Fresno, CA - HDTV - Page 54

I'm helping some relatives who live near Woodlake. This is what I have done so far.

I put up an old CM 4228 which I got from a neighbor - - it is only about 22' above ground level.

I just ordered yesterday a Winegard AP 4800 Chromstar 2000 UHF Pre Amplifer (this should come in a few days)

My main question is - - - based on TV Fool radar plot most stations are 180 degrees apart. Can I use the Amplified CM 4228 to hopefully get both sides (meaning the 326 and 143 magnetic)? If so which is the best direction to point the antenna 326 or 143?

Also, is the antenna high enough - - - or do I need to go higher?

TIA

I’m not optimistic, but pointing at Fresno (heading 326) is the only option unless you settle for Bakersfield only. If you remove the screen from the antenna, maybe, just maybe, you can get away with a single antenna solution. In my very limited messing, it seems to work out better with digital broadcasts than analog.

My setup (see above) poops out with a Noise Margin = -18.7dB (Pwr = -109.5dBm). That suggests you can pull in both the Fresno and Bakersfield stations, but you may have a project on your hands.

I put a different BALUN on the CM 4228 yesterday and put it back up pointed toward Fresno (326 mag) and scanned again. Here are the channels received without the amp. (Channels with a X-0 are analog still)

7-1 KAIL (MyNetworkTV) (North of my location)
7-2 RTV (Retro Television)
7-4
8-0
13-0
16-0
18-1-3 KVPT (PBS)
21-1 KFTV (North of my location)
26-1 KMPH (North East of my location)
27-0 KJKZ
30-1-3 KFSN (ABC) (North of my location)
32-0 KJEO
33-0
33-1-5 (Many Sub-Channels here)
35-0
43-1-4 KGMC
51-0
59-1 KFRE
61-1

Thus, I getting most of the stations North and North East of Woodlake but none from Bakersfield. So far no NBC or CBS which they would like to receive.

So far I'm pretty happy with the results considering they were only getting one digital station before (only had rabbit ears).

New Winegard amp comes tomorrow so I should have a new report Wed. or Thurs.

Good show, chapelrun! I'll be curious to know how things go with the amp.

Not for sure why but I get less channels after installing the Winegard App. In genenal terms without the app I was getting 9 analog and 9 digital channels. Now with the app I'm getting 6 analog and 6 digital.

Possibly the noise ratio on the Winegard is a bit high at 2.7 dB

Does anyone know if the FM trap changes the noise level at all?

At this point I may need to take the app back out.

I did remove the Winegard Amp and rescanned - now I get 10 analog and 9 digital channels - - - similar to what I posted above.

Here is what I think happened.

http://www.hdtvprimer.com/ANTENNAS/basics.html

Read the section on why not all amplification works about half way down the article.

Not all amplification is created equal - - if I had it to do over again I would have purchased the Channel Master 7775 instead of the Winegard. But they are very happy with the extra channels and really like the RTV (Retro Television)

I haven't had a KFSN signal since the transition either, but we haven't watched any network TV in the last few weeks, so we didn't notice. I tried this and my Dish box found 30.0 as well. Strangely enough, my TV in the bedroom with a built in ATSC tuner now shows two 30.1 HD channels, they look identical in the setup menu, but there's no signal on the old 30.1, only the new 30.1 has the KFSN signal. Very strange....wonder why KFSN screwed with their feeds when no other broadcasters in this market did...

We saw that as well. The old 30.1 was the one that broadcast on VHF 9 while the new 30.1 was the new' one now using UHF 30. Rescanning took the non-op 30.1 off the list.

'30' always has to be different!
But at least they are a more 'full-time' HD station.

Over-the-air channel 32 is now digital.

32.1 - NBC Universal Sports at 480i
32.2 - "A1" KJEO-32
32.3 - "Coastal Television Network" KJKZ-27
32.4 - "for lease"

I finally installed my 2-bay UHF antenna in the attic. Even though the antenna is about 50 miles from most of the broadcast towers, the antenna is indoors, and it isn't a 4-bay antenna, I still got between signal quality levels between 75% to 90% for all Fresno market over-the-air UHF stations. I hope this stays constant.

Is KNSO still on RF 5?

They were supposed to move to 11 in August, but I don't see a covering license filing for it yet.

Look for CW 59 in HD on DIRECTV tomorrow!

PBS next week!

This is great news - we just moved to the area and had our dtv hooked up yesterday. I was worried I would have to attempt a difficult and long range ota pbs feed

thanks again for the heads up

kvpt 18 hd is now up on Directv.

Just in time for the new Ken Burns film

Thanks for the heads up and thanks dtv

Rodney,

Agreed. Its been a fun six years, and thanks for starting the thread!

Adam

A new over-the-air channel popped up this week, but it's in Spanish. It's called Estrella TV, and it's found as a substation of KFRE, 59.2.

Did ABC-HD fix the problem where the screen would get fuzzy after the video switched to a screen with a lot of detail? I didn't see any of that in the college football game today.

edit : it still gets fuzzy, but it only lasts for about a 1/4 of a second instead of 4-6 seconds.

KMPH will be doing HD news broadcasts within a month. Nice!

Just in case any local DirecTv customers did not yet notice, both KVPT 18(PBS) & KFRE 59 (CW) HD signals are now available over sat signal. Make adjustments to any guide/channel options, if needed.

The digital OTA lineup for the Fresno market on Silicondust's website shows that KNSO is still broadcasting out of channel 5. I don't have a VHF antenna to confirm it, but I know that site updates the listings at least once a week.

update : confirmed, KNSO is still on 5. I somehow caught it on a UHF antenna.

KMPH News is now in HD. I wonder who is next to convert to HD, CBS47 or KSEE24?

I saw an ad for KSEE's 7:00 News. The ad shows a living room w/ Steph Baroojian in what appears to be "HD" on a flat screen.

This of course means NOTHING!!

Happened across KMPH's HD news the other night. I rarely watch KMPH News, but the PQ looked good. One remote shot I saw also looked like KMPH got some nicer HD cameras to use out in the field than Ch 30 currently has.

KAIL and KMPH removed their SD versions of the HD channels. KMPH replaced it with thisTV, which is a station of reruns owned by MGM.

I'm surprised at how great the picture of KAIL looks after the digital switchover. A bunch of their reruns are in HD and they don't have that odd fuzzy picture all the time anymore.

-----

Here are the antennas that I used to successfully receive digital signals from the Fresno stations to Visalia where I am. They are both in the attic of a one-story house, about 15-20 feet from ground level.

Eagle Aspen DTV2BUHF 2-Bay UHF Antenna

and

Channel Master 2016 UHF/VHF-High Antenna

What's funny is that both were rated for reception up to 30 miles, yet here I am about 55 miles from most of the broadcast towers and I'm getting signals at almost to full strength. The reception problems that I had before went away when I stuck them on a post and a mount in the attic. Both antennas being rated red zone (medium directional) for reception might have helped as well. A lack of height was the main problem of bad reception all this time.

Also, I managed to get digital 7 with the UHF-only antenna without problems. KNSO (still on RF 5 !?) comes in glitchy on the UHF-only antenna, and perfect on the 2016, even though it's not meant for VHF-Low reception.

I watched channel 47 and they were talking about the remodeling of their news set this week. They also mention cool surprises this comming week. I have a feeling their remodeling their news set for HD.

That would be nice if 47 goes to HD news. I use to watch 47 for news but switched to 30 because of HD.

For evening news, I usually go w/ 30 as well. WOuld be cool to see 47 go HD soon.

As for KMPH's 10:00 News, no HD paintjob can fix that horrid hour. But 26's HD news does LOOK nice.

Any locals here w/ DirecTv having constant audio dropouts & other glitches on KSEE 24's primetime HD stuff? Just wonder if it's a D*, NBC or KSEE issue.

Lately, iwhen any NBC show we have DVR-ed gets played I now automatically kick on the subtitles/captions - cuz I know random lines of dialog are gona be lost or garbled.

I've noticed this a lot as well on episodes of "The Office" that I've DVR'd - I get the annoying audio "brrrps" a lot on those episodes. I do get these time to time on other HD channels on D*, but Channel 24 has been one of the frequent culprits lately. It also seemed like I was watching Sunday Night Football on Channel 24 a few weeks back and the picture was off a bit and I switched over to the antenna feed on 24.1 and everything was okay. Maybe something is off on D*'s HD feed for Channel 24?