Understanding cable - can analog & digital coexist?

[rcoates777]

Gang -

I need a little education here. It seems to me that theoretically the physical cable running from the pole into my house could be carrying both analog and digital cable signals at the same time. Is this right?

Currently I have analog cable from Comcast and no cable boxes. If I ever decide to move into this century and buy an HDTV and upgrade my Comcast service to Digital with HD does my analog service go away or could I still watch my non-HD sets just the way I do now? And if I am able to do that I hope that the price of my existing analog package is included in the more expensive digital plan.

Thanks.

Bob

[chip_r]

Gang -

I need a little education here. It seems to me that theoretically the physical cable running from the pole into my house could be carrying both analog and digital cable signals at the same time. Is this right?

Currently I have analog cable from Comcast and no cable boxes. If I ever decide to move into this century and buy an HDTV and upgrade my Comcast service to Digital with HD does my analog service go away or could I still watch my non-HD sets just the way I do now? And if I am able to do that I hope that the price of my existing analog package is included in the more expensive digital plan.

Thanks.

BobIf you have Comcast, they both exist now. Analog (NTSC) coexists with digital (QAM). They use different frequencies and different tuners. It just depends what Comcast chooses to put down the cable and what type of tuner you have.

To answer your questions ... if/when you move over to digital cable via a cable-card ready digital TV or a digital set-top box, any other TVs or analog tuners (Tivo series 2 for example) will still work and you will receive the analog programming. At some point in the future, Comcast will shut down the analog portion of the cable spectrum and move fully to digital. This is because they can pack more programming into a QAM signal versus an NTSC signal. That point will not happen at least until Feb 2009 and will most likely happen 1-2 years after Feb 2009.

As this transition occurs, Comcast will likely "nudge" analog customers away from their analog sets and force them to use digital set-top boxes by removing analog channels to make the analog (cheaper) packages less attractive.

If you pick up a an HDTV now with a ATSC and QAM tuner, you will pick up some of those HDTV channels that Comcast is now using even as part of your analog package. They're not encrypted and I believe your local HDTV channels MUST be included in your analog service and tunable via a QAM channel as part of FCC requirements. The Comcast customer service people were very vague about this one but after purchasing an HDTV I found out what they were "hiding". They don't want to broadcast (no pun intended) the fact that some of the HDTV channels are available without their ($/month) digital boxes. Not many channels (45 in my case) but some.

Yes, to specifically answer your questions ... your analog is included in the digital package. And some digital is available in your analog package (for the analog subscription price).

[rcoates777]

Chip -

Great response - I can't even come up with a followup question!

Thank you.

Bob

[chip_r]

No problem. I went through exactly the same issues in the last year with Comcast. I'm more than happy with my analog cable, analog Tivos, and 1 ATSC/QAM HDTV set receiving a mix of analog and digital without a set-top box. Glad to clear up of some of the confusion Comcast propagates about their services.

[BobB]

The Comcast customer service people were very vague about this one but after purchasing an HDTV I found out what they were "hiding". They don't want to broadcast (no pun intended) the fact that some of the HDTV channels are available without their ($/month) digital boxes. Not many channels (45 in my case) but some.

Are you saying you're getting 45 HD channels, or 45 channels total? On my Comcast system here in Boston there are fewer than 30 HD channels in total, and that number includes all the pay-for-each-one sports and movie channels!

[chip_r]

Are you saying you're getting 45 HD channels, or 45 channels total? On my Comcast system here in Boston there are fewer than 30 HD channels in total, and that number includes all the pay-for-each-one sports and movie channels!Should have been clearer. It's 45 digital channels in addition to my 70 analog channels. Of those 45 digital channels, about 6 are 1080i, 6 are 720p, and the rest are 480i. Many of the channels available in analog are also in digital (480i). The 1080 and 720 channels are the local HD feeds over QAM. Unfortunately the 480i channels are skewed toward the "shopping network"-type channels and not good programming but I have a few decent ones in 480i (History Channel, CNN, Travel Channel, etc). More channels actually show up when I do a scan but it's the "on demand" channels and they're only available when someone in the neighborhood is using that feature. Those are not included in my 45 digital channel count.

[BobB]

Should have been clearer. It's 45 digital channels in addition to my 70 analog channels. Of those 45 digital channels, about 6 are 1080i, 6 are 720p, and the rest are 480i. Many of the channels available in analog are also in digital (480i). The 1080 and 720 channels are the local HD feeds over QAM. Unfortunately the 480i channels are skewed toward the "shopping network"-type channels and not good programming but I have a few decent ones in 480i (History Channel, CNN, Travel Channel, etc). More channels actually show up when I do a scan but it's the "on demand" channels and they're only available when someone in the neighborhood is using that feature. Those are not included in my 45 digital channel count.

That makes sense. Twelve is about the number of HD channels that are available in their basic digital package before you start adding pay-per-channel options. I can see why they don't want to advertise that!

[chip_r]

I can see why they don't want to advertise that!I read the fine print on Comcast's web site and my analog (expanded) channel listing shows my locals in HD at numbers above 125 and they're included as part of basic service. When I asked a Comcast CS agent about this she insisted I needed a converter box at $6/month to receive anything digital (local or not). They tuned just fine using the fractional (.) channel numbers on my TV w/o a box.

I believe they can't encrypt the locals and they must be in clear QAM. I think it's for the same reason a cable provider must provide local channel access at their lowest (basic) rates in NTSC. It's just extended into the digital versions of the same locals.

[jjberger2134]

I too, use Comcast and I bought a flat panel LCD TV earlier this year for my kitchen (19" Samsung). When I plugged it in to the coaxial cable I was surprised to get some HD content. I also get about 10-15 channels in HD. Those channels being the 4 main networks, along with some of the smaller networks (WB, PBS, etc).

For example, my local NBC is on Channel 4, but on my LCD TV I can tune to Ch 4 (SD) or Ch 4.1 (HD). I even get channel 4.2 (Weather) and 4.3 (can't remember). The same goes for ABC, CBS and FOX.

There are many stations that are out of place, but those seem to be the digital version of the remaining stations. For example, History, Weather or CNN channels show up in their normal place when tuning to say Ch 57 (History) but also the digital version is something like 110.4 (or some other weird number). I guess those channels are out of place because I do not have a digital box to properly map them. So overall, in my case it seems that I am getting directly to my home - Analog (Mapped Properly), Digital (Not mapped properly), Limited HD (mapped properly). Does this make sense?

[chip_r]

There are many stations that are out of place, but those seem to be the digital version of the remaining stations. For example, History, Weather or CNN channels show up in their normal place when tuning to say Ch 57 (History) but also the digital version is something like 110.4 (or some other weird number). I guess those channels are out of place because I do not have a digital box to properly map them. So overall, in my case it seems that I am getting directly to my home - Analog (Mapped Properly), Digital (Not mapped properly), Limited HD (mapped properly). Does this make sense?Yes it does. The QAM channel represents a specific frequency but the 3 digit number listed by the cable co for those channels on their boxes are arbitrary. The boxes do the mapping as you are suspecting.

[telcoman]

I just purchased two new Sony HD LCD TV's in Florida. I shipped my old Series 2 TIVO from NJ to Florida and purchased the new dual tuner non HD for New Jersey
I receive 12 digital HD channels from Comcast in Florida with no cable box.Some are 480, 720, and a few 1080i. I haven't replaced my analog TV in NJ yet but will be doing so soon. What is cool as I can program two Tivo's remotely from my PC in Florida & NJ. I have a slingbox in NJ & may get another one for Florida.
Has anyone used a slingbox from more than one location and accessed cable systems in two different states?
Does it work better with FIOS?

Telcoman

[rcoates777]

OK, I think I understand the digital & analog mix that Comcast offers.

Now what about FiOS? Do they have any analog offerings or does everything that comes out of the FiOS pipe need a digital tuner? I really don't want to have a separate box for all the old analog sets still present in the house.

Thanks.

Bob

[ilh]

FiOS is really pretty much just like cable. At the moment, in the Boston area, I get all the basic stations with an old TV on stations in the 2-66 range. I don't know if they have plans for reusing this analog bandwidth for more digital channels.

[rcoates777]

ILH, thanks. I'm in the Boston area and this sort of information is hard to find. Glad to talk to someone first hand who has actually done this. And I do understand the possibility that this analog service may not be around forever.

Bob