Dish to expand HD

[drdroo]

Actually my area is nearly perfect, but we won't be seeing HD locals for quite a while. Took until Dec 2005 to get them in SD...

 

[skottey]

Knoxville serves a large area, including south east Ky (which is where I live). They also have alot of subs in the Knoxville viewing area. They may be going by how many subs they have in an area. Why put up hd locals in a area where you don't have as many subs?

I think when a non subscriber considering Dish goes to their website and searches for their address for locals and sees they don't get their HD, they turn away and go elsewhere.

I have cable too with HD locals and a $50 Radio Shack HD antenna on both my television setups that picks up all the digital channels in one room and all but NBC in the other, and that is my backup.

I understand people in the country, especially in a mountainous region, not being able top pick up digital OTA, but Dish has to start somewhere and you'd think they would offer locals by top markets first.

I guess you are right that they are going in their order of current subscribers. I don't know too many fellow citizens in my city with Dish. We have a 2-3 cable companies (including FIOS for some and Knology for some) and BHN for all available, as well as DirecTV. So I can see why Dish consideration would be way down on somebody's list. As I have said before, I got Dish last spring because they had the most HD at the time available to me.

I wanted Dish to do well but got sick of not hearing anything. I haven't canceled them yet. If they gave me a little more information on new HD that was a little more accurate than them saying they have 76 nationals now (when they clearly don't), I might hang on longer. As i stands I am getting ready to cancel.

 

[skottey]

Once again, what is Dish supposed to do, negotiate with the top "x" markets until a deal is made with all of them ? What if other markets are willing to make deals with Dish *now*, ignore them ? It's clearly obvious that Dish works with the stations in a market and if it's going nowhere, they move on to another one.

fair enough.... one would think though that since they have negotiated deals with analog locals, the process of negotiating HD locals would be easier. It is to the benefit of the locals to by available by all providers. Most people don't have OTA these days.

 

[tsduke]

fair enough.... one would think though that since they have negotiated deals with analog locals, the process of negotiating HD locals would be easier. It is to the benefit of the locals to by available by all providers. Most people don't have OTA these days.

You would think it would be that easy, but the station owners are getting greedy and the days of free or cheap retrans is pretty much gone.

 

[Hall]

Dish is NOT alone in this. My local Time Warner doesn't carry NBC or WB/CW in digital/HD yet. They do carry CBS, ABC, and FOX though. TW says the stations want too much; the stations say TW wants it for free. Blah, blah, blah.... Who knows what the truth is.

Do a search for LIN Broadcasting or Sinclair Broadcast and see how "eager" they are to have their digital channels carried by cable and satellite providers.

IMO, the stations are going to "lose". So few people get television via antenna only nowadays that when the analog shutoff comes along these stations will lose 75-85% of their viewers if they're not available on cable or satellite. I say that the cable and satellite companies hold their ground and wait for the stations to ask them to be carried !

 

[ggw2000]

Agree..

Dish is NOT alone in this. My local Time Warner doesn't carry NBC or WB/CW in digital/HD yet. They do carry CBS, ABC, and FOX though. TW says the stations want too much; the stations say TW wants it for free. Blah, blah, blah.... Who knows what the truth is.

Do a search for LIN Broadcasting or Sinclair Broadcast and see how "eager" they are to have their digital channels carried by cable and satellite providers.

IMO, the stations are going to "lose". So few people get television via antenna only nowadays that when the analog shutoff comes along these stations will lose 75-85% of their viewers if they're not available on cable or satellite. I say that the cable and satellite companies hold their ground and wait for the stations to ask them to be carried !

Our local TWC has ABC, NBC, FOX but no CBS. Local morons won't deal and this has been going on for over a year! There was alot of unhappy folks in the area with the super bowl being on CBS last year for sure. Absolute BS as far as i'm concerned..
Gerry

 

[drdroo]

Our local TWC also doesn't have CBS in HD. In their case it has to do with an ongoing dispute with the local CBS station.

 

[darrencp22]

Our local TWC also doesn't have CBS in HD. In their case it has to do with an ongoing dispute with the local CBS station.

I think these stations want satellite and cable companies to pay for their equipment and costs for converting to HD.

 

[drdroo]

I do think it has to do with money ultimately, but our CBS station is already in HD here in the city and was one of the first to do so years ago. I believe CBS was also in HD on cable when they were Adelphia, but when Time Warner took over the market it became a dispute.

Unfortunately, our FOX station is a subchannel off the ABC station (because the local ABC station owns the FOX station too). So of course, that means we don't get a majority of sports in HD. On Cable, FOX is in HD here.

It took E* until Dec 2005 to get our locals in SD here, even though this market is the majority of the dish users in the state and they cover Southern Maine where 90% are cable. I don't have high hopes that they're going to offer HD locals here anytime soon. D* is probably going to have them before then, even though D* doesn't even have SD locals here yet.

E* getting the locals in this market caused a massive subscription surge, to the point that they had to send additional installers into the region. Unfortunately, they don't pay attention.

 

[Hall]

I think these stations want satellite and cable companies to pay for their equipment and costs for converting to HD.

There's nothing "HD" about it, it's digital. The TV stations have to convert to digital on their own by Feb 2009 regardless if they're carried by any cable or satellite company.

 

[Hall]

Local morons won't deal and this has been going on for over a year!

I do think it works both ways and that the cable companies want the channel for free, likely just like the analog is currently free, invoked by "must carry" by the TV station. The TV stations got the wise idea not to invoke the must carry clause and instead asked for payment.

Here's part of an e-mail from my local TWC's "Product Manager" regarding the lack of NBC and The WB carriage:

Here is what I know at this point. Our corporate office is in negotiations with NBC to carry WDTN-HD. WB, it is just a matter of time before we carry this channel in HD. I understand we're close.

That e-mail is from October 2004. Hey, at least they're "close". Neither channel is carried yet today. All of this was on-going before Oct '04 too, of course.

 

[darrencp22]

There's nothing "HD" about it, it's digital. The TV stations have to convert to digital on their own by Feb 2009 regardless if they're carried by any cable or satellite company.

I understand that. I'm talking about something else. Regardless of the 2009 deadline, most stations are/will transmit HD as well. That requires new technology (ex HD cameras). I think they are being stingy with negotiations with Sat and Cable because they are looking to recoup these costs.

 

[drdroo]

Yes but there's no reason to switch to digital and not upgrade to HD at the same time. The networks have HD programming ready to go and viewership only goes up with primetime in HD.

Just as a side situation:

Our local FOX station has claimed the FCC is the reason why they aren't able to offer in HD over the air. There's no process for them to easily get a license for another slot (since the FOX station is new), so they shoot out FOX on the ABC subchannel.

If what the station says is true, the FCC has made this conversion process more difficult as result. Once 2009 hits, the ABC station can move down to the VHF analog allocation for their digital feed, and the FOX station can stay in the current allocation.

A problem that Dish has is that several of their uplink locations for locals are receiving analog (including ours, I believe). If that's the case, they've gotta get on the ball or we could see missing locals. These stations are allowed to kill analog early, if it is required for their digital conversion plan.

 

[Hall]

I understand that. I'm talking about something else. Regardless of the 2009 deadline, most stations are/will transmit HD as well. That requires new technology (ex HD cameras).

No, you have a misunderstanding of this. The stations do NOT have to do anything in/with HD. They do not have to do their news or their own programming in HD, therefore no new "technology" is req'd. They can continue to use the same cameras, same sets, etc, etc that they use today. The programming that we watch from these stations, i.e. prime-time shows, comes from the network in HD, not the station. The stations just pass it along as-is.

 

[drdroo]

This is correct. Our locally developed programming is not in HD and probably won't be for a while.

They still had to install new broadcast hardware and HD reception hardware for the network feed. For a long while ABC was pulling in the Nascar ESPN feed in SD. They finally did add the reception hardware necessary to bring it in HD and pass it through.

This is still probably a costly venture, especially for smaller stations. It isn't as costly as re-tooling all the local programming for HD (new cameras, etc).

Last I checked, Oprah isn't even in HD (unless somethings changed in the last year or two). It's mostly Prime Time programming and sports.

 

[NightRyder]

All of our major (Portland, OR) local stations news is now in HD and I've even seen several local commercials shot in HD.

NightRyder

 

[drdroo]

The Portland, OR DMA is almost 2 times larger than our entire state's population. Wikipedia says Portland, OR's 'metro' population is 2.3 million. Our state is around 1.3 and has 2 (almost 3) DMAs..

The problem is that most of these smaller DMAs don't have the money required to go fully HD. I'm sure they'll get there, and as hall pointed out, they're not required to go HD, just digital.

 

[dennispap]

Quote:
Originally Posted by digiblur
If Jackson, MS is lit up on 61.5 then New Orleans will be also. Take a look at the map that posted in one of the CES threads here. You can see a dot for Jackson, MS and the dot is on the Slidell area which was meant for New Orleans.

Since i only get 110,119, and 129 i guess dish will have to come install a different dish.Which one gets all 4 sats ?

None can get the three listed and 61.5.
.

I guess Dish will be replacing a lot of dishes , or loosing a bunch of customers as directv offers the locals in hd on one dish. If i can get all of the programming on one dish with say 61,110, and 119, or whatever 3 sats i would need, great. if not, i am not putting 2 dishes on the house.
It seems like it will be awfully expensive to switch out all of the dishes in a certain area, if the locals are put on a sat, that is currently not being used in that area. If dish says you need 2 dishes, i think most people will drop dish and go to directv. Funny, when i signed up(11/2006), the cr said the hd locals would be up before xmas 2006. Not only did that not happen, he definitely didnt say i would need a 2nd dish.Well see what happens.

 

[darrencp22]

No, you have a misunderstanding of this. The stations do NOT have to do anything in/with HD. They do not have to do their news or their own programming in HD, therefore no new "technology" is req'd. They can continue to use the same cameras, same sets, etc, etc that they use today. The programming that we watch from these stations, i.e. prime-time shows, comes from the network in HD, not the station. The stations just pass it along as-is.

Umm.. I know the difference between national and local programming. i've seen local programming in HD. I've seen news programming in HD. I've also seen local programming NOT shot in HD. One day they WILL ALL be in HD. To do this they will need to purchase new equipment. Those cameras and "technology" cost $$. I'm just saying in this case, some stations are probably trying to recoup/fund costs when they negotiate new contracts.

 

[drdroo]

I guess Dish will be replacing a lot of dishes , or loosing a bunch of customers as directv offers the locals in hd on one dish. If i can get all of the programming on one dish with say 61,110, and 119, or whatever 3 sats i would need, great. if not, i am not putting 2 dishes on the house.
It seems like it will be awfully expensive to switch out all of the dishes in a certain area, if the locals are put on a sat, that is currently not being used in that area. If dish says you need 2 dishes, i think most people will drop dish and go to directv. Funny, when i signed up(11/2006), the cr said the hd locals would be up before xmas 2006. Not only did that not happen, he definitely didnt say i would need a 2nd dish.Well see what happens.

E* has been committed to the 1 dish solution (from what I've seen). However, they use the 61.5 sat because they acquired it from Rainbow DBS. I think we'll see the comeback of a single dish solution when the new sats are launched.

If things are still all screwed up after that, there should be a cause for concern, but don't forget that they intend to do an all-MPEG4 service too (see the CES thread), which should help overall for people who have HD.

I'm in 18 month again as of Sept or so, but I'll sit back and watch the show anyway. It'll be a colder day in hell before I go back to D*. I'd sooner go without.