Hattiesburg, MS - HDTV - Page 5

I think I know the answer...but what direction are you pointed?

By indoor are you referring to on tv or like an attic mount?

It is Feb 12, and still no CBS HD. Guess we really do have to wait another year. Jericho will look great tonight on analog cable.
I guess it will add to the "mystique" of the show.

It's a regular indoor antenna that I sit on top of my speaker. Nothing really large. I have it pointed south toward the WLOX and WXXV towers. It picks up WDAM fine in the living room connected to my Dish Network box. When I hook it up to the Media Center box in my bedroom, the signal strength is fine, but its just a blank screen. It doesn't really make sense. I've been warned about multipath with the strong signal, but everything I read says it will cause things like ghosting etc, not just a blank screen. I'm at a loss.

I'd be fine with it connected to my Dish box, but Dish doesn't provide a guide for stations that they don't carry. VERY frustrating.

Stallion,

I remember the conversations about your problem. Neither I or any of the other Raycom engineers could come up with a suitable reason for your PC not decoding our signal. Has anyone else here had that problem?

The prevalent thought at the time was that the PC receiver was more sensitive and it was being overloaded by the signal.

We just installed some new encoding equipment. I assume you still have the same problem?

I have not connected it to my Media Center PC in a while, maybe as long as a month. I'll give it a try again.

So my situation just got really bizarre...I have one of the large aluminum antennas that fold out...I moved it into the attic and shortened my cable run and improved my NBC signal but lost everything else. I pointed it due south, collapsed down the arms and set it on the rafters instead of suspended from the top of the attic. My NBC decreased from 100% to about 70% but now I have a 70% signal for FOX and about a 40% ABC signal.

Anybody know why collapsed and laying in a pile in the attic is working better?

Anybody else have any unexpected methods to improve reception?

I've rescanned a couple of times, and I have not been able to pick up WDAM in HD. Is it down? It's been the best and easiest one for me to pick up with my Vizio built-in antenna. I've also not been able to get PBS for quite sometime.

No, we are up at full power. Where are you located?

Jim

Off of Oak Grove road in Hattiesburg. I'll try to rescan tonight.

Me (South 34th) and a buddy of mine (Elks Lake Rd) have both lost our WDAM HD as well.

When I punch in 2-1, which used to be WDAM HD (OTA), I get a blue "blank" screen now. I noticed in a previous post that someone was getting a blank screen for WDAM on their PC, but my tv is not hooked up to a PC.

I didn't check last night, but I've been able to get WDAM fine with my antenna connected to my Dish box. So they aren't down, as far as I know. I'll check tonight if I have time.

my WDAM is coming in fine...on 7-1 though not 2-1

drake and mrholder,

Are you OTA or on Comcast? I don't understand why it comes up on your set as 2-1.

I'm hooked up to comcast (regular cable not digital). I get a mixture of comcast analog channels and ota digital channels with the built-in antenna on my Vizio television. I just do an automatic scan or search to get the channels. It scans for analog channels first and then for digital channels. The channels are listed with dashes if they are digital (2-1, 3-1, etc.) Analog channels are just listed 2 through 64 (cable). In other words, I get WDAM on channel 4 and I was also getting WDAM on channel 2-1 (OTA) in high definition until recently.

Comcast may have filtered it out. Or stopped transmitting the signal.

The 2-1 you were getting came from comcast not OTA. I have a usb tuner that I take home occasionally and hook it to my analog cable. Last time I could get WDAM, WLOX and WXXV HD from comcastic.

Hi Jim,
Its refreshing to see someone in content production give a rip. Other stations seem to care about the quality of their signal only so much as to make sure that they can tell that it is a church's chicken commercial. Keep up the good work.
Wesley

Thanks for that. Broadcasters have to get the word out and help folks who have questions.

This is going to be a huge change for the industry and the country as a whole. I'm afraid there will be many rural people who lose access to over the air TV next year. We have been lobbying hard for local into local for our market but so far no luck.

wilkiesan28,

I do not have digital cable from comcast. All of the HD channels I get are OTA. If I do get them from Comcast, then I'm not paying any extra for them. 2-1 was WDAM in 1080i HD, until a couple of weeks ago (I lost it - it is now a blue screen). I have ABC in HD on 3-1 coming in at 720i HD (channel 2 is regular ABC from Comcast). I can get Fox WXXV on 68-1 in 720i HD (channel 3 is regular Fox from Comcast). I also get 4-1 (a weatherscan station from ABC on the coast). I'm just saying that I may be mistaken, but I believe the HD channels I am getting are from the built-in antenna on my t.v.

I guess that's where the confusion is coming from. Everyone that has regular cable gets digital cable as well. If you don't pay for it, they encrypt most everything but the digital locals (which by law they can't). Your TV doesn't have a built-in antenna, it has a built-in QAM digital cable tuner. The channel numbers you listed are where comcast is putting those digital channels you are getting. A co-worker of mine said that on the last digital scan he did for a customer's TV, Comcast had moved WDAM from 2.1 to a channel close to the FOX station (68.1). You need to do a re-scan of channels and look around there (70.1, 67.1, etc.)

Your TV should also pick up a Weather channel digital forecast around channel 60 or so, plus VOD channels in the 70-90 range. The VOD channels will be blank unless someone in your area is watching a VOD program. If you have children I would delete those channels from the TV, as you will never have any idea what type of VOD program someone might be watching.



Jim,

Any word yet on what might be causing the audio problems I talked to you about a couple of weeks ago? Shows originating in stereo still have a hollow and out-of-phase sound, and shows originating in 5.1 still have their dialog coming out of every speaker.


Kevin D.
AVS

Kevin D,

Thanks for the clarification. I'm not up to speed on how cable works nowadays. I've had the t.v. for about a year now. I basically just plugged it in, hooked up the cable, and scanned. We got the extra channels right off the bat, including the VOD channels, which we were surprised with at first, and quickly found out that the programming is not all that good most of the time. We don't have kids, but I see what you mean. The box says the t.v. has built-in atsc tuner. Is that the same thing as the QAM digital cable tuner? Thanks again for the information.

No, ATSC is the standard that OTA digital signals are transmitted at. QAM is basically ATSC over cable, so there's a chance they wouldn't list it separately.



Jim,


I've been having an issue WDAM OTA since the bad weather Monday night. The signal is dropping from good to zero every 5 minutes to every 10 seconds. It's happening on both my tuners (HD-Tivo and Dish 622). My antenna isn't pointed direct at you, but has been working fine pointed this way since you went full signal.

Don't know if the weather effected something or if you just need to reset some things.

Thanks,

Kevin D.

Still no CBS HD under Comcast.
Anyone getting WHLT in HD yet (OTA, or Cable)?
Jericho is still looking nasty on Channel 10 on Comcast Cable.

WHLT told us two weeks ago at the home show that they will be HD by the Feb '09 cut-off date. If they go HD before that, it's a bonus.

Kevin D.

Update- WDAM HD is back on for me now at 2-1 comcast (hallelujah!)
Celebrity Apprentice finale will look good Thursday night.

Crazy.. I have no idea what they're doing. When you have a cable box the signal comes down with a virtual channel number, so no matter where they physically put it it will always show up as 435 (or whatever) on the box. Maybe everyone tuning with just a TV like you complained when they started moving it around.

Kevin D.

I may have found an answer to a problem Kevin D. reported a while back about the 5.1 audio we are transmitting. Can someone here check some primetime NBC programs and tell me if the audio seems to be coming from the correct speakers? My 18 year old RCA at home doesn't seem to have surround sound. :>

Thanks,
Jim Wilkinson
WDAM

I live in Hattiesburg in the Dixie community behind Paul B. Johnston state park, and pick up all coast channels great, including 3 PBS stations, Wlox, and Fox but our local channel, WDAM's signal is so weak it shows up may be once or twice a week, this is so aggrivating that a station within 20 miles of where I live will not come in clearer than one 50 to 100 miles away does?? Please Please Please WDAM boost your signal, I really love your station, but hate that I cant watch it... Also, whats with the tube tv station on 7.2 are they going to replace it with something or will it always be a bluelight blank station.. and one more thing, why cant the weather channel from wdam be a local weather station like wlox's, .... who wants to hear about californias weather when they live in hattiesburg, ms....if anyone has any idea on how I can get wdam to come in clear and round the clock please let me know... thanks Crista

Please boost the signal at wdam so people in dixie community can enjoy channel 7... thanks,crista