Why is there no just one tower location? - it would be so much easier to point your antenna. Beside financial / political reasons, is there some valid reason(s) for the 2 tower approach?

Often

Is there a limit of how many channel can be broadcast from one tower?

Often, yes. I don't know about this case.

Is is lack of space at one location?

Sometimes. Sometimes there are other reasons.

When then CHUM-owned CITY-TV opted for the Rogers Tower rather than the CBC's Ryan Tower at Camp Fortune, I asked the CHUM engineer at CFRA why they opted for the lower Rogers Tower rather than the Ryan Tower. I was told that the problem with the Ryan Tower, is that is provides a lot of coverage north of Wakefield that's not necessary. A station in Herberts Corners can cover the populated areas from Cornwall to Renfrew for less money.

And who knows - maybe Rogers wanted much less in rent than the CBC.

Hmm. If you are only 5km from HC and between it and CF, a 4228 seems overkill to me. I am thinking if HC and CF are approximately 180 degrees apart, you might be better off removing the screen from your 4221 (not sure how feasible that is with the HD version) and take the 4228 out of the picture completely.

I will surely give that a try - maybe this weekend.

I can't help but wonder if tvlurker is onto something and people are having problems with intermodulation of 9 and 34 (or something similar). How difficult would it be to temporarily disconnect the 4228 keeping the signal combiner in-line? If you have a terminator, you might want to terminate the input for the 4228. If that fixes the problem with OMNI2 it would be a big clue as to what the issue is.

I'll try that 1st before taking off the 4221's screen and removing the 4228.

When then CHUM-owned CITY-TV opted for the Rogers Tower rather than the CBC's Ryan Tower at Camp Fortune, I asked the CHUM engineer at CFRA why they opted for the lower Rogers Tower rather than the Ryan Tower. I was told that the problem with the Ryan Tower, is that is provides a lot of coverage north of Wakefield that's not necessary. A station in Herberts Corners can cover the populated areas from Cornwall to Renfrew for less money.

I believe both CITY and CHCH started broadcasting from the Rogers tower at the same time. An issue with CHCH is co-channel interference with CKWS in Kingston. The high elevation of Ryan Tower may have caused even more problems. As it was, CKWS had to add a repeater in Smiths Falls to deal with the interference.

I give up...

I hope somebody at OMNI reads this thread to notice that many people are not getting OMNI 2.

I have two DTVs that I've played with different antenna configs. The best I ever got was one of the TVs, just once, picked up 66-3, but nothing showed.

Considering I can't get it working, and that others seem to have the same problem, I think OMNI is effectively wasting their money broadcasting it. They should do something to correct it.

well, everyone I know can't even get Omni 1! and that includes from south ottawa to downtown

I think OMNI is effectively wasting their money broadcasting it.

As long as it can hit Rogers Ottawa head-end, it's not a waste of money, as it generates simsub rights.

(Although VDN cable in Montreal manages to be able to simsub stations that aren't even availlable on basic in Montreal, like A-Channel Barrie and CITY TV on top of the Boston feeds.)

For the record, I get both OMNIs in Craig Henry with an indoor two-bay antenna on the second fllor. On the first floor, in the sde of the house away from Herberts Corners, I have a bit of trouble with OMNI2, but OMNI1 is fine.

Still no meaningful PSIP programming info, but I use EyeTV with their TV Guide service, so I can get the programming info that way.

Just thought I would share this. I browsed the Watertown PBS site and found this statement. http://www.wpbstv.org/DTV-FAQs.pdf
WPBS-TV has every intention of assisting our viewers and members
located in Canada who still watch our over the air signal with a rooftop
antenna or rabbit ears. We will be following Canada’s conversion with
great interest and firmly believe they will not be far behind, if at all. If a
coupon program is not available in Canada, WPBS-TV will try to work with
retailers on both sides of the border to ensure our viewers/members in
Canada can continue to receive all of their favorite channels originating from
broadcasters in the U.S. For now, being informed is the most important
initiative as we have a year to work on this together.

I like using OTA for the low cost etc., but I really liked having the PVR/DVR options that I had with Rogers Cable too without using a Computer for it.

Specifically for Ottawa users, is an EchoStar DTV Pal worthwhile because it can't record NTSC (regular) channels yet? Does having a DTV Pal reduce the signal from an antenna? Would the antenna need a pre-amp?

Anyone in Ottawa use that hardware to help with reception and recording of stations?

The DTVPal info is here:
http://www.digitalhome.ca/forum/showthread.php?t=95820&highlight=ottawa

RustyHD has been reporting good results with his TVIX R3310 in the ATSC DVR & PVR Recorders (http://www.digitalhome.ca/forum/showthread.php?t=56806) thread. It has a combination NTSC/ATSC tuner.

My experiment to pull in OMNI-2 was unsuccessful. I lost SunTV in the process.

First, I just disconnected the CF ( North ) facing CM4228HD and plugged the HC ( South ) facing CM4221HD directly into the UHF input on the pre-amp. I still received most of the same stations from both CF and HC; but no OMNI-2 or SunTV. I removed a 6dB attenuator from the ~80' cable run and connected the ATSC PC-TV card directly to the output of the pre-amp power supply. There was a slight improvement on all channels, but still no OMNI-2 or SunTV.

Next, I took the CM4228HD completely down and removed the back screen from the CM4221HD. While I was at it, I removed the plastic caps and turned the balun assemble over so that the metal strips were further from the boom. Still no joy!

I left it like that for now because I had other thing to do today. I'm not sure if I want to mess with this any more. There's really not much I want to watch on either Sun or Omni. Maybe I'll just wait until we get a few more digital stations in Ottawa.

Sorry if my suggestion ended up making things worse Techluvr. :( :confused:

FWIW, I am getting 27-1, 27-2 and 66-3 with the amplified Winegard Sensor II batwing antenna on my RV. 66-3 is right on the edge, a bit of occasional pixeling but quite viewable.

I am in the same boat. at Bank and conroy rd with a omni powered ant at 35 feet I can pull in PBS 18 at most times plus cbc and sun without problems. Omni 1 and 2 were picked up by my 'voom' HD box and the small t.v. in the kids room(good signal strength), but not on my sony Bravia (even with a direct feed of the ant).

hope the power is going up on these channels.

kilmister, if you move the 'voom' box to your Sony, can you pickup the OMNIs on it there?

It is really starting to sound like an interference or PSIP issue that some chipsets can deal with and others can't, rather than a signal strength issue. If this is the case, it doesn't matter what people do with their antennas. Has anyone tried talking to Rogers about the problem?

I am curious what tuners people are using (and if they can or can't receive the stations).

kilmeister, ironically those Voom boxes had either Generation 3 or 4 ATSC chipsets, while the Bravia (depending on its age) would have a Generation 5 or 6, so this is an odd situation probably related to the AGC circuit on the Sony kicking in.

I am in the same boat. at Bank and conroy rd with a omni powered ant at 35 feet I can pull in PBS 18 at most times plus cbc and sun without problems. Omni 1 and 2 were picked up by my 'voom' HD box and the small t.v. in the kids room(good signal strength), but not on my sony Bravia (even with a direct feed of the ant).

your amplified mini-state antenna is possibly overloading, and causing interference into channel 66. Tune an analog tuner to channel 66 and see how much of CITY-TV (channel 65), or perhaps a mixture of channels 9 and 34 are there.

If so, try an unamplified antenna and see if 66 comes on better.

Hi, back in Feb I bought a digital convertor in anticipation of the switch as I wanted to continue viewing the PBS station in Watertown NY in particular. I connected it to my old Shotgun antenna I was surprised to find I could recieve chn's 4, 9 and 20 on digital and after the switch I got both chn's 16 and 18 and briefly 50. With some adjustment to the rotar I was also able to pick up chn 7 but not consistently. The Shotgun has a Channel Master amp installed. I'm still receiving the three Cdn channels and 18 (norwood) well but can pick up chn 7 only intermittently (cloudy weather?)

I went out and bought a CM 4221d thinking that if the Shotgun could pick up these signals I should be able to get them all well with the CM. I roof mounted the 4221 at about the same height as the Shotgun but currently am getting only 4,9, 18 and 20. No sign of chn 7 at all. This weekend I installed a CM pre-amp on the 4221 with no result except that chn 50 analog appeared with a very good signal.

Jack
Franktown ON
Lat 45.041 Long 76.058

Hi uptowntrain and welcome here - I've moved your post into this thread covering your area. Please read through it to see if your questions have already been answered, and if you need to check on the past/present/future status of any OTA stations in your area you can check the following thread:

http://www.digitalhome.ca/forum/showthread.php?t=69697

But we'll discuss your own reception issues in this thread. Also here are some important links:

Just to add my two cents in... I'm getting both omni1 and 2 in at a signal strength of 80-90% (according to meter in a panasonic plasma and would have hoped this would have been enough signal strengh), but I only see the channels later at night on the panasonic and not at all on our samsung lcd (if I manually change the channel on the samsung I get the info omni/dolby digital, but no signal or sound even at night??).

I only have a bow tie in the attic (Barrhaven) but I have no problem with 4/9/20 digital. Any way I hope when they get city tv up in running that it will work better with my setup.

Mmm.. these do sound troublesome.

The last time I scanned for them, my TV found both of them, but the Myth box didn't like something about their data streams.

I'm hoping to put up another SBGH8.r2 later today/tomorrow, pointed right at Herbert Corners (from Bells Corners). We'll see what that does, unamplified.

Cheers