Pittsburgh, PA - OTA - Page 134

Hmmmm, maybe why that's why people are having reception problems.

well darn...I thought I was gonna be the first to break the news about 4-2 now being the THIS network...but it seems several have beat me to it. While it's unfortunate that we're losing the 24 hour weather, I think its great that theres now an OTA movie channel in our area.

Such a channel was what I suggested WPXI do with their spare subchannel when they got rid of their weather some time ago...but this works for me. Hopefully they'll have some good movies on to watch.

It's either feast or famine!

A year ago we had two 24/7 weather channels and now zero (meanwhile WPMY still has that useless SD simulcast). It was nice having a local weather channel to be able to flip to for a quick look at conditions since I have satellite and get the generic Weather Channel feed.

Dave Kasperek (and anyone else who may know):

Your contributions to this forum are much appreciated Dave and I understand that responding to every query impinges on your time. But here goes anyway... :-)

Like so many now living in other parts of the country, I'm originally from Pittsburgh and old enough to remember both WIIC and WTAE (``Take T and C'') signing on. In the pre-cable era, with the terrain, getting solid reception on the Big Four (2, 4, 11 and 13) of that time was a challenge in Baldwin. Complicating things was that the direction of each transmitter site was different (less so with KDKA-TV and WIIC).

Here in Dallas, as is the case in many other markets, a common site emerged over time, making over-air-reception a lot easier. Here, it started with the ABC and CBS affiliates cooperating with the Hill Tower project, which evolved to the large farm at Cedar Hill, home of all of the TV sticks. Across the state, Philly has the Roxborough antenna farm.

What were the factors that prevented a joint project in the Pittsburgh area? I suppose that WTAE's spacing to Columbus would have added to the complexity of site location.

Of course, that ship has long sailed and in today's economy, it would be unthinkable. Even with the high cable/satellite penetration in the DMA, had there been an antenna farm, some of the problems associated with the DTV transition might have been eased.

Some people seem to think that elliptical polarization can improve reception in some areas without having such a sobering effect on the electric bill. If I may ask what are your thoughts on that as far as any practical application for WTAE assuming the FCC would approve such a power increase?

I miss the full-time weather channel. I actually watched 4.2 quite a lot, almost every evening (very late, midnight+) I would leave 4.2 weather on "in the background" while I caught up on some work. It was great. Had to like Nikki, too! I watched a little closer when she was hosting.

Hopefully one of the other stations in town will bring back a full-time weather channel. It really is quite useful. For the past year that I watched 4.2, I do not remember ever pulling up the weather on the 'net, and in fact seldom watched the weather during the evening news. I figured that I would watch it at night before I called it a day.

RIP 4.2 Weather. Since I do not like very many movies, I doubt that I will watch the new 4.2., although I realize that a classic movie channel will appeal to some people. I just wish that with all of the unused subchannels available in Pgh, that someone would keep *1* as a full-time weather channel. I mean really, kdka has ZERO subchannels, wtae has the grand number of *1* subchannel, wpxi has a whopping *1*, FOX and CW have ZERO (simulcasting doesn't count). Public TV -- WQED -- is the only one with a honest attempt, having 2 subchannels (and that is still a LOT less than other cities, where it is common to find many stations having 3 subchannels.)

If these subchannels are any indicator, we Pittsburghers must be poorer than just about any medium-size city out there. Even Johnstown has a lot more subchannels than we do. I read these forums, talk to friends/family in other cities, and just about every other medium-size city (smaller than PGH) and certainly the larger cities all have a TON more subchannels than we do. Are we really this poor that we cannot justify more than *2* subchannels among the BIG THREE NETWORKS combined, with KDKA contributing NOTHING?

KDKA is a shell of their former greatness. KDKA is downright shameful. It is obvious that they must not have 2 cents to invest in their product. Here's a suggestion -- jettison your aging over$priced anchors and acquire young attractive (albeit unproven) talent for a LOT less $. Be the Oakland A's of TV, and EXPAND your business with the cost savings. I really do not think most people care to see the same overpaid sportscasters/anchors year-after-year. These guys and gals are NOT Walter Cronkite. They are EASILY replaced whether they realize it or not. The fact is that no one has mustered the moxy to challenge them. Perky young journalists, actors/actresses, and others with presentation skills & public-speaking skills are graduating all the time, and they would kill to make 50% of the salary of these "untouchables." Supply and demand. You don't have to be a journalist to present the weather or present the Sports. You need to have a smooth delivery and have a pleasant appearance. Anyone who overpays for those skills is not business savvy. The supply is much greater than you think. You just have to look for it, and stop thinking that your aging talent has bargaining power.

Back to the subchannels issue... I guess that I just do not understand the lack of interest in subchannels from the networks. To me this is an incredible waste of bandwidth for basically the cost of transmission. Even if you resold the time to HSN or QVC it would be better than NOTHING. Surely someone would be interested enough to buy the time at a rate sufficient to cover operating costs, and hopefully in the future turn it profitable. With CATV rates rising EVERY YEAR FAR IN EXCESS OF INFLATION, eventually more families will go OTA. A typical CATV packages is already $70 after costs are added up, and many packages far exceed that sum. Seems very shortsighted for the local networks to not have their foot in the door even if the project only breaks-even financially. If you do not try, you will not succeed.

Just to chime in on the loss of 4-2, I am yet another OTA household that switched to that weather channel on a daily basis, as we have satellite for our cable channel programming. The best part was having a local radar image to view at regular intervals, so as to plan important tasks such as car washing, grass cutting, or trips to the swimming pool. (Though the studio portraits of the anchors and investigative reporters that was also in the rotation was a bit gratuitous and somewhat annoying.)

So if any of the stations are listening, I would continue to patronize a local Pittsburgh "weather-only" sub-channel, if it was offered. I suggest that channels 22 and 53 should consider an alliance with one of the stations to put up a weather sub-channel, similar to the way that our FM radio stations broadcast weather prepared by the TV folks. To me, it's smart business, as it gives the ad execs one more option in which to sell advertising time to local clients.

I'm not against weather sub-channels but it does seem that their days might be numbered. Many people have turned to the internet to get their weather immediately rather than wait for a broadcast to cycle back to the info that is needed. What I see as a final nail in the coffin is the growing popularity of smart phones. Ever since I got an iPhone, I've had immediate access to weather conditions no matter where i'm at. This include local/regional/national radar and satellite loops, hour by hour forecasts for each day, historical data such as rainfall in the past few days, live web-cams, etc...

Not that there isn't still a market. I'm sure plenty of people can chime in about how a broadcast weather station is a better match for their lifestyle.

Given the choice though, i'd rather have TV stations broadcast entertainment for displaying on big screens around my house and leave weather info on my phone. Weather doesn't benefit as much from a big screen.

As for the KDKA bashing, it seemed a bit misinformed. Sure, KDKA deserves constructive criticism on technical issues. But basing them for wasting salaries on big-name anchors seems completely unfounded. I'd bet the poster of that rant has absolutely no clue about KDKA's budget or compensation packages for employees. If anything, it seems that KDKA has been rotating temporary anchors while searching for replacements for Keith, Sonni and others.

As has been pointed out on numerous times in this thread and a few others, KDKA and it's sister station WPCW are owned and operated by CBS Corp. And CBS has a current policy of not permitting their O&O DTV stations to multi-cast and create sub-channels.

Now the problem with multi-casting is that as you divide up the 6 Mhz broadcast channel you give up the ability of having the highest levels of HD DTV broadcasting. And given the number of current viewers with HD TV sets (and it grows daily) most stations want to delivery the highest quality programming they can on their main channel. Having a sub-channel, or multiple sub-channels, cut in to that, and can also create greater problems in the video and audio, like video artifacts, pixellation and sound drop outs on both the main and sub channel(s). Any broadcast engineer knows when it comes to multi-casting - THERE IS NO FREE LUNCH!

WTRF (VHF 7) in Wheeling, WV is a classic example. They are running three channels. 7.1 is a CBS affiliate, 7.2 is a FOX affiliate and 7.3 is an ABC affiliate, which is not an unusual setup for any station in a small market. WTRF operates their main channel (7.1) in HD at 1080i, while the two sub-channels are operated in SD at 480i. They have a hard time doing this and a simple look at posts from WTRF viewers about the reception quality shows this. Personally I can't say if they have managed to fix things yet, but when on occasion I was picking up WTRF's broadcast, I can attest that the sound quality on their FOX sub-channel (7.2) was horrible.

Now concerning comments about the lost of a OTA weather channel, I can agree that I'll be missing it too. Like you, it was easy to turn to and get a look at the local radar map when bad weather was threatening. One thing of note that I came across yesterday when I was doing a little surfing was something I saw on one site (and I'm not exactly sure which one it was). It stated that WPXI had received a lot of comments regarding the lost of their weather sub-channel. Now when this occurred it was beyond their control as the weather service they were using ceased operation at the end of 2008. It was also stated that WPXI management was toying with the idea of re-starting their weather sub-channel. So perhaps Dave Morrison, who is associated with WPXI and occasionally turns up here, can confirm this.

It was probably http://www.pbrtv.com/, as I saw the same thing.

What I thought was interesting is that the NBC O&Os have kept airing a weather service under the "NBC Plus" banner. It looks just like the old Weather Plus service sans the national coverage.

Perky young journalists, actors/actresses, and others with presentation skills & public-speaking skills are graduating all the time, and they would kill to make 50% of the salary of these "untouchables."

And it's exactly why journalism in this country stinks.

Amen.

Anyone know if and when WQED is moving back to VHF 13? Personally I hope they've reverse course on this decisions are going to stay on UHF 38 based on all the trouble with VHF channels.

From their most recent filing with the FCC:

Woah, if I read that correctly... the change is precisely one week away, August 18th.

I'll start crossing my fingers now. Maybe, just maybe I'll be able to get VHF-13 without having to rearrange and/or buy new antennas.

At this point if they don't like channel 13 their only option would be to switch WQEX to 13 and keep WQED on 38.

That would be fine with me...it would keep WQEX from interfering with WBGN anyway.

They've said that same thing on their DTV transition program and in between programs. I didn't think they'd actually take until August 18 to get things ironed out.

I'm on the fringe of WQED's signal here in the Richland section of Johnstown, receive a 7o/30 most of the time...would be nice to get a steady picture for a change or maybe after the 18th,I may get zilch.. we'll soon see !

It will probably work out fine them moving,however I'd like them to stay on UHF also . I was scared when WPCW moved to 11, but their signal is booming for me once I put up a VHF combo antenna. Lately WQED's programming has not been great,I found better PBS programming on WNPB-33 .

Currently WQED is scrounging for every blessed dollar they can get to make up for a shortfall in the Governor's proposed budget of about a million dollars or more they would have received in state funds. Since WNPB is located in WV they probably are not facing the same type of budget problem.

So depending on how and when the budget mess in Harrisburg is finally resolved may determine how long it will be before QED's programming returns to more normal fare.

If the FCC service map in to be believed the 25 kilowatts ERP WQED will use to broadcast on VHF 13 will penetrate further in to the Johnstown area than their current UHF signal on channel 38.

I figure that since I get WPCW on CH11 without any problems I should have a fairly good chance of getting WQED at 47 miles out. I have never received anything on CH38 even during the same brief times that I have been able to receive CH22 & CH53. I for one am looking forward to this change.

I would think that WQED's biggest problem is their lower tower height. I imagine that if their channel 38 signal was at 1000 feet HAAT like the other signals in the market, it would cover just as well.

- Trip

Is there a rough timeline/schedule for getting the WTAE Oakland translator up and running?

Since WBGN signed on with a digital signal on UHF 16, I would pick it up, but the station never registered high enough for my converter boxes to decode anything. Still I would check on the station's signal every so often.

Several days ago, either due to WBGN boosting their transmitter power, or perhaps the atmospheric conditions, I was able to pick up the signal and my converters resolved it in to 59.1, etc. This lasted for all of a couple of hours before the signal faded back below the "cliff", and I got the infamous "No Signal" error on a blank screen. (I also think now it might be due to the fact that WBGN shares WQED's tower, and perhaps they did something with their broadcast antenna because of QED's up coming switch over.)

Since then the station pops in from time to time, mainly in the early morning (before 9 AM), or very late at night (after 10 PM). But even when it shows up, my converter boxes seem to have a very hard time decoding the signal, as usually I end-up looking at a wash of shifting colors on the screen, with only tiny bits of sound. This is the case on all 4 of their sub-channels. Yet the signal strength indicator shows a good enough signal level to produce a reasonably decent image and sound when I've received a similar signal level from other stations .

And then sometimes when I'm simply switching though channels and I hit 59.1, .2, .3, .4 with only a blank screen, the converter box will lose the PSIP staton ID information, and I end up with the box pointing to 16.1, etc. (WQEX's PSIP station ID of 16.1, is then shoehorned in between WBGN's UHF 16.1 and 16.2 channels.) I should point out I've very rarely seen this happen on any other stations' PSIP IDs that have been stored by my converter box.

I know Trip once commented to me on how the quality of a DTV station's broadcast signal can be as important (or more important) in being able to receive it than it's ERP. So I was wondering if anyone else who can pick up WBGN, is or has experienced anything I've described here?

My Insignia converter box has no problem resolving RF 16 to 59-1, but my Samsung TV keeps it 16-1 so I end up with two 16-1s as you described. The set has no problem differentiating between WPCW and WPXI, but it is older and older receivers can have problems with PSIP if it is not set-up properly.

I'm not in the market, thus the query:

Per the FCC filing posted upthread by PA_MainyYak, did WQED complete its transition to RF-13 today? If so, what's the OTA signal like on the VHF facility?

Nothing so far. Still on UHF 38

As of this time (4:45 PM) WQED is still broadcasting on UHF channel 38.

Perhaps they will switch over later this evening, like say around midnight.