Moncton is laughing for the tower location and coverage.

CBAFT-DT is on the hill above Magnetic Hill Zoo/Park
CKCW-DT (CTV) is on Caledonia Mountain and will be pushing over 230 kW of power.
CIHF-DT-3 (Global) is also on the Caledonia range but a little farther south and east and is planned to push a still impressive 84 kW

Now the sucky thing that is also impacting 22 cities (Us here in Freddy too) is that the CRTC is letting the CBC have till Aug of 2012 to finish their build-out. This means that CBC ch 7 in Moncton will still be analog for up to but not more than one more year.

CBC-DT out of Charlottetown will be a bit of a stretch for most people on the west side of Moncton but might be reasonably received in Dieppe and parts of Riverview and east Moncton. So if you have fortune on your side, you can go all digital but good luck.

Well,

I am kind of lucky myself because I have a direct view on CBAFT tower, and on CKCW tower... but I don't see the CIHF tower.

My ground level is higher than CBAFT so I might have a good CBC-DT from PEI then!
I am located north of Moncton on Indian Mountain.

Yeah for the digital package ... but boooh for the lack of channels !
We should have more OTA stations.

Well just out of curiousity, I put a small whip antenna on my Hauppage tuner this morning to see what I could find. I picked up a very pixellating Fredericton Global picture. That was deep in my basement.

Just before supper, I took the same whip and plugged it in my Panny TV upstairs. To my surprise, I was actually picking up a 69% signal. That was even better than it's analog counterpart, which wasn't coming in at all or very hard to see.

When is ATV/CTV supposed to be online?

One last thing, am I right to assume that now that we will have local HD channels, we can say goodbye to the Super Bowl american ads?

ve9mdb,

I read your French post as well. If you are along the ridge by Indian Mountain and you have a tall tower, you have a good shot at picking up CBC Charlottetown in HD. How does channel 13 analog look to you right now? Picking up the HD channel will be easier if you tune your system for good analog reception, since the tower and antenna and channel will be the same. You would want a VHF antenna pointed due West. This would also pick up CBAFT on 11 even though it would be at 90 degrees (since you are so close).

I've also picked up TeleQuebec on channels 15 and 32, from an attic mounted antenna in my house in a valley. It usually only happens on some evenings in the summer. It's possible these could be picked up once they go to digital - but only once in a rare while while the weather is right (called "tropo" or tropospheric ducting).

Dan...

Ya, Global analog was always crap for me too. The digital is so much better that a straight piece of wire almost works!

As for ads, not sure how that works...

And I am channel scanning like a nut every day but there is still no CTV. They are out of the SJ market for us but we should still receive it as I can still reliably get the analog and it is from the same tower that CTV-DT will be from. The conversion site the government has up shows them as being online by Aug 31st but at this rate, it feels like they are waiting till the very last day for whatever reason.

Just so you know, I am now only using the reflectorless Gray-Hoverman antenna and from inside the house. I plan on getting it rebuilt for outdoor mounting but it still works so well from inside for Global, that I am holding off to see what the deal is with CTV. On an HDHomerun, I am getting Global with 80%+ signal strength and 90%+ signal quality.

I'm afraid to put anything outside since I already have 1 10 foot dish, 1 5 foot dish and place to add 1 1m offset dish and 2 76cm dishes. If I add something else , my wife will hang something that I have dearly close to my body.... ;)

Too bad CBC in our area won't be going digital anytime soon. They are on the list that has been extended until next year.

It must be nice to be close to a big digital market like in Ontario where they have access to so many US HD channels. That would mean the of cable for me, that's for sure.

Wow!!! Your place must look like a CIA listening station!!!

And ya, those lakeshore dwellers in Ontario are laughing. Where I am not a sports nut and am paying for Netflix, I should be laughing with just the two stations as when I checked, over 90% of the shows we watch are carried on Global and CTV. Most of the rest is on Netflix and anything missing can still be "acquired" with other means. I just flatly refuse to pay for sat or cable anymore. I have been without for more than 3 years and I have not died yet :P

I channel scanned this morning and there is still no CTV. Can anyone in Saint John confirm that it is not up and that it is just not me not being able to pick up the signal...

Here I had to do a complete new scan to get Global-DT ... because it was on the same channel on analogue and my dumb tv set couldn't store channel 27 twice !


Before I was just scanning for new channels... not a new scan !

Matt

One last thing, am I right to assume that now that we will have local HD channels, we can say goodbye to the Super Bowl american ads?

Yes, once a local channel is OTA in HD, it can request a simsub of the American HD channel.

NTV HD:

For a few hours yesterday evening, NTV (21.1) was coming in very well for me, my signal strength on the SONY LCD was 85 with a S/N of 28 and my other tuners also showed strengths in the 80 - 90 range! There must have been a little atmospherics kicking in there for a while. The signal eventually fell back to the normal 75 level a few hours later.

I have not actually scanned for CBC, but they most likely will not switch over until Sept 1. The lousy picture quality of analogue really stands out now as compared to digital. The CBC signal has reduced detail, noise, minor ghosting, etc. whereas the NTV signal, even older 4:3 480i, looks great. Bring on digital.

I checked my antenna position (attic) and found I had it perfectly pointed..CBC 87°, NTV 92° antenna at 90-91 ° (compass north)! I have ordered a channel master 7777 to amplify the signal...better quality than the cheap phillips in use at present, but no problems encountered recently.

Happy viewing,
P.E.H.

I have been told to not use any amplifier when there is a strong station within 40 km from your place ... because it overload the receiver's front end.
What do you think about that?

Also, CTV station (channel 2) in Moncton couldn't be received at 12:00 today ... I wonder if they are working in converting the system, putting new antennas on the tower ?

Matt

Too bad CBC in our area won't be going digital anytime soon. They are on the list that has been extended until next year.

Actually you should be still good to go for CBC DT if you're in the Frederiction area :-)

The big CRTC analog extension decision (2011-494) had a another related decision posted the same day (2011-495) Just for Frederiction and Saint John.. the good words (for Frederiction DT at least) are below.. note the go live date requirement in the last statement..

8. Accordingly, the Commission approves the applications by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation to amend the broadcasting licence for the English-language conventional television programming undertaking CBAT Fredericton to add a post-transition digital transmitter to serve the population of Fredericton and to change the technical parameters of CBAT in order to maintain service to Saint John and the surrounding area in analog.

9. The new digital transmitter CBAT-DT will operate on channel 31 with an average ERP of 4,200 watts (maximum ERP of 7,360 watts) with an EHAAT of 102.8 metres.

10. The analog transmitter CBAT-TV will operate with an average ERP of 5,400 watts (maximum ERP of 22,000 watts) with an EHAAT of 423.2 metres. All other technical parameters will remain unchanged.

11. The digital transmitter must be operational and the changes to the technical parameters of the analog transmitter must be made at the earliest possible date and in any event no later than 31 August 2011.

ve9mdb:

My signal is split in house to 4 sets so the level is cut a lot. Without amplification, I get no (or a pixillated) signal. The TVfool plot for my area for NTVHD UHF shows me to be on the edge of the attic antenna range, even though I am not very far from the transmitter. I guess it has to do with the topography (and of course, local trees). The proposed digital CBC VHF plot shows a bit stronger signal, but the digital power level will be about 5% of the present analogue level, so some amplification will probably be needed.

If the 7777 (higher UHF amplification than VHF) is too much I can always get back to the present set up! You never know until you try it out. My present levels are in the 70 - 75 area on the SONY LCD and Channel Master 7000PAL, but about 46 - 50 on my accessHD converter box, so there seems to be room for improvement. Only the SONY LCD gives a S/N ratio number and that is usually 20-22, so again maybe a little improvement can be found.

I mostly want to maximize the level so I will not have any trouble in bad weather, especially during snow storms and other bad winter weather. I will report on what happens with the 7777, maybe it will be a bit too much, but it is not much more powerful than my present set up, but may be of better quality!

Cheers,
P.E.H.

Hi I'm an Transmitter tech with Global Maritimes.I
I would like to hear from viewers of Global HDtv in the Maritimes,
I've had a Chance to view all 5 global Signals in Nova Scotia New Brunswick and PEI and I Thought they looked Great. Now I'd like to know if anyone receiving Global from Saint John or Fredericton has
had any problems or the Moncton PEI or Halifax Signals There are still some bugs to be worked out but it's all coming together.
Thanks

Hi Dave.. I was down in the Fredericton area at the beginning of August installing an Antenna at my mothers place on Keswick Ridge in anticipation of the DT revolution for that area.. I had no trouble at all picking up both 44 and 12 and both looked great. Was great finally seeing the localized "Global Maritimes" bug in OTA HD!

My only feedback would be that one of the channels at the time (can't remember if it was 12 or 44 right now) was reporting itself as virtual channel 8.1 which WAGM Channel 8 also uses to ID their SD FOX-TV feed from Mars Hill (their CBS HD feed is ID'd as 8.2).

The TV tuner it'self (Samsung) had no issue displaying two 8.1 channels one after the other but viewers North and West of Fredericton might be a little confused by all the channel 8 riches they suddenly have ;-)

For all I know you've got this sorted out already, if not I'll let you know what I'm seeing when I'm down again for Labour Day.

Hey dav13. I'm picking up global on 12.1 from Saint John from across the water at ST Mary's Bay.Seems to be working good it only went out a couple of times I figure for maintenance.I wonder when the info in the guide will be turned on.

Hi Dave,

I am located in Stilesville, just north of Moncton. It is about 43 km from the channel 27 transmitter.

I am receiving it perfectly with the outside antenna.
For the inside antenna for a TV set I have in the bathroom, I had to move the little antenna a bit.. but I am still receiving enough signal to have a constant image.

Also, I am picking up a bit of channel 42. I think it is from PEI. Unfortunately, that channel is not strong enough to give me a viewable image.

That's all I can report in regard of Global DT.

It's exciting to finally have a digital signal on our tv !!! I can't wait to see the other two locals TV to convert, CTV and SRC !

Matt

Well the signal for Global has been spotty for me the last 2 days signal at 40 -55% in dartmouth so sometimes it drops out or goes blocky.

Hi Dav13. My reception here for Global 12.1 has been excellent. I am in an elevated location here in Rothesay but my antenna is just rabbit ears in the basement. I have occasionally noticed a few flutters in reception but the HD quality is amazing in OTA television. I have been anxiously waiting for CTV to switch to digital I should have no problem at all picking it up here. I suspect the same thing will happen here as did with Global they will switch off the analog and just go to digital. I check quite regularly so will post when I start receiving 9.1 CTV HD.

dav13, I'm in Halifax, behind the Vic Gen Hospital on South St, 2nd floor, and reception is touch and go sometimes - sometimes sound cuts out, sometimes perfect sound and picture, sometimes a few pixels blocks freeze, and sometimes it takes my TV minutes to find and decode the signal, all with the antenna in the best position I can manage. I don't suppose an ERP increase is in the offing?

Also, will your EPG data reflect any details?