Charlotte, NC - OTA - Page 170

Audio keeps dropping out on WBTV during Bold and the Beautiful. Switched to WSPA.

WBTV is having all kinds of issues it seems. Saw this posted elsewhere.

WBTV tower cam had very good live video of Air Force 1 leaving Clt this morning.

From our control in Charlotte, up the fiber to the uplink in CT, to the bird, back down to TWC receive site, thru the TWC plant, back to us in the control room via TWC..... 15 seconds.

Really now..some would say that Ballantyne is NOT Charlotte...

Ballantyne says they are not Charlotte!

I thought all the Clt stations did a good job with the DNC coverage. Despite a few audio/video glitches here and there, it was overall very well done. I'm sure it was a major technical and logistical challenge.

Out of curiosity, I performed an audio comparison between 3 UNC transmitters. I used two receivers, and positioned myself about halfway between them. WUNL and WUNG did not seem to be different as to when I heard the audio. I could not actually tell which source was which. However, there was some difference with WUNE. The sound from WUNE was slightly behind both of the others, a few milliseconds, which I think might be explained by that transmitter being quite a ways more distant from the receivers than the other two stations.

RF travels at the speed of light..So I don't think you could notice any difference due to the relatively short distance..most likely, it's due to MPEG transport delay and processing.

You may be perfectly correct. The time difference, line of sight RF, to me, between WUNG and WUNL is very, very small. The time difference between WUNE and either of the other two, relative to me, would be about .3 millisecond. I did not figure that until you responded, but should have. There are two knowns I should mention. WUNE is one of a small number of UNC stations that multiplexes the programs in a different order from the flagship WUNC. The Explorer Channel is .1 on WUNE, rather than having the main UNC-TV program on .1. That might or might not explain a delay. The other thing is that WUNE is about 85 miles from me, and, I have often wondered if I was receiving it in a straight line of sight.

I am told that WUNE is multiplexed differently in order to gain carriage on DirecTv.

I've understood that carriage was the factor, but the specifics, I've never been sure of. Over time, I've sorta thought that UNC-TV 's vision changed as to how to do digital. Originally, the thought was OTA would be strong. But, when things got going, subscription customers seemed more the audience. Eventually the 4 daytime programs dropped to 3 OTA, with carriage having to be the reason.

WUNE/Linville and WUNM/Jacksonville carry UNC-EX on their primary channel to get the EX channel on satellite. I assume it's for DMAs where there are duplicate channels - WUNM overlaps with WUNK/Greenville. I'm not sure what WUNE overlaps with... WUNG maybe?

Do not all UNC channels have the UNC-EX on satellite? WUNL Winston-Salem is listed like this on the Directv guide... I assumed they were just re-maps of WUNC Chapel Hill put in the appropriate channel spot in each DMA.

26 UNC
26-2 UNCEX

Event though UNC-EX is either the -3 or -1 position and never -2 OTA...

Yes, WUNE overlaps with WUNG since they are both in the Charlotte market.

This is true but just barely. I get both from Huntersville and it's true they are multiplexed differently which did force not only DirectTV but Dish Network as well to provide two UNC channels as part of their "locals" package. My antenna configuration is more than what most would have in this area and I'd say the vast majority of people in CLT will never pickup WUNE.

In general I think UNC-TV does a pretty bad job of providing coverage to Charlotte. Their station in Concord, WUNG, doesn't put out much power, and it's also located NE away from all the other transmitters in the area making it difficult to pick up with an OTA for a lot of the area. In Raleigh, their main station is operating at full power and is easy to pickup with an indoor antenna.
Edited by blackcat6 - 9/9/12 at 4:35am

WUNE- 17 has a very strong signal, and it may be due more to tower height in the mountains, rather than power level. I am not sure if they are full power 1000kw, but they do put out a good signal. I receive them here in northern Greenville, SC with a UHF yagi antenna in the attic. So in Charlotte, if you had a 91XG, MXU59, or 9095, you would probably be able to pick it up. Not so sure if a DB4, 4221, or CS2 would quite be able to get it, which would probably be a more typical antenna for the Charlotte market.

That was a pretty smart move to do that, although it is a little strange to have to type in 17-2 to watch the main channel OTA (and through QAM where I live)! I'm surprised that South Carolina ETV doesn't do the same thing to get Dish and DirecTV carriage of either the South Carolina Channel or ETV World. In the Greenville/Spartanburg market, they could possibly get Dish and DirecTV carriage of both subchannels since they have three stations in that market.

Yeah. The primary reason that I get it is that I have my main antenna pointed at Hickory for WKHY and due to my location it puts WUNE right in the line of sight It was a fortunate alignment or otherwise I don't think I'd get it. . There is some other station up that way which I will pick up from time to time but I don't remember which one. I've got a 4 bay hand built antenna in an upstairs bedroom on a TV that's not used much, and while it will pick up WKHY, it won't get WUNE.

SCETV has overkill in the GSP market, with 2 full power stations with an almost identical coverage area. 29.1 in Greenville, and 49.1 in Spartanburg. Plus 38.1 in Greenwood. I get all 3, with 2 of them at 100%. Gov. Nikki Haley wants to cut funding to the arts; what they should do is sell off either RF9 or RF43, after determining which one has the better signal. Like I said, they are too close together and have almost identical coverage maps. Unnecessary duplication. If anything, they should improve the Rock Hill SCETV signal on 30.1 to better serve the Charlotte market. As for UNCTV, I also receive 33.1 from Asheville, which is multiplexed normally, unlike 17.1.

I can get 30.1 at the very north end of UNCC at the Harrisburg border with no problems at all.

I get WNSC, WTVI, and WUNG all just fine here in Mint Hill.. which is 2 1/2 times more PBS than is needed....

You, Tyler and Blackcat all have made good points. I will squarely blame the FCC's myopia for the under and over service involved here. Too few channels available, too much chance of co-channel and adjacent channel interference. At some point, the FCC will have to determine that the legitimate rape of OTA is over for a while, and, have to remap channel assignments, assuming there are any TV channels remaining.

Even in my hilly-terrain area south of Morganton, I get all these PBS channels: WUNE (17) Linville, WUNG (58) Concord, WUNF (33) Asheville, and a Polk County translator from the UNC-TV Network. From SCETV, I get WNTV (29) Greenville, and WRET (49) Spartanburg. The head-scratcher here is that a good chunk of this audience (environmentalists) hates the sight of TV towers because they ruin the natural beauty - do they know their campaign against a taller WLOS tower atop Mt Pisgah also impacted their beloved PBS? Those mean TV towers also kill birds...and I could go on but I won't. I'm too busy trying to drill for oil in my backyard.

Eric

I enjoy some of the PBS programming, and it certainly has its place. I particularly like NC Weekend, and Washington Week. But both UNCTV and SCETV are always having telethons asking for money. Looks like the unnecessary overlap and duplication of transmission towers could be reduced or redesigned in order to reduce expenses. I receive 3 SCETV channels and 2 UNCTV channels at my location, and that just seems like overkill.

I notice some changes to channel 46 & 55

• WJZY 46.3 = Identified as THISTV (right now showing same as 46.4)
• WJZY 46.4 = Country TV appears to be moving here.
• WMYT 55.2 = Identified as SOUL (blank picture &Sound)

Same here for PBS programming. Since there is almost no science, nature, history, decent cooking, or any anthology shows being shown on the main HD channels, PBS is the only place to find it.

It is good to see ThisTV returning. But I hope they do a good job multiplexing in terms of pic quality on all 4 channels. ThisTV looked good when it was on WBTV, and I would hate to see the HD suffer on 46.1. Although I don't watch much CW programming. As for this Soul of the South, I guess it'll be sort of another Bounce. Not my personal preference there.

ABC has moved General Hospital to 2pm so, in most markets, the new Katie Couric show can be carried at 3pm. Or in some cases, 4pm. So I find it curious that in Charlotte, WSOC has chosen to carry it a day late at 10am, while moving Dr. Phil to 3pm. Does Dr. Phil do that much better than they expect Katie to do? I sometimes watch The Drs. and Dr. Oz, but not normally Dr. Phil. I am watching Katie on 13-WLOS right now, although not really interested in Jessica Simpson talking about losing her baby fat. I would like to see ABC use Katie more on GMA, as she is very good on morning TV.

Here is an article about WJZY adding This TV:

http://www.cbc-raleigh.com/capcom/news/2012/wjzy_12/this_tv/this_tv.html