Las Vegas, NV - HDTV - Page 5

Maybe if enough people email the engineering department adair@journalbroadcastgroup.com they will tell us.

I just emailed him and got an auto reply that said he was on vacation this week. It also gave his cell phone number. I wouldn't call it though. I think if we all send him an email when he gets back Monday he will see all of the messages and maybe he'll reply to one of them.

whose email is that? the engineering dept at ABC?

Yes it is the email of Ron Adair, the engineer for the local ABC channel. I have emailed him before. Sometimes he answers my questions, sometimes I don't even get a response.

For what it's worth, here is what the KTNV (ABC) Administrator wrote on their forum board:

"I am being told that we are 99% sure that we WILL be broadcasting the Super Bowl in HDTV and following that we will be broadcasting all the HDTV ABC shows in HDTV. I hope this is the news you wanted to hear about this. If you have any further questions that's what we are here for. Thanks!"

Looks like the Super Bowl will be their 1st HD broadcast.

Toby

That is great news if it is true.

Ditto!

Bump. Any new word on ABC and the superbowl?

How about any other HDTV future additions? I did see the Cox HDTV commerical that did not mention ABC being in HD. At least they are not being disingenuous (on this issue!).

I sent an email to Ron Adair at the email address listed in this thread, and received this reply:


So I think it is safe to assume that we will get the Superbowl in HD.

Update on KTNV ABC...They are installing equipment right now and should be up and running for the Superbowl in 2 weeks.

Toby

Nice to see CBS broadcast their playoff games in HD. Next weeks game will be in HD also. Anyone caught a hockey game on HDNet? Just the natural sounds of the arena and a terrific picture. Quite an improvement of the usual SD feeds.

Has anyone gotten digital sound to work from the Cox HD box. I plugged a cable in but it didn't work.

I did. I just plugged an interconnect into the digital out, and into the coax digital in on my receiver. When I access the digital channels, the Dolby Digital light comes on. So, I assume it's working. The sound does noticably improve.

I did. I just plugged an interconnect into the digital out, and into the coax digital in on my receiver. When I access the digital channels, the Dolby Digital light comes on. So, I assume it's working. The sound does noticably improve.

The difference between the Fox broadcast of the playoffs and CBS was incredibly shocking. A friend of mine who is new to HD was a convert. He exclaimed, "why doesn't the average joe football fan know about this..." I agree, Sports is the "killer app" for HDTV. They should run that a lot more in the stores instead of those nature loops. Just picture in your mind a season of football, baseball, hockey and basketball in HD. Makes you salivate, huh?

I agree. In fact, I checked out the HD version of the AFC game at home, then went over to the wife's uncle's house (big Raiders fan), and saw the SD version. HUGE difference. Of course, mine was set up to get the Dolby Digital surround, which made things that much better...

Hi,

What kind of cable from stb tp receiver?

Eddie

I used one side of a Zu Disco cable stereo RCA pair. I emailed the company, and this cable is designed with adequate bandwidth to handle analog and digital. Pretty good stuff for the price.

I will soon upgrade to the Oxyfuel interconnect.

fasteddielv


Check your settings menu I think it can be disable I am not home butt you push setting twice then page down until you see digital out I think

lvthunder,
I didn't know you finally got HD cable! How does it compare your other sources?
Pretty much all of the digital channels will have a direct digital output of some form or another wether it is 2-channel, 3-channel, 4-channel digital or Dolby Digital 5.1. Most of the movie networks will ouput 5.1 when available but the locals are touchy. I have seen them flip flop back and forth a few times watching CBS or come back from a commercial break in SD mode with analog. Someday they will go all HD like Discovery and not have to keep switching the feeds.
For the coax feed, typically any RCA patch cable should work. If you have a reciever with auto switching inputs, choose that as your source mode. If you have to manually switch each time it will be a pain in the rear everytime you watch the analog channels below 99.

vegggas

I agree that any RCA cable will work, but since we're dealing with higher bandwidth for digital audio, a better-than-standard cable will yield better results. Of course, this also depends on the rest of your audio system whether or not you'll be able to hear the differences...

Yes I finally got the HD box. I really don't like it. The box itself looks like a $10 clock radio that you would get from Wal Mart. I also don't like the fact that there is no optical out. I also have a 4X3 TV and I don't like the fact you can't switch it to 480i mode and fill the entire screen (the installer told me not to watch anything but the HD channels thru the component output. That's a pain.) I also don't like that the menu won't come up when it is outputing 1080i. My Sony HD-100 (Directv) does all of these things. The only two reasons I got this is because I live near Black Mountain and I'm blocked from getting ABC and CBS. The other reason was they were running a special that the HD would be $30 a month. When the first installer came out he didn't have the right box, the sheet said just Digital Cable. He called the main office and they told him there was no HD package for $30 a month. The installer told me I would have to pay $120 a month for HD (this includes the 3 meg service for the cable modem which I only ordered 1.5 meg). I pretty much told him to go piss up a rope and called customer service the next Monday. I had to read the CSR the web page and she put me on hold to check with the manager. So she gets back on the phone and says OK and blamed the marketing department for not notifing them of the special. So when my three months are up I'll be either looking towards getting Dish and a waiver from CBS (which they already say they will deny) or getting BEV (Canadian Satallite). But all in all the HD programming is good the box itself just sucks. Maybe by time my three months is up there will a a STB on the market that will let me get CBS and ABC with just Expanded Basic. If that's the case I will probibly just do that.

Nonsense. The digital audio is an AC-3 encoded bitstream. Jitter isn't even an issue since the clock is generated on the receiver. The decoded bits and the timing are going to be the same as long as the cable isn't introducing errors - and if that happens, you'll know it because your receiver will mute.

Ideally, an RCA interconnect with 75-ohm characteristic impedence should be used, though for typical interconnect lengths, it isn't going to matter.

-Jonathan

Has anyone seen channel 13 today. On cable (I can't check OTA on this channel) they were broadcasting a 4X3 picture. I had turned to 13 earlier in the evening and just saw a blank picture. I wonder if channel 13 is installing the HD stuff?

This box does suck with a 4x3 TV - No aspect ratio control, so you get a letterboxed 16x9 image in a 4x3 window. A friend of mine, who also has a 4x3 TV, uses something called stretch or fill mode on his TV to fill the screen with HD content. Doesn't look too bad, but there should be alternatives. (see below)

Don't quite know what you mean, but the graphic overlay is generated in SD mode and will not display HD content in the preview window...(also see below)

Typical sales reps, no arguments from me about that sort of thing.

From what I understand, the 3100HD was an upgrade from the old modded 2100HD and COX LV bought a fixed amount of these 3100's for launch of the HD product. At the time, these were about the only thing compatible with the software in use in LV and they cost roughly $500 each. I have heard that when this supply runs out, they will no longer carry any HD boxes in stock, because of these factors:
1) Money - They knew going into this venture, that they would lose money and there is no way to recap the cost of such an expensive STB. The upfront cost is too prohibitive to purchase a large volume, but it had to be done to roll out the product.
2) Laws and ruling - Until the standards were set (last week!) and manufacturers were able to produce large amounts of STBs, they were not going to see the STB's in retail stores for consumer purchase.
3) New and better products would be available soon making the current stock obsolete. Once the regulations were set and adopted, they would see the same trend in cable modems where prices would plummet and better products would pop up everywhere.
At CES, I had a Q&A with the Pioneer guys and saw their new Voyager 3510HD box which is supposedly available later this month and is scheduled to be a retail product at electronics stores. It is compatible with COX software and was running the COX HD feed, and will most likely be available within a few weeks or more. Good news is that it has all of the features you mentioned were missing from the SA3100HD, including all format decoding with 6 display choices for output, HD graphics overlays, and full downconversion. Also, pushed back until summer though, is their DVR for digital HD cable. It wasn't running, and there were no brouchures left, but it looks like a winner if it ever gets released. COX has supported Pioneer with their analog boxes, and they should follow suit with their new digital HD boxes too, we just have to wait and see when it happens.
Since COX LV was just acknowledged for it's deployment and commitment to HD services and is considered to be the standard for future HD cable systems and their deployment, I see no reason why they would try to hold back any of this technology available to the consumer.

vegggas

So do you think I'll be able to buy one of these new boxes and only keep expanded basic and get CBS-HD and ABC-HD?

They are definitely doing something on Ch 13. I guess we'll find out Sunday when they show Alias

Toby

First, the local HD channels are encrypted, so Cox would have to authorize you, they arent in the clear. And I'm sure they'll say that you need digi cable in order to get HD (even if its not a technical requirement, they'll do it to increase revenue).

The Ch 13 webpage has posted an official statement about their HD status. This is great news! Go to www.ktnv.com

Toby

I don't have any idea what kind of plans or pricing they may come up with, but I'm still trying to get a responce from the correct people to get locals "clear to air" for standard digital broadcast instead of with a subscription. This probably will not get resolved soon as there is no current reason to distribute free HD content without some prior authorization within a subscription. Currently I don't think there are individual and a la cart systems in place to handle the amount of subscriptions needed for each individual box in such a large cable system.
Long Winded Technical Explanations Assumed Here... somewhat going off topic.
All digital channels are encrypted. A group of plans are created for different packages and those package details are broadcast to your box, which authorizes the decryption process for each channel plan. Without the standard plan subscription to authorize the box, no channels will be decrypted or decoded at all. So the bare minimum would be for a subscription to a basic digital package to authorize the box to decode the basic channels, including, hopefully, the local digital. Basic Analog is in a separate system and doesn't need to be decoded to view channels, thus there is no subscription plan or equipment needed other than to have the drop feed connected to your location and a fee for the network access. Once you add a converter to your analog to get PPV and movie channels, you are then on an active network system that needs to authorize those extra channels.
The digital encryption scheme is the only way to make the closed private cable network actually closed and private. Having to get an authorization for services and thus decreasing cable theft, hopefully will eliminate most of the ingress problems caused by illegal drops and non authorized connections, which will make for better picture quality, reliability and greater bandwidth availability. I work to build, service and help maintain, about 120,000 gaming hotel rooms with VOD, PPV and Data communications via RF lines. We are looking to go completely digital eventually to avoid the theft and ingress issues that plague the Vegas and other areas. Especially when a good hearted hotel employee runs their own feeds off the lines and creates problems within the system and then calls to complain about their signals- ARGH! If you only knew how many times adult PPV content was shown in public areas because of a property connecting to a closed system without prior authorization and then have them scream about it... Sorry, had to vent.

vegggas