Albany, NY - HDTV - Page 160

Exactly the same experience here in Schenectady with two Silicondust HDhomerun tuners. My DVR recordings would indicate the problem with WNYT began on or about August 18th or 19th. My other equipment (Vizio TV and DTV converter) tunes the channel in just fine, but does show a significantly weaker signal than on other VHF channels.

Yep. My experience this morning exactly. I guess I can put all my test gear away and either wait for them to fix it, or wait for the leaves to fall from the trees.

At this point none of the receivers we use at the station are showing any problem nor does the test equipment we use to monitor the transmitter. I'm also not seeing the problem with the receivers I use at home or at my camp.

There may be something occuring that the HDHR receivers are particularly sensitive to so I'll look into this further and try to duplicate it with an HDHR receiver I have. We are using Apex Exciters for the Main Channel 12 Transmitter site, but we use a Larcan exciter on the Channel 18 transmitter at Bald Mountain. It may be possible that the Apex Exciters are doing something that is so subtle that the other receivers ignore whatever is causing the HDHR to unlock.

Rich Klein
Dir of Engineering, WNYT

I haven't picked up WNYT for several weeks now. However, when I did pick it up earlier in the summer season it must have been from tropo ducting. My antenna is weak (HD-1080 which is lousy on VHF) and location is far (Poughkeepsie). I always consider WNYT as a bonus from tropo ducting when it does come in, since I never receive it at all during the colder months of the year.

Just to throw in my two cents - my HDHomeruns are doing fine with WNYT. Using the HDHomerun Config gui I'm getting 86% signal strength, 82% signal quality and 100% symbol quality.

Those levels are normal for my setup here in Johnstown. Maybe the lousy weather has messed with your setup - check your wires, you would be surprised how easily they can come loose if the wind can move them at all.

Thanks for updating the AVS forum. I too have this problem and if it helps I use a TiVo. I don't remember when I started having problems, but WNYT used to come in around 85% signal strength, today it's in the 35% range and lots of pixelation.

We've been running an HDHR receiver with a dual tuner here at the studio receiving the main transmitter for the past 24 hours. So far I'm not seeing the problem with periodic unlock or SNR drop, but we'll keep this monitoring system up here for a while (We usually use this system for field testing).

For the viewer in Johnstown, he may be receiving our translator on channel 21 which receives channel 12 and retransmits the signal without demodulating down to baseband. This method preserves the exact modulated data as the main channel, so any errors would show up on that transmitter as well as the main channel 12 transmitter.

One thing I should mention is that with the bouts of severe weather we've received this season, antenna and feed line damage is something you may want to rule out when having reception problems. This is true even if only having a problem with one or two stations. Antenna problems, unterminated lines, and amps can all cause problems that may not affect all channels.

Regarding amplifiers... If DTV signals get clipped or distorted due to high levels passing through the amplifier, the stronger signals can often become unreceivable. If you have an adjustable gain amplifier try different gain settings to see if that makes any change.

Rich

Richard - not sure what you did, but I'm back in the 80% signal strength range and, of course, no dropouts. Looking forward to tonight's game.
Thanks!

From my DVR recordings I can say the WNYT reception problem went away sometime between 1 am Monday September 5th and 6:30pm Tuesday september 6th. So your tests, while appreciated, was too late to witness the problem for yourself. Thank you so much for investigating.

I was about to write to AverMedia thinking my PC-e tuner was causing the reception problems with VHF Ch13 when I came across this thread . My Panasonic TV and Dish DTV DVR are both receiving VHF 13 with absolutely great signal quality. The Gateway SX2840-01 w/Avertv HD Duet tuner using Windows Media Center for watching/recording WNYT Chan13 has been incredibly challenging with signal quality either barely registering or zero while all the other local area channels have absolutely great signal quality. Just a minute ago I plugged in a WinTV-HVR950Q usb tuner into my Windows 7 Laptop and again, using Windows Media Center, cannot "see" Ch13, yet all other locals show up great. All these tuners are being fed by the same antenna w/no amplifier, just a 3-way splitter. Reading Mr. Klein's responses now has me perplexed...is there an equipment problem, is it Windows Media Center software or is there some nebulous mystery phenomena going on here? Any way to resolve or eliminate some of the variables?
Peter

DBC333, if your problem persisted after September 6th, then I would say you are experiencing a different problem then I and these other recent posters.

Yes, my reception of Chan 13 has been terrible and continues to be...even as of today. So I guess it is a different problem but the thread read sorta/kinda the same to me. Puzzling is that the reception is only bad with my 2 Win 7 computers using the WMC tv function. When using the plasma tv tuner and the dish DTV DVR tuner, reception is great.

I think that there could be a few issues in play here. First, I've found that not all tuners are created equal. Some tuners using older or alternate chip sets simply do not perform well or have diminished capability.

Sometimes adjacent channels will cause problems for some tuners while other tuners have no problem at all. In this market WNYA (51) transmits on channel 13 from the old WRGB transmitter site, while WNYT (13) transmits on channel 12 from the Capital Region Broadcasters site. This is the only adjacent channel situation in this market and could be a factor with some tuners. Especially in isolated areas where a combination of the transmitter locations and antenna patterns might cause significantly different received signal levels on the two adjacent channels.

The second issue has to do with signal strength and a combination of either poor signal to noise ratio in the antenna system or on the other end, the receiver's ability to handle higher signal levels or small distortions in active antennas or amplifiers in the antenna system.

Knowing the locations of viewers having problems and also antenna system information may help identify whether this is a receive problem or some other cause.

Rich

It's interesting to note that the common thread for all of us posting here with WNYT signal problem is that it only appears to be affecting DVR equipment. HDHomeruns, Tivos, and PC TV tuners.
Back when I was having the problem it looked like I was getting intermittent interference every 2 or 3 seconds. I would loose sound and the picture would get pixelated every 2 or 3 seconds.

Was wondering if there has been any progress on this? TV Fool shows it in their plot, but can't seem to confirm if/when it goes operational. Info here: http://maps.google.com/?q=http://www...ELD%26state=MA shows a coverage map that would be favorable for my location. WCWN is still very hard/impossible to get on channel 43 here so hoping this comes on line soon.

Not recently. We've been busy with the upgrades in the Helderbergs and problems caused by the hurricanes.

WCWN is omnidirectional into the main antenna.
WCWN is now using WRGB's old channel 39 transmitter.
WCWN has a solid state back-up transmitter.
WCWN's directional antenna has been remounted and fed with 3" diameter feedline.
WRGB's channel 6 antenna is fed with the 7" diameter feedline that WCWN had been using.
WRGB has an operational standby transmitter at the old analog site.

More recently we've installed equipment to improve the work-flows for posting news stories on our web site.

The channel 19 antenna at Jiminy is on the tower. The transmitter is in the building.

I can almost taste it. Thanks for the update. Maybe we'll be up by the time the newly revamped NY Mets take the field for 2012!!

Was the elevation changed or does this antenna remain in the same aperture?

I have a question for WRGB Engineering - I remember reading that Universal Sports is going to be done for at the end of the year. If this is the case will there be a possibility of thisTV being moved to 45.2?

On a separate note I know this has nothing to do with WRGB but does anyone know if AntennaTV is going to be on TW Cable and specifically as a Clear QAM channel and if it is, where is it?

It's lower:

https://licensing.fcc.gov/cgi-bin/ws...&fac_num=73264

"ThisTV" will remain on WRGB.

We don't yet know what will replace Universal Sports. Place your suggestion here, but note that the engineering department doesn't get to select the programming.

Is anyone else having issues with WCWN or WRGB on 45.3? I'm in North Adams, MA and it appears to be dropping out about every 10 minutes or so for about 10 seconds. Never had any issues before.

Thanks.

In Albany, I'm having the same issue. Signal drops for about 10 seconds every 10 minutes or so on 45-3. No idea what's going on????

I know you can't do it because of ill-advised, do-gooder FCC regs, but my vote would be for the return of the WRGB radar. Yes, I can get it online (and I do, often) but my TV boots up a lot faster than my computer does.

I can receive all of the Albany stations, even wyna, except for rf 12 , wnyt. I can receive rf 18 though. I'm just north of Saratoga Springs in Wilton.

WNYT's transmissions on RF channel 12 and RF Channel 18 are identical in terms of the data content. The same data is transmitted from both facilities with a very minor change in the PSIP ID. Some receivers will drop the first instance of a channel if they see a second identical transmission on another channel during the scan. If you have a Sharp brand TV, this may be the reason for the lack of the reception on RF 12. The other reason could be that your preamp or distribution amplifier (if you use either) is distorting the RF 12 signal. WNYT's transmitted power is higher than either WXXA on RF 7 or WNYA on RF 13, so may be affected negatively with amplifiers set up for higher gain. The last item I'd check is where your antenna is pointed. From Wilton, you should be pointing directly to the Helderbers at a heading of 199 degrees true, or 213 degrees using a magnetic compass. Being off axis can imapct the frequency response on individual channels, causing one channel to be lost.

I am using a Magnovox TB100MW9 dtv converter. Sometimes rf 13 will come in, when it comes in at all it is pixelized if I enter in rf 12 manually. I have an antenna in the attic winegard pr-7032 and outside antenna winegard hd 7082. I used tvfool to help to point my antenna properly. When I hooked up the antenna that is outside, wxxa and wyna show big improvements vs the attic one. I was unable to receive rf 18 with the attic antenna and wnya was pixelized. Wnyt rf 12 signal stayed about the same, pixelized. I need a signal better than 17 to receive the signal well. Wnyt rf 12 comes in at 16 with both antennas. Wxxa went from a 17 with the attic antenna to a 60 with the outdoor antenna. All the uhf stations except for rf 18 come in with an 80 and wrgb is at 75. Rf 18 comes in with a 40 which is still very good. Except for rf 18, uhf was good on the attic antenna also with only a drop of about 10. I tried two antenuators, one alone for a 6db reduction and another in line for 12 db reduction. It did not make much difference in pixelization. If it is the converter that is my problem, can anyone recommend one that is more robust? Thanks in advance.

I am using a cm 7777 preamp on the outside antenna which feeds 100' feet of rg6 cable going to a 4 way channel master splitter with an additional 50' of cable going to their various tvs. The attic antenna has an old radio shack preamp with about 75' of rg6 cable. The attenuators where placed just after the splitter.

WXXA (RF7) and WNYT (RF12) are combined into the same antenna at the transmitter site. WNYT transmits at 15 kW and WXXA is at 10 kW. It is possible that a reflection is causing some frequency response issues at your location, but that should be fixable by rotaing that antenna one way or the other and noting the change that makes while monitoring RF12, then verifying than there has been no loss on the other channels. The signal display on the TV is not signal strength, it is signal quality, and too much signal can be as much of a problem as toow little signal. Adding attenuators after an amplifier that may be adding distortion will not change the situation.

You mention splitters. Are all splitter outputs properly terminated? Any unterminated coaxial lines will act as filters that can affect the other outputs, so make sure each output is correctly terminated at a TV or with a 75 ohm terminator. Keep in mind that any coaxial switches usually leave the unselected line interminated.

I would proceed by feeding the antenna directly to one TV to be used as a reference, bypassing all splitters to see what is going on directly, and I'd also initially leave out the attenuators. See what each station looks like at that point. If RF12 is still bad, then I'm thinking that a reorientation of the antenna might be in order. The headings you received from TV Fool should pretty much match the headings I send in an earlier e-mail.

Let me know how you make out. You can feel free to contact me directly with more specific information at RKlein@wnyt.com

WTEN started airing its local news in HD yesterday.

Thanks for your reply. The unused outputs of the splitter are terminated with 75ohm terminators. The snowy weather today caused wnya to not be viewable. It also caused wnyt rf 12 to not pixelate. The reading went to 20 and was steady. All other stations readings were unchanged. I have 2 TVs for now each with the same type of dtv converter. I only used the attenuators to experiment with. I originally did not use a preamp with the attic antenna. I installed it because of not getting all of the stations and because of the long cable runs. I may be adding more tvs later. With a break in the weather, I will try to bypass the preamp on the outside antenna to find out what happens.