipment. No problems whatsoever, though my PS3 seems to have some occasional handshake issues with my Samsung LCD but this seems to stem from the switcher and not the cable length.

I don't have anything close to that length, but I've also had great luck with Monoprice cables. I have a couple that are 25ft. which could probably hold up the Golden Gate Bridge. (I'd say the Poplar Street Bridge, but I think it needs too much work. :))

There are HDMI over Cat5e type solutions that will reach that length easily, but they'll cost a lot more.

I'm ready to make the switch completely to Blockbuster Online for Blu-ray rentals. I've had both for a couple of weeks (took advantage of a Blockbuster free 2-week offer), and I'm sold.

I'm switching from a Netflix $10/month plan (1 DVD or Blu-ray at a time) to a Blockbuster $20/month plan (3 DVDs or Blu-rays at a time). The serious upside is that I get 5 free in-store exchanges a month. That means that all the new releases that Netflix customers can take months to get now are available to me as part of my monthly plan.

I read with interest this report at TVPredictions (http://www.tvpredictions.com/net112008.htm) about this very issue. I couldn't agree more.

This is a piece of news (http://blogs.zdnet.com/BTL/?p=10893&tag=nl.e539) that could dramatically impact all us computer junkies over the next couple of years. The USB 3.0 spec is set and devices supporting it will be out before long. Think about USB 2.0 and how many devices we use today based on that standard (and how many old standards it has essentially replaced) and you can see why this would be exciting to a nerd like me.

Interfaces like serial, parallel, SCSI and often even Firewire are gone from the list of what I use on a regular basis - all because of USB. I used to use Firewire hard drives, but over time USB drives proved more reliable, so now all I use Firewire for is the occasional camcorder transfer. With flash drive storage (over USB), that's changing, too.

It's backward compatible with USB 2.0 and 1.1. At up to 400MB/sec, bring on the new USB 3.0 devices. They'll change the face of computing, just like their little brothers and sisters did.

I'm organizing a parade! Who's with me!!!???

What do you Kevin Costner, Sony and Richie Incognito have in common?

They all live by the "If you build it, they will come" philosophy.

For Kevin Costner, it was a corn/baseball field in the middle of nowhere. For Sony, it's Blu-ray video. For Richie Incognito, it's a Rams football stadium with "idiot" fans.

I'm really glad Richie Incognito decided to stick his weenie in a Cuisinart yesterday. It'll be fun watching him hold his bleeding crotch as he limps out of this town.

As for Sony, I'm amused to see all the finger pointing (see this article from TVPredictions) (http://www.tvpredictions.com/blusales112108.htm). The movie studios were criticizing the Blu-ray player manufacturers for making Blu-ray players too high. Now that they're much lower, and Blu-ray still isn't meeting expectations, Sony is claiming the discs cost too much.

Note to Richie: fans don't cheer much when the team doesn't play well.

Note to the Blu-ray folks: people don't buy a product when you charge them too much.

Blu-ray should take a cue from Kevin. If Sony wants a world in which Blu-ray players cost a $1,000 and Blu-ray movies cost $35, and everyone in the land has to have them, they should make a Sony Pictures film. That's the only way that's going to happen.

If Blu-ray doesn't want to stick its own weenie in a Cuisinart, they'd better realize that the only road to success is lower player prices AND lower disc prices.

To Joe: Brilliant!

The trucks were all over my parents neiborhood today. ATT is giving a one month trial of U-Verse in any area with new service. My father was sick and tired of the "Charter Experience" and took advantage of the offer. He had three TV's connected, one an LCD HD Samsung, now with a HD PVR, and the lowest Broadband tier. They had to run a new drop, add a new NID box outside, run some new coax and connect all three TV's plus the modem and computer setup. It took six hours. He did not opt for the HD tier yet, but he does get the locals in HD, and they look fairly decent. SD PQ is about on par with Charter's digital SD feed. One thing I have heard was that channel changing could get quit slow, but I did not see that problem, acutally faster than my Dish Network PVR. The broadband will be nice, upgrading from AOL dial-up, and dad loves the PVR. Just to test the service I had all three TV's on, the HD set was on a local HD channel, and was doing some broadband testing. I did not see any drop in bandwith, but he is only getting 1.5Mb download.

It should require the same space as the disc itself. In other words, lots. :)

What are you guys using to rip the HDDVD and BR disks?
I usually use DVD Fab Decrypter but it won't recognize my HD disks.

Thanks,
Token

What are you guys using to rip the HDDVD and BR disks?
I usually use DVD Fab Decrypter but it won't recognize my HD disks.

Thanks,
Token

I use img burn, along with anydvdhd..

From the comments over in the HD Programming Forum here, I'm obviously in the minority, but I really enjoyed 24 Redemption tonight.

They're all complaining there was too much setup and no payoff. I think Fox's billing of this as a "movie" got people's expectations too high.

Rather than a movie, I sort of consider it the first two episodes of what will be a 26-hour season. Certainly whetted my appetite for what's to come in January.

As for the picture quality, I saw no blocking or pixellation... refreshingly free of the glitches that have plagued KTVI of late... about the best 24 has ever looked on Fox... though it would look a lot better on ABC with ABC's higher bit rate.

But 24's sound quality is still the best on TV, bar none. I've said many times no other show makes my speakers disappear and allows me to hear bullets fly through the room, or pick out individual instruments playing the musical score like 24 does. The soundtrack of 24 has had more in common with big budget action movies (Die Hard, etc) than with other TV shows... and tonight was no exception.

With 24, Lost, and Galactica all coming back, I can't wait for January!

I also enjoyed '24 Redemtion' and agree that the PQ was much better than in the past with 24...I don't remember any glitches or sound blips like happened in the past.

I pretty much knew this was going to be a prequel to the upcoming season after I saw an interview with Keifer on Leno. That said, I CAN wait for January...I've got too many home projects I need to finish, and I've got too many shows I already watch. I can't wait for 'Prison Break' tonight.

FYI, it looks like ABC is going to drop the hammer on "Eli Stone," "Dirty Sexy Money," and "Pushing Daisies."

http://www.broadcastingcable.com/article/CA6616537.html?nid=3341

From today's Studio Briefing:

The two hour TV movie 24: Redemption drew solid ratings Sunday night, auguring well for a return of the 24 series in January. The telecast averaged 12.04 million viewers. Combined with a half-hour football over-run earlier in the evening that drew 17.86 million viewers, Fox was able to post a rare win for a Sunday night. CBS, last week's Sunday-night winner, remained competitive as its 60 Minutes drew 14.53 million viewers. ABC also registered strongly with the 36th Annual American Music Awards, which captured 12.20 million viewers. NBC's Sunday Night Football, however, fell victim to the heavy competition, posting a below-average 12.29 million viewers and its pregame Football Night in America attracting only 6.71 million.

Here's a promo (http://www.scifi.com/scifiwire/index.php?id=62432) for the upcoming season of Battlestar Gallactica. Jan. 16, 2009 is the day.

Anybody else watch Sunday night's episode of The Unit?

Just got done playing back my recording from the FusionHDTV card... lots of pixelation and glitches... most unusual for KMOV since they restored full bandwidth to 4.1.....

Wondering if all this was actually KMOV's glitches or was my Fusion card hiccuping?

Was set to tune in and watch SLU-Nebraska basketball game tonight on FSM. No game --blacked out here. Huh? It's in Nebraska. I don't recall any college games of any kind ever being blacked out. So I called Dish to find out. They said they don't make the calls, they just do as their told by teams and leagues. Of course, all this took over half an hour of talking to someone from Pakistan/India/wherever, who at some point asked me about my Thanksgiving plans. So I have 2 questions: Does anyone know why this game would be blacked out locally? When did Dish turn into Charter?

I'm currently playing with a nifty little piece of software called PlayOn (http://www.themediamall.com/playon).

It brings streaming video from hulu, netflix, and CBS.com to the HR20... or PS3, or xbox360, or any other uPnP-type box.

I'll put up a detailed report soon, but meantime....

I'd been wondering when someone would bring hulu to Windows Media Center since the day I started using Media Center in the first place. While PlayOn is not entirely glitch-free, having hulu on my DirecTV box is good enough for me not to care about getting it on my Windows Media Center anymore.

Anybody else watch Sunday night's episode of The Unit?

Just got done playing back my recording from the FusionHDTV card... lots of pixelation and glitches... most unusual for KMOV since they restored full bandwidth to 4.1.....

Wondering if all this was actually KMOV's glitches or was my Fusion card hiccuping?

I've recently noticed wide swings in signal strength on 4.1 and it's limited to only 4.1. All other major local OTA stations seem rather pegged at their respective values thanks to my solid rooftop antenna. However, KMOV will occasionally dip from 100 to the lower sixties, causing the glitches you describe. I sent a brief note to Engineering to try an verify who's end may be at fault and of course, no one responded.

Short answer: I don't know :confused:

Looking for a little extra storage space for your DVR? Here's a deal at Staples (http://www.staples.com/office/supplies/StaplesProductDisplay?storeId=10001&jspStoreDir=Staples&AID=10422268&partNumber=728062&SID=u0t0f0fp15819c0s146&catalogIdentifier=2&PID=1225267) for a 750GB USB drive for $90 with free shipping.

Anyone hearing much about the possible actors strike? I wonder how many more such things the industry can survive. The issues are complex, but I think public perception in this economic climate will not favor another strike like the one that brought last year's shows to an early end. OTA TV as we know it has some serious challenges ahead.

I've recently noticed wide swings in signal strength on 4.1 and it's limited to only 4.1. All other major local OTA stations seem rather pegged at their respective values thanks to my solid rooftop antenna. However, KMOV will occasionally dip from 100 to the lower sixties, causing the glitches you describe. I sent a brief note to Engineering to try an verify who's end may be at fault and of course, no one responded.

Short answer: I don't know :confused:

Definitely issues with KMOV lately. I get audio pops and pixelation a lot.

Via DirecTV.

OK, you have convinced me-I'm ready to switch to DIRECTV, I have had it with Charter.

Those of you who have DIRECTV, what are you unhappy with/wish they would change or improve? I will be doing 2 HD tuners and 2 Standard tuners.

Anything in particular to be aware of regarding hook up?

Definitely issues with KMOV lately. I get audio pops and pixelation a lot.

Via DirecTV.

I wonder if they know there is a problem. When emails to their Engineering Dept go unanswered, it's anybody's guess.

Anyone needing a tuner for their PC's will be interested in Cyberestore's Black Friday sale. They have the best tuner of the bunch, the HDhomerun, for $139.

http://www.cyberestore.com/index.php?target=pages&page_id=sale

Two tuners, and it connects to your router rather than sitting in a PCI/PCI Express slot. Picks up channels 24 and 46 better than my FusionHDTV cards or my HR20.

Definitely issues with KMOV lately. I get audio pops and pixelation a lot.

Via DirecTV.

Wouldn't ya know, just a week or so after I proclaim KMOV as one of the few bright spots in the St. Louis area HDTV situation.... :rolleyes:

Wouldn't ya know, just a week or so after I proclaim KMOV as one of the few bright spots in the St. Louis area HDTV situation.... :rolleyes:

So, it's YOUR fault! :D

Does anyone know when KMOV is going to be moving its digital channel from 56 to 24?

Is this happening on the analog shutdown date (Feb 17) or before that?

Does anyone know when KMOV is going to be moving its digital channel from 56 to 24?

Is this happening on the analog shutdown date (Feb 17) or before that?

I suspect it won't be til the shutdown date, because if KMOV moved to channel 24 before that, it would hose KNLC's analog signal (more so than KNLC's analog signal is hosed already, I mean).

No inside knowledge claimed here, just my guess.

KNLC is shutting off their analog on January 19.

While we're KMOV-bashing, anybody else noticing lots of glitches during the Titans/Lions game? And that these glitches are really LOUD????

Nobody's mentioning it in the national thread on the game over in the HD Programming area, so this must be a local KMOV problem, again.

Dish owners, I just read over at SatelliteGuys that Dish Network has started their long-anticipated change for HD receivers such as the 211/411. Now you can add an external USB drive and, for a one time fee, turn the receiver into a DVR. It's limited to single sat and single OTA tuners, but it's a great way to upgrade your non-DVR to DVR status with an external drive. I'm hooking one up later day and activating it. I'll report when my Thanksgiving dinner lets me.

There are photos over at SatGuys that look just like my 622 screens. I've been looking forward to this since the rumors started flying.

KNLC is shutting off their analog on January 19.

Is this a firm date? If so, it's a month early and I wonder if that's to give KMOV some time to move down from Channel 56. Perhaps the pre-work has already started and is the cause for the rotten reception we're all "enjoying" now.

Just wanted to add that although the Dish 211/411/etc. can be turned into DVRs, they are limited to live TV viewing or programmed recording at one time, not both at once.

OK, here's the latest report. I've tried several times to get my external hard drive activated for my Dish 211, but the latest story I'm getting is that at this time only the black Dish 211k, not my silver Dish 211, is supported. That's not what my 211 tells me when I plug in the hard drive. It tells me to call Dish to have it activated. If anyone has any luck with a regular Dish 211, please report.

I had a similar problem and had to call them back. The final solution was to have the receiver reactivated for the hard drive. It will work with the silver 211, just have to be persistent.

Yeah, I've been reading more online about it and I think I just got a tech (and maybe his supervisor) who wasn't up to date on this issue. I'll try again tomorrow.

Dish's own web site says that both the 211 and the 211k will work.

Is this a firm date? If so, it's a month early and I wonder if that's to give KMOV some time to move down from Channel 56. Perhaps the pre-work has already started and is the cause for the rotten reception we're all "enjoying" now.

It's from http://knlc.tv:


URGENT: On Monday, January 19th, 2009 at 12 AM, KNLC TV Channel 24 will cease broadcasting regular analog TV, but will be available if you have digital television or a television set with a converter box and an antenna. We will still broadcast on the new digital full power television at KNLC-DT located at Channel 24.1 Please take note that on February 17, 2009 all analog broadcasting for full-power TV stations in the St. Louis area. If you have questions or concerns call KNLC at 314-436-2424.

I wonder if KMOV paid them to shut down early?

FYI, KMOV is switching from 56 to 24 on Jan 19th. I think there putting KNLC on the -2 subchannel during the transition. Also, all stations are planning analog shut off test dates on Jan 14,23 and 26.

FYI, KMOV is switching from 56 to 24 on Jan 19th. I think there putting KNLC on the -2 subchannel during the transition. Also, all stations are planning analog shut off test dates on Jan 14,23 and 26.Jim, thanks for the update on this.

I'm pleased to see that there are test shutdowns planned. With the PSAs and test shutdowns, as well as ramping media coverage, there will really be no excuse for anyone being surprised by this switchover, though I'm sure there will be some scattered grousing anyway.

Hope it all goes smoothly for you.

Charter has been trading below $1 for 50 days now. It closed at 19 cents on Tuesday.

If NASDAQ does re-impose its below-$1 delisting policy at some point -- even if the low watermark is dropped to 50 cents -- a big rally will have to start soon.
________________________________________________________

Charter Communications stock crossed its 50th consecutive day of trading under $1 per share on Nov. 21.

In past years, that would have meant the lengthy delisting process from the NASDAQ Stock Exchange would have already had a 20-day start.

But stock markets' downward momentum and wild volatility have helped give Paul Allen's cable company a break in that respect.

In mid-October NASDAQ, pointing to a highly unusual surge in the number of stocks trading under $1 per share, suspended its $1 price threshold until at least Jan. 16. In its Oct. 16 application to the Securities and Exchange Commission, NASDAQ said that at the end of September, 227 stocks were trading below $1 per share, up hugely from just 64 at the same time last year.

By Oct. 9, the number of penny stocks had risen to 344.

NASDAQ proposed suspending the requirement through Jan. 16, 2009. It would restart any new action regarding share price deficiency using data starting on Jan. 19.

NASDAQ had suspended the $1 minimum price requirement only once before — after the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.

Charter closed at 19 cents on Nov. 25.
________________________________________________________

FWIW, at 19 cents a share this makes Charter's market capitalization just $78.3 million, compared with a debt load of nearly $20 billion.

Also, all stations are planning analog shut off test dates on Jan 14,23 and 26.Just out of curiosity, will your digital carrier switch to channel 30 or remain on 31?

Just out of curiosity, will your digital carrier switch to channel 30 or remain on 31?
We're staying on 31...branded as 30. Everyone in STL is staying on the digital channel but KMOV.

We're staying on 31...branded as 30. Everyone in STL is staying on the digital channel but KMOV.
I would think an antenna cut for that frequency would have enough bandwidth to work on both.

Or... random thought... are you only using ONE antenna with a diplexer?

FYI, KMOV is switching from 56 to 24 on Jan 19th. I think there putting KNLC on the -2 subchannel during the transition. Also, all stations are planning analog shut off test dates on Jan 14,23 and 26.

So KMOV is gonna start MULTICASTING again???????

Say it ain't so!!!!!

Just wanted to add that although the Dish 211/411/etc. can be turned into DVRs, they are limited to live TV viewing or programmed recording at one time, not both at once.

Apparently I was wrong on this. You can use both the OTA and sat tuners, while watching a third program that's already on the hard drive. This means it should work just like the 622/722, but without the extra sat tuner. I'll wait to find out for sure, but that's what I'm reading now.

I'm still wrestling with tech support to get my receiver activated for the external USB drive.

You know that 1.5TB drive I was so happy about for $150? Well, TigerDirect.com (http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/searchtools/item-Details.asp?EdpNo=4138742&sku=TSD-1500AS) has the drive for $120 with $1.99 shipping on orders under 35 pounds and over $100.

Also, CompUSA online and TigerDirect are now merged.

BTW, those 1.5TB drives have been great in my UnRAID server. I've added 5 in the last couple of months and so far no problems. They also seem considerably faster than the 500GB drives I have in the same box.

FYI, KMOV is switching from 56 to 24 on Jan 19th. I think there putting KNLC on the -2 subchannel during the transition. Also, all stations are planning analog shut off test dates on Jan 14,23 and 26.

I sure hope you're wrong about the -2 part. That can only degrade the quality of the main channel. I thought I read somewhere that KNLC was moving to a different available channel (UHF 14, I think).

But then again, if that were the case, why wouldn't KMOV just land there???

An antenna cut for 30 will work on 31...works here! We're have two separate antennas and transmission lines for 30 and 31. Doesn't look good for using the 30 antenna as a back-up for 31. The bandwidth falls off sharply on either side.

KMOV will only be multicasting 24 during the transition period of several weeks. Don't know what they'll do beyond that.

Doesn't look good for using the 30 antenna as a back-up for 31. The bandwidth falls off sharply on either side.
That surprises me. I am not familiar with antennas whose bandwidth is only 1%.

KMOV first started multicasting the day of the 2006 election. They multicast local election coverage that night, and only that night, but then continued to multicast a blank screen (similar to what KraPLR is still doing)... and never restored the full bandwidth to the main channel until just a few months ago. I hope we don't get a repeat of that!

FYI, KMOV is switching from 56 to 24 on Jan 19th. I think there putting KNLC on the -2 subchannel during the transition. Also, all stations are planning analog shut off test dates on Jan 14,23 and 26.

Anybody know why they are switching? I pick them up fine here in south St. Charles. In fact I get all the majors fine, but I had to reposition antenna to get KSDK DT reliably, but in doing that I had to sacrifice WRBU and KPLR. I guess in theory signal should be easier to get since lower frequency is longer wavelength which is less line of sight, but it still is UHF.

I'm using a fairly long range directional UHF/VHF antenna in attic. Would a DB-4 or similar give me better results since its less directional?

Channels 52-69 go away (for full-powered stations, anyway) on 02/17/09, KMOV is just getting ahead and doing it early.

- Trip

Thanks

I see that KNLC-DT (24.1) is currently operating on Channel 14. Why would they need to also share a sub-channel with KMOV?

The following is from Reuters (with a slightly amended headline):
_________________________________________________________

Time Warner CFO: Charter Not As Cheap as Stock Price Indicates

Charter Communications Inc (CHTR.O: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz), the fourth-largest U.S. cable company, is not a cheap acquisition target, the chief financial officer of Time Warner Cable Inc (TWC.N: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) said on Monday.

"Charter is an example of a situation when you really have to look at more than the stock price," CFO Rob Marcus told the Reuters Media Summit in New York, when asked about rumors that Time Warner Cable may buy Charter.

"Even today at the level they're trading -- at pennies essentially -- (Charter) is still trading at an enterprise value that is probably double the enterprise value of Comcast or Time Warner Cable," Marcus said. "So that tells me it's not cheap at all."

Analysts have named Time Warner Cable, the second-largest U.S. cable company, which is in the process of separating from Time Warner Inc (TWX.N: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz), as the most likely buyer for Charter.

Buying Charter would help Time Warner Cable compete better against Comcast Corp (CMCSA.O: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz), the largest U.S. cable company.

Shares of Charter, in which Microsoft Corp (MSFT.O: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) co-founder Paul Allen owns a controlling stake, were trading at 18 cents, down more than 1.2 percent, in morning dealings on the Nasdaq.

Marcus said any potential acquirer of Charter would also have to take on the U.S. cable company's large debt load.

"One of the issues, the thing that's really precluded in any transaction in spite of the fact that they've been rumored to be looking for a buyer for several years, is that they've got debt leverage levels that actually exceed what the top-tier cable companies are trading at on an enterprise value basis," Marcus said.
_________________________________________________________

Full story here: http://www.reuters.com/article/Media08/idUSTRE4B04TQ20081201

Channels 52-69 go away (for full-powered stations, anyway) on 02/17/09, KMOV is just getting ahead and doing it early.

- TripCorrect. This was done to make more contiguous and usable spectrum available for other wireless communications purposes. Most of this freed up spectrum has already been auctioned off by the US government.

Of course, Congress spent it (several times) before they got the money, but that's a whole other story. ;)

I see that KNLC-DT (24.1) is currently operating on Channel 14. Why would they need to also share a sub-channel with KMOV?

Someone from KMOV should really be answering this...but my understanding is that was the agreement they made with KNLC so they could switch early. Not sure how long they'll b'cast KNLC on 24.2.

Heroes was terrible last night - one video dropout after another. And KSDK decided to add even more intrusive message scrolls at the bottom of the screen. I think they must have felt that the last scrolls didn't tear people out of the show enough, so they increased the banner size and really screamed it at us.

To add insult to injury, they pre-empted Chuck, which will air Sunday at 11:30pm - no doubt in glorious kSDk standard definition. Nice work from the leader in HD.

Swanni today asks the question, "Is 3D coming to your home?" (http://www.tvpredictions.com/dream120208.htm)

The answer is, probably not. Jeffrey Katzenberg is trying to convince theater owners to invest in 3D cinema projectors, so he's telling them that the 3D experience isn't going to be available in the home for many years. As much as I like 3D and will go to the movie theater to see it, I now dread the prospect of having to spend over 2 hours in movie theater seats when I have such a comfy recliner in my living room.

Speaking of recliners, though, I did have an odd thing happen the other day. I got up and found a small russet wedged in the seat. Huh.

Heroes was terrible last night - one video dropout after another. And KSDK decided to add even more intrusive message scrolls at the bottom of the screen. I think they must have felt that the last scrolls didn't tear people out of the show enough, so they increased the banner size and really screamed it at us.

To add insult to injury, they pre-empted Chuck, which will air Sunday at 11:30pm - no doubt in glorious kSDk standard definition. Nice work from the leader in HD.Thanks for the heads-up on Heros, I haven't watched it yet. Was that the OTA feed?

Yeah, I was po'd about Chuck being pre-empted. I modified the recording so it will start early and end about 30 minutes late, since I seem to remember issues while trying to record other pre-empted programming.

On the topic of DVR setting: It sure would be nice if you could start a recording 1 or 2 minutes late.

All my NBC recordings are set up for OTA. I record Sarah Connor from satellite. The audio has improved a little since I last complained about it on that show. It's also grown on me. It's not at the top of my list, but it's really improved a lot since it premiered.

I forget if I mentioned it, but My Own Worst Enemy has been canceled by NBC. They'll be airing a final few episodes, and it's gone. I'm not going to miss it too much. The acting, writing and production value were decent, but on screen chemistry was lacking, and the basic premise was seriously flawed. Of course, the basic premise of Chuck is one of the silliest things in the history of television. But the chemistry is amazing and the comedy makes the goofy premise irrelevant. My Own Worst Enemy has virtually no comic relief and collapses under its own weight.

Swanni today asks the question, "Is 3D coming to your home?" (http://www.tvpredictions.com/dream120208.htm)

The answer is, probably not. Jeffrey Katzenberg is trying to convince theater owners to invest in 3D cinema projectors, so he's telling them that the 3D experience isn't going to be available in the home for many years. As much as I like 3D and will go to the movie theater to see it, I now dread the prospect of having to spend over 2 hours in movie theater seats when I have such a comfy recliner in my living room.


I'd agree Joe...3D is more of a "special event" for me. Like getting to see a show in IMAX. Which, coincidentally is where I saw my last 3D show, the U23D concert film. I thought it was outstanding in terms of an experience, but unwieldy for home use. I'd be up for a 3D movie once or twice a year (and it would have to be a GOOD movie), but beyond that, meh.

Heroes was terrible last night - one video dropout after another.........

FYI, my kids recorded it last nite and just viewed it today after school. It was equally bad via the E* local satellite feed.

Hey all...it's been a long time since I've posted.

Just discovered I reached 10 years as a D* subscriber. They sent me a letter saying I'll get $5 off for the next 10 months (currently paying about $85/month). I'll take it, but I'm thinking about doing away with it altogether, and going for OTA, AppleTV, the PS3 for BRD, and what I can get of the web.

I've been hanging on for Speed HD, but that channel really sucks big time now. There is so little real motorsports it's barely worth keeping in my channel list. I've been also following the Stargate series on SciFi, but that's about to end in a few weeks anyway. I haven't gotten into anything else really. I like Top Gear, but can do without. The wife likes some stuff but would be glad to see the savings of not having D*.

Meanwhile, we're about to pull the trigger on a new DLP, the Sammy HL67A750. Just waiting to see how low the price will get in the next few weeks.

I'd agree Joe...3D is more of a "special event" for me. Like getting to see a show in IMAX. Which, coincidentally is where I saw my last 3D show, the U23D concert film. I thought it was outstanding in terms of an experience, but unwieldy for home use. I'd be up for a 3D movie once or twice a year (and it would have to be a GOOD movie), but beyond that, meh.

I LOVE 3D. I'd pay a lot to have it in my home theater, but only if the movies and (hopefully one day) TV shows were there in sufficient quantity. I'm just afraid I'm not going to see very much of that in my lifetime.

My last 3D movie was Journey to the Center of the Earth - a bad movie but a really interesting 3D experience. I can't wait for more of it. For me, it's the next giant leap in the movie going experience - like color, but potentially even bigger.

Meanwhile, we're about to pull the trigger on a new DLP, the Sammy HL67A750. Just waiting to see how low the price will get in the next few weeks.

I think that's their newest LED DLP set, isn't it? American had it on sale last summer for just under $1,900, lower than the 61" version is at most places. If even a few movies had been available in 3D, I might have bought it at that price. American has its once a year employee pricing sale. It's a good time to buy. I got an Onkyo 606 for my computer room/editing suite.

I think that's their newest LED DLP set, isn't it? American had it on sale last summer for just under $1,900, lower than the 61" version is at most places. If even a few movies had been available in 3D, I might have bought it at that price. American has its once a year employee pricing sale. It's a good time to buy. I got an Onkyo 606 for my computer room/editing suite.Yes, that's their latest and best. It's a 1080p LED backlit DLP with 120 Hz processing (no color wheel, no replacing bulbs). My inlaws have it. I took my PS3 over on Thanksgiving and without any calibration and just some minor tweaking of user settings Planet Earth and Iron Man BRDs looked great. Much better than our aging (4 yr old) 720p DLP.

Amazon has this (the 67") for $1900 (and has for a while). I've heard rumors that Sammy is going to do a $200 drop in MSRP (from the current $2399) so I'm hanging in there to see if that happens. Otherwise, I'll probably order in time to enjoy while I'm off for 12 days at XMas. :)

Yes, that's their latest and best. It's a 1080p LED backlit DLP with 120 Hz processing (no color wheel, no replacing bulbs). My inlaws have it. I took my PS3 over on Thanksgiving and without any calibration and just some minor tweaking of user settings Planet Earth and Iron Man BRDs looked great. Much better than our aging (4 yr old) 720p DLP.

Amazon has this (the 67") for $1900 (and has for a while). I've heard rumors that Sammy is going to do a $200 drop in MSRP (from the current $2399) so I'm hanging in there to see if that happens. Otherwise, I'll probably order in time to enjoy while I'm off for 12 days at XMas. :)

Best Buy still has both the 61" and the 67" sets on display down in South County, even though most of their display area has been redesigned for LCDs and Plasmas. Of course, those Samsung rear projectors cost a lot more there than you'd pay for them online. I really like the picture quality, and I love the idea of never having to replace a lamp again (or see the rainbow effect). Front projection LED DLPs are coming from a lot of manufacturers before long. The technology to do 3D with the front projection DLP systems should be there, too. Problem is, only computer games are available right now in 3D, and the final standard they agree on for the home might not even be compatible with the current DLP offerings.

Best Buy still has both the 61" and the 67" sets on display down in South County, even though most of their display area has been redesigned for LCDs and Plasmas.....
The Brentwood BB has the 67" on display (didn't look for the 61"), but they're asking MSRP for it. Buying from Amazon is fine with me. It includes free white glove delivery, and Samsung customer service has been stellar in the past. All three TVs in my house are Samsung (61" 720P DLP, 40" 1080P LCD, 32" 720P LCD). I got my 1080P LCD from Fry's last year, but they don't have any deals on the DLP (also asking MSRP).

I expect I'll order from Amazon within a week.

Maybe this is old home week since I haven't posted in ages either. I have been with E* for at least 10 years as well, but the reception issues I'm having are really starting to tick me off. I can't get channel 2 or 5 off of the Dish. I know it's an aiming issue and I have an antenna so I'm getting around it, but the dish is on the roof now and after the light snow we had over the weekend, enough built up on it to kill my signal during the early morning which skipped a couple of scheduled recordings.

I'm seriously considering testing out u-verse. My folks have it so I know a little about it. Problem is that I love the 622 and since I've been with Dish so long, I fear change. Does anyone know if Dish has anything interesting coming down the pike? The channel lineup is about the same from an HD standpoint regarding the channels I watch. Plus I'll save money on the overall tv/phone/dsl setup I have now and get Showtime and Max which I don't get currently.

Any thoughts are welcome. Thanks

Maybe this is old home week since I haven't posted in ages either. I have been with E* for at least 10 years as well, but the reception issues I'm having are really starting to tick me off. I can't get channel 2 or 5 off of the Dish. I know it's an aiming issue and I have an antenna so I'm getting around it, but the dish is on the roof now and after the light snow we had over the weekend, enough built up on it to kill my signal during the early morning which skipped a couple of scheduled recordings.

I'm seriously considering testing out u-verse. My folks have it so I know a little about it. Problem is that I love the 622 and since I've been with Dish so long, I fear change. Does anyone know if Dish has anything interesting coming down the pike? The channel lineup is about the same from an HD standpoint regarding the channels I watch. Plus I'll save money on the overall tv/phone/dsl setup I have now and get Showtime and Max which I don't get currently.

Any thoughts are welcome. Thanks

One thought comes to mind. Actually, it's more of a question: Why haven't you called E* to report this difficulty? Local Channels 2 and 5 should come in as well as any other channel you subscribe to. That goes for HD or SD resolutions. If only those two channels are intermittent and affected by the amount of snow on your roof, you have a hardware issue that's related to poor aiming, trees, a bad LNB or a loose connection. In other words, a very simple fix that may not even cost you anything as a 10-year subscriber.

Maybe this is old home week since I haven't posted in ages either. I have been with E* for at least 10 years as well, but the reception issues I'm having are really starting to tick me off. I can't get channel 2 or 5 off of the Dish. I know it's an aiming issue and I have an antenna so I'm getting around it, but the dish is on the roof now and after the light snow we had over the weekend, enough built up on it to kill my signal during the early morning which skipped a couple of scheduled recordings.

I'm seriously considering testing out u-verse. My folks have it so I know a little about it. Problem is that I love the 622 and since I've been with Dish so long, I fear change. Does anyone know if Dish has anything interesting coming down the pike? The channel lineup is about the same from an HD standpoint regarding the channels I watch. Plus I'll save money on the overall tv/phone/dsl setup I have now and get Showtime and Max which I don't get currently.

Any thoughts are welcome. Thanks

I tested UVerse. The service is okay, but I think it is slightly more expensive. I have been a DirecTV sub for 10+ years. I have 8 receivers on my account. I think to get 8 receivers + HD + DVR would have been more expensive than what I have now. I also have 5 HD Receivers in my house, so I couldn't watch HD on all of them at the same time. Which I do now.

The service is okay. The VOD is pretty cool cuz it is RIGHT THERE when you want to watch it, but I think you need to do a cost analysis.

One thing I have always thought is that if you are into watching sports of all kinds then DirecTV is the choice, but if you are into watching Movies then any provider will probably do. So now it is down to how many receivers do you need, and will the cost equal out.

For me, it just didn't work out.

Thanks for the suggestions. I did have them out at my cost (I think it was around $50) in the early spring. The guys that came out did a good job, but I still had to pay for it. Then I think one of the storms over the summer moved the Dish slightly. I didn't call because I didn't want to drop another $50 and I had a workaround.

I have looked at the cost and it would be cheaper for me. Currently, I only have the 622 which has two tuners. It's just my wife and I and if she wants to watch TV in the bedroom, I can just change it to dual tuner mode and flip a switch. Typically, whatever is on the main tv is on all of the other tv's. For sports, I watch FS Midwest for Cards and Blues. The other sports channels fill in the rest. I don't get the add-on packages, so any of the providers would work.

They have a 30 day try out period. Maybe I'll give it a shot and see what we think. I guess I'm more concerned that I might miss something really cool coming from Dish in the near future whatever that might be.

Thanks for the advice. If anyone else has an opinion, feel free.

It's likely that I'm one of the very last to get clued in on this, but I recently noticed that "Seinfeld" on TBS is now in "true" HD widescreen format, with no stretching.

Of course, there is cropping and zooming going on here, but for the dozen or so episodes I've seen so far, it's pretty impressive. Colors are definitely richer, and while the same was probably true when TBS was taking the 4:3 HD versions and stretching them to fill the screen, I just couldn't bear to watch then.

For some reason, when winter rolls around each year I tend to program my DVR to record/store a couple of "Seinfeld" episodes each day. It was a nice surprise to see the HD widescreen versions when I did that this year. Very nice.

FYI -- there is an AVS thread that discusses this in more detail:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=1063659

I wasn't aware of the change in the Seinfeld airings to true HD on TBS. I've seldom looked at TBS for months because of the stretch-o-vision SD. I just tuned in to it and caught part of an episode of Raymond that was actually HD, also. I captured many of the Raymond eps when they were first-run. The TBS stuff is not quite that good, but it's certainly better than what I used to see on the network.

I hope they do the same for Friends, which was also shot on film. It would be fun to see those shows in HD for the first time.

I wasn't aware of the change in the Seinfeld airings to true HD on TBS. I've seldom looked at TBS for months because of the stretch-o-vision SD. I just tuned in to it and caught part of an episode of Raymond that was actually HD, also. I captured many of the Raymond eps when they were first-run. The TBS stuff is not quite that good, but it's certainly better than what I used to see on the network.

I hope they do the same for Friends, which was also shot on film. It would be fun to see those shows in HD for the first time.

Hmm, I was actually hoping Friends would just disappear forever :)

I hope when SciFiHD starts in Jan they follow the lead .. my friends who have it now say their "HD" programming is really bad, with a lot of shows in 4:3 and not even stretched ... which may be better, but still, what's the point of an HD channel with no HD programming?

It's amazing what an HD channel will do ... I haven't watched Food Network since the original Iron Chef series ended a couple of years ago, but now that I have the HD channel I've been watching it again. Makes me hungry :o

...I haven't watched Food Network since the original Iron Chef series ended a couple of years ago, but now that I have the HD channel I've been watching it again. Makes me hungry :oMy fave: Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives. As I now travel regularly throughout the Midwest and Southeast, I have a list of the most interesting DDD venues for those cities, stored in my cell phone...

"Now, that's money." :)

OK, here's the deal of the day (http://slickdeals.net/#p3787): a Samsung Blu-ray player and 8 Warner Blu-ray movies for as little as $137. The link is to Slikdeals.net, just a few items down, and you have to enter a special code at checkout. It's quite a deal, though - like getting a Blu-ray player for free. And there are some really good titles, too.

OK, here's the deal of the day (http://slickdeals.net/#p3787): a Samsung Blu-ray player and 8 Warner Blu-ray movies for as little as $137. The link is to Slikdeals.net, just a few items down, and you have to enter a special code at checkout. It's quite a deal, though - like getting a Blu-ray player for free. And there are some really good titles, too.

Already expired :mad:

I just checked my DVR recording of last week's "Chuck" which was pre-empted by one of kSDk's internally produced AssHat Specials last Monday.

As it happens, last night's re-broadcast started 20 minutes late, in part due to Sunday Night Football running long, in part due to the pointless kSDk Sports special that aired afterward, and most of all because I should know better by now and set up an hour or two of padding for the kSDk rebroadcast.

Especially dumb on my part since I saw it sitting in there on the To Do List... :( At least the 40 minutes that's available looks to be in HD.

Anyway, if anyone else is in the same boat, here's the link to Hulu, where you can watch last week's now-you-see-it-now-you-don't "Chuck versus the Sensei" episode:

http://www.hulu.com/watch/46869/chuck-chuck-versus-the-sensei

FYI -- KMOV is giving the same pre-emptive treatment to "Big Bang Theory" this week.

I watched last week's Chuck episode on Tuesday, on NBC's own web site. The quality was better than the the hulu video appears to be. I'm sure my episode of Chuck from last night on Dish is the same - cut off because the program guide doesn't reflect long football games. Glad to hear it's at least HD, though.

Speaking of Chuck, the number one reason I'm such a fan is Zachary Levi's acting. He reminds me a lot of Tom Hanks, in that he moves extremely quickly and believably from comedy to drama. There was an episode last year entitled "Chuck vs. the Helicopter." Chuck emerges joyfully from landing a helicopter (talked down by Sarah, because he didn't know how to fly) and is soundly berated for not following the orders of his government handlers. Levi reminded me of Tom Hanks in one of his early movies, "Splash." Here's a guy who's not the typical leading man - kinda goofy looks, not exactly a Greek god - but he can convey virtually any emotion. And probably most importantly, he transitions from one to another with incredible ease. I would not be surprised to see him go on to do great work in television and film, just like Hanks. Mark my words on this one.

As it happens, last night's re-broadcast started 20 minutes late, in part due to Sunday Night Football running long, in part due to the pointless kSDk Sports special that aired afterward, and most of all because I should know better by now and set up an hour or two of padding for the kSDk rebroadcast.

Especially dumb on my part since I saw it sitting in there on the To Do List... :( At least the 40 minutes that's available looks to be in HD.

Anyway, if anyone else is in the same boat, here's the link to Hulu, where you can watch last week's now-you-see-it-now-you-don't "Chuck versus the Sensei" episode:

http://www.hulu.com/watch/46869/chuck-chuck-versus-the-sensei

FYI -- KMOV is giving the same pre-emptive treatment to "Big Bang Theory" this week.

I found the hard way that the half hour of padding I was giving The Unit on KMOV Sunday nights was woefully inadequate... and now pad that show for an hour.

Speaking of hulu, I mentioned a program called PlayOn (http://www.themediamall.com/playon) a week or so ago that's proving to be pretty cool. You install it on a PC that's connected to the same router as your HR2x (or any other UPnP box such as PS3 or xbox360)... and you have netflix.com, hulu.com, cbs.com, espn.com, and youtube.com on your big screen TV instead of your tiny little computer monitor.

I'll write more after I've had more time to play with it, but preliminary rating on the Blob-O-Vision scale, *** and a half, out of a possible *****. I'll definitely be paying the $30 when my trial period runs out.

I'm posting this for anyone that might be thinking of switching from D* or E* to U-verse. I followed moman's advice and called E* about my issues. They will be sending someone out to re-point the dish at no cost to me and when I mentioned U-verse he transferred me to a "Loyalty Specialist" and she promptly gave me $20/month off of my bill for 10 months and 3 free months of any two movie packages I wanted. (Which I'll have to cancel in 3 months or start paying for them.)

So they ended up treating my right as far as I'm concerned and I'll stay a happy E* subscriber for the foreseeable future. My guess is that your mileage may vary depending on how long you've been a subscriber.

Anyone having issues with KETC? I'm in Troy, IL and had trouble last weekend with losing/weak signal on 9-1. I spoke to a friend that lives in New Athens, IL and he had the same issues. We are pointing at KETC at vastly different angles.

I just checked my DVR recording of last week's "Chuck" which was pre-empted by one of kSDk's internally produced AssHat Specials last Monday.

As it happens, last night's re-broadcast started 20 minutes late, in part due to Sunday Night Football running long, in part due to the pointless kSDk Sports special that aired afterward, and most of all because I should know better by now and set up an hour or two of padding for the kSDk rebroadcast.

Especially dumb on my part since I saw it sitting in there on the To Do List... :( At least the 40 minutes that's available looks to be in HD.

Anyway, if anyone else is in the same boat, here's the link to Hulu, where you can watch last week's now-you-see-it-now-you-don't "Chuck versus the Sensei" episode:

http://www.hulu.com/watch/46869/chuck-chuck-versus-the-sensei

FYI -- KMOV is giving the same pre-emptive treatment to "Big Bang Theory" this week.

I padded the recording 1 1/2 hours because I had been burned in the past. Maybe I'm selfish, but I hate it when the only shows that seem to be pre-empted are the one's I watch.

Chuck on Hulu wasn't too bad, especially since I loaded the episode while I was watching the first 40 minutes via my TV. And I have a general inclination to do everything thing I can to avoid giving NBC any more face time -- over-the-air or online -- than I have to. Definitely not watching any new NBC shows from here on out. Too many reasons to go into here.

Caution: "Spoiler Alert" for the following (highlight to read)...

But last night's new Chuck episode ("Chuck vs the DeLorean") was brilliant, possibly the best episode of the first 2 seasons. I especially liked the response to the "Where's Morgan" question after his recent purchase of the used DeLorean:

"Well, if he's managed to get his hands on some plutonium, he could be just about anywhere...or any time."

From Trading Markets web site:
___________________________________________________________

Charter Vice Chairman Submits Resignation

Charter Communications Inc (NASDAQ:CHTR), a broadband communications company and cable operator, announced on 5 December that Marc B Nathanson has resigned from its board of directors effective 1 December 2008.

The company said that his position on the board will not be replaced at this time. He had been a member of the board for more than eight years and had been in the cable industry since he helped found Falcon Cable in 1975.

Nathanson resigned to make more time available for other personal and business interests.
___________________________________________________________

http://www.tradingmarkets.com/.site/news/Stock%20News/2068969/

From Trading Markets web site:
___________________________________________________________

Charter Vice Chairman Submits Resignation

Charter Communications Inc (NASDAQ:CHTR), a broadband communications company and cable operator, announced on 5 December that Marc B Nathanson has resigned from its board of directors effective 1 December 2008.

The company said that his position on the board will not be replaced at this time. He had been a member of the board for more than eight years and had been in the cable industry since he helped found Falcon Cable in 1975.

Nathanson resigned to make more time available for other personal and business interests.
___________________________________________________________

http://www.tradingmarkets.com/.site/news/Stock%20News/2068969/

So let's assume Charter throws in the towel at some point. Obviously cable service in the St. Louis metro area won't just go dark. Somebody will buy the carcass. The question is who.

There's some big NBC news today. First, Jay Leno is moving to prime time when he leaves The Tonight Show. He'll have the 9:00 pm slot, replacing the late night NBC dramas. Also, NBC is speculating on the need to scale back their 7-day-a-week, 3-hour-a-night schedule. Could be they'll become more like Fox or the CW. There's a storm coming.

FYI -- KMOV is giving the same pre-emptive treatment to "Big Bang Theory" this week.

Why was it that Kmov decided to broadcast BBT in SD instead of HD last night and the audio sounded like there was a bit of an echo. :mad: I saw tonight they pre-emptied NCIS for a special on Forrest Park. Can't they show these specials at a different time? Kmov and Ksdk seem like the worst offenders of this.

Time Warner has serious interest in Charter, according to one of the top finance guys there, but because of the near $20 billion debt, nothing can happen until Charter goes Chapter 11.

Joe,

I think the storm is a general storm. Any business model or company that's looking even a tiny bit marginal is going to be severely tested over the next couple of years.

What NBC is doing looks smart. The WSJ indicated that it costs NBC approximately $5 million per hour of prime-time programming, so dropping an hour Monday through Friday saves $25 million a week.

Although there's no word what Leno is going to be paid (the Journal wrote it will be "astronomical"), NBC comes out way ahead on this deal.

Anyone having issues with KETC? I'm in Troy, IL and had trouble last weekend with losing/weak signal on 9-1. I spoke to a friend that lives in New Athens, IL and he had the same issues. We are pointing at KETC at vastly different angles.

I'm in Edwardsville and I rarely lose KETC. It usually has a lower signal strength, but always comes in. True, I will have some occasional blocks or pixelation, but these are very minor and I don't even lose audio when they happen. Plus they are almost exclusive to daytime. Nighttime is usually free of this.

Over the weekend I recorded Sid the Science Kid and Austin City Limits with no glitches.

BBT was pre-empted and rebroadcast in SD only at around 2 a.m.

As far as I know, KMOV does not have the equipment to time-delay HD network programming, or if they do, they don't have the people and/or desire to make use of it in these sort of situations.

Joe,

I think the storm is a general storm. Any business model or company that's looking even a tiny bit marginal is going to be severely tested over the next couple of years.

What NBC is doing looks smart. The WSJ indicated that it costs NBC approximately $5 million per hour of prime-time programming, so dropping an hour Monday through Friday saves $25 million a week.

Although there's no word what Leno is going to be paid (the Journal wrote it will be "astronomical"), NBC comes out way ahead on this deal.

I understand it's probably a smart business move, but I'm not looking forward to more Jay and whatever other cheap alternatives they come up with. My discomfort at today's news might have been less severe if I had hope that whatever they end up with after they cut would be quality programming.

Time Warner has serious interest in Charter, according to one of the top finance guys there, but because of the near $20 billion debt, nothing can happen until Charter goes Chapter 11.

I've been very happy with Charter's Internet and telephone services, despite the fact that I wouldn't entertain for a second using their video services. The new infrastructure they've built over the last few years is good.

That said, I'm ditching Charter telephone in a couple of weeks, for MagicJack. I installed a MagicJack system for my parents when Charter raised their telephone service from about $23/month to over $58/month. (It was the end of a promotional period.) AT&T wanted about the same thing for comparable phone service. I called Charter and, after some prodding, they told me that they offer a 1.5mbps Internet service for $20/month. So, I added the Internet service to my folks' account and put a laptop in their basement with MagicJack, then canceled Charter telephone. It's been good enough that my folks haven't really noticed much of a difference. So, for $110 (my Christmas present to them), they have 5 years of local and long distance. I'm their tech support, but so far they haven't needed much in the way of help.

I liked the service so much, I got one, too. It's better than the Vonage service I lived with for about 3 years. I had more service issues with Vonage than MagicJack so far.

I told my folks that even if Charter folds, they probably won't have an interruption of service. Whoever acquires the business after a bankruptcy will almost certainly be a better company. Meanwhile, they are paying about the same as the were with the Charter promotional for their MagicJack phone service. The only down side was that they had to give up their old phone number. I told them it was a good opportunity to reconnect with friends and relatives, since they had to call to give them the new number. That's pretty much the way it's worked out, too. :)

I've been very happy with Charter's Internet and telephone services, despite the fact that I wouldn't entertain for a second using their video services. The new infrastructure they've built over the last few years is good.

That said, I'm ditching Charter telephone in a couple of weeks, for MagicJack. I installed a MagicJack system for my parents when Charter raised their telephone service from about $23/month to over $58/month. (It was the end of a promotional period.) AT&T wanted about the same thing for comparable phone service. I called Charter and, after some prodding, they told me that they offer a 1.5mbps Internet service for $20/month. So, I added the Internet service to my folks' account and put a laptop in their basement with MagicJack, then canceled Charter telephone. It's been good enough that my folks haven't really noticed much of a difference. So, for $110 (my Christmas present to them), they have 5 years of local and long distance. I'm their tech support, but so far they haven't needed much in the way of help.

I liked the service so much, I got one, too. It's better than the Vonage service I lived with for about 3 years. I had more service issues with Vonage than MagicJack so far.

I told my folks that even if Charter folds, they probably won't have an interruption of service. Whoever acquires the business after a bankruptcy will almost certainly be a better company. Meanwhile, they are paying about the same as the were with the Charter promotional for their MagicJack phone service. The only down side was that they had to give up their old phone number. I told them it was a good opportunity to reconnect with friends and relatives, since they had to call to give them the new number. That's pretty much the way it's worked out, too. :)

I have been reading up on the MagicJack service, just seemed to good to be true, please keep us updated.

I also was happy with Charter Internet and phone, I just couldn't get the correct bill two months in a row. :eek:

For the Dish customers, they are launching a new satellite in the morning, 7:43 am, this will go to the 129 location. This should add a better signal and hopefully more HD early next year, although they do have space for some more HD this year.

I don't have any first-hand experience with MagicJack, but a guy in one of my car clubs just said this the other day.
I had a Magic jack and it worked for one week so I tried to get it working again and after 2 months of customer service runaround and no phone number to call them I gave up and requested my money back. After 9 months and a complaint filed with the BBB I got my money back but was still out the money to send it back. :mad:

I'm sure it could be an isolated case, but I thought it was timely to share.

I wouldn't recommend MagicJack to someone if they used their phone for business. It's a little too unreliable for that. And if you have problems, don't expect to get someone on the phone. I've chatted online with MajicJack reps on a few occasions when I was setting things up, and they solved the problems I was having. A problem I had with my folks' service was that I had to unplug the MJ from the USB port and plug it back in to be able to make outgoing calls. My nephew has had a lot more issues with his. I've had virtually no issues with my mine so far. At $40 for the MG and the first year of service ($20/year after that) it's hard to see how you could lose much by trying it.

I'd guesstimate that I had 3-4 times more problems with Vonage than I've had with MajicJack. In maybe one call in 50 with MG, one person can't hear the other (while the other party can). It was worse with Vonage, with people not being able to get through at all when no one was on the line. That was a frequent occurrence.

MG users report the typical nightmarish experiences, and others report virtually no problems at all. So far, I'm in the latter camp. I told a friend of the family that I wouldn't use MG for his business line, but I wouldn't hesitate to use it as his at-home long distance number. (His wife''s been bugging him to get free long distance service.)

You get a 30 day trial period. If you don't like it, send it back.

I got Batman: The Dark Knight on Blu-ray yesterday at Blockbuster. Amazing picture quality and it jumps in and out of 2.35:1 to 1.78:1 aspect ratio, just like the iMax film release I saw down at the Ronnie's in South County. Difference is, the Blu-ray looked better here at home than the movie did at the iMax theater. Crystal.

I like TVPredictions. Swanni usually manages to cut through the BS easily. Here's his take on the uptick in Blu-ray player sales (http://www.tvpredictions.com/blusales121008.htm) during Black Friday.

I like this quote:

“Sony was fairly active in bundling players with HDTVs,” said Paul Erickson, director of DVD market research at DisplaySearch. “But price aggression is proving to be the fundamental way to drive Blu-ray players into homes. This holiday, that’s probably going to continue.”

I love corporate speak. The translation is, "Charge less and people will buy more Blu-ray players." Same for the discs.

Gotta go. I'm participating in a focus group today. They're paying me and 11 other people $50 to tell them whether we'd rather have them slap us in the face, kick us in the butt, or shake our hands. I've got my work cut out for me making that decision.

I understand it's probably a smart business move, but I'm not looking forward to more Jay and whatever other cheap alternatives they come up with. My discomfort at today's news might have been less severe if I had hope that whatever they end up with after they cut would be quality programming.Yeah, I see your point, but really this is just an acceleration of the ongoing trend to more "reality" programming and less "scripted" drama and comedy. Jay Leno in prime time is just a new twist on non-scripted.

I think the primary risk from a quality programming viewpoint is that as the networks rein in the number of hours of scripted programming, the chances for an outside-the-box hit (think "Chuck," "Lost," or "Firefly") probably goes down, because they'll probably be less inclined to take risk with those remaining programming slots. Playing it safe and sticking to the formulas will be even more common than it is now. Innovation will increasingly be found on cable -- and even more likely, online -- not the networks.

The other way of looking at this is that networks are just now figuring out that the business model that worked great in the '50s, '60s, '70s and much of the '80s, when they were effectively each one of the only three choices available to the majority of viewers, isn't workable today. In a way, it's pretty incredible that they have resisted changing as long as they have. But as you said about the oncoming storm, now is the time for all businesses to get serious about adapting to fast-changing environments, or face the likelihood of dying. When money is cheap, all sorts of questionable business ventures can breathe free; when credit tightens it's survival of the fittest time.

Another example of this reality for TV is the fact that the BCS bowls are moving from networks to cable. No doubt there will be lots of viewer wailing about this and I would not put it past Congress to stick its clueless beak in, but sooner or later everyone is going to have to learn you can't forever fight the market just to preserve what's come to be seen as the "perfect" status quo.

Yeah, I see your point, but really this is just an acceleration of the ongoing trend to more "reality" programming and less "scripted" drama and comedy. Jay Leno in prime time is just a new twist on non-scripted.

I think the primary risk from a quality programming viewpoint is that as the networks rein in the number of hours of scripted programming, the chances for an outside-the-box hit (think "Chuck," "Lost," or "Firefly") probably goes down, because they'll probably be less inclined to take risk with those remaining programming slots. Playing it safe and sticking to the formulas will be even more common than it is now. Innovation will increasingly be found on cable -- and even more likely, online -- not the networks.

The other way of looking at this is that networks are just now figuring out that the business model that worked great in the '50s, '60s, '70s and much of the '80s, when they were effectively each one of the only three choices available to the majority of viewers, isn't workable today. In a way, it's pretty incredible that they have resisted changing as long as they have. But as you said about the oncoming storm, now is the time for all businesses to get serious about adapting to fast-changing environments, or face the likelihood of dying. When money is cheap, all sorts of questionable business ventures can breathe free; when credit tightens it's survival of the fittest time.

Another example of this reality for TV is the fact that the BCS bowls are moving from networks to cable. No doubt there will be lots of viewer wailing about this and I would not put it past Congress to stick its clueless beak in, but sooner or later everyone is going to have to learn you can't forever fight the market just to preserve what's come to be seen as the "perfect" status quo.

I agree 100%. I also can't complain, because I abandoned being a participant in the major networks' business model a long time ago. When I made it a regular practice not to watch anything when it airs, I was thumbing my nose at commercial television. I watch everything from my DVR and skip the commercials altogether. There are consequences of doing that, the most notable of which is cheaper, less risky programming - like the reality programming I hate so much.

The short story, though, is that I hate commercials more than I hate the risk of losing Chuck. I'll find alternatives.

For Terminator fans, here's a cool animated poster for Terminator Salvation. (http://www.sonypictures.net/movies/terminatorsalvation/poster.html)

Any of you thinking about an HTPC with BluRay drive... might want to get your copy of AnyDVD HD *now.* Just got this from SlySoft (AnyDVD's parent company):

Dear valued customer,

As of January 1st, 2009, Slysoft will change its update policy from free
lifetime updates to an annual subscription fee. All license purchases
made before January 1st, 2009 will not be affected by this change; as
promised, all licenses purchased before 2009 will still be honoured
under Slysoft's free lifetime update policy.

SlySoft announces this step in advance in order to provide its customers
with the choice between the old and new licensing model. Buyers who act
quickly can get an additional discount with the current ongoing special
promotion.

Until Wednesday, December 31 2008 Slysoft offers a 20% discount on all
software products--except upgrades. If you are entertaining the thought
of purchasing one of Slysoft's products, now is the right time to act!

Good tip, Bob. This little gem of a program might just save you a lot of headaches and expensive upgrades if you try to put together a home theater PC. I love digital connections, but the copy protection attached to them can be a real pain, especially if you don't have all the latest HDMI compliant gear. Slysoft helps get around some of the pain digital copy protection creates. Even with all HDMI compliant gear, I still get the occasional error message saying something is wrong with my connections.

Simpsons fans, here's an interactive guide (http://adn.blam.be/springfield/) you might like.

Good tip, Bob. This little gem of a program might just save you a lot of headaches and expensive upgrades if you try to put together a home theater PC. I love digital connections, but the copy protection attached to them can be a real pain, especially if you don't have all the latest HDMI compliant gear. Slysoft helps get around some of the pain digital copy protection creates. Even with all HDMI compliant gear, I still get the occasional error message saying something is wrong with my connections.

And as if Slysoft's switching from the dollar to the Euro didn't almost double the price of AnyDVD already... now they're changing to a subscription model????

Everyone who's even thinking about this program should get their copy NOW.

Latest on Charter...talking with bondholders about converting debt to equity...three board members have resigned in recent months...stock price closed on Friday at 15 cents a share.
__________________________________________________

Charter Communications Inc. has tapped Lazard LLC, the MSO’s long-standing financial advisor, to step up discussions with the company’s bondholders about “financial alternatives” aimed at improving the cable operator’s balance sheet.

“We believe engaging in discussions with our bondholders, aimed at improving our capital structure and enhancing our financial flexibility, is in the company’s and our customers’ best interests,” company president and CEO Neil Smit said, in a prepared statement.

He added that the objective “is to improve our balance sheet, which will better position Charter for the future, while we continue to focus on delivering quality service to our customers and growing our business.”

The MSO did not divulge any specific alternatives it might try to pursue. In March, acquisition rumors swirled after Paul Allen, Charter’s controlling stakeholder and the billionaire co-founder of Microsoft Corp. revealed that he had received “informal inquiries” about potential deals or investments involving the cable MSO.

Nothing’s come of it so far, but some analysts speculated at the time that Time Warner Cable Inc. or Comcast Corp. would be among the most interested in purchasing some of Charter’s cable properties -- at least those that align strategically with some of TWC’s and Comcast’s existing system clusters -- if Charter opted for a sale option.

Charter officials were not immediately available for further comment Friday morning.

Charter, which is saddled with about $21 billion in debt (as of Sept. 30, 2008) and has witnessed a board member exodus in recent weeks, noted that it had cash and cash equivalents in excess of $900 million as of Dec. 10, 2008 -- funds that it can tap to continue paying operating costs and expenses.

Charter, which reportedly laid off 75 employees recently and reduced its operating divisions from three to two, is coming off a third quarter in which revenues rose 7.3 percent and net customer adds rose by more than 50 percent year-over-year.

Charter stock was trading at 15 cents per share this morning (up 1.7%), off from a 52-week high of $1.68.
__________________________________________________

http://www.lightreading.com/document.asp?doc_id=169269&site=cdn

http://www.axcessnews.com/index.php/articles/show/id/17212

Here's the new Battlestar Galactica webisode (http://galacticasitrep.blogspot.com/). One scene reveals the sexual orientation of a recurring character. Sorry, guys, it's not Six.

The Charter news gets a bit worse as DSL Reports has a story on Moody's marking down Charter's debt rating and suggesting that bankruptcy is likely in 2009:

http://www.dslreports.com/shownews/Charter-Bankruptcy-Likely-In-2009-99674

The article also echoes previous reports that Time Warner is a leading candidate to pick up pieces of the business if Charter starts carving itself up.

Here's the new Battlestar Galactica webisode (http://galacticasitrep.blogspot.com/). One scene reveals the sexual orientation of a recurring character. Sorry, guys, it's not Six.
We already knew one of the Sixes orientation, she "hung out with" Admiral Caine...

From today's Retail Bridge newsletter:
___________________________________________________________

The new Moxi HD DVR -- being sold by CE maker Digeo -- finally hit this U.S. market this week.

Boasting a 500GB internal hard drive, CableCard support, built-in networking and free programming updates (i.e. no subscription fees) the Moxi seems like the answer for consumers looking for an alternative to the TiVo HD DVR. And, unlike the TiVo, the Moxi can be used to stream video, music and other content between the PC and TV, including web video.

The catch? The Moxi HD DVR, which is currently only available in limited numbers, will set you back some $799, compared to just $299 for the TiVo HD (plus service fees).
___________________________________________________________

Even with no subscription fees, you have to wonder, "WTF? $799?"

Digeo -- another in a long line of clueless Paul Allen enterprises...

I ordered my new TV last night from Vanns. It's the Samsung HL67A750 1080P LED DLP. Can't wait to get it.

Meanwhile, my wife and I spotted a cherry/glass BDI stand (model 9629) at Best Buy for $699 that we liked. But according to the BB web site, they didn't have it in stock at the store for pick up, so they wanted to charge us tax and $70 for shipping. I found a place in Nashville, TN called Modern Essentials that has it for the same price plus $54 for shipping and no tax. I ordered it last night. Today they shipped it from their warehouse in...Maplewood, MO!!! Hell, I could have just picked it up (well, maybe not...I have a MINI now). Anyway, it's coming via Fedex, but their tracking site says it'll be delivered in 3 days, on Friday. WTF? I'll bet it arrives tomorrow.

Not sure when the TV will get here. It's coming from Vann's. They are in Montana but I don't know where they ship from. Supposedly it should ship today.

Whoohoo...can't wait!

Congrats on the new set. Be sure to give us a report when you get it home and set up. :)

The catch? The Moxi HD DVR, which is currently only available in limited numbers, will set you back some $799, compared to just $299 for the TiVo HD (plus service fees).
___________________________________________________________

Even with no subscription fees, you have to wonder, "WTF? $799?"

Digeo -- another in a long line of clueless Paul Allen enterprises...

Considering I spent $1500+ on the first ReplayTV model that did SD only and had a whopping 12gig hard drive in it (actually two 6gig drives), I guess I can't laugh at anybody who buys this.....

Nepotism at CBS (http://www.tvpredictions.com/swannithree121508.htm), simple stupidity at NBC (http://www.tvpredictions.com/swannitwo121508.htm) and Blu-ray stealing market share from DVD being a bad thing? (http://www.tvpredictions.com/bludvd121608.htm)

These three items come from TVPredictions. No wonder HDTV faces hurdles - it's all run by short-sighted Brobdingnagian idiots. The first two speak for themselves, but the last is almost funny. DVD sales (hardware and software) were tanking *before* Blu-ray came out.

OK, not that it means that much, but Time Magazine ranks Chuck #10 in its top ten TV shows. That includes the cable networks, too. Mad Men, a show I've just started watching on Blu-ray, comes in at #2. What an amazing show that is, chock full of great acting and rich writing.

.........
___________________________________________________________

Even with no subscription fees, you have to wonder, "WTF? $799?"

Digeo -- another in a long line of clueless Paul Allen enterprises...

I think the problem is when they originally penciled down the idea of coming out with a Retail product the Tivo price was a lot closer to that $800 price tag... But they took so damn long coming to market that the Tivo has gone through several price reductions now making this Moxi look way overpriced. I could be remembering wrong on that Tivo price but for some reason I thought I remember it being hella expensive at one point as well.. I have a Moxi through Charter and love it.. But no way in hell its worth $800... Even if priced the same as the Tivo I think you would have a hard time convincing me I should buy it for a few hundred when I can rent from Charter.

Congrats on the new set. Be sure to give us a report when you get it home and set up. :)Wow, got a call from Fedex this morning. I am scheduled for delivery of the TV on Friday (less than 4 days after placing order).

And that stand that is shipping to me in U City from Maplewood? It's also scheduled to deliver Friday. I guess they have to get it to their hub in Memphis before they can take it up Big Bend. :rolleyes:

Wow, got a call from Fedex this morning. I am scheduled for delivery of the TV on Friday (less than 4 days after placing order).

And that stand that is shipping to me in U City from Maplewood? It's also scheduled to deliver Friday. I guess they have to get it to their hub in Memphis before they can take it up Big Bend. :rolleyes:

I'm sorry, did I hear a sneeze? Maybe you should call in sick Friday and give yourself time to recover, eh? :D

I'm sorry, did I hear a sneeze? Maybe you should call in sick Friday and give yourself time to recover, eh? :DI'm 10x4 work weeks anyway, so I am golden for getting to fool around with toys on Friday. Sometimes duty still calls on Friday, but not this week. :)

But I still haven't had my performance review. That could get scheduled for Friday. Might have to do it early or over the phone. ;)

KMOV) -- For more than two years KMOV has been trying to reach an agreement with Charter Cable to have KMOV’s signal available to Charter cable customers. We have made offers, Charter has not responded. We want Channel 4 on Charter, but effective December 31st, Charter will no longer carry KMOV.

http://www.kmov.com/charter/ - for full story

bhornberger,

It sounds like Charter is really digging in its heels. Does this mean that Charter will no longer carry KMOV in either SD or HD, once the transition occurs?

Since KMOV-DT has re-surfaced here as a topic, I wanted to point out that KMOV recently has been running a crawl notice that indicates there may be, for distant viewers, some loss of reception of KMOV's digital OTA transmission during the lead up to the transition.

The crawl notice also suggests that it will be necessary for all viewers to "re-scan" for KMOV-DT's signal on or around a couple of different dates, and presumably this is related to the change in channel assignments.

There's more on the KMOV web site here:

http://www.kmov.com/news/asseenonnews4/stories/0812117-kmov-contour-dtv-reception-maps.71619e07.html

I'm 10x4 work weeks anyway, so I am golden for getting to fool around with toys on Friday. Sometimes duty still calls on Friday, but not this week. :)

But I still haven't had my performance review. That could get scheduled for Friday. Might have to do it early or over the phone. ;)

Well?????

Well?????All is well. Got the TV yesterday as planned. I was just getting dressed whent eh Fedex Cargo driver called to ask if he could come early. He was there by 8 AM (my appt. was for 10-3). He even helped me lift it onto the stand (I only had curbside delivery).

So I spent part of yesterday playing around with it. I've set it up with the tweaks found in the AVS displays forum. Blu Ray on my PS3 looks awesome. D* not as good, but much better than the 720P DLP this replaces. The black levels are far superior. The new TV sure reveals how crappy TNT[not]HD really is.

Overall, my wife and I are very pleased with the new set. I would like to get it calibrated but will have to wait until I've set aside money for some other priorities.

bhornberger,

It sounds like Charter is really digging in its heels. Does this mean that Charter will no longer carry KMOV in either SD or HD, once the transition occurs?Given that Charter is circling the drain the whole issue could be come moot sooner or later.

Since KMOV-DT has re-surfaced here as a topic, I wanted to point out that KMOV recently has been running a crawl notice that indicates there may be, for distant viewers, some loss of reception of KMOV's digital OTA transmission during the lead up to the transition.

The crawl notice also suggests that it will be necessary for all viewers to "re-scan" for KMOV-DT's signal on or around a couple of different dates, and presumably this is related to the change in channel assignments.

There's more on the KMOV web site here:

http://www.kmov.com/news/asseenonnews4/stories/0812117-kmov-contour-dtv-reception-maps.71619e07.html

Standard Canned response...


Mr. Trippe has asked me to thank you very much for taking the time to write!

We continue to negotiate with Belo Corporation, the owner of KMOV-TV (CBS) to carry their signal on our system past December 31, 2008. We have reached hundreds of mutually beneficial agreements over the past several years with other broadcasters, and are hopeful we can in this situation.

Charter is working hard to control the rising costs of programming services, which directly impacts our customers. KMOV-TV is demanding high monthly fees from Charter cable customers for the same programming they provide free over the air and which CBS provides for free on the Internet at www.cbs.com.

The United States Government gives KMOV and other broadcaster’s free use of the public airwaves to transmit their television programming. KMOV-TV is demanding a significant amount of money for programming that is available for FREE. With broadcaster’s advertising business suffering and broadcast TV ratings low, KMOV is trying to maintain their profits on the backs of our customers.

Charter wants our customers to know that we will continue to negotiate in good faith to reach a fair and reasonable agreement with Belo and KMOV, as we have in the past. I assure you we have responded to KMOV and want to reach an agreement with them. We just want to obtain a fair and reasonable agreement, so that you won’t have to bear the extraordinary costs associated with carrying KMOV.

We will continue to negotiate in good faith to obtain an extension or an agreement before 12/31/08. We have no intention of dropping KMOV, the choice is up to them. We are hopeful that we will reach an agreement and I am sorry that you have been placed in the middle of this dispute.

It is their decision I hope they give us permission to carry their signal; all we want is a fair deal for you and the rest of our customers.

Thank you again for letting us know your concerns. We appreciate your business!

bhornberger,

It sounds like Charter is really digging in its heels. Does this mean that Charter will no longer carry KMOV in either SD or HD, once the transition occurs?

That's the way I read it.

I have looked at D* and U-Verse, but I'm against having boxes on all my Tv's and rerunning some cable though the house. That would drag the price up more than I'm payign now for Charter for HD + SD Boxes + HBO/Show/Max/MovChan.

I'm looking to purchase a HD tivo, get a few cable cards (which are cheaper than the STboxes) and pull an antenna feed for my KMOV.

That's the way I read it.

I have looked at D* and U-Verse, but I'm against having boxes on all my Tv's and rerunning some cable though the house. That would drag the price up more than I'm payign now for Charter for HD + SD Boxes + HBO/Show/Max/MovChan.

I'm looking to purchase a HD tivo, get a few cable cards (which are cheaper than the STboxes) and pull an antenna feed for my KMOV.

After waiting 2 years for Charter to get KMOV back in HD, I just had DIRECTV installed yesterday. I too got tired of the same "canned respose" and lack of any real progress. But after all, if Charter is tanking they weren't negotiating from a position of strength.

Since KMOV-DT has re-surfaced here as a topic, I wanted to point out that KMOV recently has been running a crawl notice that indicates there may be, for distant viewers, some loss of reception of KMOV's digital OTA transmission during the lead up to the transition......

I live in Creve Coeur and am an E* customer who considers OTA a valuable alternative. KMOV must consider folks in my neighborhood "distant" viewers because Channel 4-HD is the only OTA channel that's 100 on my TV one minute and then breaking up and dropping into the 60s the next minute. It's just not reliable and hasn't been for the past month or so. Others on this Forum have reported similar issues. Wonder what's up with that?

This should have no bearing on their move to UHF channel 24 next year. But if something flakey is going on at their transmitter site (or if they're simply inept), it's rather foolish to pull themselves off Charter until the technical issues are resolved. All it can do is hurt their overall viewership if folks cannot pull a steady signal in via OTA.