Philadelphia, PA - Comcast - Page 353

Here at least, when we went digital (WOM), we maintained the locals on QAM but little else. There ARE others but I haven't spent any time looking. The switch knocked out most of the analog channels I was getting (like ESPN) so I had to get their little non-HD box for a small TV I have on my porch so I could watch sports.

Anyway, your locals via QAM should be OK for a while.

hello all, new channels in philly?

Network-Channel Number-Package
BBC America- 1225 (Digital Preferred)
Crime & Investigation 1231 (Sports/Ent Pack)
Nat Geo Wild 1262 (Digital Preferred)
Smithsonian Channel 1265 (Digital Preferred)
Cooking Channel 1281 (Digital Preferred)
DIY 1291 (Digital Preferred)
Jewelry TV 1315 (Digital Preferred)
Game Show Network (GSN) 1325 (Expanded Basic)
Ovation 1345 (Digital Preferred)
Galavision 1368 (Digital Preferred)
Sprout 1505 (Expanded Basic)
Hub 1511 (Digital Preferred)
MavTV 1621 (Digital Preferred)
Outdoor Channel 1630 (Digital Preferred)
Sportsman Channel 1632 (Digital Preferred)
World Fishing Network 1632 (Sports/Ent)
IndiePlex 1862 (Digital Preferred)

Also being added on or about Dec. 15 are these premium HD channels:

HBO West 1911
HBO 2 West 1914
HBO Signature 1915
HBO Signature West 1916
HBO Family 1917
HBO Family West 1918
HBO Comedy 1920
HBO Comedy West 1921
HBO Zone West 1924
HBO Latino West 1926

Cinemax West 1931
MoreMax 1932
MoreMax West 1933
ActionMax 1934
ActionMax West 1935
ThrillerMax 1936
ThrillerMax West 1937
WMax 1938
5StarMax 1941
OuterMax 1944
@Max 1946

Showtime2 1952
Showtime Beyond 1954
Showtime Beyond West 1955
Showtime Showcase 1956
Showtime Showcase West 1957
Showtime Extreme 1958
Showtime Extreme West 1960
Movie Channel 1970
Movie Channel Xtra 1972

Starz West 1981
Starz Edge 1982
Starz in Black 1984
Starz Kids & Family 1986
Starz Cinema 1988
Starz Comedy 1991

Are you asking if they're on? If so, yes they are.

any word if they're coming to the burbs?

Got the annual price hike letter, pretty bad this year, about 5% raise in prices.

I'm on month 7 of my 6 month promo and was pleased to see it's not quite at the full rate yet for digi preferred, just like how the triple play packages have less of a discount for the 2nd year or whatever. Instead of $40/mo it's now $60/mo, but that sure beats the new price which is now north of $80 I think it was?

Digital economy dropped to $30/mo just like in Philadelphia. HSI went up $1 to 45.95. What is with that, it was a 42.95 since I moved to the area in 2004, now it's going up every year as well! I didn't see a change in the DVR service, it wasn't listed so I'm guessing it didn't change from the 15.95.

I found buried in the letter a note about CBS College Sports(CSTV) going to digital preferred around Feb 1st. Most other areas/cities already did this last year or before.

Anyone else in Philadelphia (Center City/South Philly) having trouble getting QAM channels through Comcast? Last night I lost everything but the WHYY channels and a couple others. Has anyone called customer service and gotten an explanation?

Digital Economy is mostly just channels 2-100 without sports channels, etc. But can anyone tell me if you get On Demand? Can you get HD? Can you order a DVR? Is HD and DVR the same cost as other packages?

aindik,

not in my area collegeville pa 19426. the highest channel is 993

The post said "in Philly." As in, in the City. In the City of Philadelphia, at least in Center City and South Philly, they're on. The suburbs are a different story.

I would really like it if they could replace the useless hdppv channel (785) with game hd. I'd even deal with them splitting time and turning it back on when there really was an event.

There is a certain irony that we first complain about not having enough HD channels, and then when we get more we complain that they're useless. That applies to SD channels as well, though. Not that I disagree.. it's just kinda funny.
Personally I'm not a fan of the fact that they interwove "useless" HD channel in around all the local ones in the 800-810'ish range. If they are ordering the 800 range by channel type/theme then why is QVCHD and HSNHD anywhere near Fox/CBS/NBC? At a minimum all the home shopping channels should be down by TLC, E, and STYLE channels to match their target audience.

Don't mean to cross-post but thought someone here might know:
Does anyone know what model DVR they are currently distributing for the Comcast of Garden State area? I've had an SA8300HDC for many years and I'm wondering if it is worthwhile to turn it in for an upgrade. I think they use Cisco RNG200's now? Even those look like they're several years old. Is there anything newer?

One advantage would be HDMI, which isn't on my 8300, but that by itself isn't enough of a benefit to warrant swapping (and rewiring) it out of my entertainment center.

Anyway, is the RNG200 my only option?

Just a guess, but here in KoP(Lower Bucks as well), HSN and QVC are very low channels, HSN is cable ch 5 and QVC is cable ch 10, so perhaps that is why they are also low on the 800 block, along with the major networks?

I am setting up a Silicon Dust HD HomeRun on a Vista Ultimate PC. I am having issues with the guide in Windows Media Center, which comes from zap2it.com. I used the HD HomeRun config tool and tried to use the set lineupid option. But whenever I run the guide setup in Media Center, it seems to default to the Digital Terrestial lineup, which I assume is the OTA lineup. I can't figure out how to get it to look at the cable lineup, since there are clearQAM channels that are not OTA.

My AveryMedia card is still getting local QAM and a few cable only channels. Many of the analog channels are gone. A rescanning of the digital tuner card failed. My Media Center Guide imploded and was rendered useless. It will have to be completely reprogrammed, but not certain how unless I invest hours. We were hood-winked with the switch, but what did you expect from an unregulated monopoly? Need I say any more, without getting political.

If the tuner is set up in Windows(Win 7 compadible driver installed) then WMC should see it. Be sure to stop the automatic setup it tries to do and tell it that you want to complete setup manually. From there it lets you select your source(cable, antenna or satellite), country, zip code, etc. You will have to let it scan for channels and it should find your local HDs.

So you were happy with the what, 30 or so HD channels that Comcast of Garden State had? If you want the HD channels that the rest of the country has(and pays nearly the same price as you do), then removal of the analog channels was neccesary. That's a limitation of your local cable plant/system(albeit a crappy one, Garden State system was probably the worst area in SE PA/South Jersey), not politics.

Comcast will be adding the following HD channels in the City of Philadelphia on or after April 12, 2011:
796 - Telmundo HD (WWSI HD, Phila.)
1217 - C-Span HD
1218 - C-Span 2 HD
1318 - EWTN HD
1334 - Oxygen HD
1512 - Fox Soccer Channel HD
1513 - GolTV HD
1863 - RetroPlex HD
1864 - Reelz HD
1865 - FEARnet HD

And will be removing the following channels:
1918 - HBO Family West HD
1921 - HBO Comedy West HD
1924 - HBO Zone West HD
1926 - HBO Latino West HD
1933 - MoreMax West HD
1935 - ActionMax West HD
1937 - ThrillerMax West HD
1955 - Showtime Beyond West HD
1957 - Showtime Showcase West HD
1960 - Showtime Extreme West HD
1981 - Starz! West HD

Why are they removing all the additional premium channels? That's terrible news.

EDIT: Ah, now I see it's not all the premiums they recently added. Just the west coast versions of channels where we still have the east coast version. Much "less bad" news than I thought.

hello all,

is there a thread for "PHILLY SUBURBS?"

Nah, we all get lumped together with "C" in Philly. I'm on Willow Grove "C" so nothing that is posted here applies. You can make a post that is specific to your area provider in this forum and get some responses.

hello all,

what's this letter code in philly?

He just means "C" = Comcast. There are seperate threads for Verizon FIOS, and Over the air(OTA) digital TV in Philadelphia and it's suburbs.

This is BS anymore. Does anyone have any idea when any of these new channels will be available in the burbs, specifically Whitemarsh Twnsp. Talking to Comcast is useless.

hello all,

do we have new boxes in this area?
dcx4300 or 3501

I think you mean the DCX3400? Yes they started popping up last year. I know NE Philly has them. I've got one over in Montgomery county/KoP. If they have enough of them, they will distribute the DCX3400m boxes(320GB hard drives) that are multi room capable, to regular DVR subs.

Ok so tonite I turned on the bedroom tv which is just set up to get the qam channels I guess, (its connected to cable but no cable box) And on channel 119.3, it is csn in hd, and I can watch the flyers! Is this the case all the time, and will I still have it if I have basic cable? Is there a philly qam thread?

It wasn't CSN, it was CN8. You saw the Flyers live tonight because something else was on CSN at that time.

I downgraded to limited basic a couple of months ago and it's really not as bad as you would think. CN8 HD shows a replay at 10:30 or 11pm of whatever live event was shown on CSN HD that day. They also replay it a second time at 6am the next morning. I can't remember the last time I watched a Phillies Sixers or Flyers game live from start to finish in real time on CSN HD. I almost always wound up recording it and scanning through it later. So having to wait until 10:30 isn't a deal breaker for me.

I downgraded to limited basic right after the Super Bowl with the intention of going back to one of the digital tiers when baseball season started up again. That's not happening now. Between the replays on CN8 HD, the OTA Phillies games on Channel 17 and the HD streams of MLB on ESPN3.com, I have more than enough MLB content to keep me happy.

The real test for me is going to be the NFL, if they even play this year. It will be tough to find a replacement for the Red Zone on Sundays, the Thursday night games on NFL Network or the Eagles Postgame Live on CSN.

The Sixers. A rare 3 sport night in Philly. Flyers, Sixers and Phillies (on channel 17).


I've contemplated dropping to limited basic and filling in the non-OTA stuff with Amazon purchases. I'm not even a Philly fan. Oddly, one of the few things keeping me with higher tier service is the 18 Phillies-Mets games a year, which I can't get through MLB.tv. Though, as you mention, some of those are on 17 or 29 and some are on ESPN3 (I think there is one Phillies-Mets game on a Sunday night this year). And others, like the next two, I go see live.

I would also miss the HBO and Showtime original series. I could watch them on Netflix, but that's years later.

I would need Comcast to let me keep my three CableCARDs. I can live without Digital Preferred, but you'll pry my TiVoHDs from my cold dead hands.

hello all,

is this a new box (Xfinity RNG200 Cisco) & is it available in our area?