Chicago, IL - OTA - Page 103

My thought process is that if they put the pure HD on WWME-LD, because the reach would be limited, you'd want the widescreen to be available as well. Thus the widescreen SD on the full-powered signal.

- Trip

Yeah, generally speaking. But I get 23.1 pretty well here for the most part, so I guess I wasn't thinking in those terms.

Interesting. I'll make note of that.

Can you be more descriptive?

You guys having fun with our DTV subchannel allocations???

It was true HD, The channel is naively 1920 X 1080I. The nature of the beast PQ wise was HD. An up convert from SD did not look as good as this did. I use TS reader to tell a bunch of technical stuff, and I can tell you it was HD material, and wasnt a SD upconvert.



Also, the whole WLS testing on DT7 had me thinking. Signals generally travel further at night especially when Tropo conditions allow. So at 4.7 KW I might get WLS DT but only at night when conditions allow. Is there going to be some sort of daytime testing for WLS for us out here in the sticks. WLS should consider this type of testing, weather it's for an hour block during the 11 am news or during soaps. I dont know what there current analoge wattage is at, On my CM 4228 I get 7 in really decently. I'm hoping that if there is a drop in power it wont affect me. What I am going to do is lock down my system and report current power levels of all channels and then post transition levels.

Im glad they are not doing the allocations as they are screwing with us in the sticks. What should happen is this..

26.1 WCIU HD (1080I if not sharing) or (720P if sharing with another hd channel.) No need for SD wide as after Feb 2009 everyone will be digital. Also 99% of new tvs are wide screen. You all need to get past the old technology. Most people who have SD sets using antenna's will most likely upgrade to HDTV's or get cable, or a combination of both. For those OTA die hards they will have converter boxes they can watch in wide screen or fill in the screen to fit there 4:3 sets. In the matter of 5-10 years Most of those diehards will have upgraded or passed away. (Old people)

26.2 MGM HD (720P)

WCIUDT full power.

Idealy I would like to see WWME go full power. I can get it now, but only during the fall/winter/early spring. Once when the trees go into bloom I lose it.

23.1 METV HD 720P Old HD programs can premere on METV all leftover sd programming could go to METOO.
23.2 METOO SD
23.3 What ever is on 26-6 now and in the future can go here.

The wild card..

METOO's Channel allocation. That could potentially lead up for space for another HD channel if this also went to full power, or a mix of 6 sd channels. Options.. Options... Options.... Keep the HD programming on Full powered stations as it will reach the most and keep the most happy!

This is how you allocate channels! (not that hvs10trk didn't know how) Hey do you need help!

This TV is only going to be in SD, not in HD. So said the press release.

- Trip

Nice typo.
Thank you, Bob.

So the answer is that you were receiving it on a computer, not on a television, and the software analyzed the signal and gave you the information.

OK then, is it possible for a human watching an HD channel on a television set to distinguish native HD content from upconversions of SD content?  If so, how (other than assuming that anything in 16:9 is probably native HD and that anything in 4:3 is not, which would be right a good portion of the time but not all the time)?

Those wondering..
WBBM CBS2Chicago's helicopter Chopper2 HD is in Service as of 5am this morning..

Oh, that's just a pecularity of the windows mythtv client. On a full (i.e. linux) myth frontend, I have to key in 021 (02, sub-channel 1) to get channel 2.

But your question (and your I'm sure facetious suggestion of a secondary/pirate WBBM-DT) got me to digging around in the myth configuration screens, just to verify what's going on under the hood. I'm definitely, somehow, pulling in WBBM-DT on channel 3. (see attachment)

On a side note, during yesterdays wind-nami I was unable to achieve a lock on WBBM-DT. Once the winds calmed down, it came back in again. That doesn't surprise me; there's a tree across the street and down a ways that's my OTA nemesis. When the winds really really get moving, it causes occasional-to-rare dropouts even on the best channels. That it degraded WBBM-DT enough so that I couldn't lock wasn't in the least bit surprising!


Oh man, you're going to make me hook up my TV again, aren't you? Hurumph! 7 analog has some snow but not too bad. 9 analog has a ghost image but it's consistent. 11 analog looks just fine. 5 analog sucks, and 2 analog is terrible.


Actually, my reception with rabbit ears was what caused me to go with an external DB2. Reception was all over the place; during the day I could usually get WLS just fine, but at night it was bad news. Plus I couldn't find a single antenna position that worked with all of the channels. Once I went external and a bigger antenna, things went from iffy to rock-solid.

I am receiving it on a tv.. And a computer... ok the computer is hooked up to the tv .. Seriously, I have connections on both and one should be able to tell the difference between HD and SD from the eye. 16 x 9 SD is not as clear as 16 x 9 HD. If everything is connected right then the picture on an HD picture should be noticeably more clear as there are more native pixels to the picture. SD wont be as clear because the image quality doesnt conatin the same pixle count as HD.

Also, the source is a big thing as I have seen some SD material look just as good as HD. Then again I have seen HD look like You Tube SD. I can tell you that the show on WYCC was either HD or a very very good SD source. Im 99 percent positive it was HD because it had the HD pop that SD normally doesn't have.

Bob, OK, thank you, but it seems to come down to having to start by learning with one's own eyes -- not someone else's words -- what to look for, and that requires knowing what one is looking at during the learning process.

At this point, when I watch an HD channel I'm not confident in my guesswork, and I lack any way to find out whether my guesses are right in order to develop and hone any skill.

I'm using TV Guide on Screen with my DMR-E85H and an Echostar TR-40. I have my TV Guide ZIP Code set to 00003 which is Chicago. Miraculously, everything appears to be working correctly (thanks to another posting between you and joe111671). When I go to the TV Guide Channel editor I don't see an entry for MeToo or anything resembling any of the other call letters, such as WMEU-CA or WCIU-DT. I see about 20 pages of every other imaginable channel, including every cable station, but no MeToo. Any Ideas?

We don't want you to watch our stuff. Just kidding. Who's your provider? Probably an error in their data. Wouldn't be the first time its happened.

Looks like I lost MeTv (58.3) out of Milwaukee for good. It's changes to a looping advertisement for ThisTv, which will be on that subchannel in November.

MeTv is now on 49.1, and I've been trying to get it, but I can't. It must be too low-powered.

Sucks, because they show stuff at different times than the one here. So that's one good channel I've lost so far.

It'd sure be nice if they could do that here, though - I mean, put ThisTv on 26.3 in place of MeToo (or, better yet - on 26.2, and drop both MeTv and MeToo). Then move MeToo to 23.2 (and then of course up the power on 23.1 and 23.2, so everyone can get it).

Or even better yet - put ThisTV on 23.3, too. But no need for any SD widescreen version of 26.1 on either channel, as long as the power on both is sufficient.

But I realize that upping the power on 23.1 would be going against their "budget".

Looks like I lost MeTv (58.3) out of Milwaukee for good. They're running a looping ad for ThisTv now, which will be on that subchannel in November.

MeTv is now on 49.1, and I've been trying to get it, but I can't. It must be too low-powered.

Sucks, because they show stuff at different times than the one here. So that's one good channel I've lost so far.

It'd sure be nice if they could move all the subchannels to 23 here and just up the power. (No need for any SD widescreen version of 26.1 on either channel, as long as the power on both is sufficient.)

But I realize that increasing the power on 23.1 would be going against their "budget".

To tell you the truth, I don't even like a lot of the MGM movies they're showing on the ThisTv ad - I could do without the channel altogether. Some of them are musicals, and I absolutely abhor musicals (I hate Elvis movies - they're a joke). All the other ones are movies I've seen a hundred times. Doesn't look like anything I'm going to really watch much.

I doubt it has anything to do with budget and is more related to the FCC capping their power due to them being a low-powered station in a very crowded area.

If Kevin Martin gets his way and allows Class A stations to relicense as full-service stations, I imagine that WWME-LD would power up.

- Trip

Why can't I pick up Channel 9 over the air anymore? I used be able to get the digital channel a few months ago but now I get no signal? Did something change a few months ago?

Patience my dear Watson, patience.

You're probably not the guy to ask, or may not be able to say anything even if you do know, but...

Does This TV have a website up yet? I'd be interested to see what specific things it will have, and I'd like to see this demo reel. Not living anywhere near Chicago or Milwaukee makes it hard to turn on 58-3.

And I bet you definitely don't know or can't say anything about these 30 affiliates I read about. You know, things like which stations those are? I'm itching to find out.

- Trip

I don't if it's really what you'd call a "demo reel" - it's more like a looped "It's coming!" announcement for the channel, and they kind of allude to a few of the things they'll be showing, like Elvis movies, Dances with Wolves, Silence of the Lambs, etc.

There's one part where they ask trivia questions about a few movies, and from that you get the impression that those are movies and the types of movies that they'll be showing. As far as the Elvis part, they just show a still shot of him from one of his (hokey) old movies as a background in one shot.

They don't really show any movie scenes or actual lists - it's mainly talk and text.

I suppose some people who have had nothing but OTA their entire lives may not have seen these movies a thousand times, but that's not the case with me. So some may find it truly exciting. They are not the movies only the cable premium channels would show - they are the ones played over and over on the standard national cable channels over the years (like the two more recent above-mentioned films). I don't know what I was expecting - I figured they'd be popular, recent major motion pictures - I guess maybe I was just hoping for some I haven't seen so much. (But Elvis movies? That's even worse.)

I'm mainly itching to find out if ThisTV will carry the original Outer Limits. One of my favorite shows of all time.

If they do... I will want This TV in my area ASAP!

- Trip

No, only movies, as far as I know. That might already be shown on either MeTV or MeToo.

Now those channels most people would love. Hardly a bad or lame show on either. Mostly old, B&W's from the 50's and 60's, and some color thrown in (the really classic stuff like "Get Smart"). Great stuff. Makes you wonder what ever happened to good TV programming since then when you watch it.

http://www.broadcastingcable.com/article/CA6608561.html

This article suggests otherwise. I just want confirmation on Outer Limits before I get my hopes raised too much.

- Trip

Oh, that's cool then (they were showing the old O.L. on some channel here a couple of years back, so that's why I thought it might already be on). I see they mention "horror films". Maybe there is some hope for me then. Sounds pretty worthwhile.

Glad you cited that article (even if it does take forever and a year to download for some reason). Thanks. I wonder why they don't mention that stuff on the advertisement, though? That seems to me to be the stuff people would care more about.

I just really really hope they don't show too many musicals. I just find those things utterly ridiculous. I mean, standing out in the middle of nowhere, and all of a sudden breaking out into song, with a full, invisible orchestra backing you up coming from nowhere. C'mon! Or how about Elvis, when he's driving with Ann-Margaret down the highway and he turns on the radio in his car, and all of sudden starts singing - I mean lip-synching - the vocals to the song, while the music coming from the radio is only the backing track? Or West Side Story, where they're supposed to be a mean, tough bunch of gangbangers ready to kill each other, and then all of a sudden they start flitting around like a bunch of Nijinsky's? I know I'll probably get flamed big time, but outside of The Wizard of Oz when I was a little kid, I just could never get into that genre for anything.

I don't have a provider. That's why I bought the DTV Converter Box. Now it's starting to look like my analog TVGOS is not getting any listing data at all from the DTV-PAL. It can, however, change the channel on the DTV-PAL.

No public site yet. What market are you in out there? I can tell you if you have a "This" affiliate or not.

I was just waiting to see if you really were getting it before I said anything or started telling people on the other threads. Nobody so far has gotten the TVGOS conversion feature to work.

Thanks for that info, even though it's not what I wanted to hear. I'll stop banging my head on this one (for a little while anyway). I'll let you know if I ever get past this block.