Last night at 9:10 pm LPTV station K31GL came on the air at 9:10 pm. The Sig. strength was at 63-64% this morning and a test pattern saying "K31GL-D" was on the test pattern unlike KJJM-LP when it was off air. WFAA-TV Stated that "the TV stations across N. Texas will turn off in 2009. But our power is limited, but after the deadline, more power will be transmitting off of our transmitter in Cedar Hill and more as well." "As more as well"? That possibly or could be saying that more DFW channels maybe all could be going from analog to digital. Including LPTV? Comment please i am confused!http://www.wfaa.com/news8now/
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K31GL-DT is on the air!
- Thread starter eskipper411
- Start date
LPTV's, TV Translators and Class A's don't have to transition to digital.
WFAA-DT will be moving back to 8, but KFWD (52) will be moving to 9 - so the issue will most likely be 52 vs. 6...
I'm not sure who has "priority" rights, as both WFAA and KCEN had 9 as their initial digital channel... (IIRC, if you were initially assigned a digital channel, it was protected, but if you went back to your analog channel number, you were at risk of neighboring station on the same channel). The pro's can answer the details better than I...
Jim
I'm not sure who has "priority" rights, as both WFAA and KCEN had 9 as their initial digital channel... (IIRC, if you were initially assigned a digital channel, it was protected, but if you went back to your analog channel number, you were at risk of neighboring station on the same channel). The pro's can answer the details better than I...
Jim
well right now i lost it but they were airing a test pattern i have trying to catch it on my Plasma but signals too unstable.tripinva said:
Rock solid signal here in Plano. Amazing for as little power as it puts out.
I'm guessing digital is somehow more efficient than analog. I noticed that the max power for digital is 1,000 kw where it was 5,000 kw for analog UHF. Probably the same reason our digital wireless phones are smaller and the battery lasts longer than our old analog phones. But again I'm just guessing. Can anyone a little more technically saavy comment on my hypothesis? Does a digital LPTV carry a bit further per watt?
Well K31GL did today when they came on today when I called them right now.radioguybroadcasting said:
fredcantu said:
The 1 MW digital / 5 MW analog comparison is apples to oranges, as the 5 MW for analog is max power while the 1 MW for digital is average power. And those numbers are for UHF. For VHF, it's a sliding scale based on antenna height above average terrain (HAAT), but again, average power vs. maximum power. For LPTV UHF, the ceilings are 150 kW analog and 15 kW digital, while for VHF it's 3 kW analog vs. 300 W digital.
That being said, digital does seem to be a bit more efficient. Then again, IANAE. (I am not an engineer.)
Another thing about digital is that the picture is clear until signal strength drops off sufficiently (usually about 50%). After that, you may first get pixelation, then a garbled picture, but you eventually lose it altogether (called the "cliff effect"). You don't get the slow degradation of signal that you get with analog.
eskipper411 said:
LPTVs, CLass As and Translators are not legally required to go digital by February 2009, but there is no law preventing them from doing so.
For what it's worth.. K31GL appears to be retransmitting two LPTV stations.
I believe 31.1 is KHPK-LP and 31.2 is KNAV-LP. Their ID on 31.1 showed both sets of call letters and identified it as the Genesis Television Network. The website genesistx.com shows those two stations but does not mention K31GL.
Funny thing was last night I saw them running infomercials on 31.1. When it ended and right after they ran the ID, the DVR they are using for programming went back to the main menu and stayed there.
I believe 31.1 is KHPK-LP and 31.2 is KNAV-LP. Their ID on 31.1 showed both sets of call letters and identified it as the Genesis Television Network. The website genesistx.com shows those two stations but does not mention K31GL.
Funny thing was last night I saw them running infomercials on 31.1. When it ended and right after they ran the ID, the DVR they are using for programming went back to the main menu and stayed there.
tested said:
Ive seen LPTVs and the like where all I see is a DVD logo bouncing across the screen or a computer setup menu.. for days on end.
tested said:
31.1 is Genesis Television Network's English language service, and 31.2 is their Spanish language service. The two versions of Genesis run different schedules -- the Spanish language version isn't just a dubbed simulcast of the English channel.
When I went to channels 22 (KNAV) and 28 (KHPK) for comparison, channel 22 was running an "out of service" sign and channel 28 was also showing something different from what was on the digital channels. So I'm not sure if the simulcast that you saw was temporary or not.
Lastly, I note that K31GL is using a lousy MPEG encoder -- I could see plenty of digital artifacts on both sub-channels, which shouldn't be the case for a standard definition DTV station that is only carrying two programming streams.
It's not that they're using a lousy encoder, the problem is that it's been compressed all to hell. I have a contact in the area and he sent me a capture of K31GL-D and they've got:
31-1 using 2.6 Mbps
31-2 using 2.3 Mbps
Null packets using the remaining 13.7 (!) Mbps.
Whatever encoder they are using, I think it's just configured wrong. That or they plan to add subchannels, though I'm doubting that's the cause.
- Trip
31-1 using 2.6 Mbps
31-2 using 2.3 Mbps
Null packets using the remaining 13.7 (!) Mbps.
Whatever encoder they are using, I think it's just configured wrong. That or they plan to add subchannels, though I'm doubting that's the cause.
- Trip
on my converter i aint getting no sound but on My lcd in my friends room there is sound what is wrong i mean every other channel get sound but those 2 dont.
Well, the lack of PSIP could do it, but so could their signal configuration. Something is odd about it; the capture I have shows the signal as "DVB" and not "ATSC" even though it's clearly ATSC. Also their TSID is very wrong and this is going to screw with more than one receiver.
- Trip
- Trip
TexasTom said:
It's entirely possible that it's not a simulcast at all. I don't currently have a TV hooked up to receive analog signals so I wasn't able to check it out. All I can report is what I saw on the one legal ID I was able to witness.
One wonders if Mako Communications will put the rest of their local LPTV stations on the remaining bandwidth for K31GL?
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