Abilene, TX - HDTV - Page 7

Great info guys, and especially thanks to 93geo. Anyways, when will Suddenlink start carrying KRBC in HD as it is for KTAB? I sure hope that Suddenlink is planning on carrying KRBC in HD.

With my QAM tuner I get KRBC @112.1 using Suddenlink expanded basic. Still couldn't find KTXS (ABC) digital in my last scan though..

Got an answer for you on this problem. The station engineer at KTAB said that they have a new Frame Sync on order, and that this will fix the problem when It arrives, and is installed. He also said that to his knowledge, this problem is only associated with KRBC. Also, for all of you out in the fringe locations; in 2009 when the analog shut off happens, the digital transmitters will move up the KTAB tower 90 feet to the top. Not a lot, but any little bit might help.

Did anybody read the story in the Abilene Reporter news about HD in the area. It is full of good information for people that don't know much about HD. I find the last line of the story rather humorous: "Calls to local FOX affiliate KXVA were not returned Friday." That is what I got when I e-mailed them about HD or even going digital.

Link to story: www.reporternews.com/news...

I wonder what in the world happened to KTAB this afternoon. The U.S.Tennis Open is supposed to be in HD, I called about an hour and a half ago but still no results. The lady that answered at the station said she had had several calls about it.

I usually don't call, because the person answering usually doesn't know how to fix it. I always e-mail the chief engineer gmccandless@ktab.tv

Kudos to KRBC for the decent quality HD for the Cowboys game last night. I haven't lived here very long but that is the first HD football game I've seen through the local networks..

I thought the Cowboy's game was descent quality most certainly better than it was on Thursday night for the Colts/Saints. I don't think it is our local though but rather NBC itself.

CBS's broadcast of the Texan game on Sunday was superb. I wish this was the Cowboy's home instead of lousy Fox but at least they are in Primetime for half their games this year which means HD.

On the Forum NBC historically gets poor marks--constant criticism, while CBS usually gets positive comments, at least that is my impression.

Hey guys...sorry I haven't been around much. Here's some of my observations....

Regarding KRBC: I didn't even know KR-HD was on Suddenlink until I read Brian Bethel's story in last Saturday's Reporter-News....they must have just turned it on, because I was checking almost every day! But the NBC HD quality is awesome, at least on my 52" rear-projection. Sunday's Cowboy's game looked great! And I'm glad to see many of you are watching KR's newscasts...it's tough working for both the cellar-dweller and the powerhouse (KTAB). And once we get that frame sync, the news should be fine. Also, I was watching Leno/Conan on Monday night and was frustrated that the HD switch wasn't "flipped." It dawned on me it was because we had to have the weather "bug" on the screen due to severe storms in our viewing area (FCC rules); KR's bug system only works in SD mode right now, but hopefully the new frame sync will allow it to work in HD, like KTAB's.

As for KTAB, I was extremely frustrated that Sunday's US Open Men's Finals wasn't in HD. It could have been a case of the network's systems failing, but more likely it was "our" fault. T-bone2006 provided a great email address....

Now for some comments on specific posts:

riclar: I'm glad you're getting good digital reception in Sweetwater. KTAB-DT is broadcasting at full legal power, which is 50kW. Right now, KRBC-DT is only at 25kW, which is still considered "full power," but we'll be at 50kW prior to the Feb '09 analog shutoff. And as you stated, the stations' DTV antenna is currently side-mounted on the tower below 'tab's analog stick. While 90 feet may not seem like much on a 700+ ft. tower, every inch does makes a difference.

joemama127: I empathize with your comment regarding the professionalism (or lack thereof) of our local newscasts, and I'm sure you meant it with a grain of salt, but remember this is Abilene, Texas. Out of 210 tv markets in the nation, we're #164. Yes, most of our on-air personalities are fresh-out-of-college...some are still in college...and some are literally off the streets. The average starting pay for a full-time reporter/anchor is just over $7.00/hour. The "control room" people make minimum wage. That's how this industry works....you pay your dues in a small market, then move up to the big markets. Some of us (like me) have been-there-done-that, worked our asses off in big cities, got burned out, and later returned to our hometown with enough experience to make a decent living, training the next batch of kids to move up...a never-ending cycle. Anyone expecting across-the-board professionalism in any market with less than a million population is in for a surprise...Abilene's market only has about 350,000 population.

93geo-
I may be fairly new to the area but like I said.. I did go to ACU back in the early 90's...and as a communications major I actually knew some of the people that got their start at Abilene stations. I know that the pay is really poor starting out and it's treated as more of an "internship" than anything else...but I still find the local newscasts comical and far more entertaining that a slick professional cast in the metroplex.

I'm just happy that things are moving forward quickly...when I moved here a little over a year ago, HD was virtually non-existent and even if you paid for "HD" from one of the Sat/cable companies you still wouldn't get any of the big 4 networks in HD. The HD we're getting now is very comparable in quality to what I was getting in Ft Worth... (and yes, they have trouble with "switching" to HD there also)

93geo

Thanks for a great post and sharing some of your knowledge with us. It sure helps put things in perspective.

Ok, that explains some things. I am having trouble keeping a stable signal on KRBC. KTAB almost never has a glitch, but KRBC can get rough at times, especially in the mid afternoon. It's watchable, but the interruptions are very annoying. I raised my antenna 5 feet and it seemed to get worse. I had wondered if the KRBC transmitter might be below the KTAB transmitter on a vertical alignment along the tower. If so, I thought this might explain why it's harder to keep a good signal on KRBC; but broadcasting at lower power most definitely explains it. I'll leave my antenna alone until KRBC is up to 50kW like KTAB. I'll bet my KRBC problem disappears when that happens. And the 90' hike in height should also help in 2009. Sounds like things are only going to get better. Can't thank you enough for the info.

I have found that KRBC is very directionally oriented as far as my indoor antenna is concerned. I can have the signal bouncing around on the signal meter with micro blocking (as you described), and rotate the antenna as little as five degrees and get a strong stable signal.

Agreed, directivity seems very sensitive. Unfortunately, I don't have a signal meter of any kind, I make small adjustments based on what I'm seeing on screen, but it seems I can't rid myself of the micro-blocking on KRBC no matter what I do. At best the interruptions happen every 3 to 5 minutes and usually last a couple of seconds during the daytime, at night, It improves. These blips don't make it unwatchable, but It's very annoying, I'm pretty sure It's the wind generators causing this. If KRBC plans to go up to a higher level of power at some time in the future, I don't think I'll need to do anything different on my antenna, If not, I'm may need to look at adding another identical antenna and connect them to make a 16 bay bow-tie UHF receiver, and hope that works. As said before, raising the antenna didn't help me probably because there are a lot of large trees around my house and I'm probably dealing with some multipathing going on with the signals.

You know it is strange. I can have a day when the signal I get from KTAB and KRBC is almost 100% and steady, then the next day without touching anything, like last night and this morning, and have the signal jumping all over the place and micro blocking quite a bit on both channels. Wish I knew what the problem is.

I had raised my antenna a bit hoping to get a little stronger signal, instead it did just the opposite. I've lowered it back to nearly where I had it before. KTAB comes in great, and KRBC comes in great except during the afternoon hours when interference seems to increase, and the frequency of sound drops and micro-blocking gets a bit more noticeable. All considered though, signal quality is really very good at this lower height for some crazy reason. 93geo, I hope your right about a power increase for KRBC in the future. I think it's needed for us over here in Sweetwater to get a good solid reliable signal. Now, has anyone heard anything about KXVA, and just were is their tower in relation to the KTAB tower, are they pretty close? When KXVA finally does go digital, I fear the KIDB transmitter serving Sweetwater will not be adapted to digital, and will permanently shut down in 2009.

Glad to find this thread. I have really enjoyed reading from the beginning and catching up.

93geo is correct that for the foreseeable future there will not be any local broadcast station producing HD content. But it looks like the first locally produced and broadcast HD will be from a recently installed fully operational 1080i HD studio at First Baptist Church in Abilene. With the help of KR, First Baptist Church will be airing the 10:30am service in 1080i HD before the end of the year.

FBC bulldozed its analog TV studio in April of 2006 and installed a native
1080i broadcast studio using 3 remote controlled cameras, HD CG, HD closed caption, and HD tape recording. Also, Dolby 5.1 will be broadcast. Lubbock Audio Visual was the general contractor on the install. The HD studio has been up and running since April 2006 but the HD signal is down converted to analog to get it broadcast. The church is currently working to install an HD microwave link to KR master control straight into their switcher. It has not been easy or cheap but the pictures we are seeing in-house are amazing and I am looking forward to getting them on the air.

I also have a 1080i Dolby 7.1 home theater with an HD projector. I have been getting 80-95 signal strength for KR and TAB and a consistent 69-70 for TXS on an indoor powered antenna in the attic hooked up to Dish recievers. The pictures are impressive. Also, the Dish HD channels are impressive too. I live out by Shotwell Stadium.

greenfox200

What tpe of powered indoor antenna do you have?

It is an RCA with a flat front and a rabbit ear antenna on each side. I boutht it at Best Buy over a year ago and they do not have that model now. Best Buy says that they hear the best results are from a Terk they sell.

I strongly encourage everyone in this thread go to www.myfoxabilene.com and set up a personal blog under the theme of "when is KXVA going HD?"

The guy on the commercial said "it can be sports, politics, local issues or anything"

I have done that.

I have done that too.

I wonder how long it will be before they delete the posts...do we want to start a board?

It is ashamed that you can't get a response from these guys one way or the other. I would almost bet you that is the way all their business is handled and the number one reason they have nobody that wants to advertise with them.

I have used their "contact us" to respectfully ask when they will be going HD or even simply digital on 3 different occasions and still haven't gotten a response. If it weren't for Cowboy games then channel 6 wouldn't even be programmed into my remotes favorites menu.

edit- also does anyone know if Suddenlink is passing through ABC digital now? I can get KRBC and KTAB digital through my QAM tuner but my last scan turned up nothing for ABC. It's a pain in the ass to have to use rabbit ears for one channel..

I got an email some time back from Jackie Rutledge, GM for KTXS saying that KTXS was going through a sale at that time and it would not be until after the sale that the new owners would consider negotiating with Suddenlink to get the HD signal on cable. That sale is complete now. My suspicion is they have not been able to come to a financial agreement to do so.

Well son of a gun can you believe there is actually a response from KXVA posted on the Blog section at www.myfoxabilene.com ? Here it is:


Alright guys what do you think? Just an FYI the last time that I checked the FCC's website I found no, none, not one, application that was filed by KXVA for a digital license to transmit...I am going to see if I can find that web site again and double check.

This guy's info is way off. I've been trying for over 2 years to get some kind of respond that made sense. Currently I use an antenna to receive all the stations in the area and am on D*. I've tried numerous times to get an HD waiver just to receive the HD broadcasts over the dish but no responses. Please pursue this. I am VERY interested to hear how they wiggle out of this one.

Okay a little more info to add fuel to the fire. I can't remember if KXVA is still part of KIDY or are they separate entities now? Either way this clearly shows that there is no FCC License issued to KXVA (expired or current) for channel 15. It does however show that KIDY-DT out of San Angelo has a license to broadcast on digital 19.

http://www.2150.com/broadcast/defaul...=Show+Stations

I also ran across this in the FAQ section here at AVS that I found interesting and confirms my suspicions of someone blowing smoke up our butts:

Is a station's digital signal transmitted on the same channel as its analog signal?


I am not sure if this does us any good other than the fact that it proves KXVA has no interest in actually telling it's viewers the truth.


Edit to add more info: Here you can search for our local stations and see who has filed what applications in both digital and analog:

Search under call sign for the following:

KTXS-TV
KRBC-TX
KTAB-TV
KXVA

http://fjallfoss.fcc.gov/prod/cdbs/p...d/app_sear.htm