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i hate digital tv

And then, there's the whole UHF/VHF thing. VHF channels are a tough catch for any indoor antenna that isn't fairly close to the transmitter and is actually indoors (even near a window).

High-powered UHF stations make it through windows and walls in metro areas, but don't go out as far as VHF stations in rural areas.

There is no perfect answer. The closest you get is putting up an outdoor antenna and get it somewhat off the ground, but that's not an option for many (including yours truly).

To add to the confusion, some old UHF analogs are actually on VHF "real" RF channel numbers, like WOIO/19, the CBS affiliate here (RF 10, on a VERY bad allocation with low power).
 
What is funny is, now the FCC wants to squeeze more into the digital spectrum, so stations might be "sharing" channels in the future. They want to use more VHF.....but, many of these new "HDTV" antennas were made for mostly UHF use, as a good majority of OTA stations are now UHF. So, if some of these stations move from UHF to VHF, what are they gonna do? Put out PSAs to get a new antenna???? This'll be fun.

cd
 
I've posted several times on the problems with DTV and I am in a prime location and should not have any issues.

In summary though.....I see no improvement. Analog may have been marginally deficient in PQ but more than made up for it not having reception issues. Things that never bothered analog seem to be major problems for digital:

1. People walking behind an indoor antenna (in an adjacent room no less) cause picture and audio loss.
2. Wind and sun angle (behind the transmitter towers) wipe out the picture.
3. Rain, even light rain, crashes the signal.
4. Subs are generally of no value to me (they are mostly Spanish/religious/infomercial or weather loops). The one exception is PBS' World.

I'd go back to analog in a heartbeat.
 
landtuna said:
I've posted several times on the problems with DTV and I am in a prime location and should not have any issues.

In summary though.....I see no improvement. Analog may have been marginally deficient in PQ but more than made up for it not having reception issues. Things that never bothered analog seem to be major problems for digital:

1. People walking behind an indoor antenna (in an adjacent room no less) cause picture and audio loss.
2. Wind and sun angle (behind the transmitter towers) wipe out the picture.
3. Rain, even light rain, crashes the signal.
4. Subs are generally of no value to me (they are mostly Spanish/religious/infomercial or weather loops). The one exception is PBS' World.

I'd go back to analog in a heartbeat.
Click to expand...
Me too, but I do like the better signals I get with basic cable. And when I say basic, I mean BASIC. A little over $10 a month and the only national channel I get is WGN America. Only a few problems, mostly minor.

When the digital signals work, though, they are an improvement over what I had before. The problem is I could have just gotten one of those really good antennas. I was amazed at the improvement on the nighlight channel (still analog, explaining what to do), though I would never be able to watch that one again.
 
I live in the Hartford/New Haven TV market. Our only commercial station still on the VHF band here is WTNH-TV (ABC) of New Haven. Their virtual channel is 8 while their digital channel is 10. On the non-commercial side, there's WEDN-TV (PBS) of Norwich. Their virtual channel is 53 while their digital channel is 9.

I own a 26" Sanyo LCD HDTV circa 2006 with limited basic serving it (the locals, QVC, TBS, the P.E.G. channels and NECN). I keep an Insignia converter box next to it to check on antenna sub-channels which Comcast doesn't carry. Any stations I receive from Rattlesnake Mountain (CW, PBS, NBC and FOX) are fine. My reception from Avon Mountain (UNI and CBS) is usually good, but not always. WTNH, as mentioned, is a VHF digital and comes in most of the time. I get their sister station WCTX-TV (MY) channel 59 in nearly all the time. WTNH and WCTX transmit from the same site.

Also mentioned above is WEDN-TV from Norwich. The converter box occasionally shows some signal present, but not enough for the station to pop on. WEDH-TV channel 24 (digital 45) from Hartford has the same programming and is always one of my two strongest signals. The only other station from southeastern Connecticut is WHPX-TV (ION) channel 26 (digital 26) from New London. They're not perfect, but are there about 3/4 of the time.

If I move my antenna just slightly (sitting above a south-facing second floor window), the ION station from the Providence, RI/New Bedford, MA market comes in. However, like WEDN and WEDH, WPXQ-TV channel 69 (digital 17) of Block Island, RI is virtually identical to what WHPX-TV shows.
 
vchimpanzee said:
Me too, but I do like the better signals I get with basic cable. And when I say basic, I mean BASIC. A little over $10 a month and the only national channel I get is WGN America. Only a few problems, mostly minor.
Click to expand...

A-Ha you must be in the Charlotte area. I don't know why they carry WGN on basic when TBS is closer. I'd rather have TBS.

With the advent of digital WBTV finally has a decent signal on my side of town! Their analog was the pits and probably is responsible for the success that cable enjoys here. Without an outdoor antenna I could barely see the old Channel 3. It looked like an out of market signal. My friend is a broadcast engineer and he said that Channel 3 is just not a good frequency and 3's in other markets had similar problems.

Digital has not been without problems. I had a lot of signal fluctuation. I finally found a good spot for the antenna where all the locals seem to come in well. It will be interesting to see what happens to the signals when the leaves are on the trees again. That does seem to make a difference on UHF.
 
cd637299 said:
Mike,

If those are the DTT-901's, those are the best! I have the Insignia (same thing).

Like the OP, originally I screamed when I saw digital at first.....the pixellation (of close-by stations)....but the DXer in me has learned what to do to circumvent the problem. The Zenith/Insignia is a start, for sure!

cd
Click to expand...

Yes no complaints on the Zenith boxes. I'm thinking about getting a new Tivo Premier for the set in the living room but I don't think the tuners are as good in the Tivo as the Zenith box so I haven't done it yet.

The stations where I live are in all different directions so it makes it had to find one good position for the antenna. The drop outs drive me nuts!

I have only seen a few out of market stations on a regular basis, not as many as analog except when we had skip....now that was interesting, but it didn't last long.
 
Mike Sheridan said:
My friend is a broadcast engineer and he said that Channel 3 is just not a good frequency and 3's in other markets had similar problems.
Click to expand...

Could the use of VCR's on that channel have something to do with that? If that's the case, what about Channel 4?
 
DToTheJ said:
Mike Sheridan said:
My friend is a broadcast engineer and he said that Channel 3 is just not a good frequency and 3's in other markets had similar problems.
Click to expand...

Could the use of VCR's on that channel have something to do with that? If that's the case, what about Channel 4?
Click to expand...

That's an interesting question but I don't think it has anything to do with it. Channel 4 has been good, I've lived in two places that had a channel 4. I've only been in one city where there was a channel 3.

WBTV 26 miles away with a 2,000 foot tower running the max power for analog low band VHF (100KW) and very little signal on my side of town. I've been in business where they couldn't see the station without either a good outdoor antenna or cable. The digital signal (Channel 23) is beautiful!
 
The problem with low-band VHF is "impulse noise" - noise from electrical devices, power lines, in-house electrlcal use and the like. (TVNewsCheck's Harry Jessell wrote an excellent article about it, noting that when he was growing up, a local low VHF station would go away when his mother ran the vacuum cleaner!)

On analog, you saw this "impulse noise" as static and "sparklies" on the picture... we saw it all the time on local NBC affiliate WKYC/3, and to a much lesser extent on ABC affiliate WEWS/5. We did not see it at all on WJW/8 (CBS at the time).

On digital, that noise makes the station very, very difficult to decode, and is the reason stations abandoned low-VHF for digital in droves. I can count the number of large market low-VHF stations (below 6) on my hands.

There are a couple of digital 6s (WRGB in the Albany market comes to mind), but I can't think of a 2-5 VHF digital in a market of any size. Low-VHF digital is very poorly suited for DTV...you can endure some sparklies, but digital just doesn't decode nearly as well.
 
Scott Fybush said:
MarcB said:
Does anyone know where I can get one of those new converter boxes? I'm dropping The Comcast Monopoly for TV. Keeping their internet for now.
Click to expand...
The real key is not the box but the antenna. 99% of what you'll find on store shelves is junk - amplifiers that add so much noise to the signal that it's impossible for the box to decode it, antenna elements that won't work on the VHF signals you have in your area. Google "Terk HDTVi" to find a good, non-amplified antenna that can be had online for $30 or so. It will outperform just about anything you could buy at Best Buy or Radio Shack or the big box of your choice.
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Do you have instructions on building one? I've seen various models of homemade antennas online but didn't know which one was best.
 
WKYC/3 here was on digital 2 pre-transition, and was but a rumor for most local OTA watchers.

After the transition, they gleefully moved to RF 17, abandoned when analog WDLI/17 (TBN) Canton stayed on RF 39 - and later moved to RF 49.

I think I picked up RF 2 maybe five or six times in the entire time that facility was on the air, and I wasn't alone. Now, I can get WKYC's RF 17 with a small, indoor antenna.
 
OhioMediaWatch said:
There are a couple of digital 6s (WRGB in the Albany market comes to mind), but I can't think of a 2-5 VHF digital in a market of any size.
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Nashville & Memphis (both 5) but I get your point.

The Nashville station has installed a 100kw relay on channel 50 (on the same tower as channel 5) and has applied to get their main channel changed from 5 to 25.
 
w9wi said:
Nashville & Memphis (both 5) but I get your point.

The Nashville station has installed a 100kw relay on channel 50 (on the same tower as channel 5) and has applied to get their main channel changed from 5 to 25.
Click to expand...

Not surprised. They probably thought they could get away with 5 (less noise than 2-4), but found out quickly that it was a bad idea. Is Memphis making any such moves, even as UHF fill?

Are there any 2-4 digitals still around? I think there are a couple of small market stations...
 
OhioMediaWatch said:
w9wi said:
Nashville & Memphis (both 5) but I get your point.

The Nashville station has installed a 100kw relay on channel 50 (on the same tower as channel 5) and has applied to get their main channel changed from 5 to 25.
Click to expand...

Not surprised. They probably thought they could get away with 5 (less noise than 2-4), but found out quickly that it was a bad idea. Is Memphis making any such moves, even as UHF fill?

Are there any 2-4 digitals still around? I think there are a couple of small market stations...
Click to expand...

w9wi, take it away!

It seems that the stations with the biggest issues are WPVI-DT6 in Philly (I read that they want to move from 6, but there's no other channel available), and KCWX-DT5 Fredericksburg TX (there was a thread here about lack of coverage). I also know from w9wi that WTVF-DT5 Nashville is planning a move to UHF.

I have caught my first six lowband-V DT's in 2010, including KCWX, also one on DT3 & one on DT4.....but we all know that TV stations do not merely exist for DXers alone. :)

BTW your post re WKYC-DT2 tells the whole story.

cd
 
KHPK in Dallas is on 3, its a low-power, so I'm sure nearly no one can see it.
I think the Dallas Daystar might have stayed on 2, but I could be wrong, I haven't been able to see them since the switch.
 
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