Dallas, TX - HDTV - Page 214

Hi ed_in_tx. I'm otherwise known as Rich-n-Texas. I can't verify your observation, but in my area, a bit east of Plano, we had very little rain and no lightning. I'm a FiOS subscriber as well but I wasn't watching any network TV channels.

They just said on 5 there were weather-related power problems at the transmitter. Now back to normal.

Geesh, a lousy four months with no rainfall, & suddenly a little sprinkle shuts down everything. I had half a dozen power outages, from a second up to ninety minutes in duration.

Several power hits at CH between 9-10:30pm knocking some stations off. Some longer than others. Those UHF rigs don't like the AC power bumps. This seemed a little unusual to have this many in that period of time.
We came back after a 1-2 seconds off at WFAA
JStigler

Which cable/sat/telco providers (if any) does WFAA have a direct fiber link to?

I believe that TWC has direct fiber links to all of the major channels: KDFW, KDFI, KSTR, KUVN, KTXA, KTVT, KXTX, WFAA, KXAS, KFWD, KPXD, KDAF.

Another followup.. it's happening again now. I'll flip over to KFWD for a while and check to see if it's a Hi-VHF interference issue.

Lost KERA 90.1 FM for 30 seconds or so this morning, but didn't get a chance to check if it was happening on any other stations.

anyone watching the debacle on FOX 4 News @ 9 right now? First they had what I'm guessing was the FOX national feed test pattern for a little over a minute. When Doocy was done with the opening story on Romo's injury, they were late moving on to Heather Hays. Mike smiled and waved to the camera to help pass time. During the next story regarding a fire in Oak Cliff, there was video from the scene with no commentary. Then Steve Eager was suddenly put on camera and was not sure what to talk about. You can hear what I'm guessing its the director in the background mumbling. He must have smarted off to Eager because Steve responded accordingly.

That long stretch of video with no commentary just background sounds reminded me of the days of my big dish watching raw uncut news feeds over satellite.

WFAA/8 and KSTR/49 have dropped a few points on my converter box signal meter since the storms. Nothing major; I receive both just fine. But their readings are generally so steady even a small drop is easy to spot.

KSTR/49 has been back to its usual full-strength readings since last Thursday. WFAA/8's still off a bit, however. (KFWD/52's readings never dropped after the storms, so I don't think it's a VHF thing.)

Hi, all,

I'm a newbie with a problem. I live in DFW and I get all of my TV over-the-air. I have an Antennas Direct DB4 mounted in the side of my house about 12' off of the ground. I used a cheap compass to set its direction, and it picks up every channel in my area great, with the exception of 1 channel: WFAA, the local ABC affiliate, which apparently still broadcasts on the high VHF band. No matter how I orient my antenna, the best I can get is a signal strength of 10 or so on a scale of 1 to 100.

I was advised by a friend to run a report for my location at the TV Fool website and post it here:

www.tvfool.com/?option=com_wrapper&Itemid=29&q=id%3d60b5ebf3acf3a4

and then ask for advice.

I'm beginning to think after doing some research that I may need an additional VHF antenna just for this one channel. I just want to make sure that is going to work before doing it. Hopefully someone here might be able to verify for me what I need to do.

Thanks in advance for any help.

Actually, 2 channels, WFAA 8, and KFWD 52 which broadcasts on VHF 9. Then again you probably never watch 52. Yes a Hi-VHF capable antenna should work. But it has to be dseigned with Hi VHF gain as well as UHF. Some of the newer antennas that claim VHF have zero gain or actually a slight loss on VHF.

You're in an enviable position since all of the Cedar Hill signals are robust at your location. Since the DB4 works fine for the UHF facilities (the band for which it was built), just obtain a modest VHF antenna such as the AntennaCraft Y5713 (which might be available at nearby Radio Shack) and then combine them with a Pico Macom UVSJ UHF VHF Band Separator/Combiner.

Both the VHF antenna and the UVSJ are modest in price, with the whole cost under $30.00.

I'll second everything in this post as it is exactly what I would recommend. Great minds think alike .

I really appreciate the advice. I plan to do this project this weekend and report back.

Rabbit Ears has been showing CH 56 (7) is on the air. I haven't seen it and I'm close by. Has anyone seen it.

CH 21 is mapping over to CH 30 for me. Even with a refesh 21 maps to 21. Does anyonoe get it to map to 30?

1). There's not a whiff of KQFW/56 on my signal analyzer. It would be the strongest of te LPTVs at my location. They filed a license to cover. That could be a legal technicality so that they can seek a displacement for the facility to a core channel.

2). I have four different ATSC tuners (one a DTX-9950 converter box) and all behave properly with KWDA. None of them conflict with 21. The virtual channel(s) on all of them is/are 30.

Odd, I can't get 21 to map to 30. I have Dish VIP222K with the OTA tunner. I have deleted both CH 21's (29 and 21). Then did a manual add starting with 21. 7 channels then appear on 21 (21.1 - 21.7). Next I manually add 29 which maps over 21.1 leaving the other 6 in place.

I have the same problem with some tuners and/or converter boxes but not others. Ones that do NOT work are: Philco, Channel Master CM-7000, and Dish Network products. The CM-7000 behaves as you describe for the Dish VIP222K. The Philco gives me a second 21.1 for KTXA (which confusingly follows KWDA 21.7). I don't own one, but I expect the popular Magnavox converter boxes act like my Philco (they are almost identical).

The Dish Network products (TR-40 converter box and TR-50 HD DVR) both show KWDA as channel 70! But an Apex DT250 converter box, a Samsung DT-260 HD receiver, a Toshiba HDTV, and an LG HDTV all show KWDA as channel 30. So KWDA seems to be sending out a PSIP, but there's apparently something hinky about it that causes some equipment not to recognize it correctly.

I installed an RCA ANT751R in the attic of my 1 story town home yesterday.

By tweaking the position of the antenna, I got a channel that I had not received before with my Phillips indoor amplified antenna.

The new channel received is CH. 28.1 KHPK-LD.
(There are also placeholders for Ch 28.2 - 28.4)

I had not been able pick up it's sister station CH 31.1 K31GL-D, but CH 28 has what I want.

I still need to do some more tweaking, as I now do not receive CH 34 or CH 51 with the RCA antenna.

I may put in some fresh coax to see if that helps to bring in other channels.
Someone recommended the RCA Quad Shield RG6.

My Sanyo LCD DP42840 logs KTXA CH 21 as 21.1.

And it also logs CH 21.2 - 21.9, but there is not a channel "name" displayed for those "sub-channels".

Where did channel 27 go? I can't find it on any of my TVs. Was always a strong signal.

If you're looking for UAN, you should know that they moved from 34.1 to 47.2 some time ago. Last I checked, 34.1 was dark, there was no 34.2, and 34.3 was only broadcasting infomercials.

KHFD/51 transmits only 5 kilowatts and is very weak at my location. They have applied to increase to 15 kilowatts, which should help if/when approved; unfortunately, last I heard the FCC had frozen all channel 51 applications.

Edit: replacing RG59 coax with RG6 will help if the cable is very long. Quad Shield RG6 is probably overkill for ordinary UHF/VHF terrestrial broadcasts, but if you plan to add a satellite dish at some point, go ahead and use Quad Shield.

For the past couple of days I've experienced some sort of weak interference near 500 MHz. It is degrading the signal on RF 19 (KTVT/11) and 20 (KBOP). I don't watch 20 but its low-power signal is particularly hard-hit with frequent errors in the picture. 19 is OK but I can see a reduction in SQ on the tuner's signal strength meter.

I live in S. Garland near Sunnyvale/Mesquite. Any suggestions on locating the source of this interference? Could it be tropo from KDYW (FKA KWBU) in Waco?

Edit: Well, whether it was tropo or something else, it was gone last night. KTVT and KBOP back to normal.

Noticed on RTV's web site that they are on KHPK (28). Also noticed that Tuff is showing CH31 as their Dallas station. Since CH31 is a near never hit for me, I hope I see a trade coming up. And while I'm dreaming I keep hoping the network with the most affiliates, Create, will come to Dallas as well as the network with the 4th most affiliates, Me-TV.

I would rather KERA use their wasted bandwidth to improve their mediocre PQ and AQ, but as it stands they could add Create or another subchannel without causing any further degradation to their existing services. I don't know why they haven't added one yet, but I'm guessing it has something to do with money.

RTV isn't on KHPK/28 (yet). The web site may be referring to RTV's home prior to K31GL, which was KHPK/3.

However K31GL is simulcasting 31.1 (Sonlife) on KHPK/28.1, and 31.3 (Hot TV) on KODF/26.1 and KATA/50.4. So there's hope they'll simulcast RTV also.

And according to the Tuff TV website, they're supposed to be coming to 31.2, which is currently unused. Again, there's hope for a simulcast. There's certainly enough bandwidth available on sister stations KODF and KHPK.

Nova in HD looks pretty good to me, but KERA's signal quality has been lacking until the recent mask filter replacement. But if you want to see really crappy PQ, check out This on 33.3!