Using my TV's QAM tuner, I have sometimes seen an on-demand channel in the 88 range. Not much lately compared to last year.

Strange thing though is that each time I find one, I see no more than about 5 seconds of video and then the signal dies (my set says weak/scrambled channel). It's like the cable system is detecting that I tuned to that channel and takes some counter measure (?). This is with a Samsung HDTV.

I recall last Jan/08 we were watching some QAM on-demand stuff on a Sharp HDTV for the entire movie. But I no longer have that set to determine if the Samsung is behaving differently.

Any comments ?

p.s. I do get the Audio channels

Here's the thread on the QAM channels:

http://www.digitalhome.ca/forum/showthread.php?t=32271

It is possible that they are now doing something so that people can't see the OD channels since porno could be there..

I hit one channel in the 88 range yesterday and it was like someone's PVR session (or so it seemed). The session was rewinded during which the channel changed and there was some adult stuff.

It lasted all but 6 seconds and then the screen went blank.

Again, either my TV is not handling the QAM channels properly or Rogers is doing something to circumvent watching QAM in the clear.

Does the QAM spec call for a TV to send out a signal when on a particular channel ?

Rogers should be encrypting all their VOD channels now, I would think. Why you get a few seconds, I don't know, but they have no way of knowing someone unauthorized is watching it then shutting it off for you.

Yes, this changed about a year or so ago. When Rogers rolled out one of their firmware updates, a few days later all VOD sessions were now QAM encrypted. R.C. had a thread on this at the time by a lot of disappointed people. The fact that you are seeing it reflects a minor bug in their system I guess, and I also think they may have implemented frequency hopping which is perhaps why you are seeing it all in the clear.