Fargo, ND - HDTV - Page 13

Notice came with my January bill...nothing on it about new channels, unfortunately...

Jeez. I thought $10 a month was unnecessary for only 4 HD channels. Now they want $20? This I think is the last straw with cableone for me. I'm going to go chat with the satellite guys in town this week. Does anyone recommend any certain local distribution company?

I'm splitting my cable, running an input from the DVR into the tv but also just running straight cable into the tv. With the tv's built in tuner, I get the four hd channels from the straight cable, but the picture doesn't seem to be quite as good as from the DVR...

I don't think that's quite how it is, but I can't find the exact pricing on the website. I thought they charged $5 for the HD "package" and $5 more for the DVR. If the DVR fee is doubling that would go to $10 making the total for the HD package with DVR $15...but you should still be able to get just the HD channels for $5 (assuming they have the non-DVR receivers in stock). The other $10 really doesn't have anything to do with HD - you're paying for the DVR which you can use on ALL channels.

From the flyer, rates effective February 1:

Basic cable: $42.50
Digital access: $9.95
Digital value pak: $5.00
HDTV/DVR: $19.95

I believe the value pak is the channels above 63....the HD channels were included in the digital access, so you didn't't need the DVR to get them, at least in the past. The way it's worded now, I'm not so sure...

Technically you were supposed to pay for the HD package to get the HD channels all along, but they weren't encrypted so any QAM tuner would be able to receive them. How it used to work (according to http://www.cableone.net/digitalcable/dvr.asp) is that if you already had the HD package the DVR was $5 more. If you didn't have the HD package but did have digital cable, the DVR was $10 more (which I presume includes $5 for the HD package and $5 for the DVR). If you didn't even have digital cable, the DVR cost you $18.95 more (which they say includes $8.95 for digital access, and I presume also includes $5 for HD, and $5 for DVR).

So the $10 add-on for digital cable customers is going to $19.95. It doesn't indicate what the $5 add-on for HD customers will move to. They could be getting rid of it I guess, and it won't be possible to just pay for the HD package. Which I would strongly doubt because I'm quite sure there are people in this area who actually do have a non-DVR HD receiver - will their charge go from $5 to $10?

They don't even carry the no-DVR HD boxes any more. I fought with them for 2 days over this stating that it was ridiculous that I had to pay extra for a DVR, when I already own a TIVO. I only wanted the HD channels. I pretty much got the "well, that's too bad" from them. They don't give a rats ass about their customers. How long have we been watching that commercial of the two girls picking up their mail saying "I have cable. My rates are staying the same." I seem to remember seeing it just a month or so ago, and here we are with another rate increase.

The point is that they can try and break down the HD and dvr service into separate prices, but you can't get them separately, so you are forced to pay for the DVR whether you want it or not. It may only be $5 for the HD service, but you are going to pay $20 whether you want to or not. That's why I'm ready to switch to satellite.

I'll try to stop in and get some current info sometime. When I first got my DVR they just said they were out of the non-DVR boxes and didn't know when they were getting more. It would be an odd move for them to purposely not carry them, especially after the price increase. Before it was just another $5 which I was willing to do. And now I probably couldn't live without some kind of DVR.

Do they still have the non-DVR box in the office for the HD demo? I think they had that one and not the DVR out there before.

Yeah, that's what I argued with them about. They said they don't even carry the non-dvr boxes anymore. What a joke. If you hear differently, let me know.

Has anyone gotten one of the 6412 Phase 3 boxes with the HDMI out recently? It looked like CableOne had some based on some posts from a few months back. I replaced my box about a week ago because my old was on the verge of a meltdown (it would get really hot and the picture would freeze). I didn't make the lady check all the boxes they had, but the few I saw were all DVI boxes.

Got mine back in October, and it has the HDMI....couldn't find the manual last night, though, and for some reason I'm thinking that the HDMI isn't activiated...

I got mine in September, and the HDMI is definitely activated since that's how I have it connected.

As a resident near Fargo I've been lurking for a while now trying to keep informed on what's happening locally. For those of us in Horace on Midcontinent - KVLY, KXJB and KFME just got added to the HD channel lineup last Friday. I'm quite pleased with the HD lineup that Midcontinent is offering:

KXJB
KVLY
KFME
ESPNHD
FSNHD
TNTHD
DiscoveryHD
HDNet
HDNetMovies
INHD
INHD2

Just an FYI for any other local Midco customers wondering about HD offerings.

Does anyone know if Cableone has enabled external hard drive support on its HD DVRs, specifically the 6412? I am hoping the recent addition of local channels on MidContinent bodes well for adding the channels to Cableone, so I will need a lot more hard drive space to record HD from local channels!

Well, looks like MidContinent was able to negotiate a carriage agreement with KVLY/KXJB. CableOne better darn well be negotiating with them. Now there is no excuse for them to drag their feet in getting something done. Arrrgh.

I have the Phase 3 box with HDMI. It will send out a 480i signal but will not (in my experience) send out a 1080i signal at all, despite much fiddling. I finally abandoned it and went Component for all connections.

I did a bunch of searching on using a HD with a Phase 3 box, and it's a No-Go. It has to be specifically enabled, and from what I've read, ALL cable providers have elected to NOT enable it.

No I'm pretty sure they have not. I'm not aware of any cable companies that have enabled the SATA external HDD port on the Motorola 6412's. Motorola generally develops the firmware for all the companies, and I don't think they've got to that yet, since they've mostly been fixing issues and not adding new features.


I don't know where you're reading that, but the HDMI port definitely, 100% sure, no doubt about it, outputs HD at 1080i (or whatever output format you've selected in your cable box settings) from the 6412 box. I've been using it for many months. What are the output settings on your cable box? Is your TV HDCP compliant? (I'm not sure if there are any HDMI TV's out there that don't comply with HDCP, but it may be possible)

Also, are you passing the HDMI through any other devices (receivers, etc.) or is it going straight to the TV?

Hey guys, I just received my HD card for my media center pc. I set up the antenna and can pull in all but kvly and wday (the latter i dont care about). Is KVLY signal down right now? I have been unable to get a signal on the card nor my tv itself since yesterday. Anyone else having trouble with it? Any suggestions?

I've tried several times to get the HDMI port working with my HDTV (yes, it's brand new and HDCP compliant). I have tried it direct and thru the receiver and same results both ways. Strange thing is that both the receiver and TV are both Sony, so you'd think they'd talk well together.

Got something in my cable bill tonight that mentioned to check online about ABC/NBC/etc. going to HD signals. !!!!! Anyone have more info?

natelv: There is a bug somewhere in our listings and MCE and you have to change the physical channel number for KVLY from 58 to 44. I'm not sure of the details on how to do that, but maybe someone can post the details? It also might get fixed by whomever masters the episode guide at Microsoft.

All: I'll take 100% credit when the locals start broadcasting over Cable One. I said out loud that the minute I build a HTPC and get an antenna up and running for locals that Cable One would start sending them out and my work would not be as urgent. Sure enough...

I'm not sure exactly what you got in your insert. If it's the same one as I got, it was a national insert that basically just said to check online for availability of local channels. CableOne has a lot of markets, some of them have local channels in HD, others don't...so you have to go online to see what your market has.

Thanks for the info Sped - i will try manually programming in the channels.

natelv- which ATSC card did you choose for your MCE box?

Thanks!

I have the AVerMedia AVerTVHD MCE A180. I bought it off newegg.com. Chose it because I order everything from newegg and its one of the few hd cards they had, and had 5 star reviews. I can say this card is GREAT. Very easy to install and hasnt caused a problem yet. The problem comes with KVLY and the FCC so far, and that integrating into MCE. I've also heard good things about the Vbox hd card. I have the avermedia card paired with a sapphire brand ati theater 550 pro analog tuner card. Both work great and flawlessly so far (1 week or so). I do however notice a problem with the analog card having a low audio level (any fixes?). Then I have all this piped to my shiny new Xbox 360 as an extender (which is AWESOME).

FARGO MCE OWNERS WHO WANT HD ANTENNA RECORDING, LISTEN UP:
As stated above by me and a couple other posts, MCE puts KVLY-DT as the phsycal channel 58 when it should be 44. To get my card working with KVLY-DT and MCE, I did the following:

1. go to C:\\Documents and Settings\\All Users\\Application Data\\Microsoft\\eHome\\EPG\\prefs this is where MCE stores the program guide info in an xml format.
2. right click atscchannels.xml and select edit. IF you dont have this file yet, you need to set the signal up first in MCE and get all channels but KVLY working - then return when you see this file...
3. should give you something like this:










4. Chane the KVLY phsyical reference to .... physical="44" .... or just copy and paste this into the file.










5. I rebooted for good measure. And to my suprise this cured the problem.

6. start MCE, go the area to test your signal strength - I have Full green bars on all but KXJB which is about 2 less than full and orange - still great, strong signal.

Note: I also tried adding the channel manually the the MCE settings but this still did not work properly.

Hope that helps for some of you fellow MCE people out there who have or will have this problem.

PM me if you still need help.

What channels are broadcasting in HD in the fargo dma, a friend of mine lives in fargo and is interested. The avs list only shows pbs there being in hd, but i suspect that needs to be updated. Thank you

Thanks for the feedback natelv. I am tempted to try the Dvico FusionHDTV 5 Lite since it has QAM capabilities. It'll be a couple of months before I give it a try as I don't plan a trip the roof anytime soon. Great stuff on the channel listing modification also.

houselog442- of the channels listed in natelv's post above yours- kfme (PBS), kxjb (CBS) and kvly (NBC) are now broadcasting an OTA HD signal. kvrr (FOX) could be this year and wday (ABC) might not broadcast an HD signal in our lifetimes.

Quick update to the above modification.

My MCE updated program guide info today. It reverted my settings back to chan. 58. Stupid FCC and KVLY. It worked for a while at least. Ideas now anyone?

The FCC and KVLY didn't do anything wrong. KVLY petitioned the FCC a couple years ago to change their frequency from 58 to 44. If MCE can't update their software in two years I'd say it's their problem...

EDIT: I searched for a few minutes and found a place on microsoft.com where you can submit program guide errors. I submitted one - no harm in other people submitting them too: http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/u...rting/epg.aspx

Well, according to the forum, the rate increase isn't as bad as I thought--maybe I just misinterpreted...still nothing about new channels, though...