Thread: cant receive pbs, channel 9

hey guys, new to the forum here but it looks like i finally need some help. got a voom box and am viewing all my local stations fine except for pbs here on channel 9. it doesnt even have the option for it and skips from 8.1,.2. whatever to 10.1, etc. i doubt its my tv since i can tune to ch9 on regular broadcast. any tips? thanks!

where's "here"?

What local are you trying to get?

There are 18 markets in the U.S. which have a channel 9 PBS station. Since you mentioned receiving a channel 8 as well that narrowed it down to the North Platte, NE area as most likely. If that's wrong, then one of your stations may be a low power TV and that would explain a lack of a digital signal for now. Picking up 9 on a regular TV only shows that you can get an analog signal for that station. It may or may not have a digital signal on the air at the moment. If you tell us your zip code/location as Iceberg suggested we can give you much better information and tips.

If you happen to be in the North Plate, NE market, KPNE (PBS 9) has a larger analog coverage area than their digital signal so there are places where you could receive their ch. 9 analog signal and not their digital signal.

ack, sorry for the lack of details

but im in san francisco. so local ch9 in this area which is a pbs

also theres no ch8 in my area, its just the voom box is able to select that channel but skips over all the 9s and heads onto the 10s and up (if that makes sense). i find that weird since i know for sure theres a ch9 pbs in hd here.

KQED DT is on rf channel 30 and has its transmitting antenna about 200 feet lower than their analog antenna. It appears that KBWB, KGO, KMTP, KCNS, KBCW, and KRON digital antennas are also on the same tower or next to it. If you are getting those okay it would seem you should be able to get the KQED DT signal.

I may have misunderstood your original post. Upon re-reading it seems that what you are saying is the receiver is not attempting to scan the channel rather than a lack of signal? If that's the case you might try manually scanning rf channel 30 if that is an option on your receiver.

yes, i can get all the basic channels here fine like the news channels 5,7 etc. just the voom receiver skips ch 9 and i cant even select it. it doesnt skip any other channel like 8, 16, etc even if there isnt a signal to those channel.

You may have tried these, but if not, they might be worth a try.

Go to "Aim Off Air Antenna" and select channel 30. See if you get a signal. If so press the green button to save.

Press the Voom button and look for local channels settings. Make sure that channel 9 is not set to hidden or hide.

Beyond that, perhaps someone with better knowledge of the Voom boxes will post a solution for you.

thanks, ill give that a shot and see what happens

If it's PBS it could possibily that problem with the PSID information. Is it JUST one PBS channel that's not coming in or the whole thing? I get technically six channels but one of them will cause a rebooting so I just unlist that one.