Time Warner Cable Dallas & SDV Newbie Question

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Once TW got the TA working, it has just worked. No problems. Now I've done it. I'm doomed to three weeks of holding on customer service and truck rolls.
-- Doug

 

USA will entirely go black for me (As it is now) on my S4 but on my S3 in the other room it is just pixelated. Is that just a different in the Tivos or could the signal be degrading down the line with the new TAs?

 

Joe you are the love of my life. On a sunday within 5 minutes I got a reply. He worked on it on his end to no luck but said he would escalate to the team here and follow up. And what do you know he did.

"We've heard back from the local office, and they've advised that there is an issue in the system affecting HD channels. "

After calling and doing the online chat all I got was we will send a check. Let me say thank god for e-mail and thank god for twitter.

 

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Here's the new list of channels coming in the next wave, probably sometime within a month:

ActionMax HD to Premium HD Channel 826*
Big Ten HD on HD/Sports Tier HD Channel and Sports Tier HD Channel 794*
Cartoon Network HD to Standard Cable HD Channel 736*
CMT HD on Standard HD Channel 735*
DIY HD on Digital Plus Cable HD Channel 734*
FOX Business HD on Digital Cable HD Channel 742*
FOX Soccer Plus SD to Digital Sports Tier Channel 199
FOX Soccer Plus HD to Digital Sports Tier Channel 792*
G4 HD to Digital Cable HD Channel 773*
Game HD to PPV HD Channel 944*
GOL TV HD to Mas Canales HD Channel 793*
Hallmark Channel HD to Digital Cable HD Channel 777*
HBO 2 to Premium HD Channel 816*
HBO Comedy HD to Premium HD Channel 817*
HBO Family HD to Premium HD Channel 819*
HBO Latino HD to Premium HD Channel 818*
HBO Signature HD to Premium HD Channel 820*
HBO Zone HD to Premium HD Channel 821*
History International HD to Digital Plus Cable HD Channel 732*
HSN HD on Standard Cable HD Channel 730*
Investigation Discovery HD to Digital Cable Channel 749*
MLB Network HD to Digital Cable HD Channel 781*
MSNBC HD to Standard Cable HD Channel 766*
Nat Geo wild HD to Digital Cable HD Channel 772*
NBA TV HD on Digital Cable HD Channel 782*
Nick HD to Standard Cable HD Channel 737*
Showtime 2 HD to Premium HD Channel 831*
Showtime Showcase to Premium HD Channel 832*
Starz Edge HD on Premium HD Channel 839*
Starz Kids & Family HD on Premium HD Channel 840*
TCM HD to Standard Cable HD Channel 779*
TEAM HD to PPV HD Channel 957*
Tennis Channel to HD/Sports Tier HD Channel and Sports Tier HD Channel 795*
The Cooking Channel HD to Digital Plus HD Channel 733*
The Outdoor Channel HD to HD/Sports Tier HD Channel and Sports Tier HD Channel 791*
TruTV HD to Standard Cable HD Channel 743*
VH1 HD to Standard HD Channel 750*
WE HD to Digital Cable HD Channel 731*

* HD Television and HD set-top box required to receive HD service.

 

Some of the channels I listed above are now working for me in North Dallas, but without guide data at this time:

Cartoon Network HD - Standard Cable HD Channel 736
Hallmark Channel HD - Digital Cable HD Channel 777
HBO 2 - Premium HD Channel 816
HBO Signature HD - Premium HD Channel 820
MLB Network HD - Digital Cable HD Channel 781
MSNBC HD - Standard Cable HD Channel 766
TCM HD - Standard Cable HD Channel 779

Hopefully guide data (and additional channels from the list above) start working soon. I don't have digital plus or any premiums except HBO, so some of those might work now too.

 

I just called Tivo to get the guide data for these added...look for it soon.

 

My wife reports that HGTV-HD hasn't been working on either of our TiVo units for the last couple of days in Frisco. Is anyone else having a problem in the area? I'm out of town, and she's not upset enough to call TWC on her own.

 

I'm also in Frisco but my HGTV-HD is working fine.

 

It seems to be sporadic, and isn't just HGTV-HD -- After further testing, I found that pressing "Select" again will bring the channel up. TA issue, I guess.

 

It showed up here yesterday.

 

TWC added a few more channels to the lineup the other day

736 Cartoon Network HD
766 MSNBC HD
777 Hallmark HD
779 Turner Classic Movies HD
781 MLB Network HD
792 Fox Soccer Plus HS
816 HBO2 HD
820 HBO SGHD (dunno what this is. I don't subscribe to premium channels)
840 STZKHD (not sure what this is either)

 

they also added GAME HD on 944 and TW3D on 997 to give us 78 HDTV channels

 

I was having issues like that as well. I e-mailed TWCableHelp [TWCable.Help@twcable.com] got a response in 5 minutes (on a sunday no less) and while he didn't fix it right away he got in touch with the local guys and followed it through to the end. If she isn't comfortable with a phone call I suggest you send an e-mail to them. I'll never call again.

 

Science Channel HD (761) is really acting badly tonight (freezes, skips and pixelation) on both my Tivo and TWC DVR. So at least it is not just a Tivo/TA issue. Almost unwatchable here in Rowlett. Anyone else see this?

 

For those of you having pixelation issues, check you signal strength.

Before the TA, I was getting strength in the 40's to low 50's. After adding the TA, that dropped to the low 40's, and that must be a threshold for the TiVo, as there were several channels that would not come in at all, and others were badly pixelated. Now this was downstream of a splitter that I had for sending cable to the TV & the TiVo. I removed that splitter, and I got most of my channels back. With that I learned that the TA was adding to the attenuation of the signal.

I then picked up a $25 amp at Fry's , and bam, my signal strength shot up into the 90's across the board, including all the new SDV channels. This includes the ones that seemed most problematic these last few months, Science Channel, HGTV & others.

The funny thing is that before the TA came along, I just assumed that I was doomed to bad signal on my install, as it also seemed loosely correlated to time of day - it was worse at midday.

Ever since I put the amp in, not a single drop or pixelation issue, best $25 I've spent in a while.

Now, it does seem that if I leave the 2nd tuner (the one I'm not watching) on an SDV channel, it will disappear. I presume this is by intent, as it's only happened overnight, perhaps when low viewership channels get reassigned to other frequencies?

G'luck all.

 

"Press SELECT if you are still watching this channel otherwise it may become temporarily unavailable. Contact your cable provider for more information."

Has anyone seen this message? It popped up on HGTV today. Maybe it's some kind of "idle" timeout or something?