Champaign, IL - HDTV - Page 159

When it does get added, it will be in ALL packages, as it is considered a limited basic channel (broadcast basic)


I hope the hell they DON'T & pull down the HD quality on CBS on BOTH 3.1/49.2!
Having 1 SD sub is OK, as CBS looks good now, so I do not have a problem with the status quo now, but NO more subs!

I'm not wholly convinced that they would add Bounce. I'm not sure how well UPN did here while it tried to target urban minorities, but I wouldn't believe it was an astounding success. Its signal coverage was poor (the only time I got it OTA was in January '09, right before I hooked up our converter box), but even despite that, I wouldn't think it did well. I would hardly call this market Urban in a cultural sense (any Urban flavor is probably due to college students hailing from metropolises like Chicago). On the other hand, the entirety of the market has about the same demographics as Peoria, going off of Wikipedia's numbers. (Decatur and Danville are the closest to Peoria, but not by that much.) Keep in mind that I just tallied up the numbers for Springfield, Decatur, Champaign, Urbana, and Danville (Danville was fewer than 10,000 smaller than Urbana, so I included it). This would mostly underreport whites, as suburban and rural environments are historically predominantly white.

I assume you are ONLY talking about it on it's analog signal on WCFN-49. But while WCFN-49 did NOT reach over into C/U, it did have a pretty strong analog signal for the S/D broadcast area.
It also was carried on both 3.2 & 49.1 since day 1 - which those digital signals were launched at the same time WCFN-49 switched to UPN.

Granted those first digital signals were weaker than the current ones, but keep in mind that ALL the majority of cable systems in our DMA carried WCFN-49 on their limited basic analog service - so every one of these cable subs got it from day 1 as well, including the C/U coverage area.

Oh, I hadn't realized it. (Yes, I am talking about the analog OTA signal.) Still, I'm not sure how well UPN did in this market. Does anyone have Neilsen numbers from that time period?

Well it's pretty much a given that it did NOT do that well overall, anywhere - which is the reason it (& the WB) do NOT exist anymore!
Personally, I liked BOTH the WB & UPN WAY better than what replaced them. I watched all the shows on UPN's Monday night block. And Dilbert was an awesome show, but I believe it was already canceled by the time WCFN picked up UPN in our market.

Just an FYI; do you know that we got a full-time UPN affiliation BEFORE they did in St.Louis; they were actually one of the very last large markets to get one, on WRBU-46. (before then, UPN ran on KDNL-30 after prime time, then UPN shows were moved & split between KPLR-11 after hours & KNLC-24 - which only lasted a year or two)

I was actually watching UPN since day 1 BEFORE we got it on WCFN, via superstation WWOR-NY on satellite.

I've seen Dilbert on Netflix, definitely a worthwhile show.

You know, for being a major market, St. Louis strikes me as kinda backwoodsy when it comes to radio and TV. They don't have a 50,000 watt AM station, unlike most cities about their size further east. Slow to get or otherwise underserved by new networks (MeTV comes to mind as a recent example, historical ones include UPN and PAX*, PAX notoriously used a repeater of a station licensed to Mount Vernon - I went to school in Carbondale for a semester, and I can tell you, Mount Vernon is nowhere near St. Louis). They don't even have a major network O&O, something most cities of that size have at least 1 of. (I believe their Fox affiliate used to be O&O, but now its not.)

*ION doesn't even have an OTA affiliate for St. Louis anymore. It became an RTV affiliate (bad move, sticking with the ION affiliation would have been better, sadly), then Daystar.

Actually METV WAS recently added a few months ago to WRBU-46.2.
And believe it or not, they actually have a bunch of good subchannels scattered on several of their OTA's:

- Antenna TV on KTVI 2.2
- Live Well Network SD on KMOV 4.2 (OK, maybe NOT so much this one!)
- THIS TV on KPLR 11.2
- The Cool TV & The Country net on KDNL 30.2/30.3
- you already mentioned RTV; unfortunately, it's on an LP station in the immediate STL area


You are right about STL TV market; it's ranked as the 21st largest DMA, yet besides what you already mentioned, look at all the other things it does NOT have compared to similar sized markets:

- ONLY 1 PBS affiliate; hell even WE up here have THREE!
- NO OTA Spanish channels
- the local ABC affiliate does NOT do any local news of their own, while the local CW affiliate DOES
- there are NO locally originated OTA broadcasts of either of their local sports teams (except for Cards games that are on the FOX TV network on Saturdays & on ESPN); both the Cards & Blues moved ALL those other broadcasts to FSN Midwest only (that also meant that there are NO games anymore on WBUI-23 up here, either)

This (& other reasons) is why I "moved" my satellite service to Chicago instead of St.Louis...

I thought KMOX was still 50,000 watts?

Does anyone know (or care) about the status of the W28BE translator in Springfield (which rebroadcasts EWTN)? They're still broadcasting on analog and wreaking havoc on WYZZ-DT north of Springfield, but for at least the past year I have not seen any entries on the FCC's TV query for W28BE. Looks like they're broadcasting illegally--or they had let their license lapse but is staying on the air.

Anyone knows who owns (or owned) channel 28 in Springfield and when analog trannies and LP's are finally shut down if one of the many LP/translator CP's for Springfield (many under the likes of "DTV America") might be used for EWTN (considering the high Catholic population here in the Springfield area)? Or if the channel 33 HSN signal (which upgraded to digital within the past year) might add a 33.2 EWTN subchannel?

It IS actually...

And while speaking of the remaining analog trannies in Springfield--considering their financial problems and this ongoing Illinois and national economic and budget troubles, will Network Knowledge (WSEC/WQEC/WMEC) eventually shut down their analog channel 8 translator in Springfield without a digital replacement?

It's not on Wikipedia's list of clear channels, nor can I tune it in during the day. (I can tune in Chicago's 50k stations during the day quite usably and St. Louis is just an additional 50 miles. I should be able to at least get a really staticky signal.)

RE: MeTV, yeah, they just added it earlier this summer, only about a month and a half before us. It's been a national network since last December.

Edit: Yeah, Wikipedia is not infallible (nor is my memory!). I suppose I should check up on that list.

Not sure what to tell you, but it's definitely a 50 kW A: http://transition.fcc.gov/fcc-bin/am...2=&EW=W&size=9

- Trip

Well, that gives me some testing to do on a couple different radios. Sounds like fun.

Tonight, while I was watching Svengoolie, WCCU kept dropping out. I was still getting a signal (at about 70%, too, so pretty good), but the video kept dropping frames and even completely dropping out. It seemed to come pack in during commercial breaks. Seems like it was probably an issue with the studio to transmitter link. Has WRSP been having similar problems tonight?

I hardly ever watched WCCU, but since MeTV is on, I've spent a lot of the time watching....and yes, WCCU is dropping signal for just a few seconds each time, but it's happening quite a bit.

I pick it up through my DISH HD receiver(off air of course), and the program grid has no information. I have another stand alone HD receiver that is getting program info from WCCU. The DISH grid is probably fed through their national service. Has anyone seen the MeTV program schedule on their satellite program grid? Is it on DirectTV?

I suspect tropo from the North. WKOW has very long legs even without it, but when the heat is on it can easily get down there.



On my E* box, it shows the Tribune info for some MeTVs, but not for others. E* is very inconsistent with regard to what channels will have the info and which ones won't.

Since we've veered slightly into radio, does anyone know what's going on with WSCR lately? They had a good strong signal into Champaign County (actually down to Effingham if my memory is correct) and then it suddenly went to fading in and out. A couple of months again Grobber went to Internet only for a few hours while they were fixing a transponder (texted him and he confirmed it was for signal strength) which made things better for a month. Now it's right back to where it was. It's pretty bad when on a Sunday night French Canadian and Southern radio stations are leaking over 670's signal.

A) If they aren't of national or local importance, then why are they the only team in America with their own network deal for home games and on TV in the midwest every time they play an away game? Even WAND's GM admitted to me he was wrong after I emailed him, corporate, and the Notre Dame media relations dept. If you want to argue the independent card, neither Navy or Army have their own network deals.

B) I think everyone here knows Digital and HD are not the same. My point was that the vast majority of the population has HD sets and that is the norm now.

C) Your argument is flawed in that you assume that those stations are independently owned. Many of them are owned by large corporations. Your point is somewhat valid in that I could see where the corporations went cheap for the smaller stations with plans to "hand down" the more expensive equipment when upgrading their larger stations when better/cheaper equipment came out.

D) Another flawed argument. You make it sound as though the equipment would only be used for preseason games. In reality it could also be used for syndicated shows and for local broadcasts. 80k in equipment is what...roughly one preseason's worth of advertising? And I'm sure a local electronics company would love to put up a chunk of that for "presented by" rights to the games.

I also wonder if their cheap equipment is to blame for passing 2.0 audio when FOX provides 5.1. Also as has been pointed out, WFLD does send out the HD feed as Rockford shows games in HD. You mention cheap equipment....I think most of these locals have gotten their equipment from the Dollar store.

Madison, on my HDTVa pointed west? I doubt it, I've not seen any Chicago stations (or even evidence of them) this season. Heck, I've barely caught Bloomington! My location is frankly subpar for reliable North-South reception. (East, too. It's a darned good thing that all the stations in the market are west of here, except for W31BX, which, thankfully, is LOS.)

It's almost impossible for any of us here in Springfield to catch Bloomington around here--as the forementioned W28BE (the EWTN analog tranny that I had mentioned last Saturday was no longer listed in the FCC TV Query but still is broadcasting) is preventing us from receiving WYZZ (RF 28) in the city. I'm still wondering--does anyone know or care what the deal is with analog channel 28 in Springfield? Did their license lapse or are they just broadcasting illegally--and is anything in the works for a digital EWTN signal (either on one of the many translator CP's shown for Springfield on the TV Query or perhaps as a subchannel 33.2 to the now-digital HSN translator here in the city).

I doubt that they'd add it to the HSN station. The HSN station is owned by the same company that owns HSN (actually, I think HSN owns all of their "affiliates"). As for the construction permits, I've hit a dead end. I can't find anything about "DTV America 1" except that they hold a lot of digital low power construction permits and apparently some low power analogs. The problem is that I can't find any affiliation information for any of those stations. Perhaps someone with better Google-Fu or access to paid information sources can find something more.

As for W28BE, it might just be a lapsed license, but they've not filed a digital construction permit, which, since I don't think the FCC is renewing analog licenses, is functionally the same as a renewal. Do they still broadcast an ID at the top of the hour? If so, they're likely broadcasting illegally without realizing it. If not, then they're knowingly broadcasting illegally, which means you guys have yourselves a TV pirate. How unusual!

As for EWTN, they stream the network on their website, plus they're available on both Free-To-Air and satellite packages, so I don't see the point in having a low power affiliate period, unless Springfield has a large Catholic population, and even then, why analog? You may want to inform EWTN. I know that if I were them, I wouldn't want to be affiliated with a low-power analog that doesn't plan to jump to digital and may be operating illegally. If they drop the affiliation, that may kill off 28.

Off topic, but we all know TVFool and FMFool. Is there any resource I can use as an equivalent for AM? I kinda want to get back into AM DXing.

I saw the dropped frames again on MeTV, so I did a channel scan. Yes, the band's slightly open (WTWO decoded, partial decodes of Indy). Definitely no Chicago, though, and DEFINITELY no Madison. Maybe it's a 26 from another direction.

Edit: According to Wikipedia, the other nearest RF 26s are St. Louis and Louisville. Both are ~50 miles closer than Madison. Since I didn't see a partial decode on 28, Louisville seems most likely. But even that strikes me as farfetched.

I don't know the exact stats but there is a fairly large Catholic population here in the Springfield area. And at all hours of the day W28BE shows their legal ID on top of the screen too. And I'm also not sure who exactly operates channel 28--but I have read that this translator (as well as the original analog channel 33 HSN tranny) has been around about 20 years by now (I remember reading a microfilm of an old Springfield State Journal-Register article from about October 1991 stating that channels 28 and 33 both signed on at that time). That's all I know about channel 28--and I don't want to/don't feel comfortable with getting involved with reporting to EWTN or the FCC about the lapsed/illegal license on W28BE. (I've only lived here in Springfield since 2002, BTW).

Yeah, it's probably one of those that is doing it. This has been going on all over this part of the country this week. Weird tropo that seems to affect different freqs in unexpected ways, like when a normally strong station has issues but a weaker one on the same tower is fine & dandy. Now that the analogs are gone and the spectrum is "quieter", we have to get used to a whole new paradigm for summertime viewing.

Seems W28BE is related to these guys: http://yellowpages.sj-r.com/marian+c...446p.home.html

At least, they were the owners when the station came up for renewal in 1998: http://transition.fcc.gov/Bureaus/Ma...s/ap980630.txt

I would try calling them, asking if they're still associated with the owners of the station and, if so, what the current status of the license is and whether they plan to switch to digital. Try not to be confrontational about it, since, if they're still identifying properly, they probably don't realize anything is wrong.

Edit: What's the renewal period of a broadcast license, anyway? I know the renewal period for an amateur license is 10 years, is it the same for a broadcast license?

Has anyone else, who has Comcast, noticed the dropped and new HD channels? Without any notice Comcast dropped HBO Comedy from their line-up of HD channels. They did add a couple of interesting HD channels - BBC-America and HUB.

I still wish they hadn't dropped the HD channel of HBO-Comedy. That seems regressive to me.

Are you sure you missed it on one of your bills - because it definitely was on ours over here. Over here they added Cooking, DIY, BBCA, HUB, & NGC Wild all in HD, in place of the dropped HD premiums. We lost several several HBO, Showtime & Cinemax HD feeds in the process - & that was on our notices as well from last month; the changes just happened a week or so ago.

Evidently CC is in the process of dropping pretty much ALL HD multiplex versions of premium channels, & in ALL CC service areas. It appears the ONLY ones they are leaving are HBO2 & Showtime Too. The reason appears to be a combination of $$$ on new equipment, as well as that with the prog on those extra HD multiplexes being available OD, it made more sense to add more HD basics that would appeal to more subs, than prog that is ONLY available to (fewer & fewer) premium subs.

http://www.dslreports.com/forum/r26199053-

Part of the problem also, is that most of CC's systems have NOT dropped the rest of their analog (limited) basic channels yet - which would give them lots more bandwidth for even more HD feeds. Considering how few limited subs they have, it makes NO sense why they don't finish what they started & get rid of the rest of those bandwidth-hogging analog channels.

CC is doing exactly the opposite of DirecTV, who has added nothing BUT premium HD feeds & HD Xtra pak channels - while NOT doing SQUAT to add HD basics like the 5 we got from CC; DirecTV does NOT carry any of them, amongst the other missing HD basic that everyone else already does!

Thanks for the great response about HD channels from Comcast. Since I don't read what comes in the bill, I am sure it was a case of missing it.

You might want to go to Comcast Central and set it up so you can view your bill online and you can also view the meter for your 250 gbs cap when it is there.