The DTV Drama Continues

Feedback.pdxradio.com message board: Politics and other things: The DTV Drama Continues
Author: Skybill
Tuesday, February 10, 2009 - 10:37 am
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FCC gives stations four days to file notice of intent to cease analog service on Feb. 17

The notice even requires stations that previously had notified the commission of their intention to cease analog transmission on Feb. 17 to notify the agency again of their plans by Feb. 9.

http://broadcastengineering.com/hdtv/fcc-stations-four-days-file-notice-cease-an alog-service-0210/

Four days isn't very much time. Especially considering that 2 of those days were the weekend!

I've heard, but don't know for sure, that the Portland stations have all agreed not to turn the analog transmitters off on 17-FEB.

That's got to be a big expense keeping both TX's lit up for and additional 4 months.

Author: Jr_tech
Tuesday, February 10, 2009 - 12:22 pm
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Well, Lucy has yanked the football several times in the past... anybody think the June deadline is solid?

Author: Andy_brown
Tuesday, February 10, 2009 - 1:10 pm
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Follow the money. What's key are the stations above Ch. 50. That bandwidth has been auctioned off and the buyers are anxious to roll out new services within that bandwidth. Stations up in that range can't operate on their new, lower UHF assignment because in some cases they are occupied by analog UHF stations who are broadcasting not only there but on their new DTV assigned channel. So ..... the sooner the analogs go by by, the sooner this can happen.

It's about the money. Nothing else. The government can only hold off the new leaseholders for so long, already handing them a four month delay.

Author: Semoochie
Wednesday, February 11, 2009 - 11:59 pm
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The current bill passed with the understanding that there would be no more delays.

Author: Alfredo_t
Thursday, February 12, 2009 - 3:15 pm
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As I understand it, Verizon has had their Media-FLO transmitters on the air, in the former UHF channel 55, for quite some time. What did they do so that they could go on the air sooner?

[Don't you wish that you could pull money out of the air, the way the government does? :-) ]

Author: Skybill
Thursday, February 12, 2009 - 8:37 pm
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Alfredo, Yes they do. At least at the same site we are on in Salem, Eola Hills (aka Eagle Crest).

I know that TX has been OTA for about 12 to 18 months.

Maybe there was no CH-55 and they were granted that frequency.

I wonder if they have that channel nationwide or if they are on different frequencies in different markets?

Author: Andy_brown
Thursday, February 12, 2009 - 8:47 pm
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I'm pretty sure they'll be on the same channel all over, but can not begin transmitting if its a market where 55 is currently delivering analog NTSC. When the gov't auctioned the channels, the nationwide reach is why it brought in billions. I'm sure as soon as all markets with an operating 55 turn off, they'll fire up their system in that area.

Author: Jr_tech
Friday, February 13, 2009 - 1:31 pm
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Is the system going in Portland or is ch 54 a problem?

Tuning slowly through the range of ch 55 (716-722 mHz) with with my ICOM 8500 (BFO on), I hear little groups of "hash" from about 716.29 to 721.71 mHz... is this Media FLO? These signals are quite weak in Hillsboro.

Author: Semoochie
Friday, February 13, 2009 - 11:41 pm
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As I recall, there won't be any channels past 51.

Author: Jr_tech
Saturday, February 14, 2009 - 1:17 pm
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Another DYA antenna for UHF DTV:

http://www.tvtechnology.com/article/68820

http://www.xmtr.com/articles/RF182-fig1.pdf

http://www.digitalhome.ca/ota/superantenna/performance.htm

The Gray-Hoverman antenna would appear to be fairly easy to fabricate, offers high gain on the necessary UHF channels, and at least one article states that it has some gain on VHF channels as well.

Author: Jimbo
Saturday, February 14, 2009 - 6:34 pm
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"As I recall, there won't be any channels past 51."

That is correct. And all wireless microphones above 50 are supposed to be silent now, also. I think that deadline has passed.

Author: Alfredo_t
Monday, February 16, 2009 - 4:39 pm
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Have any of the trade or technical publications summarized who has bought the different pieces of spectrum that were formerly channels 52-69 and what services they intend to put on the air?

Author: Semoochie
Monday, February 16, 2009 - 5:26 pm
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By the way, I know it's been quite awhile but what did they do with 70-83?

Author: Alfredo_t
Monday, February 16, 2009 - 5:56 pm
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The old AMPS cellular phones and 800 MHz trunked radio systems for police/fire departments went into that part of the spectrum. There were probably other users, too.

Author: Semoochie
Wednesday, February 18, 2009 - 1:35 am
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Did anyone sign off?

Author: Jr_tech
Wednesday, February 18, 2009 - 9:50 am
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Well, Ch5 and Ch6 are off right now...

But also Sylvan FMs are at reduced power and KBPS HD is off, so it appears that Tower work is occuring. Wonder if the TV stations are getting many angry calls?

Oh-Oh! this is "bass ackwards" Ch 24 ANALOG is on but all of their DIGITAL channels (24-1 to 24-5) appear to be off.*



*This must be a result of the same tower work... but I suspect that when the shutdown occurs there might be a few "mistakes" by bleary-eyed engineers in the wee hours of the morning. :-)

Author: Jimbo
Wednesday, February 18, 2009 - 4:13 pm
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"*This must be a result of the same tower work... but I suspect that when the shutdown occurs there might be a few "mistakes" by bleary-eyed engineers in the wee hours of the morning. :-)"

I seriously doubt that. There is not much for them to do. Plus they will be ready. I know most of them and they are very competent individuals. Channel 2 and CH6 people don't have to do anything. They control their transmitters from the station and all they have to do is push the off button on the Analogs. It could be done by their Master Control guys but I am sure they will have higher ups or the transmitter guys do it due to the significance of it. Same with 24 and 49. 8, 10, and 12 will do some plumbing which may take an hour +/-. I don't know what 49 would do, probably just change the feed to the CH30 transmitter down at the station. CH22 is already done.

I don't see where there is any problem. CH10 has reportedly done it and made some tests and put everthing back. They are happy with their coverage, I hear.
They are ready now. It is a management/political thing, not a technology thing. We've already been over this. They want maximum viewers for now and OPB wants to finish their Spring pledge drive first.

Author: Skybill
Thursday, February 19, 2009 - 8:10 pm
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From Broadcast Engineering:

421 stations complete DTV transition; viewers respond

http://broadcastengineering.com/RF/stations-complete-dtv-transition-viewers-resp ond-0219/

Author: Alfredo_t
Thursday, February 19, 2009 - 8:24 pm
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The virtual channel numbering used in DTV seems to be more of a liability than a useful feature, in my opinion. I can appreciate that some managerial or marketing type at Zenith must have thought, "Hey, we can use technology to save a headache for television stations by allowing them to keep their logoes and channel identities, even though they won't be transmitting on the same channel anymore." In practice, though, this business of having to scan and then re-scan channels with the converter to catch changes seems to generate more trouble than its worth. Somebody should have thought this conundrum through when the system was being designed.

Author: Jr_tech
Thursday, February 19, 2009 - 8:55 pm
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Six Phases of a Project:

1. Enthusiasm
2. Disillusionment
3. Panic
4. Search for the guilty
5. Punishment of the innocent
6. Praise and honors for the non-participants

Have we reached 3 yet?

Author: Alfredo_t
Thursday, February 19, 2009 - 9:04 pm
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I think that we're definitely at #3.

Author: Alfredo_t
Monday, April 13, 2009 - 10:29 am
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Last week, I attended a TERAC (formerly the Tektronix Amateur Radio Club) presentation by Charlie Rhodes. Rhodes was the chief scientist at the ATSC in the 1990s. He now writes for TV Technology.

The talk provided answers to some of the technical issues that we've discussed here; in some cases, the answers were not what I had expected. Below are some of the most interesting answers revealed in the talk:

1) Contrary to popular belief, the DTV power levels were not chosen to save broadcasters money on the electric bill; they were set to the maximum levels possible without raising interference concerns (due to overloading receiver front ends). I asked, why are the UHF DTV stations running up to 1MW ERP, whereas analog stations could run up to 5MW? The answer was that the power measurement techniques are different for the two systems: NTSC power is peak power, which occurs at the synchronization pulses; DTV power figures are average power. Statistically, the peak power of a DTV signal is 7dB above the average power (roughly 5 times). This implies that a DTV station at the maximum power level on UHF would require the same size of a final amplifier as a NTSC station at the maximum power level--those big inductive output tubes are going to be around for a while.

2) DTV requires a 16 dB signal-to-noise ratio for reliable reception. 15.2 dB is the minimum required for any reception at all. This is an inherent property of the encoding and error correction used. It is not possible to improve these numbers with changes to the algorithms performed in the receiver.

3) "White Space" devices may pose serious issues to DTV reception. In Rhodes's opinion, the approval of these devices was a poor decision with political (rather than sound engineering) motivations. He says that the sensible thing to do would have been to restrict these devices to the low-VHF channels and put these channels completely off limits to television broadcasters.

4) Rhodes argued against the use of the low VHF channels for DTV use, and he believes that the stations that will be using those channels are committing suicide. The primary reason that low-VHF is a bad choice is that atmospheric noise is higher at those frequencies than on the high VHF channels or UHF. A secondary reason is that newer TV antennas are being designed under the assumption that the low-VHF channels won't be used. The new antennas won't have those long elements that one might have traditionally found on a VHF TV log-periodic.

5) Newer antenna designs will offer improved gain and directivity for their sizes because they will be optimized for a narrower bandwidth.

Further reading: http://www.tvtechnology.com/article/73532 (Note: in this article, he states that peak-to-average power ratio on DTV is 6 dB.)

Author: Alfredo_t
Monday, April 13, 2009 - 11:27 am
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I forgot three more important points:

6) The sensitivity figures for the converter boxes that qualify for the government coupons (amost 100 different models) all fall within a range of about 2 dB. Their noise figure is 7 dB or less. Some of them have very good overload characteristics. Rhodes admitted that he did not open or otherwise try to reverse-engineer these converters.

7) Nobody (other than the design engineers) knows whether the signal indicator for a given model of converter or DTV tuner is really an RF level measurement or whether it is derived in some other way, such as from the error correction algorithms. On some tuners, the signal level indicator has an abrupt behavior (described as a "balance beam"), wherein most signals that can be received well measure 90-100%, and only a very narrow range of signal strengths produce readings in the middle of the scale. Such signal meters are useless for optimizing antenna positioning. His recommendation was to use attenuators to bring the signal strength down to the threshold of receivability, and find the optimum placement through an iterative procedure involving increasing attenuation, moving the antenna, etc.

8) The only significant way that these converter box models are differentiated from one another is in the design of the user interface software. Some of the converters have software that limits their usefulness in certain circumstances. Specifically, some converters do not allow the user to manually program channels into the channel memory. If the user is in a location where the stations he wishes to watch come from very different directions, such that he has to use an antenna rotator, he may be out of luck with such a converter.

Author: Jimbo
Monday, April 13, 2009 - 3:51 pm
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Very good summarization of the highlights of the presentation, Alfredo. You must have been taking good notes.
I remember the question about power levels being asked, I didn't know it was you.

I thought it was an informative evening. One thing he didn't pass out was the schematic for his homebrew attenuator switch. 1, 2, 3, and 6 dB is all you need.
One thing you didn't mention was that he stated that around the 15.2 dB level, .25 dB is the difference between working or not working.

Author: Alfredo_t
Monday, April 13, 2009 - 4:15 pm
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I had forgotten the exact remark that he had made about the drastic nature of the working/not working cutoff. Now, I remember that he said that on their test set up, it was just one attenuator click (0.25 dB) that made the difference. Unfortunately, I didn't take written notes, and I had to run back to work, as I was working the late shift that evening.

One question that I wanted to ask him, perhaps after the talk, was if there was any way that HAMs could transmit DTV signals in the amateur bands. I refrained from asking this during the talk because I felt it was too far off-topic; if I could have stayed around longer, I might have asked him afterward.

By the way, a co-worker who also attended grabbed a copy of the presentation slides and scanned them into a PDF document. I can send that out later tonight to anyone who is interested.

Author: Skybill
Monday, April 13, 2009 - 5:00 pm
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Alfredo, I'd like a copy! Email is in my profile. Thanks!!!

Author: Jr_tech
Monday, April 13, 2009 - 7:18 pm
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Great stuff... I would love to get a copy! THANKS!

Author: Missing_kskd
Monday, April 13, 2009 - 7:35 pm
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Me Three. Love that kind of stuff.

Thanks.

Author: Jr_tech
Tuesday, April 14, 2009 - 10:34 am
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Alfredo,

Thanks again... Years ago, I built a calibrated switch attenuator for a 75 ohm environment similar to this:

http://www.nt7s.com/index.php5?page=stepatt

(values given for 50 ohm...but has a link to a site to calculate for other environments)

I built it in a thin brass box, with the resistors soldered to ground very close to the switches, assembled it with shields between the switch contacts and limited the steps to a max of 10db. Steps are pretty good up to 400mhz (or so).

Good for determining the amount of "headroom" that a given DTV signal has.

Author: Jimbo
Tuesday, April 14, 2009 - 12:10 pm
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Thanks for the links jr_tech.
Charlie mentioned that, for DTV, you really only need a box with four attenuators... 1, 2, 3, and 6 dB. That would allow you to go in 1dB steps to 12 dB, which is all you really need.
You can also buy those four individually with a female and male F-connector. So you can put them inline. I hear (not verified) that you can get them at Norvac, Double-O, and URS.

By putting an amplifier at your antenna, you may boost the signal of the lower power ones but put the higher power ones at too much gain so that your receiver is overloaded. (Too much signal) = (too little signal) = Nothing. Using attenuators is a way to check for too much signal.

When the upper V's return to their original channels for digital, they will be using much less power than they are now on their temporary UHF assignments and also much less power than on their current analog VHF channels. Currently, 8, 10, and 12 have 316KW on VHF. They are going to drop to 25, 32, and 24 KW respectively, when they move their digitals to their old channels in June (?). I guess we won't know if that date holds until June 13.
Then, the adjustments begin again.

Author: Alfredo_t
Tuesday, April 14, 2009 - 12:37 pm
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I bought a set of F-connector attenuators from an online supplier, but I am not sure of the name. These are the "cable TV" attenuators that Rhodes described. I had bought them to overcome overload problems that I had with one FM tuner and with a TV. Originally, I had meant to buy the adjustable 75 Ohm attenuator that Radio Shack carried, but unfortunately, that product has been discontinued for many years. Therefore, I bought several 3 dB, 6 dB, and 10 dB attenuators, with the intent that if I needed more than 10 dB attenuation, I could just cascade them.

By the way, did anyone not receive the PDF that I sent you last night?

Author: Alfredo_t
Tuesday, April 14, 2009 - 12:44 pm
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Additional info: I think that I bought my attenuators at Rackmount Devices (scroll to the end of http://www.rackmount-devices.com/products.html?sp=17&fc=3&pc=21 ). They are under $2.00 apiece. At these prices, it is easy to put together a kit of attenuators for diagnostic or overload prevention purposes.

Author: Semoochie
Saturday, May 02, 2009 - 5:50 pm
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Just looking through the FCC site, I see the following digital low power stations will be operating from the west hills: 5, 28, 34, 36, 41, 42, 44 and 49. All of these stations should cover the entire metro area and then some. 18 will be beaming in from the southwest and there are also some flashcut possiblities. Some of these stations are move-ins and there could be more to come. It's beginning to look like there might be more TV stations than AM or FM! Stay tuned, quite literally.

Author: Motozak2
Saturday, May 02, 2009 - 7:32 pm
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Do you know what any of those channels will initially broadcast? Will they be simulcasts of the NTSC LP's (KUNP-47, KORK, KOXI etc.)?

Author: Semoochie
Sunday, May 03, 2009 - 12:37 am
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I didn't bother to write down call letters. I just thought the sheer number of stations was interesting, along with the move-in aspect. For instance, one of the stations mentioned on this board, KWVT is moving here to channel 49.

Author: Jimbo
Sunday, May 03, 2009 - 6:24 am
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What is low power? Low digital power on 49 isn't going to cover much. Look at KPDX at reduced power on DT.
Low power on VHF can do better. Not sure about CH5. There are some adjacencies to KOIN-DT and KATU-DT, as in "channel sandwich". That has got to give some potential interference.

Author: Semoochie
Sunday, May 03, 2009 - 10:27 am
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It seems that digital signals don't overlap like analog does. This is even supposed to be true with HD Radio, once the hybrid system is discarded, assuming that ever happens. The coverage for some of these low power stations extends as far south as Salem. My guess is that it will be similar to FM translators, where objects in the way cause loss of signal. Still, a roof antenna should work fine for many people in the Portland area.

Author: Jr_tech
Sunday, May 03, 2009 - 11:25 am
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As best I can figure from the FCC site (some stations have multiple CPs ):

5 KCRW-LP .3kW
28 KOXI-LD 15kW (col Camas)
34 KKEI-CA 15kW
36 KEVE-LP 15kW (col Vancouver)
41 KORK-LD 15kW
42 KXPG-LP 15kW
44 KOXO-LD 15kW
49 KWVT-LP 15kw (col Salem)

Anybody have a design for a UHF booster with very good dynamic range?

Author: Andy_brown
Sunday, May 03, 2009 - 11:47 am
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"What is low power?"

Class A Television

http://www.fcc.gov/mb/policy/classa.html

"It seems that digital signals don't overlap like analog does."

Not exactly.

RF propagation remains the same. Modulation is what is changing. Modulation may contribute to interference with adjacent channels. It's not really overlap except perhaps in AM broadcasting. Where and how coverage thins to unacceptability is also changing. In analog, weak signals can be detected even in the presence of large amounts of on and off channel interference. Digital reaches a point of non detectability and poof it's gone. As a result, the interference caused and interference received behaviors are different. Until all the analog trash is gone, the FCC doesn't really know what the relationship between ERP and coverage will be. Because broadcast signals are going to be addressable, receivers will reject stuff they aren't tuned to more easily than in analog technology.

Of course, RF blanketing isn't going to go away. It would be interesting to see how two adjacent digital TV signals originating from close together would behave on a receiver within the close in area.

Author: Semoochie
Sunday, May 03, 2009 - 2:51 pm
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Channels 45 and 46 would seem to qualify. Some of those "multiple construction permits" are for analog. There's an application that I can't figure out: It's for KATU channel 2 analog at 50kw, dated January 2009.

Author: Jr_tech
Sunday, May 03, 2009 - 3:07 pm
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Some of those "multiple construction permits" are for analog.

So what is the game here...why, for example, would KXPG-LP have a CP for both a 15kW digital and a 100kW analog from the same transmitting location?
(as well as ch 22 digital, on the air with 745kW)

Author: Semoochie
Sunday, May 03, 2009 - 5:21 pm
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Some of those are displacement CPs that were never built because they were analog. Others are just superceded by other applications like for instance, KPDX channel 30 is listed as both the KPTV facility that never upgraded, probably because they knew they were moving to 12, as well as the upgrade.

Author: Alfredo_t
Monday, May 04, 2009 - 12:04 am
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This is probably one of those threads that has gotten too long for its own good: the important thing to remember, as far as coverage is concerned, is that the receiver must see a signal-to-noise ratio of 15.2 dB or better in order for reception to be possible. Scroll up, and you will see this discussed in more detail. By the way, are there any photos available online that show what an NTSC picture looks like at various different signal-to-noise ratios?

Author: 62kgw
Monday, May 04, 2009 - 8:49 am
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some people thimk that they will be able to listen to DTV audio on a HD Radio!!will that work???y/n???did some station imoly that would work??

Author: Alfredo_t
Monday, May 04, 2009 - 10:05 am
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Ha ha ha! I could definitely envision non-technical people thinking that a HD radio would receive channel 6 audio. "Hey, they're both digital, right?"

Author: Jr_tech
Monday, May 04, 2009 - 10:15 am
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No, It won't work... perhaps a low power chipset will be developed to recover DTV audio as well as HD-FM for portable radios, but I see no sign of that yet!
A lot of people use the little analog TV sound portable radios, which will be useless (for the most part) when analog TV shuts down. My guess is that there would be a good market for a digital portable radio, even though reception might might be difficult in some situations (such as a moving car) where the old analog devices worked ok.

Author: Jimbo
Monday, May 04, 2009 - 11:30 am
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"There's an application that I can't figure out: It's for KATU channel 2 analog at 50kw, dated January 2009. "
Not difficult at all. It is probably to run KATU analog at half power....50KW. They suffered some damage from ice, similar to KPDX in December and had to reduce power. The app was probably to continue running at that level because it did not make sense to fix it since they were planning on shutting it down in a few months. It, of course, has been extended until June. They have actually been running at about 40KW since that time.

""It seems that digital signals don't overlap like analog does."

Not exactly."
True, Andy. A good example to look at is KUNP on channel 47. It is an LP at 100KW analog. KGW-DT is on 46 and KPDX-DT is on 48. KUNP has noticeable interference in it from the adjacencies. When they shut those down in June, KUNP will not have the digital interference in it.

"some people thimk that they will be able to listen to DTV audio on a HD Radio!"
Come on now 62. You need to stop saying "some people" when you are clearly speaking only of yourself. This has been explained several times to you, previously (in other threads). You need to get off the HD radio complaints in your head.

Author: Jeffreykopp
Monday, May 04, 2009 - 6:14 pm
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Anyone know current avail of the Zenith converter? Circuit City gone, and Best Buy is out of them.

Thanks.

Author: Jr_tech
Monday, May 04, 2009 - 6:54 pm
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Odd note on Amazon:

"Currently unavailable.
We don't know when or if this item will be back in stock."

http://www.amazon.com/Zenith-DTT901-Digital-Tuner-Converter/dp/B001BNT3FS

Perhaps tha-tha-thats all folks?

Author: Semoochie
Tuesday, May 05, 2009 - 2:08 am
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I should have prefaced my remarks with the words, "in a purely digital world".

Author: 62kgw
Wednesday, May 06, 2009 - 9:46 am
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digital is digital,no maybes, no TV Sound!!!

Author: Roger
Wednesday, May 06, 2009 - 10:27 am
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So, are "some people" actually "those people" that you hear about, but are never actually named? Then, there are "You people" and "them"

Are "they" all in the same shadowy group?

Author: Alfredo_t
Wednesday, May 06, 2009 - 10:48 am
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> digital is digital,no maybes, no TV Sound!!!

Yes.
* A is A
* DTV reception either works or it doesn't.
* The TV Sound portable radios won't work anymore (unless you live in a place like Ouray, CO, where there are NTSC translators that operate on VHF).

Author: Semoochie
Wednesday, May 06, 2009 - 12:47 pm
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for now.

Author: Jr_tech
Wednesday, May 06, 2009 - 1:01 pm
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Has an official deadline for analog TV translator shut down been announced yet?

Author: Alfredo_t
Wednesday, May 06, 2009 - 1:25 pm
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I would hope that some kind of an exception could be made for the NTSC translators in Ouray and similar places--though I am not holding my breath that it will. Ouray is one of those places where unlike metropolitan areas, spectrum is not at a premium. When I visited some friends there last year, I took a portable TV. The UHF band was completely vacant. There were two NTSC VHF translators. One of my friends said that a DTV translator was under construction but not yet on the air. The only official FM broadcast signals in town were from a LPFM station and a handful of translators.

Author: Semoochie
Thursday, May 07, 2009 - 1:46 am
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No but I don't see that stopping anyone from building them. It's just a matter of time and even in Ouray, one is already being built!


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