Tag Archives: television

Entertainment

The Clock Is Ticking

High-power analog television has but a week of life left in the States. And with analog on the ropes, and most of the locals already gone, I’ve been watching for some things I couldn’t have seen otherwise.

One thing that really surprises me is just how often there are openings going on. With casual checking, I’ve found stations coming in from somewhere almost every other day. And Tu Canal from Mexico is in about every third day on channel 2. With us having stations on channel 2, 4 and 5, I had no idea any of this was going on. It’s been fun to see, but come Friday, the domestic stations will be gone, leaving me with Canada, Mexico and Cuba as the likely analog stations I’ll still see from time to time.

I’m still not quite sure how I’ll figure out when there’s domestic E-skip taking place that I could leverage for DTV. An exercise for the writer, I guess. 🙂

Tonight, the airwaves held a surprise. Since the mass shutdown on June 12th, I’ve seen plenty of activity on channels 2, 3 and 4. Tonight though, I got a quick glimpse on channel 6 of KOCT-TV from Carlsbad NM. Tu Canal had been in for an hour or two, so I knew things were hopping down that direction, but to see the MUF climb up to channel 6 was pretty cool. I’ve only seen anything that high here once before. A few years ago, we had some kind of opening — probably Es — that allowed us to watch a bunch of stuff from up around Rapid City SD. This was nowhere near as long lived.

However, my huzzahs go to KOCT — they identified with a long duration slide that allowed me plenty of time to catch it at its peak. Many of nightlight stations seem to identify pretty rarely — probably like they did in real life at twice an hour. I’ve had a channel 2 from somewhere in New England in twice over the last week with Norm from This Old House talking about DTV and have yet to see an id on the station. That’ll make ya happy. 🙁

In any case, with one week of domestics left, I’ll be paying attention as I can, and seeing if I can get anything new in the log. Once Friday rolls by, I’ll put my list of stations up. Hopefully, our local channel 5 will go off the air, and I’ll find some station(s) still on before they shutdown too.

Entertainment

Digital Transition

Last night, the transition from analog to all-digital television began. Becky and I watched it until the gory end. We watched our PBS station on channel 9 drop off, and within a couple of minutes, all the locals (except channel 5) disappear. Channel 5 appears to be acting as a “night light” station, broadcasting DTV transition information. I have no idea how long that’ll last.

However, there were still a lot of stations on the air. Some were broadcasting DTV transition info, and others were still transmitting regular programming. With the St. Louis stations out of the way, I was able to see some stations that I ordinarily couldn’t have because of the locals. It was nice to see some of those before they disappeared.

It’s been my theory that once the US analog stations were gone, it would clear the path to seeing analog stations from both Mexico and Canada with greater ease. I could have been more right. Within a few minutes of the local channel 2 switching their analog signal off, I started seeing XEPM out of Mexico (near Las Cruces). Cool.

I stayed up until about 2.15am, spinning the antenna, looking for fresh signals.

This morning, there were still quite a few analog stations up and running, much to my surprise. And this morning, I was treated to another opening, this time to the Atlantic coast — Charleston, Daytona Beach and Charlotte. Once again, if the locals had been on, I would never have seen any of it. For all I know, signals have always been like this, I just couldn’t see ’em. I even saw some signals from Canada this morning.

Tonight — in theory, the last night of analog broadcasting — almost every station is gone. I’ve seen a few signals from Mexico, and a couple of locals, but most of the analog signals are gone. However, there’s still one stubborn station, WSIL, sitting on channel 3, running normal broadcasting. I’m a little surprised at that, and am wondering when they’ll turn out the lights.

Transition has been fun, and if the signals from Mexico and Canada have been any indication, there could some real fun to come!

Entertainment

Analog Swan Song

When I got back to the Deauxmayne today, I got some lunch going, and took a peek at the TV. Ever since the digital transition dates have been announced (and extended), I’ve been looking for long haul analog signals that I just won’t be as likely to see after the cutover date.

Today, I was rewarded with a few moments of viewing from KTVK, Channel 3 in Phoenix. That’s quite a long haul from here, and is a station I’ve only seen once before. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to get set up with the camera before they slid into the mists of the background noise, but there was no doubt about what I was seeing… perhaps the last analog Es propagation for a long while.

However, there’s some good news in all the hullabaloo about transition here in the States. The Canadian and Mexican transition dates are still some ways out, and with the lower VHF channels all cleared out, that should make for some easier pickings down the road. That should make for some interesting viewing!

Geek-Speak

Stay of Execution

Anyone who’s been around me for more than a week or two in my house has seen my eyes light up at the prospect of far off TV viewing. I just love the spring and summer when the weather and the ionosphere conspire to produce just the right conditions to watch TV from Wisconsin. Or Florida. Or Montana. Or Arizona. Or Cuba.

However, the move to digital TV here in the States will really foul that up. Oh, the propagation that allows those things to happen will still be there, but the telltale signs won’t. With analog signals, you can see other strong signals start to bleed through, and when there’s several on the same channel, there’s a glorious whine that is reproduced nowhere else in nature. It’s fun, and is one of my earliest memories of playing around with radio (well, TV is technically radio, right?). With digital signals, I imagine the only heads-up you’d have is unexpected blockiness, or perhaps other kinds of interference that won’t be real obvious as signs of long distance TV signals coming in.

And I’ve been counting down the days until the mandated switch to digital, with woe and despair. This week though, the President’s wish was granted, and analog TV got a four month stay of execution. Yippee! Maybe Barack likes chasing long distance TV signals too. 🙂

So now we have what could be the perfect storm. Many stations already have their plans in place to switch to digital, cut the analog umbilical cord, and stop feeding two transmitters and possibly two transmitter sites — our local ABC affiliate was showing commercials tonight indicating that they will be turning off their analog signal at 11.59pm on the old cutover night. I say, let ’em do it.

Here’s where the perfect storm comes in. Some stations probably will keep their analog transmitters live through June. I’m sure many won’t. It’ll just depend on their plans. But for those that do, they’ll be entering a time when tropospheric ducting and E-layer ionospheric conditions could bring some of those far off signals to me… without having to fight some of the local (and local-ish) stations just to see the far off stuff. In particular, it’ll be interesting to see what our stations on the VHF channels do (channels 2, 4 and 5).

If they all move in a couple of weeks, it could be a DXers paradise around here for four months. From what I can tell, the only VHF station that will shutdown on February 17th will be channel 4. That’ll help, leaving both channel 3 and 4 available for some of that long haul stuff.

And the last bit of silver lining? Canada doesn’t complete its digital transition until August 2011, with Mexico having started, but not completing the transition until 2021. Quiet, mostly abandoned VHF bands, and targets within one E-layer hop from here may make for some pretty cool stuff over the next few years.

Sit back kids, and help me watch for Star Trek in French from Quebec, and futbol from Mexico!