A Vacation

I am typing this message from a timeshare in Pennsylvania. Yep, I'm on vacation.

And what kind of vacation would it be if I hadn't dragged my reception equipment with me? I'm staying at Fernwood in the Poconos, which is in a valley which cuts it off from virtually all TV reception. All I can see here are analog signals--WTBY-54 Poughkeepsie, WMBC-63 Newton, and occasionally WNJB2 Blairstown. None of them will make it here in the world of digital, due to new tower sites.

But that doesn't mean I haven't been busy. I managed to get my mom to stop several times on the way home, plus I took a drive today. I've received:

• WHSV-DT Harrisonburg
• All of Hagerstown, MD's stations
• All of Harrisburg, PA's stations (WGCB-DT was too weak but I got the gist of it)
• All of Scranton, PA's stations except WQMY-DT which may not be on the air
• Most of Philadelphia's stations (except WHYY-DT, WNJS-DT, WMCN-DT, WBPH-DT, WWSI-DT).

I hope to go through Allentown on the way home and receive WBPH-DT, and maybe complete Philadelphia if I'm really lucky. I also want to try to get a better capture out of WGCB-DT and stop somewhere near Staunton to try and receive WVPT-DT.

I am also going to the suburb in New Jersey where my relatives live tomorrow with my uncle. He needs to go home to pick something up, and I'll be going with him to try and receive as many of the New York stations as I can. At my grandparents' house I've received 2/4/5/7/9/11/13/29/31/41/47/50/63/68, so I'm expecting to receive at least those stations tomorrow. Ideally I'd also like to grab 58 and 25 (I didn't have a VHF antenna last time, and 25 wasn't on the air).

All the data from my trip is uploaded and posted. All the data from today's journey is posted, but the captures have yet to be uploaded. I hope to correct that soon.

Have a great holiday week.

Digital TV E-Skip

I believe that I broke a record today.

I decoded a few frames of KOTA-DT 2 Rapid City, SD on the DTT900 in the kitchen. I tried to get it on the DViCO so I could get a TSReader capture, but I was too slow.

So I'll keep trying to get some proof of reception throughout the summer before getting too carried away. If Wikipedia is to be believed, the current DTV E-skip distance record is 1,236 miles, whereas my reception was about 1,370 miles.

I almost got WWAY-DT to add to my Wilmington collection, but it didn't quite make it. I got WECT-DT and WUNJ-DT a few days ago, along with WFXI-DT, WUNK-DT, and others. I'll be doing more DXing before the summer's out.

Have a great week!

Quick Followup Re: WDRL-DT

Good morning.

All I have is a quick followup to my last post. After I received WDRL-DT on Saturday night, I sent an e-mail to the general manager informing him of my findings. I told him of three things he could fix in his signal to make it decode for some people with finnicky tuners.

Well, I managed to decode WDRL-DT again yesterday and it's either a coincidence and he just happened to configure PSIP and his TVCT yesterday, or he listened to me and configured it. It now maps to 24-1 and has "WDRL" listed for the call sign. The whole TVCT is filled out now, though there's still no program guide. (You can find an updated TSReader listing on the listings page)

Now that it's correct, my DViCO will show me video when the signal is strong enough, and the station even seemed to add itself to the DTT900s downstairs. I have yet to see any picture out of my Zenith HDV420, but at some point while sitting on 41-3 it remapped itself to 24-1.

I also determined that the DTT900 shows a clear picture on WDRL-DT when the WinTV-D has as little as 12.6 dB SNR, which is below the point where I can even determine the PIDs on the WinTV-D. The DTT900 tries to decode as low as about 12 dB on the WinTV-D but is pixelated and generally unsuccessful.

Anyway, I have to go off to work, just wanted to make that note. Have a good day!

Happy Memorial Day

Hello again, all.

I've had nothing much to post about for the last two weeks. I've been working my new job and keeping up with site updates as needed.

A couple of interesting points. The first is that pre-amplifiers can greatly improve fringe signal, even having two in a series. For many years, my family has had a setup involving two antennas out on the roof and then coming in to a 30 dB Radio Shack amp. On Saturday, on a whim, I took my CM7777 and put it in the line before the Radio Shack amp, and saw signal on my weakest signals spike. To be specific:

• WBRA-DT went from about 11 dB up to 13.5 dB-14.2 dB, usually sitting right at 13.8 dB.
• WDRL-DT went from varying between 4-7 dB to a fairly consistent 10-12 dB, usually sitting right at 10.8 dB.

WDRL-DT is probably a lost cause for the time being, but there's still hope for PBS, as we're seriously considering a larger antenna that is actually wide enough to capture the waves on channel 3.

Speaking of WDRL-DT, I was finally able to decode the station on Saturday evening thanks in part to the amp and to favorable atmospheric conditions. I've posted some TSReader output and found that the station does not appear to be transmitting any PSIP at all. The Zenith receivers showed the station on 41-3 with no guide data or identification, and my DViCO I use for TSReader wouldn't even show me the video feed for some reason. This probably explains why I seem to remember my Zenith HDV420 shutting itself off last time WDRL-DT decoded (it was never strong enough to do so on Saturday night with that receiver).

Does anyone know if there's a receiver like the WinTV-D in terms of its signal measurements, but with a newer chip in it? I love the way it measures signal, but the tuner in it is atrocious. I had 13.8 dB SNR on it when WDRL-DT was decoding cleanly on the Zenith DTT900 boxes downstairs. The WinTV-D generally needs about 16.5 dB SNR to decode cleanly, just to give an idea of how much of an improvement there is. (That said, low-VHF on the Zenith begins trying to decode a lot sooner, but isn't watchable until it's stabilized on the WinTV-D, which just goes to show how much more signal is required to overcome low-VHF's problems.) If you wish to see what its signal meter looks like, here's Girard Westerberg's page on it. The signal meter images begin about 2/3 of the way down the page.

Anyway, enjoy your Memorial Day and updates here will resume tonight just after midnight. Have a great day!

Retired One Section, Added a New One

Good afternoon!

Not much to talk about today. I retired the Subchannels section about half an hour ago. It was falling out of date and it was quite annoying to have to update two pages every time I got an update, so I went ahead and retired it.

In its place, I spent most of today as well as a large chunk of last night researching and building its replacement. While it has absolutely nothing to do with OTA DTV, I wanted to make this page for my father who loves watching video on the Internet. As long as I was compiling this huge page, I figured I might as well make it available to the public. So there it is; enjoy it.

I know I'm missing a lot of things in the Sports and Music sections, but neither subject interests me too much. I should hope that people find some use in the massive list, and do let me know if any errors are found.

Have a good day!

Free to Be Accurate

First of all, let me start off with some news updates.

As I'm sure everyone has heard by now, Wilmington NC is slated to be the DTV shutoff "test market." They will terminate analog on September 8, 2008, five months ahead of the shutoff for the rest of the country. Right in the middle of hurricane season, no less, and in a market with all UHFs. Personally I think it was a poor choice of market, whereas Chico, Lexington, or Columbus would have been superior choices.

I managed to finish Raleigh yesterday, due to some intense tropo ducting, now that I'm home. I'm also running through and trying to update all the UNC stations so they are the same. I'm part of the way through, still have to do the stations in Charlotte, Greenville, and Asheville.

Low VHF digitals continue to suck. WBRA-DT has annoyed me to no end since I've gotten home. Right this moment the signal is decoding at 16.9 dB, but it is always gone when there's something I want to watch. Their answer? "Get satellite." Also a great way to ensure they cut their donations, since those will end up in the satellite bill instead. Good job, WBRA, way to provide a public service!

Finally, the point of this post. Last month, days before the official launch of RabbitEars, I received an e-mail from the Senior Vice President of Technology at the CW. (Since I have not received permission to publish his name, I shall not) He complimented the site I had even then, and requested a list of his own affiliates. Fortunately, the site as it stands was launched the next day, and on the Search page it provides a list of both CW and CW+ affiliates. He asked for my mailing address and said he wanted to send me something from the CW.

Gift 1
Gift 2 (Front)
Gift 2 (Back)

And as you can see, I've chosen to wear the green one today.

I have my last final this afternoon, and so I won't be doing anything with the site this afternoon. Have a good Thursday!

Joy is a Visit to NBC29!

Hello all!

I have exciting news! I visited NBC29 on Monday. I received an invitation before I left for college back in August to come visit once I'd gotten "settled in." Since engineering school kept me quite busy, I was unable to do so before now.

It was such an amazing experience. Got to see all the equipment, discuss broadcasting issues and whatnot... it's very wonderful.

More importantly, I have pictures! I was planning to do a full walkthrough here on the site, but I may not do so since I wouldn't be adding much more than I already have.

So without further ado, here's the links to the pictures:

NBC29 Pictures

Enjoy!