• Drahken
    • 2 years 8 months ago
    • Posts: 1239
    		 We have WGN superstation on dish, but not any broadcast version of it. No channels here have any subchannels for metv, my network tv, metoo, nor any of the other ones that popped up in the wake of the upn/wb merger. In fact, if it weren't for that independant guy coming along, we -still- wouldn't have any new networks.
    When everyone first switched over, I expected a chaotic settling in period, but I figured they'd have brought in some other subchannels after all this time.

    RTV used to have good stuff before we got an affiliate (at one point someone had a live stream of it on justin.tv & it had several good classic shows), but now that we finally have it, it doesn't have jack.

    If you're curious, here's the listings for my area's broadcast channels http://tvlistings.zap2it.com/tvlistings/ZCGrid.do?lineupId=PC:16501
    signature*WARNING: The above post may be highly opinionated, read at your own risk.

    Gee Caspah, you're a twicky one!
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    • stake n sheak
      • 2 years 8 months ago
      • Posts: 1772
      		 Damn dude, that blows :(
      On the other hand, you have the best ZIP code...so that's...something :lol:

      We seem to only get RTV at certain times. The only time I've caught it is late weekend nights. Otherwise it's qubo. After a night at a concert and/or drinking I am watching He-man and She-ra which I never did when they were new. They are kind of bad, but I am strangely compelled...

      One thing I've noticed at my parents' house where they have cable, the cable company compresses the signals. It looks crap! The picture is small on the screen, or it has macroblocking like 240p youtube...does Dish do that?
      tangspot2 wrote:
      Mrs. stake you say some nasty on my threads. Dirty bitch
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      • Drahken
        • 2 years 8 months ago
        • Posts: 1239
        		 Uh... What's so good about the zip code? *confuzzled*

        I watched heman & shera religously back in the 80s, heman was definitely one of my fav shows.

        Before I got dish I had time warner cable & they recompressed the signals pretty bad, much like what you're describing. I figured that everyone was overcompressing the HD signals to save bandwidth or something. Then when I got dish I was pleasantly surprised at the quality. The HD channels are sharp, clear, and fullscreen, just as they should be.
        The SD versions of cable networks (ie, nickeloden, etc) are also quite good, with the aspect ratio being the only blatant indicator that it's an SD channel.
        Dish's rebroadcast of SD broadcast channels is a bit different though, they tend to be a little more blurry than the originals (although this is sometimes a good thing, particularly with cartoons (once in a while I watch some of the saturday toons on CW, which is only available in SD both over the air & via dish). On the OTA signal, lines are often jagged & there's visible noise. On the softer dish rebroadcast, all of that is smoothed out. It really comes down to a matter of taste.)

        One thing that's annoying though is that you wind up with 2 copies of every channel that's available in HD, and the only way to get around that is to use channel locks to block out the SD versions of those channels.


        One thing with dish & broadcast channels though is that it doesn't carry all the ones for a given area. For example, here it only has the ABC/NBC/CBS/FOX/PBS/CW channels, none of the extra PBS ones, and none of the RTV ones. You can get around that pretty easily with some boxes though, because they have a built in antenna tuner. You can connect an antenna & get your broadcast stations through your dish box (which also allows you to use your dish DVR on them). One thing that's really weird about that though is that the box's reception differs from the TV's reception. I have my antenna connected to a splitter, with one going directly to the TV & the other going to the dish box. Sometimes the box will say that it can't pull in the signal, but if I switch over to the TV it comes in just fine.
        signature*WARNING: The above post may be highly opinionated, read at your own risk.

        Gee Caspah, you're a twicky one!
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        • stake n sheak
          • 2 years 8 months ago
          • Posts: 1772
          Drahken wrote:
          Uh... What's so good about the zip code? *confuzzled*
          When I look at that page you linked it says the ZIP is 12345. (upstate NY) Is that wrong?

          Drahken wrote:
          The SD versions of cable networks (ie, nickeloden, etc) are also quite good, with the aspect ratio being the only blatant indicator that it's an SD channel.
          On my TV (and I think most widescreens?) I can change the aspect ratio from the remote. It's annoying but at least I can see the picture as it should be. My girlfriend's TV has a choice for 'set by program' so we only have to change it if somebody's putting a letterboxed thing on SD signal.
          tangspot2 wrote:
          Mrs. stake you say some nasty on my threads. Dirty bitch
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          • Drahken
            • 2 years 8 months ago
            • Posts: 1239
            		 Yes, it's very wrong. I don't even have a clue where or how it'd be pulling that up. The zip code (the correct one) is right on the end of the url.

            I meant that the image is square, with black sidebars, not that it's stretched. (Although the dish box lets you adjust the display, so you can stretch it or zoom it if you prefer. However, it's a universal setting. The OSD indicates that you can set it seperately for SD and HD channels, but the HD setting affects everything & the SD setting can't be changed.)
            signature*WARNING: The above post may be highly opinionated, read at your own risk.

            Gee Caspah, you're a twicky one!
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            • Guild_Navigator
              • 2 years 8 months ago
              • Posts: 2009
              		 Can't say I miss this thing



              Around 1979 we got HBO and I finally could hear George Carlin say Shit-Piss-Fuck-Cocksucker-Motherfucker-Tits and Twat... :D
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              • Drahken
                • 2 years 8 months ago
                • Posts: 1239
                		 This is the one I currently use:



                It works surprisingly well for a small, set-top antenna, and it was only $10 at big lots. (The low price & the fact that it's amplified were the whole reasons that I bought it, as a cheap way to check out how the local broadcast scene had changed since the digital switch.)
                signature*WARNING: The above post may be highly opinionated, read at your own risk.

                Gee Caspah, you're a twicky one!
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                • mlauzon
                  • 2 years 8 months ago
                  • Posts: 148
                  		 Yes, I do. I had a B&W tv with the built-in antenna in my bedroom, and in the living we had the colour TV, and it was connected directly to the big antenna.
                  Michael
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                  • stake n sheak
                    • 2 years 8 months ago
                    • Posts: 1772
                    Drahken wrote:
                    Yes, it's very wrong. I don't even have a clue where or how it'd be pulling that up. The zip code (the correct one) is right on the end of the url.
                    Weird. Well I changed it to your area, and the channel lineup looks exactly the same.
                    Here's mine:
                    http://tvlistings.zap2it.com/tvlistings/ZCGrid.do?method=decideFwdForLineup&zipcode=60626&setMyPreference=false&lineupId=PC:60626
                    There's like 4 times as many channels here.

                    I have some cheapass rabbit ears I got at Family Dollar for like five bucks. They work good. I rarely have to move them around if the sky is clear. I had a more cool looking set but they didn't work as well. I got one of those flat "digital" antennas because I thought I needed one when the switch was made. Worst $60 I ever spent! It performed way worse than the $5 rabbit ears!

                    I want to get a roof antenna someday. I think I would never have to adjust it, since I can see downtown (where a lot of the stations are) if I stand on my roof.
                    tangspot2 wrote:
                    Mrs. stake you say some nasty on my threads. Dirty bitch
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                    • Drahken
                      • 2 years 8 months ago
                      • Posts: 1239
                      		 Damn, you lucky S.O.B. I count 61 channels in that list, more than 5 times what we have here. Hell, that's almost as many channels as I was getting from cable for $70/mo (although over the air you don't get ones like nickelodeon or discovery).


                      I found a good sweet spot with my little antenna. I haven't had to move it in several months.
                      signature*WARNING: The above post may be highly opinionated, read at your own risk.

                      Gee Caspah, you're a twicky one!
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                      • pikachulover
                        • 2 years 8 months ago
                        • Posts: 2932
                        		 I do. I lived in a flight path for like 7 years. A lot of the recordings I made back then are horrible. I uploaded some of those videos to youtube and wrote that I lived in a flight path.

                        There use to be this low power station that use to show really good shows. This was back in like 1999. My dad would get so mad that I watched such fuzzy tv programming.

                        There are a lot of problems with DTV. There are too many ways to get interference. But where I live there is a large selection of sub channels. So I'm pretty spoiled here.
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                        • pepsiru1es92
                          • 2 years 8 months ago
                          • Posts: 1142
                          		 Yep. When I was about 5 we switched from Adelphia Cable to DirecTV. This was before the days of locals over satellite, so we had to put up an antenna to watch the local stations. One nice thing about living in Buffalo is the availability of Canadian TV. If you have a good antenna, you can get about 5 channels from Canada. I had an indoor antenna set up to watch CBC from Canada, but I have since lost it due to the Canadian digital transition. If we put up an outdoor antenna, we could get it back. Here's the lineup for my area.

                          http://tvlistings.zap2it.com/tvlistings/ZCGrid.do?method=decideFwdForLineup&zipcode=14094&setMyPreference=false&lineupId=PC:14094
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                          • Drahken
                            • 2 years 8 months ago
                            • Posts: 1239
                            		 You can get canadian stations here too, depending on your location (ie, if you're near the top of a hill or down in a valley). At my old house 9which was further up the hill), I could pull in several canadian stations using nothing more than a piece of speaker wire run around the perimeter of the cieling.
                            signature*WARNING: The above post may be highly opinionated, read at your own risk.

                            Gee Caspah, you're a twicky one!
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                            • randomuser2349
                              • 2 years 8 months ago
                              • Posts: 578
                              		 I still have an old 70'-80's portable black and white TV. Unfortunately, they shut off analog signals last year. Now it's nearly useless. It still works though.
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                              • Goofball
                                • 1 year 1 day ago
                                • Posts: 101
                                		 I'm from a small town where cable TV wasn't made available until 1988. By then, I was in the Army. Before that, the township had supposedly entertained the idea of getting cable TV, but the people who had any say in the matter were mostly senior citizens who didn't see any point in it. After all, they grew up without ANY television.
                                I remember getting only 4 channels, 5 on good days. Then, in either 1980 or 81, some kind of deal was struck so that our local TV tower could pull in WGN and ESPN (ESPN was nothing like it is today--NCAA basketball games between schools you never heard of, lumberjack competitions). But WGN was still a good network at the time.
                                It wasn't that bad, though. It was before the infomercial came about, so weekend late-night TV could be quite enjoyable--crappy B horror/sci-fi and the occasional B/W classics, stuff you rarely get to see today, even with cable.
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