What are channels like 89.100 on my Sony LCD television - QAM

[West Islander]

When I ran the channel set-up on my new second-hand Sony Bravia 40S4100 LCD television, it found analog and digital channels. I was surprised by this as I don't have any set-top digital box.

I live in Dollard des Ormeaux, Quebec, and have Videotron analog cable ("classic cable") and plug the coax directly into the coax hole on the back of the television.

When I scrolled through these pre-programmed channels, I discovered many with decimal points, like 77.1005, 77.1007 and so on. (See the list below.) About five of so of these show movies in 480i, and one shows movies in 720p. A dozen or so are music (FM radio?) channels. But I don't see these channels listed on the Videotron website, nor on Zap2It.

So, my initial theory was that this Sony Bravia 40S4100 has an antenna powerful enough to pick up digital channels over the air (OTA). But when I checked the TVFool website for OTA digital channels in my area, I didn't recognize any of the channel numbers. Or I may just be interpreting these results incorrectly.

My second theory was that Videotron has some undocumented channels that they provide for free. Maybe they figure no one with a 1080p television still has analog cable and so no one would notice.

I Googled these odd channel numbers but didn't find an answer. Does anyone know what these channels are?

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MY DETAILS

Television: Sony Bravia 40S4100, which is a 1080p LCD television (circa 2008)

TV service provider: Videotron classic cable (analog, no box)

Channels with decimal points that I receive:

• 71.1005
• 71.1007
• 71.1010
• 71.1048
• 71.1124
• 71.1135
• 71.1136
• 77.1101
• 89.100 (saw a movie in 720p)
• 89.125 (saw a movie in 480i)
• 89.155 (saw a movie in 480i)
• 89.156 (saw a movie in 480i, there was a Super Ecran "SE" logo on screen)
• 104.1
• 104.3
• 104.4
• 104.5
• 104.6
• 104.7
• 104.8
• 104.9
• 104.10 (looked like an advert channel for Illico in 480i)
• 104.11
• 104.12
• 104.13
• 104.15 (the audio channels started here)
• 104.16 (audio...)

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[57]

Here's the FAQ answering your question: These channels are unencrypted QAM (cable).

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


Here's a post useful for those new to the forum - FAQs, Search Tips, Optimization, etc:

http://www.digitalhome.ca/forum/showthread.php?t=57741

[West Islander]

Thanks for the reply. I couldn't figure it out and didn't have the vocabulary to even search for the answer. I appreciate your help.

Just one more question: do I ever need to re-scan my channel list on my television? Or was my television was smart enough to find the potential unencrypted QAM channels, even if there was nothing being shown at the same of the channel scan?

[57]

You can rescan once in a while to see if there's anything else, but you probably won't find anything of much use.