Albany, NY - HDTV - Page 161

Boy that was fast!!!! NOT!!!

I sampled it briefly during the 5 PM news and my first impression was that the studio shots had high setup and clipped whites. But they must know about it and it's easily fixed. I'm sure they'll straighten it out soon. In the past I've been impressed by the DVD-or-better quality of their SD feed.

Three things.

1. For the last two days, WNYA 51 has not been sending programming data (PSIP), which mildly put is really annoying when going through my CM7000-PAL DVR and not knowing what is on. Is there an engineer or contact on here who reads this... please fix!!!

2. What's with WMHT sending out the PSIP in all CAPS on 17.2 and 17.3 with no program descriptions, yet the TVGOS is fine.

3. And finally, I've never seen any discussion of Glens Falls WNCE TV 8 (RF 31) from anyone south of Glens Falls. Is anyone receiving this? I wish they could get guide data in there.

- Brian in Glens Falls

WNYA PSIP started back up, so that's good. Just one comment about the amount of data they're sending; it's only 10 hours ahead. If an engineer sees this, any reason why you can't do at least 24 hours?

I purchased a cm-7000 dtv converter. I tried it on both the attic and roof top antennas. It receives wxxa rf 7 much better than my magnavox 100 using the attic antenna. With the roof top antenna, it receives wnya much better than the magnavox. Wnyt rf 12 will not come in most of time with either receiver on either antenna. Since both wnyt rf 12 and wxxa rf 7 share the same antenna, are in the same ball park power output wise and are so close in frequency, wnyt should come in. Wxxa comes in great. Wnya rf 13 comes in good too but not as strong as wxxa rf 7. I can receive a signal from wnyt but it is not strong enough to produce a picture. It is about 8 out of 100 on the signal meter. Wxxa is at 100. I'm stumped. Does anyone else have any suggestions no matter how far fetched as to why this is the case?

You did not mention your location nor the type of antennas in use, but I suspect a problem with too strong of a signal. WXXA has an ERP of 10 kW while WNYT has an ERP of 15 kW while WNYA on RF13 is about 12.5 kW. Knowing the antenna type and the distribution details of the antenna system would be quite useful in determining the cause of the problem. Compression and non-linear distortion in the antenna system is one of the most critical factors in reception of digital TV.

Please feel free to contact me directly at rklein@wnyt.com so we can determine how best to resolve the problem.

Thanks for your reply Richard. I have posted on the previous page about what I am using for an antenna, etc. I am in Wilton almost 40 miles away from the transmission site. I thought that that would be too far away to worry about signals being too strong but you're the engineer, I am not. According to fooltv, I am receiving edge1 signals for the Helderbergs.

Thanks. I didn't link your previous posts to this later one. From personal experience, signal to noise and pass band frequency response are critical to reception.

Forgive me if I am repetitive in any of the suggestions, but I think we should start at the beginning again. If you have access to a spectrum analyzer, you will be looking for the most rectangular appearing signal for each station (you may not be able to see any differentiation between 12 & 13 since they come right up to each other). If you don't have access to the analyzer, you will need to use your signal quality read out from the receiver.

I'd start out with very little or no use of amplification at first, and send the signal to a one TV only with no splitters in line. If you get no reception of any of the three High Band VHF stations (WXXA, WNYT, WNYA), then I'd add the antenna mounted preamp and see what you get.

Assuming you get a signal at this point, compare the signal quality on each of the 3 HB VHF channels and rotate the antenna to the best average signal quality for all three stations. I suggest this because the refraction of the signal around terrain and reception from multiple paths will affect each of the channels differently, and can result in significant frequency response changes in the pass band for each of the three channels.

Once you are able to get a good compromise signal quality for the 3 HB VHF channels, then check out the Low Band VHF (6) and the three UHF channels to see how they come in.

Next, add the splitter to feed the additional TVs. If you need some more amplification to overcome the losses in the splitter, be careful about the amount of gain you add, since you will be adding significant amplifier noise to the signals as well. Add just enough to overcome the losses in the splitter, and maybe a little more using the signal quality indication as your guide. I've had good luck with an amplified variable gain 4 way splitter available at Radio Shack, but I do not see it in their current catalog.

Make sure any unused outputs of the splitter are terminated with a resistor plug, and make sure there are no unterminated lines going to rooms or TVs not actually connected.

Using the above process you should find a way to receive all of the local stations by compensating for the receive path and receive system components.

Rich

I rotated the antenna and wnyt rf 12 did not come in much better. It went from being unreceivable to pixelizing. At the same time wnya rf 13 went from clear to pixelizing and wxxa rf 7 still came in clear but the signal dropped in half. The uhf and vhf lo stations had no change, remained strong. I don't believe that my problem is signal overload. I had used a preamp during the analog days when the stations ran much higher power and I did not have any stations that were overloaded.

Based on your tests, I would definitely surmise that overload is a likely factor in your reception problem. If 12 went from unusable to pixelizing, and at the same time problems with 7 & 13 started, that tells me that there is distortion occurring somewhere in the receive system. You likely have too much gain in the system. Keep in mind that Analog signals can be compressed quite a lot with little apparent affect on reception or the picture quality. Digital signals cannot be compressed at all without substantially loosing the signal. If compression or clipping is occurring you will loose any data points that are represented by the highest signal levels. 8VSB transmission uses 8 power levels to transmit the data.

So at this point I'd still suggest bypassing the amplifiers and add them one at a time to see where the problem is occurring. You can also check out the following web site that offers some suggestions as well:

http://www.tvtower.com/hdtv_antenna_and_reception.html

Rich

19 is live. I am getting it at 100%. I did not know 45.3 was in hd.

Channel 19 was turned on yesterday, November 21. Right now it is at 40% power. It's not at 100% because there seems to be a reflected power problem with the antenna, feedline, or sampling port. We'll try to get to that next week.

45-3 is widescreen SD, but it looks pretty good.

Here's a coverage map:

http://www.tvfool.com/?option=com_wr...%26sitenum%3d3

It looks great. If it is only at 40%, it is likely to overwhelm my antenna when you go to 100%. I rotored my antenna toward Albany and away from jp and it still reads 80% on my dish receiver. I can not tell the difference between HD and widescreen ~ it may be HD is a bit brighter, but my eyes do not see much of a difference. Good job on getting this done. Now if PBS would add a repeater, I could go to an indoor antenna.

Off Topic: Anyone else having problems with the Sirius Satellite Radio repeaters in Albany? Last night signal was cutting in/out and tonight I have absolutely zero signal. Just wondering if it's just me or something with Sirius. Note: I can only receive the repeater signal within my house and not the satellite signal.

Anyone having a problem with WTEN OTA? I can get 10.3 but not 10.1 or 10.2.

I was getting it very reliably up until a couple of days ago. I have 2 different brand OTA tuners and neither one is picking up 10.1. Everything else seems to be coming in as usual. I never get WMHT OTA but I am getting Vermont Public TV fine.

I get 10.1,10.2,10.3 full bars signal strength on 3 different STBs, I'm in Albany.

No problem here with WTEN OTA on 3 different tuners (HDHomeRun, MyHD and a Vizio TV). If you get 10.3 then your reception of the other two must be OK; they're part of the same transmission. Also their PSIP info looks reasonable; some receivers get upset if that's not available (Windows Media Center is a classic example).

I've seen receivers forget the relationship between a real and a virtual channel but I wouldn't expect that to happen to two TVs at once.

Even though I'm behind the antenna I am able to recieve it and now can watch 45-1, 2 & 3 OTA! Slight dropout every 1 to 2 minutes but much better than what I was getting before the translator, it is actually watchable now. Looking forward to the full power signal.

I think my tuner and/or the splitter failed. I swapped an ATI 750 into this machine along with a diffent splitter and things seem to be back to normal. My 950Q gives 5 green bars on most channels but the ATI only gives 4 orange bars on most channels. I have no idea why this should be the case but the ATI receives channels fine; so I'm not going to worry about the orange bars.

I was picking up 10.3 with my Silicon Dust because I never set the tuner options on that channel and the Silicon Dust is my first option - likely because I manually setup cable before OTA.

I have lost the signal - nothing yesterday and today.

If this happens again, try going to the physical channel (26.3) and see if you see it there. I've had viewers call in the past who lost their mapping on their set/set top converter box, and my two channels show up on their physical locations.

Same here W, nothing yesterday or today. Wonder if it's weather related?

19 appears to be completely dead now. I get nothing.

They must have taken it off line - according to the signal map, the signal at my house should be strong enough that I could pick it up with just my dental work :-) . Great potential though.

I checked again yesterday and still nothing at my place. I wonder if WRGB EngDept could give us an explanation? Could the cold weather and snow on the ground be causing them problems for the fix?

WOW Time warner Cable Just took away Fuse TV HD, Channel 1757 with no notification says

"Fuse TV is no longer available. visit TWCConversations.com for more information"

You go on the website, no notification, nothing! Wow you suck Time Warner.

Do WRGB and WNYT actually operate antennas on West Mountain, near Glens Falls, NY? TVFool shows WRGB on Channel 39 and WNYT on Channel 45.

http://www.tvfool.com/?option=com_wr...%26sitenum%3d1

http://www.tvfool.com/?option=com_wr...%26sitenum%3d2

I was in Glens Falls this weekend and tried to pick these stations up at a relative's house with an amplified indoor antenna from Radio Shack. I tried the antenna both amplified and un-amplified and could not pick up a thing. Being 5 miles away from the tower, I figured I could pick these stations up with anything.

Are these stations not broadcasting? Is this an old tower no longer functioning? a future antenna? or is the problem on my end?

Thank you.

So far as I know, neither one has been built yet. Both are only permits.

- Trip

WNYT and WRGB each have construction permits to build transmitter facilities near West Mountain in the Glens Falls area. WNYT is currently planing to build sometime in late Spring.

Tried again today, RF 19 is dead. That was short lived.