Champaign, IL - HDTV

[jdmcdonald]

WBUI, our WB station appeared on Ch. 22 last night. It came
in barely with the antenna where it was. Moving it up 5 inches
or adding the preamp back in and it is very solid.

They are scaling their SD somewhat wrong ... some sort of
digital vertical interval stuff appears at the top unless I scroll
it all the way up, and there is a gap at the bottom with a black bar.
Also, it's skewed to the right about the width of their bug.

I visited the CC (in Champaign) last night to purchase a telephone so I could call and congratulate them from home (I've never before
owned a touchtone phone at home.) While there I saw a GWII
(see thread at proper place) and played with their OTA DTV
setup. This is some sort of Zenith STB.


As set up, it only received WCIA. But if I set the Silver Sensor
on the phone box, it readily got WCIA, WAND, and WBUI. Still
no trace of WICD, which is not unexpected considering the
store layout.

Doug McDonald

[Millsjr]

Hi Doug,

I recently learned of the dtv stations in the area from a few of your earlier posts. I am assembling my equipment to be able to get dtv, hopefully by the end of the year. Right now I have a dish 6000 that I need to purchase the ota module for. I live in the Homer Lake area and have an omni-directional antenna from radio shack in my 2nd story attic. Do you think that will pull these dtv channels in? What type of setup and equipment do you have? I realize these channels are all SD but I'm still excited about the new technology.

Are you the one that posted about WAND having their HD equip. on order?
If so, any more word on that?

Thanks, John

[jdmcdonald]

You have a problem, namely, the analog signal of WICD-15
being so close to it.

I've got a Samsung STB and a Radio Shack double bowtie antenna
with the screen taken off (making it a bidirectional antenna). The
antenna sits in the middle of my picture window on the second floor.
I live near the Assembly Hall.

I get WICD-DT (Ch 41) through two walls and it is a bit weak. The
others are strong.

You will be able to get all our channels, since WAND and WBUI
are half power as will be WCCU if they ever actually get on.
WCIA and WICD are low power, but WCIA is at full antenna
height and you will be able to get it if you try.

All you can do is try. You may need an outdoor antenna to get WCIA,
which is Ch. 48 and therefore a bit close in frequency to WICD (41)
which is blasting away behind you, so close in frequency.

You may also need an outdoor antenna to get WAND and WBUI
due only to overload from the analog WICD being so powerful and
so close.

Whatever you do, be careful not to use a cheapie amplifier in your line
without buying an expensive filter to kill WICD-15. Put your
effort in a better antenna if you have WICD troubles.

I live right next to WHMS-FM and have a terrible time with
overload from it. The best solution if you have trouble is an
outdoor antenna with a very high F/B ratio . I do assume you are
west of WICD. If somebody were a couple of miles east of it,
they will be paying big bucks to Blonder-Tongue for CATV grade
filters.



Doug

[Millsjr]

Doug,

Yes, I live west of the WICD tower, probably about 5 miles. What is F/B ratio in terms of an antenna? I didn't realize that the digital signal from WICD would interfer with the others. The analog signal doesn't seem to,do you know why there is a difference?


Thanks for all your help.

John

[dynamohum1]

With a good quality setup there should not be a problem, I have had problems trying to recieve a distant station shooting through a close adjacent local but not 2 or three channels away, I would get a decent directional antenna with a rotor and a high quality mast mounted preamp for those low power digitals.

[jdmcdonald]

5 miles from WICD is plenty to avoid disaster but still he should
avoid an amplifier of possible. There is absolutely no need
for a rotor ... just point a big UHF antenna west.

Just be sure WICD and WCCU are not in super deep nulls, a couple
of degrees rotation will fix any problem without bothering the
weaker stations to the west.

A rabbit ears will probably get WILL-DT, Ch. 9 just fine, if not
a small high VHF antenna will do it, and he can use a VHF-UHF
combiner in the downlead.

Doug

[dlclark]

Anyone in Bloomington having any luck with HDTV? I have Dish Network and was thinking about upgrading to their HDTV receiver to get more use out of my outdoor UHF antenna. Just ordered a front projector and curious if anything is available OTA.


Donnie

[rrrick8]

I live in Danville and I can't seem to be able to get any consistant signal from any of the DTV stations in the area however in the evenings I can usually pick up the Indy DTV stations which are actually further away. Is this because of the power the cent. Ill. stations are broadcasting or could it be caused by the fact that the WAND repeater (Ch-31) is located less than 1 mile to the rear of my antenna when pointing westward.

[dynamohum1]

Bloomington should be able to get PBS 46.3 peoria, WYZZ fox digital 28 is claimng to be on the air but I know of no-one that can recieve them, they are supposed to raise their antenna 180 more feet very soon, then you may have a shot, but they are owned by Sinclair so you can look forward to the trademark low power crappy upconvert and no passing of network signal that is making Sinclair infamous in the digital broadcast world.

[jdcolombo]

I live in the Arbour Meadows subdivision in Savoy, and I get the following with a Radio Shack VHF/UHF antenna pointed east, using a Channel Master preamp. The signal strengths are readings from my RCA DTC100:

WCIA (CBS 48-2): 94 Full-time.

WCFN (UPN 48-3): 94 full time.

WICD (NBC 41): 84 full time (note that this signal is coming from the back end of my antenna, which indicates that the RS antenna I'm using has poor F/B rejection, but in this situation, that works to my benefit!).

WAND (ABC 18): 65, on during prime-time only (7:00 - 10:00 p.m.)

WBUI (WB 22): 48-50 full time. As of 12/1, they were having audio problems - getting only the right channel from them.

Still nothing from Fox (WCCU).

John Colombo

[jdmcdonald]

Originally posted by jdcolombo
I live in the Arbour Meadows subdivision in Savoy, and I get the following with a Radio Shack VHF/UHF antenna pointed east,

WICD (NBC 41): 84 full time (note that this signal is coming from the back end of my antenna,

John Colombo

Uh, WICD is east of you. the rest are west. I think you mean
the antenna points west.

Doug McDonald

[jdmcdonald]

Danville should get a big signal from WICD. I predicted that the
guy in Homer would be able to get all of them with a bit of work.
Danville however I'm not so sure about.

IF a Danvillite can get any but WICD (and WCCU when they appear)
it will be with a big antenna well above the roof. WBUI and
WAND should be about the same as a half-power station
from Terre Haute.

Doug McDonald

[jdcolombo]

Originally posted by jdmcdonald
Uh, WICD is east of you. the rest are west. I think you mean
the antenna points west.

Doug McDonald

Uh - Yep. Got my directions mixed up. Antenna points west, gettin WICD from east (back side of antenna).

Also, I probably should add that this antenna was RS's "medium" range antenna and is in the attic of my two-story house. It probably sits about 20' above ground level. I don't get anything digital from Springfield (e.g., WICS) or Peoria. Wonder if a 100' tower would fit in my back yard . . .

John C.

[rrrick8]

Originally posted by jdmcdonald


IF a Danvillite can get any but WICD (and WCCU when they appear)
it will be with a big antenna well above the roof. WBUI and
WAND should be about the same as a half-power station
from Terre Haute.

Doug McDonald

I'm just puzzled Doug, why I get good signals from Indy (80-85 miles away) but almost nothing to the west. Could the WAND repeater be interfering with my DTV reception to the west? It sits less than a mile to my NE and I rotate my RS-210 (big sucker) to appr. 265 degrees to get my best readings for Wcia-dt, Wbui-dt, Wand-dt, Wi(cd-dt. All 4 register only a 9-12 on my Hughes HD receiver while I can pick up WRTV Indy (25-1) at 30-50 during daytime and 50-80 in evenings. Is there a way to block out the signal from behind the antenna?

[edster67]

DL Clark, I live in Normal, and get 46.3 out of peoria clearly.
I also get channel 3 analog clear from Champaign with my attic mounted antenna pointed to Peoria. Should I be able to recieve the Champaign HD channels clearly?

[Millsjr]

Can anyone tell me what F/B means in reguards to antennas?

Thanks for all the info. guys.

John

[rrrick8]

Originally posted by Millsjr
Can anyone tell me what F/B means in reguards to antennas?

Thanks for all the info. guys.

John

It stands for Front to Back gain. Probably along with heighth one of the 2 most important feature needed to obtain good signals from a distance. The more the better!!!

[dynamohum1]

edster,
have you tried to recieve the digital channel 28 signal at very low power from Fox WYZZ yet?

[jdmcdonald]

Dear rrrick in danville:


I don't understand why WRTV is so good. I could get it here
in Champaign, 40 miles to the west of you, from when
I got my box in August to late October. They are 5 times
the power of WBUI and WAND, but on a much lower tower.
Maybe it has something to do with the low land in the Wabash
valley.

Nevertheless, you should get a very respectable signal from
WICD. They are at low power (a couple kw) and low height, but I get them
just fine here in Champaign on a trivial bowtie antenna indoors.

WCIA is the same power as WICD but two or three times the height.
WAND and WBUI are much heigher than WICD or even WCIA and
are at half power (200 kW).

One mile from a repeater and off the back of a big antenna
should not be a big problem. Besides its not off the back
when you point to WRTV.

Can you get the other UHF DTV channels from Indy? In August I
could occasionally get ch. 45 and 46, even though there is
a low power ch. 46 analog two miles from me. This, however,
was with a huge single channel Yagi with a huge F/B ratio.

I have a Samsung receiver so I cannot compare signal readings
with you.

Are you using a preamp? It may help if you get a really good
one with good overload properties.

Doug

[rrrick8]

Originally posted by jdmcdonald


Are you using a preamp? It may help if you get a really good
one with good overload properties.

Doug

Doug,
With my RS-210 antennae I use a CM 7778 preamp on top my 1 1/2 story home, mounted on a 15' mast above the roof.
Yes, Sometimes I can get other Indy stations at night CBS-9.1, NBC-13.1, Fox-59.1 signal strength varies widely on different nights though.
Do you know of any professional antenna installers in the central Illinois area?
Rick

[migman]

Hi Central Illinois folks....

I should have my Samsung 160 hooked to my Hitachi 57 SWX tomorrow... So I will be trying antennas to see what I can get OTA.

I am in Mahomet... About 8 miles west of Champaign.

What formats are the OTA DTV stations sending? I gather none are passing HDTV signals. Are they 480P? How does the picture look when it is working? Is it better than standard NTSC (analog)??

After a while, I will report what I find.

Regards,
David

[dlclark]

It's good to know there are people in Central, IL wanting HDTV. I can't justify upgrading if PBS is all I can get. It sounds like the Champaign area is the place to be. What really bugs me is, since I dropped cable, I can't get UPN which is broadcast on analog channel 59. I may need to upgrade to VHF so I can get channel 3. No Illini games and I couldn't watch the high school state football playoffs. 31 really pisses me off as they broadcast infomercials while channel 3 is broadcasting sports on the weekends.

According to antennaweb it looks like things will improve in May of 2003 with most of the peoria stations going digital. I just hope this holds true and the FCC makes them comply.

On one hand, I'm glad I didn't invest in HDTV a few years back when I wanted to. On the other hand, now that I'm getting one all I can watch is a few HDTV satellite channels and PBS. I wish there was a way to get HDTV networks via dish since it's not available locally.

Donnie

[jdmcdonald]

rrrick8 ....

strange

That's a good antenna setup.

But if it does not get WICD-DT ch 41, something is wrong.
Perhaps overload from WICD-15. You do of course have
the FM trap active in your preamp? If there is a
nearby full power FM it could be the problem.

I suggest trying to find a Radio Shack double bowtie
antenna. They are discontinued but if you find one they
are $5. Try it indoors and see what you see. Then try outdoors
if you can, or on the second floor.

If you get the same reading for all four westerly DTV stations,
that alone says something is wrong. WICD should be by far the
strongest, low antenna altitude or not.

You might also consider trying to remove the amplifier for a test.

Doug McDonald

[jdmcdonald]

dlclark:

You should, possibly, be able to get WAND-17 (ABC),
WBUI-22 (WB), WILL-9 (when it comes on) and
WCIA-48 (CBS and UPN ... both)

They are all 33-38 miles away. I get 17 and 22 strongly
with an indoor antenna at that distance. WCIA may need
a big antenna.

Get a Samsung T-151 from Best Buy and try it. You can always
take it back. Also get from them a cheap Recoton signal
amplifier and try adding it into the antenna line.

Doug McDonald

[dlclark]

Doug, are you in the Champaigm area? I had my satellite installer put up a UHF antenna and it's pointed towards Peoria. Everything over there comes in great but I can barely get 17 and 22, they are unwatchable. I hate to sacfrifice getting those Peoria stations to add WB and I already get ABC fine. I have a Radio Shack double bow tie that I use to extend the UHF remote on Dish Network. I pointed it towards Decatur and it can get 22 and 17 a little better, but still not watchable.

I am on the North side of Normal and the antenna is on top of my two-story house.

Thanks, Donnie

[dlclark]

Just got on the rooftop and can get 17 and 22 fine, pointed towards Decatur, but I do lose all Peoria stations. Pointed to Decatur also gets me the Springfield networks, except there is no CBS. I have a Winegard PR-8800 UHF. It looks like in order to watch Illini games, I will need to upgrade to VHF as well so I can get channel 3. I could not get UPN channel 59 at all, they also carry Illini games.

Sorry, this is turning into non HDTV talk for me. I am looking forward to stations upgrading to digital. It looks like Peoria will have plenty if Antennaweb is correct.

Donnie

[dynamohum1]

dclark,
I have to ask, can you receive the fabled WYZZ FOX 28 digital signal, they claim they are covering their city of license which is Bloomington.

[dlclark]

I won't have my HDTV receiver until next month. I can tell you that we tried at my uncle's house with the Radio Shack double bow tie and could not get it. He has an RCA DTC-100 receiver and he lives appx 5 miles from the transmitter.

Donnie

[dynamohum1]

Does he live near congerville?

[dlclark]

Just outside Bloomington on the West side.