The Joys of DTV
Sunday, 6 December 2009 22:52![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dr_phil_physicsPost 11 June 2009
On air TV broadcasts in the U.S. have been digital DTV/HDTV signals since this summer. You've needed either a TV with a digital tuner, a converter box or cable/satellite. Now I am all for technologies... that work. And I've had some reservations about this particular implementation of DTV for some time.
This weekend it all fell apart.
Since The Snow Arrived On Friday...
... the local CBS channel has been pixelating, freezing and occasionally losing the sound. Interesting that the sound is much more resistant. This is on an analog cable TV, so it's a reception problem on the cable company's end. Not sure where the broadcast antenna is, but Ch. 3 is a Kalamazoo station, not Grand Rapids.
Today they're also doing a bad job on the analog signal -- half of the NFL on CBS score at the top of the frame is cut off. Good job, guys. Check your output signals much?
It's getting worse. 60 Minutes on CBS tonight was borderline unwatchable. Hell, even part of the late NFL game on the local FOX station was pixelating. You want to impress people with your superior cable TV signal? Make sure someone's managing the signal on a Sunday afternoon during football season.
The finale of The Amazing Race? Really annoying echoing audio, then the video got lost -- all green with a black bar at right and a blue bar across the top. When it came back, the aspect ratio was wrong -- too narrow -- but eventually we could turn the sound back on. Then the picture came back. Hmm, maybe somebody brushed the snow off the receiving antenna.
Then there's my sister in Atlanta. She's receiving DTV signals over the air. In the city. Flights in and out of Atlanta Hartsfield, a minor little-used airport, cause her signal to break up. Hardly even notice it. Yeah, right.
Law Of Diminishing Returns
Charter Communications, our cable company, is busy moving channels again. The public access channels have gone to the digital channels. No long any attempt to make them available to those with analog TVs. Same with C-SPAN2. We don't get that any more either. Truth be told, it's been an iffy thing over the years. Between the cable here and in the U.P., it's been on and off and on and off with whether we get C-SPAN2.
Lost Oxygen and G4/Tech TV last year. Speed Channel just moved -- no more Pinks: All Out in the middle of the night.
Sigh. Tis a messy end of a technological era, methinks.
Dr. Phil
On air TV broadcasts in the U.S. have been digital DTV/HDTV signals since this summer. You've needed either a TV with a digital tuner, a converter box or cable/satellite. Now I am all for technologies... that work. And I've had some reservations about this particular implementation of DTV for some time.
This weekend it all fell apart.
Since The Snow Arrived On Friday...
... the local CBS channel has been pixelating, freezing and occasionally losing the sound. Interesting that the sound is much more resistant. This is on an analog cable TV, so it's a reception problem on the cable company's end. Not sure where the broadcast antenna is, but Ch. 3 is a Kalamazoo station, not Grand Rapids.
Today they're also doing a bad job on the analog signal -- half of the NFL on CBS score at the top of the frame is cut off. Good job, guys. Check your output signals much?
It's getting worse. 60 Minutes on CBS tonight was borderline unwatchable. Hell, even part of the late NFL game on the local FOX station was pixelating. You want to impress people with your superior cable TV signal? Make sure someone's managing the signal on a Sunday afternoon during football season.
The finale of The Amazing Race? Really annoying echoing audio, then the video got lost -- all green with a black bar at right and a blue bar across the top. When it came back, the aspect ratio was wrong -- too narrow -- but eventually we could turn the sound back on. Then the picture came back. Hmm, maybe somebody brushed the snow off the receiving antenna.
Then there's my sister in Atlanta. She's receiving DTV signals over the air. In the city. Flights in and out of Atlanta Hartsfield, a minor little-used airport, cause her signal to break up. Hardly even notice it. Yeah, right.
Law Of Diminishing Returns
Charter Communications, our cable company, is busy moving channels again. The public access channels have gone to the digital channels. No long any attempt to make them available to those with analog TVs. Same with C-SPAN2. We don't get that any more either. Truth be told, it's been an iffy thing over the years. Between the cable here and in the U.P., it's been on and off and on and off with whether we get C-SPAN2.
Lost Oxygen and G4/Tech TV last year. Speed Channel just moved -- no more Pinks: All Out in the middle of the night.
Sigh. Tis a messy end of a technological era, methinks.
Dr. Phil
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no subject
Date: Monday, 7 December 2009 16:39 (UTC)and this is the way the world ends
Not with a bang
but in pixelation.
no subject
Date: Monday, 7 December 2009 17:32 (UTC)Resistance is irrelevant.
Dr. Phil
no subject
Date: Tuesday, 8 December 2009 02:38 (UTC)Actually, Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport is about 20 miles southwest of me, no interference at all from them. The airport that gives me fits is DeKalb Peachtree Airport that is about a mile away. Overgrown commuter airport that allows planes way larger than they're rated for to use the facilities. To say nothing of every emergency, police, news, traffic or weather 'copter is located there as well.
Fools follow the high-load power lines, which bisect my complex, into the airport, depending on how the wind is blowing. Changes of weather also seem to affect reception. But today all channels are coming in loud and clear. Now tomorrow, when I want to watch the rescheduled A Charlie Brown's Christmas, will be another story-it will be raining then!
PS - think the Amazing Race feed may have been a network issue, I surfed through it a couple time and it seemed to be having issues.
no subject
Date: Tuesday, 8 December 2009 04:00 (UTC)As for the network, even better. Again: check your output much?
Dr. Phil