Sure bandwidth issues are
forcing DirecTV to play musical chairs with its HD channel lineup, that hasn't stopped it from adding local stations in several areas recently. Austin, Cincinnati and Las Vegas are all among the cities to get MPEG-4 local broadcasts. As with the others, to get the new stations you'll need a
new dish and receiver. According to the press release, this brings the count of cities with local HD via satellite to 42, covering 62 percent of US households, and contiuing on track to provide 150 national HD stations plus 1,500 local in 2007. The new stations are:
- Austin, Texas
- KEYE/CBS, KVUE/ABC and KTBC/FOX
- Cincinnati, Ohio
- WKRC/CBS, WCPO/ABC, WXIX/FOX and WLWT/NBC
- Las Vegas, Nevada
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
kbsig106 @ Sep 27th 2006 10:19PM
I wish they would hurry up and convert my viewing area to MPEG-4... They came out 3 months ago and switched out by two Hughes boxes for 2 new H20's w/ the 5 LNB. However, my local HD channels are dead and they can't tell me when.....
Thanks for the great upgrade - to bad I can't use it.
Jax, FL
jeff @ Sep 27th 2006 10:42PM
I'm also in the Jax, FL area and I'm in the same boat. Last I heard, Jacksonville was #52 or something out of the list of the top markets and only the top 50 were getting HD locals by 2007? Also that even if we did get them I would have to surrender my HD Tivo...
kbsig106 @ Sep 28th 2006 6:56AM
Jeff - Jacksonville moved up 3 or 4 spots on the list. We're in the top 50 now - per AM 930, when talking about viewing markets for the Jags. So mayber there's hope? When you call customer service, they can only tell you the next three markets at a time.
Still, I'm happy I have the v.2 H20's and the 5 LNB. More over, they left my two old Hughes gold HD boxes behind, the installer never took them...
GhostDoggy @ Sep 28th 2006 5:43AM
You folks are not missing anything. The DirecTV interpretation just isn't worth it considering the headaches people have seen, including friends in Atlanta that seem to do much better with OTA DTV (in Atlanta).
Burrens @ Sep 28th 2006 10:29AM
I live in Austin, does this mean that DTV does not plan on adding the NBC affiliate or what? Also, what does the 5 LNB dish look like?
Joe @ Sep 28th 2006 11:38AM
Interestingly, they skipped our UPN/WB/Whatever they're calling themselves channel 64 here in Cincinnati.
bluedevil @ Sep 28th 2006 12:00PM
I live in Austin and is there any reason at all to upgrade if we get OTA already? Why should I trade out all my owned equipment (H10's) to pay $99 to rent their equipment (H20's), and downgrade the quality of my high definition?