LaCrosse / Wausau, WI - HDTV - Page 6

From what I have heard, all of the PBS stations in WI are currently upgrading their equipment and are not broadcasting anything in HD.
Ironically, Charter just started offering PBS HD through their HD teir, just in time for there to be no HD on it.

WEAU-DT has been fine for me too. (Through Charter)

WKBT-DT is working fine for me. (Through Charter, but all Charter does is grab the signal out of the air, and re-broadcast it).

quote: WLAX-DT is at 2.65kw. WXOW is at 50kw. Both antennas are mounted at the base of their towers. WHLA is near the top of its tower and is at 50kw. So you need a little more horsepower to get WLAX-DT due to its lower power


WXOW-DT's antenna is actually located just under the NTSC at the top (center of radiation for DT is 755 feet AGL). It is side-mounted on the La Crosse side of the tower... which results in a slight null toward's Rochester. Once analog goes away, we will be moving to the top of the tower and then convert our analog transmitter to digital... which will result in a lot more power (250KW erp).

I'm not sure where WLAX's antenna (ch25 analog/rf channel 17) is actually mounted since I can't see any antenna on that tower for it from over here at WXOW. It could be on the bottom I guess... since that tower isn't built to handle any extra load. For what's it worth, they barely register above the noise floor for me in Bangor. My setup could be improved since my antenna is inside my garage about 15 feet above ground... but who cares since they are simply just putting out upconverted 480i anyhow. No HD!

WHLA (ch31) ended there HD programming loop since there was going to be a hefty subscription service added to carry that feed. They will still have HD provided whenever there is something on the main PBS feed that is HD (at least once they get everything settled equipment-wise), but they aren't going to shell out big bucks for that loop!

Any more questions?

Sorry for the mistake.

Maybe someone should correct the FCC database's listing for the STA:

WXOW-TV WI LA CROSSE USA (Digital)

Licensee: WXOW-WQOW TELEVISION, INC.
Service Designation: DS Special Temporary Authority (digital)

Channel: 14 470 - 476 MHz
File No.: BMDSTA-20040402ADC Facility ID number: 64549
CDBS Application ID No.: 989163

43° 48' 23.00" N Latitude
91° 22' 2.00 " W Longitude (NAD 27)

Polarization:
Effective Radiated Power (ERP): 49. kW ERP
Antenna Height Above Average Terrain: 331.7 meters HAAT
Antenna Height Above Mean Sea Level: 599.1 meters AMSL
Antenna Height Above Ground Level: 0. meters AGL

Of course, 16 meters seems pretty small for a tower, since the analog is listed at 347m HAAT.

Not sure why they have that at zero... probably didn't have the AGL figure on hand, so they just leave it at zero. Thankfully, they have the first two correct!

I have a DirecTV HD receiver with the OTA antenna. As od this date we STILL do not have a FOX affiliate broadcasting HD. Has anyone in the Eau Claire,WI area had any luck being granted waivers for the FOX distant network feed? WEUX-DT is the local affiliate and appears to have been granted a lifelong extention.

Thanks in advance,

I know that WEUX-DT is in the works. No word on when it will hit the air or if it will even be HD (WLAX is not... so I suspect the same up in Eau Claire). I imagine it will hit the air soon. If I find out anything from their chief, I'll pass it along.

See this thread for more info: http://hdtvtwincities.com/forumbb/viewtopic.php?t=1632

You are correct. The most recent time I talked to their cheif engineer he said that the Eau Claire station would not be HD to start with, and once they got it over to digital (and got enough money) then they would upgrade WLAX to HD.

What I don't understand is how it has taken just about a year to get WEAU switched over to digital. They turned on the WLAX digital last December 9th, and he said at that point in time that they already had all the equipment to go ditial in Eau Claire.

Can someone let me know the simulcast information for WQOW and WXOW? IIRC, WKBT, WEAU and WLAX are not simulcasting at this point. I'm helping set up a web site that is intended to replace 10000kw, which went to a pay service a couple of years ago.

Thanks in advance!

I am new to the whole OTA HDTV experience, so please forgive my ignorance. I have a projector that will accept HD, but no tuner yet. Here's my story:

I live in Stevens Point. My house came with an outdoor antenna (around 6' feet long) that is mounted to a tower that has to be at least 30' high. I have no idea what kind of antenna it is, but I have become very curious about it now that I know that most DTV is UHF. I dragged our 13" standard def television over to the window and hooked it up to the cable that has been hanging (unused) from the antenna for the last 5 years.

I pick up analog Fox 55 (Wittenberg, UHF), but with bad ghosting. Antennaweb lists this station under the dark blue antenna type (medium directional with preamp). Given that all of the DTV available to Point (ABC,CBS,PBS) comes under the red antenna category, can I expect better results? Or, more of the same? Is there a better test I can try before I invest in a tuner?

If I can't use the one I have, are there others out there in Central Wisconsin (roughly the same distance or further from Wausau) who have had success with indoor antennae?

Thanks!

Irenicus,

I had a nice long message written and then the server went down and lost my rambling. Here is a summary!

What projector do you have?

I live in Wis Rapids, so I'm just a little south of you. I use a Channel Master 4228 and the 4 bay version. I have no problems pulling Wausau and now even get Eau Claire channel 13. I have my antenna about 35' up with the 4228 aimed between Eau Claire and Wausau that pulls 13 in the 70-80's range and Wausau in the 90's. I used to have two antennas roof mounted with the bigger 4228 going to Eau Claire with signal strength in the 60-70's and the smaller on at Wausau that sat in the low 90's. I do use the Channel Master 7777 preamp that I'm sure helps some along with a RCA DTC100 tuner. I have tried to pull in Green Bay Fox 11 with no long and did try to get Madison and La Crosse but nothing would work well. I thought it was weird that i can get Eau Claire so good but not Green Bay. Green Bay is about 10 miles closer and they are broadcasting at the same power for their digital signals. Basically if you have any type of outdoor antenna you should have no problems with Wausau, Eau Claire might happen if the antenna has a good line of sight. Head over to your new Best Buy or Walmart and get a simple tuner and see what works if no luck take it back.

Dave

WEAU's tower is "only" about 300 meters higher than the ones in Green Bay. Antenna height (receiving and transmitting) is the #1 factor in reception over distance. Transmitting power is way down the list.

sregener,

Where did you pull the elevation numbers from? When i looked at one of the web pages it had ground elevation and then tower height listed. I thought both were very close when you added the two up.

FCC TV Query:

WEAU-DT, 585.1m HAAT, 902m AMSL (above sea level), 567.7m AGL
WLUK-DT, 365m HAAT, 614.8m AMSL, 343.5m AGL

WLUK was the highest digital I found in Green Bay, though maybe you know of another.

WEAU has one baaaaaad tower!

Now that would make a difference. Can you explain the difference with broadcast strength. I'm looking at http://www.2150.com/broadcast/defaul...=Show+Stations

Why do some stations show 50.3kw and the next 1000kw? Is the 50.3kw really 503kw? Thanks.

I'm at work so I can't confirm this but I just received an e-mail from WPT's Ann Collins saying:

"Hi - Just wanted to let you know that Wisconsin Public Television has resumed broadcasting our HD channel. You may need to have your TV rescan for the channel, but it is back and running. Hope you are able to enjoy it."

Good news indeed!

Larry

Not all stations are broadcasting at full power today, for a variety of reasons. 1000kw is the maximum UHF power a station can broadcast at, and that is somewhat limited by antenna height - if their tower is over a certain height, that number is reduced, but never below 500kw. Yes, 50.3kw is really 50.3kw.

For what it's worth, I hope you fudged your lat/long numbers a little. Otherwise, you just posted your location to the world. Fortunately, the server lets you modify your own posts, so there's still time to fudge things. I would suspect that rounding to the nearest degree wouldn't change your results enough to matter for illustrative purposes.

Confirmed. Just checked it and they were running PBS-HD on 31-1.

I received the same message from Ann, good news to hear.

I'm not worried about my lat & long, they are just going to find me living in a van down by the river!

More from Ann. I had replied to her earlier message and asked about inconsistencies between what was scheduled on 31-1/31-2 and what was aired, as well as if WPT would be broadcasting original programming or reimplementing the national feed. My membership expired last month and this is just the incentive I needed to renew.

"Hi - We have had a problem with these listings and our staff is working with the people who handle the listings. I'm not really clear on why it's happening, but we're definitely working on it.

The HD channel will be airing the programming from PBS that we were offering in the past.
We still don't have the ability to send out our own HD signal. We were able to renegotiate
our contract with PBS to make it finiaicially possible to resign for the signal.

So one channel should be the simulcast of our regular analog programming which is what
would be listed in Airwaves and in your newspapers, and one is the HD programming coming directly from PBS."

Larry

You mean titantv's guide? Or that 31-1 never/rarely showed what was in the TV Guide?

Oops - I sometimes forget that we aren't all using DirecTV. I get my updates via satellite and several times in past couple of months, I set my PVR to record a scheduled program listed in the Advanced Programming Guide (which shows the channel schedule out to 2 weeks) only to get something else entirely. Typically, it would be the show that was being simulcast on the other channel. A show scheduled for 8pm on 31-1 would actually be on 31-2, which had a different program listed than the one being shown. I never thought to crossreference a time slot with TitanTV or TV Guide so I'm not sure if they had the correct listings or not. I'm sure I could have programmed the time and channel manually but I'm not that organized presently. Now maybe I can stay that way a bit longer .

Larry

Not sure what information you're looking for in terms of simulcasting... WQOW is WXOW's satellite station to help cover the La Crosse - Eau Claire Market. They have nearly identical programming, with everything originating out of La Crosse. The exceptions are news, cut-ins, and a church program on Sunday morning.

In terms of Analog and Digital broadcasts, both stations fully replicate programming their analog programming on the digital channel. Both stations also have a secondary channel on the digital (WXOW actually has two available), but they are relatively dormant due to FCC requirements (EAS warning, closed captioning, children's programming). 19.2 for WXOW is on but simply rebroadcasting the same version as 19.1 but in anamorphic... if that's your thing .

Hopefully this answers your question... but I guess I'm still a little confused on what you were looking for!
-Jarrett

So 19.2 is 480i? Or 720p? I assume 480i, since fitting two 720p versions on at the same time would be difficult.

Otherwise, exactly the info I needed.

That is correct... 480i is what it is. 19.1 and its 720p signal eat up 12 Mb of the 19.4 Mb stream. Until they figure out how to compress things more, one HD is what you'll have. SD channels only require 4 Mb for full 480i resolution. Our 19.3 signal, when available is squeezed a bit (2.5 Mb)... so that one will show some artifacts when there is a lot of picture change and motion (compressors can't keep up). Let me know if you need anything else!
-Jarrett

Has anyone noticed a problem with WKBT-DT and their Dolby 5.1 signal? I receive the Dolby from both WXOW and WHLA, but my AV receiver won't show any 5.1 signal from WKBT. This seems to just started recently or maybe I just noticed it. Every once an a while, I lose the voice track and only get the sound track. I wanted to find out if this was a problem other people noticed, or I have to dig farther into my equipment.

Anyone around here using Charter cable with a cablecard? I just made the plunge into a Samsung HLR4667W DLP with an installed cablecard at home (finally). The problem I've been seeing is that the TVGOS data will not populate. I'm not even getting "no listings"... I simply get the empty "this screen has no data available" message when the TV guide comes up (for four days now).

I find that odd, since I purchased the 50" version of this set for work a month ago and it does populate the guide. The only difference in the set-ups is the fact that one uses a cablecard (home) and one does not (work). Both have off-air antennas hooked up for the local DT's. Any one else using a cablecard in the area and having these issues? I'm rattling some cages over at Charter, but so far, no ideas. My only thought is that they've switched to a full digital lineup with their STB's and probably cablecards as well. That may be stripping the VBI off the host channel (I'm guessing WHLA... although I have some gemstar junk in one of my racks at WXOW as well, I think for VCR plus though). Quite odd

If anyone out there has any ideas, let me know... I've searched through the other forums and found lots of issues with Toshibas, but not with Samsung's. This should work! Thanks for any input in advance!
-Jarrett

Charter in Rochester has been doing data "shaping" for quite some time now, squeezing three 13Mbps streams into one 39Mbps channel. Now, that may not be a problem for 720p as WXOW-DT does it, but it *is* a problem for any station delivering full-bandwidth HD, especially in 1080i. The picture quality, I'm told, suffers horribly from this shaping.

Rumor has it they'll be buying better encoders (possibly flexible bit-rates) in the near future to correct the artifacting problems, but no one has reported it being done yet.

It is entirely possible that Charter is chopping bandwidth to squeeze more channels in over there in La Crosse, too. And anything considered "extra," like guide data, would be the first to go.

Anybody else having Audio problems with Monday night football? WAOW-DT VIA OTA I'm getting just the left and right speaker without any commentary. Very Annoying