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JoeMSG

Last reply Sep 28, 2009 · posted in Cable Television and Fiber Providers

Questions on Comcast conversion from Anlg to Dig

I have had Comcast Extended (? one step above Basic, not digital) service for a number of years. I have one HDTV tuner, one analog PVR, and an analog TV. Comcast has supposedly "upgraded" the San Francisco Peninsula to digital. I have received their digital conversion boxes, but have not hooked them up or activated them. My HDTV shows analog channels from 2 to 33. It also shows a large variety of digital channels with channel numbers that differ from their published ones. I also get Higher Definition for a number of local channels on strange channel numbers.

I don't want to run my PVR through Comcast's converter box. I can use its programming capability to record programs that come through on the analog channels. I do want to use Comcast's box on the analog TV to get the other channels. I don't know about using the box on the HDTV.

1) Is Comcast expected to "drop the other shoe" and cut off the remaining analog signals?

2) I have not activated the Comcast boxes. If I do activate a box and connect it to my analog TV, will Comcast do something to my feed that prevents my PVR from seeing the analog channels or prevents my HDTV from seeing all the channels that it currently sees? An other way of putting this is do all of the receivers need to go through the Comcast boxes once I activate?

3) My HDTV shows a noticably poorer image on 720 and 1080i HD than it does for Blu-ray DVDs. People often look like they are using gobs of pancake makeup (in Photoshop I would liken this to edge sharpening with surface blur). Is this a characteristic of the program source or is Comcast playing games to reduce the bandwidth of its "HD" channels?

I am a new member and to do not recognize many of the abbreviations that the cognoscenti use here. Please be gentle.

Thanks,

Joe

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meinename

Sep 25, 2009

Sorry if I'm unclear but this is going to hurt.

JoeMSG said:
I have had Comcast Extended (? one step above Basic, not digital) service for a number of years. I have one HDTV tuner, one analog PVR, and an analog TV.

From reading further, your HDTV seems to have a QAM tuner. This is good and you already seem to know how to use it.
Right or wrong, to make it easy I give the flawed analogy:
CATV=QAM and ATSC=Antenna
Comcast here in Portland changes the QAM lineup when it suits them, anywhere from 2-9 months. They don't support you watching through your QAM tuner and you should not expect any support that way.

JoeMSG said:
Comcast has supposedly "upgraded" the San Francisco Peninsula to digital. I have received their digital conversion boxes, but have not hooked them up or activated them. My HDTV shows analog channels from 2 to 33.

These I assume are the Basic tier channels. Public Access, C-SPAN, Locals, Discovery, Shopping Channels

JoeMSG said:
It also shows a large variety of digital channels with channel numbers that differ from their published ones. I also get Higher Definition for a number of local channels on strange channel numbers.

These would be the QAM channels

JoeMSG said:
I don't want to run my PVR through Comcast's converter box. I can use its programming capability to record programs that come through on the analog channels. I do want to use Comcast's box on the analog TV to get the other channels. I don't know about using the box on the HDTV.

You seem to have it figured out except on the HDTV :up

JoeMSG said:
1) Is Comcast expected to "drop the other shoe" and cut off the remaining analog signals?

No time frame has been given. When they shut off 33-71 here, we had 2 months warning. You should know ahead of time.

JoeMSG said:
2) I have not activated the Comcast boxes. If I do activate a box and connect it to my analog TV, will Comcast do something to my feed that prevents my PVR from seeing the analog channels or prevents my HDTV from seeing all the channels that it currently sees? An other way of putting this is do all of the receivers need to go through the Comcast boxes once I activate?

2 parts to that question.
The first part on the analog PVR:
The Comcast boxes DO NOT PASS-THROUGH the signal when in standby or off.
If you want to keep using the PVR on 2-33, don't bother hooking the cable box in between the wall and the PVR.

Part 2 on the HDTV:
I would get an HD box if they don't cost extra. If that's not the case, the options are ugly. I used a Standard Definition Motorola DCT-something via the composite cables for a while with a high-grade splitter that I got from a Comcast technician. I ran one cable to the TV and the other to the Cable box.
That would let you watch the Clear-QAM SD and HD via the TV tuner and still watch other stuff as well via the Cable box.

JoeMSG said:
3) My HDTV shows a noticably poorer image on 720 and 1080i HD than it does for Blu-ray DVDs. People often look like they are using gobs of pancake makeup (in Photoshop I would liken this to edge sharpening with surface blur). Is this a characteristic of the program source or is Comcast playing games to reduce the bandwidth of its "HD" channels?

If the channel is available via an antenna, then by FCC mandate, it is the source.
Cable companies are barred from re-compressing the Over-The-Air channels on their cable systems.
Now as for all the cable channels, both the source and the cable company are to blame.

Here is where it gets technical, so I'll try to keep it simple.
What you need to take away from all the numbers is that they are sending a squeezed picture and having the cable box re-stretch it to 4x3 or 16x9 Aspect Ratio
Simply they are sending the following:

Almost EVERY digital SD channel on the Comcast system here is 512x480i
Analog TV, DVD and my OTA SD channels are 704x480i
720p OTA is 1280x720p
1080i OTA is 1920x1080i
Comcast HD is 3 formats I've seen. All are flagged widescreen.
1440x1080i
1920x1080i
1280x720p

Now the SD boxes will only put out 704x480i
512x480i => 704x480i
1280x720p => 1280x720p
1440x1080i => 1920x1080i
1920x1080i => 1920x1080i

Now I haven't even covered bitrates, and that's where it gets really bad.
This is how much information (I think of color) is allowed per picture.

Comcast SD here is 1.5 Megabits-per-second to 3 Megabits-per-second
Analog TV is generally recorded to a Hard Disk at 4Mbps
DVD has maximum video bitrate of 8 Mbps
Blu-ray supports a maximum video bitrate of 40 Mbps but nothing so far has gone above 25 Mbps last I checked
OTA HD can vary from 9 Mbps to 15 Mbps (ATSC supports a Max of 18 Mbps)
Cable HD channels I've seen vary from 7.5 to 15Mbps

What amount is minimum is an eye-of-the-beholder, Personally:
1080i still-shots with little-to-no-movement are fine with 11Mbps
1080i with movement need more than 15Mbps
720p needs everything it can get. 12Mbps
480i needs a minimum of 3Mbps for everything to look about new VHS quality

Mind you I like to be able to READ what is on screen even if it is only there for a second. That is where my standard is set.
I can't read what is on Comcast SD unless the letter/sign/note is on screen for more than 2 seconds in the center.

JoeMSG said:
I am a new member and to do not recognize many of the abbreviations that the cognoscenti use here. Please be gentle.

Thanks,

Joe

Now some details I've glossed on but I hope this helps.

Please ask if there is anything more!

bicker

Sep 25, 2009

I think meinename answered all of your questions; I thought I'd just try to clarify some items...

JoeMSG said:
1) Is Comcast expected to "drop the other shoe" and cut off the remaining analog signals?

Not before 2012. There was a general feeling that they and other legacy service providers would continue providing some analog after that, but that sentiment has been waning as it becomes obvious that newer service providers have no intention of doing so (some already having dropped analog completely).

I keep on forgetting how they're figuring the exact date in 2012; I think the date is either 2/17/12, 6/12/12, or 12/31/12, but don't quote me on that. Also, that's just the date in 2012 when they might start getting rid of the local over-the-air broadcast channels via analog... they might not do it on the applicable date, but rather sometime after the applicable date.

JoeMSG said:
2) I have not activated the Comcast boxes. If I do activate a box and connect it to my analog TV, will Comcast do something to my feed that prevents my PVR from seeing the analog channels or prevents my HDTV from seeing all the channels that it currently sees?

Not as a direct consequence. If they are to do anything along those lines, they're going to do it regardless of what you do.

JoeMSG said:
An other way of putting this is do all of the receivers need to go through the Comcast boxes once I activate?

No.

JoeMSG said:
3) My HDTV shows a noticably poorer image on 720 and 1080i HD than it does for Blu-ray DVDs. People often look like they are using gobs of pancake makeup (in Photoshop I would liken this to edge sharpening with surface blur). Is this a characteristic of the program source or is Comcast playing games to reduce the bandwidth of its "HD" channels?

Generally, you only see this on cable channels. There is only a limited amount of bandwidth but a practically unlimited amount of consumer desire for more HD channels. How do you fit what is effectively 1200 MHz of data in a 750 MHz pipe? There is no way to do that other than to use compression. For folks who would rather have fewer channels but each one full bitrate, that sucks, but the problem is that there are so many more of "them" (people who reward service providers for providing more and more and more channels, without much regard for how compression affects picture quality).

JoeMSG

Sep 27, 2009

Thanks, meinename. I appreciate your help.

meinename said:
You seem to have it figured out except on the HDTV :up

No time frame has been given. When they shut off 33-71 here, we had 2 months warning. You should know ahead of time.

Actually, I think I have the best handle on the HDTV QAM tuner. They have already cut off 34 and up on analog. My other shoe reference was asking about dropping the analog on 2-33. If Bicker is right, that seems to be coming in 2012 or so.

meinename said:
If you want to keep using the PVR on 2-33, don't bother hooking the cable box in between the wall and the PVR.

I understand and did not plan to put a box in that path. My main concern was that an activation of the box would change the feed from Comcast in some way that made it impossible to use a receiver without a cable box. It appears that the activation will not change anything for PVRs and tuners that do not have a cable box in their input path. My understanding is that I will be able to use a QAM tuner directly hooked to the cable feed to get everything after the box activation with some caveats: 1) Weird and possibly slowly varying channel numbers; 2) no "on demand"; and 3) no scrambled stuff like the premium channels.

meinename said:
If the channel is available via an antenna, then by FCC mandate, it is the source.
Cable companies are barred from re-compressing the Over-The-Air channels on their cable systems.
Now as for all the cable channels, both the source and the cable company are to blame.

This is a little off topic, but does that mean the the feed for over-the-air channels will have the same quality for both cable and satellite (future decision)?

meinename said:
Here is where it gets technical, so I'll try to keep it simple.

I expressed myself poorly. Technical is OK. The abbreviations are strange.

meinename said:
What you need to take away from all the numbers is that they are sending a squeezed picture and having the cable box re-stretch it to 4x3 or 16x9 Aspect Ratio. ...

This is news. Are you saying they are sending a squeezed picture (my read is something like 1280 horizontal for an 1920 image) or are they sending a picture compressed with a lossy compresion technique. The 1440x1080i signal was not something I was aware of.

There is not much I can do about it. My underlying concern is if I should expect differentces in this area between Comcast and satellite competitors.

meinename said:
Now I haven't even covered bitrates, and that's where it gets really bad.

This is news. My guess was that they handled the bitrate constraint with lossy compression. I was thinking more in terms of static images or images changing at a constant rate. I did not think about manipulating the frame change rates. Do they vary compression so that highly/quickly changing frames are more lossy?

Joe

JoeMSG

Sep 27, 2009

Thanks Bicker. Between you and meinename I have learned a lot.

bicker said:
...Not before 2012.

...Not as a direct consequence. If they are to do anything along those lines, they're going to do it regardless of what you do.

I was concerned that the rest of the analog will not disappear as a second step in the 2009 conversion. It makes sense that it will go away some time.

bicker said:
Generally, you only see this on cable channels. There is only a limited amount of bandwidth but a practically unlimited amount of consumer desire for more HD channels.

My underlying concern is whether this is different between Comcast and competitive satellite services.

bicker

Sep 27, 2009

JoeMSG said:
If Bicker is right, that seems to be coming in 2012 or so.

Just adding some details to this: Legacy providers (like Comcast) have committed (voluntarily) to keep local over-the-air broadcast channels available via analog until sometime in 2012, at least. Some other suppliers, such as RCN, have already taken them away.

Regardless: If any are provided as analog, they all must be.

JoeMSG said:
My main concern was that an activation of the box would change the feed from Comcast in some way that made it impossible to use a receiver without a cable box. It appears that the activation will not change anything for PVRs and tuners that do not have a cable box in their input path.

It is important to understand this from the other direction: Everything a video service distributor does, these days, is aimed away from having to make physical changes to customize the service delivered to each individual subscriber. The objective is to get all service variations between subscribers to be handled via software. That's not the case everywhere yet, but that is the direction.

JoeMSG said:
My understanding is that I will be able to use a QAM tuner directly hooked to the cable feed to get everything after the box activation with some caveats: 1) Weird and possibly slowly varying channel numbers; 2) no "on demand"; and 3) no scrambled stuff like the premium channels.

Encryption can, and probably eventually will, be applied to any programming, except for the local over-the-air broadcast channels. (Cablevision has even petitioned the FCC for permission to encrypt those channels, though I hope that'll get rejected.)

JoeMSG said:
This is a little off topic, but does that mean the the feed for over-the-air channels will have the same quality for both cable and satellite (future decision)?

I'm not sure I know exactly what you mean, but I think the answer is yes.

JoeMSG said:
There is not much I can do about it. My underlying concern is if I should expect differentces in this area between Comcast and satellite competitors.

There are always going to be differences between suppliers. The absence of differences would prompt me to suspect illegal collusion. However, there is nothing about the technology that necessarily means one will be better and less expensive than the other. Except this: Cable can support two-way services natively, while satellite requires (usually cable) Internet to provide the return loop on two-way services. That has ramifications. Also, older cable systems tend to have less bandwidth available in total (but that's just a matter of upgrading the facilities).

meinename

Sep 28, 2009

JoeMSG said:
Thanks, meinename. I appreciate your help.

Actually, I think I have the best handle on the HDTV QAM tuner. They have already cut off 34 and up on analog. My other shoe reference was asking about dropping the analog on 2-33. If Bicker is right, that seems to be coming in 2012 or so.

2010 and 2012 are the major expiration years but I can't keep straight which rules expired when right now.

JoeMSG said:
I understand and did not plan to put a box in that path. My main concern was that an activation of the box would change the feed from Comcast in some way that made it impossible to use a receiver without a cable box. It appears that the activation will not change anything for PVRs and tuners that do not have a cable box in their input path. My understanding is that I will be able to use a QAM tuner directly hooked to the cable feed to get everything after the box activation with some caveats: 1) Weird and possibly slowly varying channel numbers; 2) no "on demand"; and 3) no scrambled stuff like the premium channels.

This is a little off topic, but does that mean the the feed for over-the-air channels will have the same quality for both cable and satellite (future decision)?

The only promise/rule I read applied to cable companies. Something to the effect that the OTA stations and the satellite companies already agree on bitrate during carriage negotiations.
Yet cable companies were sending an unaltered analog broadcast of the OTA stations, So the OTA stations wanted an FCC rule stating that the cable compaines CAN NOT alter the broadcast audio and video sent to the cable company.
The fear was that the cable companies were going to compress everything down, giving cable viewers the impression that the OTA channels looking just as bad to dissuade "basic-only" customers from ditching cable and going antenna-only

Now the cable co needs to alter some "tags" in the datastream so that your QAM tuner doesn't get confused by ATSC info on a QAM channel (this is a good thing) and is allowed.
Unfortunately here, that means guide data is lost in the process.

JoeMSG said:
I expressed myself poorly. Technical is OK. The abbreviations are strange.

This is news. Are you saying they are sending a squeezed picture (my read is something like 1280 horizontal for an 1920 image) or are they sending a picture compressed with a lossy compresion technique. The 1440x1080i signal was not something I was aware of.

Sorry to muddle this, but I want to be a bit more clear. Some stuff like PalladiaHD is shot at 1440x1080i.
However everything in the shot is already 16x9 Aspect Ratio
A trick from DVD's is the Widescreen vs. fullscreen.
Both editions are 720x480.
In the widescreen edition everything is skinny until the DVD player stretches it out, and letterboxes it or crops it off at your preference. The video is square pixels streachedby the DVD player to rectangular pixels.
In the fullscreen edition, the extra edges are lost to the purchaser. The video stored is rectangular pixels.

How does this apply to Dish/Cable?
The HD picture size of 1440x1080i can be those square pixels ready to be expanded to rectangular pixels.
The Dish/Cable companies are taking that already expanded picture and squishing it again, while applying tirck on the set-top boxes to make it not so obvious.
Usually softening.

JoeMSG said:
There is not much I can do about it. My underlying concern is if I should expect differences in this area between Comcast and satellite competitors.

The satellite providers are well known for their compression and squeezed picture.
Dish and Direct will sell you their HD at 1280x1080i at 10Mbps. Hence the nickname HD-lite. Well back then it was 1440x1080i at 12Mbps...

I say I get better HD out of the Comcast cable I have here in Portland vs. Dish Network or DirecTV.
Remember, cable providers under the same company name vary from area to area in "how bad things are" on each channel

JoeMSG said:
This is news. My guess was that they handled the bitrate constraint with lossy compression. I was thinking more in terms of static images or images changing at a constant rate. I did not think about manipulating the frame change rates. Do they vary compression so that highly/quickly changing frames are more lossy?

Not so much "lossy compression" as "transcoding"
They take the source channel and make a new A/V stream at their requirements.
Mostly chucking Picture data out via softening and "losing" color data (there is a name for removing colors, but I can't remember it).
Numbers again:
Source =transcoded=> To your cable box
SD 704x480i @ 4Mbps-6Mbps => 512x480i @ 2.5Mbps-3Mbps
HD 1440x1080 @ 12Mbps-15Mbps => 1280x1080i @ 8Mbps-10Mbps
HD 1920x1080i @ 15Mbps-18Mbps => 1440x1080i @ 9Mbps-12Mbps

The gripe with the HD-Pixel-Quality fans is the fact that the companies are reducing the shot and not the studios, who take all the extra time and effort to make it all come out pretty and nice within the given boundaries.
The cable companies run it through a real-time transcoder which focuses on meeting bitrate quotas, no real attention to how it all comes out.

jayn_j

Sep 28, 2009

meinename said:
The satellite providers are well known for their compression and squeezed picture.
Dish and Direct will sell you their HD at 1280x1080i at 10Mbps. Hence the nickname HD-lite. Well back then it was 1440x1080i at 12Mbps...
I say I get better HD out of the Comcast cable I have here in Portland vs. Dish Network or DirecTV.
Remember, cable providers under the same company name vary from area to area in "how bad things are" on each channel.

A good post. Just wanted to bring up the following. My local Comcast has noticably lowered bitrate on the locals. They also lowered the HD channel's bitrates when they went from 2 HD/channel to 3 last year.

Meinename would imply that Comcast is better than satellite in this aspect, but given my local Comcast, I would have to give the edge to DISH right now. As he mentioned, Comcasts vary greatly, and you really need to do some comparison shopping.

MorCowbell

Last reply 13 minutes ago · posted in DISH Network Support Forum

Saved OTA list on Dish can't be appended

I have Dish with Hopper3. I choose to get local channels OTA and had a "guide list" established at my previous home. Having moved a few miles away, I wanted to update the list by appending a couple new stations via a rescan. As many would know, some stations come in with the UHF/VHF antenna aimed in one direction, while others come in better with a different direction.

Unfortunately, when a scan is done (bringing in 25-30 stations for that particular antenna aim), the dialog screen does not present the established guide list; it presents an empty field to the right that the scanned stations may be selected one by one and added to the empty guide. But because of antenna aim, some stations originally saved are missing, and would have to be retrieved with a different antenna aim. But as I explain, if a 2nd scan is done with a different antenna aim, the stations saved from the first scan are lost.

It troubles me that Dish didn't develop software that would allow a user to simply append only 1 or 2 channels to the established list.

Any thought on this? Has anyone experienced this or heard of this from others?

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Foxbat

Monday at 2:18 PM

Televes makes an antenna signal combiner that will support ~~two~~ three different antennas pointing towards two different locations, and has filters to drop the signals from the channels that interfere with the 2nd antenna channels. This produces a signal that would contain all your receivable channels in one feed. It would probably cost less than a single antenna on a rotor controlled by a smart box that would relocate the antenna mast towards the TV station you wanted to tune in, plus it's instantaneous, without waiting for the antenna to slew towards its target.

Why Choose the Televes SmartKom?

SmartKom combines filtering, combining, and amplification in one outdoor preamplifier. Its three inputs and 32 programmable digital filters allow installers to select, combine, and level channels from different antenna sources, while the included ASuite app supports both automatic and advanced Bluetooth programming.

Key Benefits

Three VHF/UHF antenna inputs
32 programmable digital channel filters
Automatic channel scan, filtering, and level balancing
Advanced per-channel programming through the ASuite app
Bluetooth programming through the included power supply interface
Automatic gain control on each filter
LTE/5G out-of-band filtering
Compatible with HDTV, UHD 4K, and supported ATSC 3.0 signals
Configuration retained after power loss
12V, 750mA power supply included

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MorCowbell

Yesterday at 12:38 PM

I appreciate your sentiments, Bobby but as a professional programmer for many years, a hallmark of good programing is robustness – anticipating user needs and, where practicable, adding the necessary coding structure. Knowing that Dish must have understood the nuances of antenna directionality on signal strength, it seems that an accommodation could have been made to append direction-dependent stations. Though I haven't seen the code, it would not have taken a lot of effort to make that accommodation. And as to you point about "First and primary, there are anomalies in the software that can cause issues when you have scanned channels in the mix that have little or no signal. You get error pop ups …", if a rogue station causes the issues you described, it can easily be removed.

Another hallmark of good programming is documentation. Dish decided not to release any documentation on the OTA process for users. A key part of such documentation would have been an explanation that when a rescan is performed and new stations are saved, the original OTA list is overwritten. This could have even been done with an onscreen dropdown warning. That would prevent users from finding this out the hard way.

Finally. piggybacking on RVvaquero's comment about the "remote control issue", I should add that I am having a similar issue. Ever since I used the Pairing Wizard to tailor control for my Samsung TV, I find that it sometimes takes not 1, not 2, but 3 presses of the On/Off button (several minutes apart) to finally kill the TV. This is kinda maddening and, as with OTA function, not discussed in any Dish documentation I've seen

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Almighty1

Yesterday at 5:16 PM

Good points MorCowbell - All they had to do was add a few more options including the existing, I don't remember the exact names:
1) Scan/Re-scan and it will ask if one wants to overwrite database aka delete first or add to existing database
2) View existing database and add or delete manually
3) Save Database
4) Restore Database

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dishstaller

Yesterday at 9:42 PM

I could very well be wrong....it has been a LOT of years but back when I had a 722K it seemed like when you went back to the scan screen that you could just scan again and it would ADD those channels to the previous list or you could delete the previous results and only add the channels from the new scan.

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MorCowbell

13 minutes ago

Methinks you are wrong, Dishstaller - at least for what I see now..
I so wish that functionality was available ...

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Scott Greczkowski

Staff member HERE TO HELP YOU! Cutting Edge

Last reply 23 minutes ago · posted in The Chit Chat Club

Song Name Game Part 3!

Sometimes a thread gets so many posts in it that is can cause issues for the server so that why today we introduce The Song Name Game Part 3!

So let the game continue!

The last song was added by Bobby who posted...

One Meat Ball - Andrews Sisters

CONTINUE ON AND HAVE FUN! WELCOME HOME TO SATELLITEGUYS.US!

Here are the original rules for the game as posted by WebbyDude back in 2006. http://www.satelliteguys.us/threads/68645-Song-Name-Game

Just name a song title and the band who performed it. The next person does the same thing, but needs to list a song title or band name which includes a word from the previous entry. Pick songs from any genre.

Example:

Long Live Rock and Roll -- Rainbow

Rainbow in the Dark -- Dio

Another example:

Ride the Lightning -- Metallica

Lightning Strikes -- Ozzy Osbourne

Get it?

An additional note: we all know that song titles, sometimes, use profane words. Because this is a family friendly website it is advised that you clean up that title up a bit. This is accomplished by using something like sh!t instead of the real word. Thanks....

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EatMyVolts

Today at 12:38 AM

Heaven Is In Your Mind -- Traffic

hwkn

Today at 2:35 AM

HEAVEN IS A Place On Earth-Belinda Carlisle

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ClarkGable

Today at 5:29 AM

Earth Angel - The Penguins

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dishstaller

54 minutes ago

The Heart of Rock & Roll - Huey Lewis and the News

harshness

23 minutes ago

Closer to the Heart - Rush

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comfortably_numb

Pub Member / Supporter

Last reply 43 minutes ago · posted in Internet Television (IPTV) Discussion Forum

Philo now offers discounted annual plan

Not sure saving $24/year is worth it unless you're a hardcore Philo user. I'll stick with monthly.

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Jimbo

43 minutes ago

comfortably_numb said:
Not sure saving $24/year is worth it unless you're a hardcore Philo user. I'll stick with monthly.

View attachment 195247

$24 for the Year, would be more useful.

TWiT Tech Podcast Network

52 minutes ago · posted in TWiT Tech Podcast Network

Ginux: A Rust Operating System Kernel Built in 11 Days #shorts

Time for another AWESOME video from the TWIT Network!

View: https://www.youtube.com/shorts/X5Yp6dbu76U

Direct YouTube Link - Ginux: A Rust Operating System Kernel Built in 11 Days #shorts
TWIT's Website
TWIT Live Feed

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osu1991

Pub Member / Supporter

Last reply Today at 9:01 AM · posted in The Chit Chat Club

USA Healthcare Costs are Ridiculous

Pissed off at the crappy healthcare costs

My health Insurance renewal for 2027 just came in. Going from $827 a month to $1,187 a month. Deductible going up a $1k to $9,350. Max out of pocket also going up $1k to $11,000. Doctor co-pay of $40. Urgent Care co-pay $50. ER 50% coinsurance after deductible. That's all in network. Out of network is double, should it be needed.

Have to think about this. I'm really tempted to just go without now. I only go to the doctor once or twice a year. I pay out of pocket for Tirzepitide and can do without the Rosuvastatin (crestor) now. Really tired of spending over $10k a year and getting nothing out of it.

After years with Blue Cross I switched last year to Ambetter as my Blue Cross premium was going from $1200 to $1800 for a Silver plan and the Bronze plan was still going to be $1300 at BCBS. Ambetter was $827 for the same coverage with a Bronze plan. Didn't think it would jump this much so soon.

I'm guessing a Silver plan is probably over $2,000 a month for 2027.

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osu1991

Sunday at 7:39 PM

Such a scam. Healthcare.gov shows me cheaper individual plans available for 2027 from ambetter that ambetter doesn't show on their website. Looked it up. I've spent $68,000 in premiums the last 5 years and got nothing out of it except a few doctors visits and labs.

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dishstaller

Sunday at 8:15 PM

osu1991 said:
I've spent $68,000 in premiums the last 5 years

That's why I cancelled ours and just started saving the money. We're about to do the same thing with our home insurance.....not cancel it outright but do away with the portion which covers wind damage. We're paying over $5k right now and that is AFTER I dumbed things down...and it keeps going up. Got a couple trees I want to have taken down first before I do that however. After we do that, it will knock about $3k off our annual premium.

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harshness

Monday at 10:51 AM

dishstaller said:
not cancel it outright but do away with the portion which covers wind damage.

Other than fire, what other kinds of damage do you guys get down there?

dishstaller

Monday at 11:26 AM

harshness said:
Other than fire, what other kinds of damage do you guys get down there?

Not much else. Fire is the only thing I really worry about. I honestly didn't know I could remove wind coverage until someone told that they had....dropped their annual rate from $6,500 to $1,800. I'm currently paying $5,160.

Jimbo

Monday at 6:36 PM

dishstaller said:
Not much else. Fire is the only thing I really worry about. I honestly didn't know I could remove wind coverage until someone told that they had....dropped their annual rate from $6,500 to $1,800. I'm currently paying $5,160.

Does the Wind portion cover Hurricanes ?

dishstaller

Monday at 8:58 PM

Jimbo said:
Does the Wind portion cover Hurricanes ?

Yes. I covers ANYTHING wind related. If the wind blows down a tree on my roof...that is wind related.
That is why I want to take out a few trees first before I drop it.

I'm not worried about my roof. House was very solidly built and has hurricane straps. I put the metal roof on myself with the help of a friend and I recently replaced all of the outer screws with #12 2 in screws which I also dipped the tip in silicone before driving them in. Any other damage I'll fix myself like I did after Michael gave us a visit in 2018.

Jimbo

Monday at 10:13 PM

dishstaller said:
Yes. I covers ANYTHING wind related. If the wind blows down a tree on my roof...that is wind related.
That is why I want to take out a few trees first before I drop it.

I'm not worried about my roof. House was very solidly built and has hurricane straps. I put the metal roof on myself with the help of a friend and I recently replaced all of the outer screws with #12 2 in screws which I also dipped the tip in silicone before driving them in. Any other damage I'll fix myself like I did after Michael gave us a visit in 2018.

So, the Roof will stay, hopefully the rest of the house stays as well ... if the Hurricane decides to take the house and move it down the street, well at least the roof will go with it !

dishstaller

Monday at 10:49 PM

Jimbo said:
So, the Roof will stay, hopefully the rest of the house stays as well ... if the Hurricane decides to take the house and move it down the street, well at least the roof will go with it !

Why be such a smartbutt.
We went through a cat 5 hurricane.....the foundation is sound. Trees hitting the house are the only thing I am worried about when it comes to wind related damage.
IF you had actually been through multiple hurricanes like I have, you would know that most of the damage, unless you were stupid enough to build along the coast.....something ALL of our ancestors knew better than to do, is roof related. In a lot of cases the roof gives way and then the house suffers water damage due to the heavy rain.

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navychop

Yesterday at 9:30 AM

I've had CTs etc within MINUTES of entering an ER (A&E).

In Canada, they publish wait times (months) for CTs. And track the number of deaths of such people while waiting.

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TRG

Yesterday at 12:02 PM

dishstaller said:
Why be such a smartbutt.
We went through a cat 5 hurricane.....the foundation is sound. Trees hitting the house are the only thing I am worried about when it comes to wind related damage.
IF you had actually been through multiple hurricanes like I have, you would know that most of the damage, unless you were stupid enough to build along the coast.....something ALL of our ancestors knew better than to do, is roof related. In a lot of cases the roof gives way and then the house suffers water damage due to the heavy rain.

A good friend of mine is a general contractor. He has quite a large network of builders throughout the U.S. In certain parts of the country roof straps, brackets, clips are a code requirement now. Older homes can be upgraded if they have attic access. These roof reinforcing methods significantly strengthen roof integrity during high wind events.

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meStevo

Yesterday at 1:03 PM

navychop said:
I've had CTs etc within MINUTES of entering an ER (A&E).

In Canada, they publish wait times (months) for CTs. And track the number of deaths of such people while waiting.

Except you're comparing emergency care - which is available just as quickly in Canada - to scheduled outpatient diagnostics.

The last 2 CTs I needed had to be scheduled 3-5 weeks out here as well.

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dishstaller

Yesterday at 1:15 PM

TRG said:
A good friend of mine is a general contractor. He has quite a large network of builders throughout the U.S. In certain parts of the country roof straps, brackets, clips are a code requirement now. Older homes can be upgraded if they have attic access. These roof reinforcing methods significantly strengthen roof integrity during high wind events.

Ours was built in 1986. Hurricane clips weren't required then but the man who built it obviously had my mentality and had them put on anyway. Good thing he did because it would have been very hard to find home insurance without them.
When I was young and I was helping my Dad add onto our haybarn he would go to the lumber yards and get those metal straps they used to use bundling lumber. We would cut them and strap them over the rafters. He had been through a tornado years before and had seen barn roofs lifted right off.

osu1991

Today at 8:16 AM

AI is now deciding who gets healthcare in 6 US states – and it's already harming patients | BBC Science Focus Magazine

An AI pilot programme is attempting to cut down on ‘wasteful’ medical procedures, and patients are paying the price

www.sciencefocus.com

thomasjk

Today at 9:01 AM

osu1991 said:
AI is now deciding who gets healthcare in 6 US states – and it's already harming patients | BBC Science Focus Magazine

An AI pilot programme is attempting to cut down on ‘wasteful’ medical procedures, and patients are paying the price

www.sciencefocus.com

During the summer I was hospitalized prior to having a pacemaker inserted. Shortly after discharge I received a letter from United Healthcare denying the level of coverage during the hospitalization. The denial text was written by a AI that sounded like a third grader. The hospital appealed immediately and it was eventually overturned.

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tparker

Last reply Today at 8:20 AM · posted in DISH Network Support Forum

"Bonus View" Channel List

I was bewildered with all the new DISH TV "Bonus View" channels, so I put together a web page table with all the info I could find. It's at:

https://anythingpeaceful.org/dishtv/DISH_TV_Bonus_View_Channels.html

Here's a partial screenshot of the table, as sorted by Channel Name. (You can click on a column header to sort.)

If you have any corrections or suggestions, please post here.

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tparker

Sep 23, 2026

Two new Bonus View channels Added today:

And two Removed:

My full list is at: DISH TV "Bonus View" Channels

Thanks to Pat for the heads up.

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tparker

Sep 30, 2026

One Bonus View channel added today. And one correction (on my part):

One Removed:

My full list is at: DISH TV "Bonus View" Channels

BTW, not a Bonus View item, but there was a temporary channel 304 Spooktacular added, I imagine just for the Halloween season.

Thanks again to Pat for the many tips.

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tparker

Oct 21, 2026

Three new Bonus View channels today:

My full list is at: DISH TV "Bonus View" Channels

As always, thanks to Pat for the tips.

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tparker

Oct 28, 2026

Four Bonus View channels removed today:

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bnewt

Today at 8:20 AM

Why all the changes?

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TFLEV

Today at 7:32 AM · posted in TFLEV

Geely E5 (EX5) First Drive: Meet The Toyota RAV4 of China!

Time for another AWESOME video from TFL Electric Vehicles!

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JvCXgeUJXS0

Direct YouTube Link - Geely E5 (EX5) First Drive: Meet The Toyota RAV4 of China!

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Gary Toma

Staff member Pub Member / Supporter Cutting Edge

Last reply Today at 7:24 AM · posted in DIRECTV Technical Resources Forum

DIRECTV Transponder Map ~ Data 10/28/2026

The TPN Map Excel Presents all DIRECTV Channels:

National (50-States or wide/NAT+PR beams)
Local (Local-Into-Local or narrow/Spot beams)

Additional tabs provide:

OTA the (Over-The-Air) Database
VOD (Video On_Demand) Records
Offline Records
Engr Records
Net Decoder a graphic presentation of all satellites and transponders

Domestic Satellites
@99W...... D11, D14
@101W.... D16
@103W.... D12, D15
@110W.... D5
@119W.... D8

Understanding the TPN Map

Making Sense of the TPN Map Display Conventions

DIRECTV_TPN_Map_261028.xlsx 1,878 KB

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KyL416

Yesterday at 5:48 AM

The Election HQ Mix is now live on channels 71, 200, 202-1, 307-1, 349-1, 356-1 and 360-1, there's also a red button app on CNN, NewsNation, BBC News, NewsMax, CNBC, MS Now, FOX Business and FOX News.

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dtv757

Yesterday at 12:31 PM

Any updates on CW Norfolk for sat

Thanks

doctor J

Today at 7:22 AM

DirecTV Satellite Transponder Updates for Nov 04 2026

Comparison of Transponder Data for Nov 04 2026 vs Oct 28 2026:

No changes in system tables for any transponder tuning parameters.

Changes to the use of defined transponders:

2 Previously unused Transponders with current APG records::
Net 15 TID 12 Beam NAT is a National Transponder on D12@103ca, TPN 13
Net 15 TID 17 Beam NAT + PR is a National Transponder on D15@103ca, TPN 18

Stream (PID) counts:

LIVE Streams	National		Spot Beams
	Count	Change	Count	Change
4K	4
HD	266	2	1449
SD mpeg4	144		194
SD mpeg2	433	-1
RB
Audio	89
Push	26
Slate	19		1

TEST Streams	National		Spot Beams
	Count	Change	Count	Change
4K
HD			1
SD mpeg4
SD mpeg2
RB
Engr Work	56	18

The PID count Excel workbook provides much more count detail.

Newly updated tables of Streams on each transponder are available in the DataDigesters TPN Grids

More details of changes in individual channels will follow in the Weekly Analysis
and Gary Toma's Domestic TPN Map Excel files
Reshuffle setup ?
Weekly Analysis soon
Enjoy
DataDigesters

doctor J

Today at 7:23 AM

Weekly Analysis for 11/04/2026:

Weekly_Analysis_261104.xlsx 16 KB

KyL416

Today at 7:24 AM

Prep for More TPN swaps

NewsMix -> ElectionHQ

MLBEI -> NBALP in the 740s

No sign of the additional CW affiliates that were added to stream a few weeks ago

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zippyfrog

Pub Member / Supporter Lifetime Supporter

Last reply Today at 5:20 AM · posted in DISH Network Support Forum

110/119 Listings Post 129 Transition (Updated 11/01/2026)

Over the past year I have been tracking the changes on Western Arc. The past 3 months have had a lot of changes that I posted in the other MPEG2 Western Arc shutdown thread. Now that 129 is (basically) out of commission, here is where Western Arc stands. This is just a national channel list, (no local channels) based off what I can see and what others have contributed. Thanks to everyone who has helped me come up with the locations of some of the channels – I would try and list all of you out, but I know I would forget someone! As has been suggested in other parts of the forum, it would be great to collect the spotbeam data for those who could contribute!

A couple of pieces of info:

Out of the 64 transponders between 110/119, there are currently 50 transponders that Dish is licensed to use. 22 are Spotbeams, 28 are ConUS transponders (14 transponders are licensed to DirecTV and Dish doesn't have access to them)
Those 28 ConUS transponders are divided as follows:
- 10 are dedicated to National HD channels (ESPN, CNN, Disney Channel, etc). Dish is maxing out at 16 HD channels per transponder (note – in an earlier post I said there was one transponder with 17 HD channels, that was an error on my part. When I double checked my listings, one channel changed transponders). Before the transition, there was a maximum of 14 HD channels per transponder.
- 1 transponder is dedicated to adult content
- 2 are a mixture HD PPV Movies/4k channels
- 3 are set aside for HD Sports channels that are only on for live games (NBA League Pass, the PAC 12 alternate channels, some PPV events, etc); 3 SD PPV Sports Channels are there as well.
- 7 are for SD and/or music channels. Dish is maxing out at 26 SD channels per transponder thus far on the SD transponders.
- 5 transponders on 110 I have no channels listed but Dish operates. (they are labeled as ConUS on my chart below) There are other things that could be on those transponders, like RV Distant Networks, internal testing channels, etc, that I can't see. They might be able to be used for additional content, but I am not sure exactly what is on those transponders.

There are two transponders that have lower than normal SD channels – 110, TP 21 and 119, TP 19. Previously those transponders contained the programming guides that get downloaded from the satellite when the receivers download EPG. I assume that is where the programming guides are still downloaded from, thus less channels there.

When I talk about number of channels on a transponder, all my numbers are unique channels – for example, channel 101 and 199 are the same channel mapped to two different numbers, but in terms of space, only takes up 1 channel worth of bandwidth on the transponder.

Finally, I have to give Dish a ton of credit. When it was 110/119/129, Dish had 82 transponders they were using – it took a lot to get it down to 50 transponders and figure out where all the pieces were going to go. What are the things they did to get there? Here are the things I saw:

During this migration from 129, Dish converted 7 ConUS transponders on 119 into Spotbeams – that is how they ended up fitting on all the HD locals that used to be on 129. (for those interested, TP 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 13 are the ones that used to be ConUS on 119 that are now Spotbeam)
Removed almost all SD duplicate channels that are offered in HD
Converted remaining SD channels from MPEG2 to MPEG4
There are also 2 subtle things that changed from the HD channel perspective
- At the beginning of the transition, Dish decreased the number of PPV Movie channels – prior to this transition the PPV channels HD PPV movies were 502-522; now they are 502-517.
- At the beginning of April when MLB, NBA, and NHL regular seasons were all going on at the same time and this transition began, there were a ton of games "joined in progress" for the HD feeds. That wasn't common since the days before the full time HD RSN's. The reason for that was prior to the transition, Dish had 4 transponders set aside for HD Sports – 2 transponders was the bandwidth set aside from the HD RSN's before Dish dropped the RSN's, then 2 transponders were for alternate channels. Now we are down to 3 transponders for HD sports.

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zippyfrog

Sunday at 4:47 PM

With the extra hour I had this morning, I updated the listings. Another month has passed, and nothing has moved off 110 to 119 for the national channels. I really thought those handful of transponders on 119 would have been populated with the national channels from 110, but no change.

Can someone who has a Hopper tell me if the 4k channels are still on 110 and if so, what transponder?

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Bobby

Sunday at 5:07 PM

zippyfrog said:
With the extra hour I had this morning, I updated the listings. Another month has passed, and nothing has moved off 110 to 119 for the national channels. I really thought those handful of transponders on 119 would have been populated with the national channels from 110, but no change.

Can someone who has a Hopper tell me if the 4k channels are still on 110 and if so, what transponder?

They appear to be on 110, transponder 8.

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zippyfrog

Sunday at 5:30 PM

Bobby said:
They appear to be on 110, transponder 8.

Thanks! I do have my listing correct then.

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zippyfrog

Yesterday at 5:11 PM

Dish has officially removed all the locals from 119 and they are all on 110 now. TP 02, 04, 06, 08, 10 were all functioning as Spotbeams as of last week, but now they are ConUS.

This means all 21 transponders that Dish has access to at 119 are now ConUS.

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dishrich

Yesterday at 9:34 PM

zippyfrog said:
Dish has officially removed all the locals from 119 and they are all on 110 now.

Might be a silly question, but does this mean ALL 29 TP's on 110 are positively spot beams now?

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zippyfrog

Today at 5:20 AM

dishrich said:
Might be a silly question, but does this mean ALL 29 TP's on 110 are positively spot beams now?

Nope - TP 1-13 are still ConUS on 110. Which is crazy...there are so many different spotbeams on the new 110 satellite compared to the older 110 or 119. Now, someone can correct me if I am wrong on this - but aren't there two satellites at 110 right now? If so, it looks like TP 1-13 are coming from the old satellite at 110 and 14 onward are spotbeams on the new satellite.

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TWiT Tech Podcast Network

Today at 3:22 AM · posted in TWiT Tech Podcast Network

Whiskey Pick: Sideshow Lincoln Straight Bottled-in-Bond Bourbon

Time for another AWESOME video from the TWIT Network!

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lsr0owJQjdM

Direct YouTube Link - Whiskey Pick: Sideshow Lincoln Straight Bottled-in-Bond Bourbon
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Questions on Comcast conversion from Anlg to Dig

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Song Name Game Part 3!

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Ginux: A Rust Operating System Kernel Built in 11 Days #shorts

USA Healthcare Costs are Ridiculous

AI is now deciding who gets healthcare in 6 US states – and it's already harming patients | BBC Science Focus Magazine

AI is now deciding who gets healthcare in 6 US states – and it's already harming patients | BBC Science Focus Magazine

"Bonus View" Channel List

Geely E5 (EX5) First Drive: Meet The Toyota RAV4 of China!

DIRECTV Transponder Map ~ Data 10/28/2026

110/119 Listings Post 129 Transition (Updated 11/01/2026)

Whiskey Pick: Sideshow Lincoln Straight Bottled-in-Bond Bourbon