Strange things with COX Cable

[MarcB]

The 3 COX Cable Franchises here in Connecticut still let you have cable TV without needing a cable box. Channel 21 has not had a Channel assigned to it since CSPAN moved to Channel 15 (Analog) and later 76 Digital several years ago. After several months of with a message on a screen that CSPAN moved to Channel 15, Channel 21 had Color Bars on the screen. Then for several months beginning July 31, 2013 there was a message on the screen Effective July 31, 2013 LIN-TV has discontinued The CoolTV. For more information contact Lin Television Group at 401-xxx-xxxx. - That was weird because The CoolTV was never on Channel 21. It was on Channel 812. Then Channel 21 went back to color bars - until the other day. As of the other day there is a frozen image on the screen of a creepy looking guy who looks like he is sitting in a restaurant. I don't know what the heck that's about.


Then for the past few days until today Antenna TV Channel 810 was being fed by out of market station WPIX 11.2 rather than by local WTIC-TV 61.2. I don't know if this was COX's doing or a problem with WTIC-TV. I contacted Antenna TV on Facebook and they told me they would try to contact WTIC-TV. Unfortunately their engineer was out of the office until today. I would have to think that this was WTIC-TV's doing and not COX's doing because COX dropped WPIX several years ago. (They were using equipment from Cablevision to pick up WPIX and when Tribune and Cablevision got into a dispute and WPIX got yanked from Cablevision COX lost WPIX as well. After more than a week COX made the announcement that WPIX would be dropped permanently).


I also wonder how they notify customers who have Cable Boxes of channel line-up changes. I wonder if they just put a message on each individual channel or not. My Mom and I don't have a cable box. We have 3 HDTVs and all the channel line up-changes are shown on Channel 19.55

 

[vchimpanzee]

I don't understand why anyone needs a box. When I got a new TiVo I was told I'd need to add a box. Then I was told I only need a box if I want the shopping channle, the community college channel and the religious channel. I didn't.

The cable just plugs into the back of the set. Or with TiVo, into the TiVo, and then the feed from there goes directly into the TV.

Now I just hope Comcast fails in its merger attempt or at least Time Warner doesn't make any changes afterward.

 

[Avid Listener]

A so-called "cable ready" television set has a certain number of channels. I'm not sure exactly how many, but it is a specific, finite number. If your cable system has more channels available than that specific, finite number, then you need a converter. It's just simple technology. My cable system has well over 800 channels. Granted, a lot of those are duplicates of the same stations, one in SD and the other in HD. Then there are the dozens and dozens of pay-per-view channels, and all of the music only channels. But 'em all together, and you need a converter to handle all the channels.

 

[tripinva]

I don't understand why anyone needs a box.

Because Cablevision, Charter, and Comcast are all in the middle of encrypting the entire line-up while going digital-only. No box (or no cable card), no channels. I'm sure it's only a matter of time before the rest of them follow suit.

- Trip

 

[Morgan Wick]

I also wonder how they notify customers who have Cable Boxes of channel line-up changes. I wonder if they just put a message on each individual channel or not.

Short answer: they don't. To be fair, Comcast Seattle almost never actually moves a channel, but so far as I know we get no notification of when new channels are added or when Bloomberg SD was moved to channel 50. (Tangent: Bloomberg displaced either Oxygen or Lifetime, with the other at 51 and the displaced channel moving to the 60s or 70s. 49 is truTV, which hardly belongs in a news neighborhood anymore. Why not slot Bloomberg there?) The only time in recent memory Comcast has actually notified people about a channel move was when they moved a bunch of subchannels to the 300s and left a slide on the old positions notifying people of the new ones.

 

[MarcB]

Whatever the problem was with Antenna TV it was fixed last week. We are once again getting it from the correct affiliate WTIC-TV 61.2. Meanwhile the frozen image of the creepy guy on Channel 21 (with no box) is still there.