One Local Channel Pixilating- others aren't

[Taylork]

I am in the Houston, Texas market. Have the 722K DVR, 3 LNB 1000.X dish (110, 129 and one other satellite, can't recall which) and another HD receiver.

Signals from all sats are always at least in the high 50s + (lowest being 129), usually in the high 60s at least. so it aint' that.

PROBLEM: ONLY ONE HD channel is causing problems out of all those we get, a local channel 2 *KPRC* of Houston, Texas. Of course, that is our favorite for local news and national news.

Dish says no tech problems with the channel. They said to reset the receiver, but that makes no sense since it is only one channel. ( I will try that when I get home, however)

We have occasional pixilation on this channel, and today it got significant worse for a tad bit, including jumbled audio, according to my better half. Used to be most prominent during the national news during the 5:30 CDT news, but today it seemed to get bad (but then cleared up). Again, just a sparkle or two with minor pixing. Not unlike when it is heavy heavy rain, but this is not our case today. At the same time it was a problem I had her check other local stations in hd and no problems. When she went back, it was still a problem. But, in fairness, after about 1 minute it cleared up.

Thankfully, as I said, it has cleared up, but it is starting to get aggravating especially when all the other channels are PERFECT!

Naturally, Dish wants me home to "talk to them" when they help, I understand that, but it seems someone might have experienced something like this in the past? Just trying to do homework before I try the fix.

Any ideas? Thanks so much in advance!
Taylor

 

[KAB]

Sounds like it could be a problem on the station's end. Can you pull in the station OTA directly through your TV? If so, see what it looks like on it.

 

[TheKrell]

The one idea I have is to use the ATSC tuner to get KPRC OTA. This will work even in the heaviest of thunderstorms, AND you can see any subchannels KPRC has. (ThisTV and LATV.)

 

[Taylork]

Can't use OTA

Unfortunately, we live in Huntsville (about 80 miles from Houston), and OTA signals are not feasible since I took down the TV antenna a few years ago, especially since the digital signals have come about.

I appreciate your scratching your heads on this, I am most perplexed on this one. While not a complete idiot with electronics (I am a Ham), I am in over my head on this one.

Perhaps the phone call later with Dish will help. But any thoughts from you all surely are appreciated! :up

 

[KAB]

Do the reset as Dish suggested. It's been know to solve a plethora of little mysteries. But again, keep in mind it may not be Dish's problem.

 

[Taylork]

I will try the reset and post an update probably tomorrow if I talk with Dish. Again, I thank you all for your thoughts and help. I suspect it being KPRC's issue, but it has gone on for a long time. As a former subscriber of Dtv, there never was an issue with KPRC on their sat (but it was SD, not HD)- and I haven't looked at SD vs HD on Dish.

 

[MikeD-C05]

I have Houston locals and I don't see any problems on this KPRC channel. In fact this is the one channel I never saw any problems with going back to 2005 when DISH started with HD locals for Houston. Over the last 5 years I had to work with the dishquality folks for picture and audio problems on Ktrk channel 13 , KHOU channel 11 and even KRIV channel 26, but not on KPRC. Now if you think that there is problems on this channel then drop an email to the dishquality folks and tell them of the time it happens , the show you are watching etc. They will respond.

dishquality@echostar.com

 

[Taylork]

Thanks, MikeD! Great idea and thanks for where to "go". The reset didn't help, like I thought, but I didn't call them last night since it was working fine during what I was watching.... I am sure it will raise its head again

 

[MikeD-C05]

Your welcome. I hope it helps fix the problem.

 

[Taylork]

Updates to issue

Some updates: The problem continues on HD for only the Channel 2 KPRC.
I have reset the receiver, no help, and here are some other tidbits:

1) I forgot to mention that occasionally the sound drops a second but the picture continues ok. In fact, this is a more common problem, but again only for channel 2 KPRC HD I can ignore that for the most part, but it too is irritating.

2) The problem is not just this TV/receiver , the same issue occurs simultaneously at a separate receiver (connected, of course, to the same dish).

3) The evening after I first posted this thread, a particularly bad pixilation at about 5:50 p.m. on the NBC news occurred, and we immediately switched to SD Channel 2 KPRC and it was ok. Went back, the pixilation was there yet. The pixilation on the HD channel was so bad it actually stopped the picture, freezing the HD channel 2 picture.

4) Have not heard back from Dish on the picture quality link earlier posted for me.

5) Last evening, for the heck of it, I was going down the various channels and went to channel 6391 (I think - my memory is getting bad) which is the HD for channel 2 KPRC instead of just hitting channel "2" on the remote, and maybe it was my imagination, but I dont' recall seeing/hearing the problem there.

Sometimes more info helps, sometimes it just confuses more. Any other sage thoughts? Thanks in advance.

 

[MikeD-C05]

The channel 6391 is the same channel mirrored at channel 2. As for the dishquality folks , keep sending updates of what you see till someone responds. I noticed the other day a breakup on the news too. I started watching it to see if I saw anything and I did. I too will start with the emails. Maybe between the two of us they will respond faster.

 

[Taylork]

The channel 6391 is the same channel mirrored at channel 2. As for the dishquality folks , keep sending updates of what you see till someone responds. I noticed the other day a breakup on the news too. I started watching it to see if I saw anything and I did. I too will start with the emails. Maybe between the two of us they will respond faster.

ALLRIGHT! It isn't just me. Thanks a ton, Mike!

 

[Taylork]

Update: Dish finds issue

For those in the Houston market and interested, Dish responded and said indeed there was a problem! It does go to show this forum works - Mike had the right method to get the job done....
Thanks for all who expressed an interest and particularly to Mike.


Quote:
Thank you for expressing your concerns and interest in DISH Network. Customer input is an important tool in our efforts to continuously improve the quality of the DISH Network service.

Thank you for your email. I did check this service and found the issue to be present. We have opened a Discrepancy Ticket and this issue was escalated to our Locals Engineers. Our engineers are looking into the problem. The Discrepancy Ticket will remain open until this issue is resolved.

We appreciate the time DISH Network customers take to email their audio/video quality concerns. Thank you for your patience and for being a valued customer.

EchoStar Broadcasting Corporation
Quality Assurance Department
dishquality@echostar.com (end quote)

 

[MikeD-C05]

Your welcome. That is the best way I know of to fix pq/audio problems. The dishquality folks are great to work with and they do respond ,although it sometimes takes a few days. I have worked with them over the years to fix problems I saw in Houston , Beaumont and Little Rock Locals packs over the years. Yes ,I was a frequent "mover" for a while there.

 

[Taylork]

PROBLEM FIXED!

Just to finish this thread by saying that as of Saturday, Aug 21, the problem appears to have been fixed by Dish. They must have worked on it Friday night around 9:30- 10:30 CDT as it was horrible then. But looks great, no audio outages and no more pixilation. Of course, I probably just jinxed the fix...