Locals on the move?

Is there a way to determine if the channels are in HD or SD? I don't have a duplicate channel but the signal I'm getting looks much better than than my SD cable signal, about the same as my HD cable signal but not as good as my HD OTA signal.

If it helps the individual channels show the station call #'s and not NBC, ABC, etc.

According to the local channel lookup page at directv.com, you should see two channel 11s-that would indicate it is being delivered in HD. Can you tell whether you're getting your locals from the 99 or the 103?

What sat box do you have? To see if you have any duplicate channels, make sure you choose all channels as your channel list, and show sd duplicates before trying to see how many versions of the channel are in your guide. Since they moved the MPEG-4 HD DNS feeds for West coast to 103, they freed up bandwidth on 110 and 119, so its possible they moved your locals to one of those...
I suggest tuning into something you know is in HD, and seeing if it is...

I tried that and couldn't really tell a difference. I could tell a difference from the HD OTA feed and D* but not between my HD cable and D*. I'll record Wheel of fortune tomorrow night because it always puts up a splash screen to tell that the show is in HD.

I'm just glad to get my locals at all at this point. There are nights my OTA just goes crazy. Would have been better had D* said they were moving them off of 72.5.

Forgot to mention. I have an HR21-100 and currently have it set to Show SD Duplicates but only show one channel. I don't mind it being SD but the signal looks almost too good to be HD or maybe my old analog cable signal was just that bad.

If you're only getting one channel with the receiver set to show duplicates, then they're SD. DirecTV is migrating channels from 72.5 to the new sats. Once they're moved, they're in mpeg-4, so you could be seeing a better picture. A good way to check is to play with the format settings under the Setup Options for HDTV - if you set your HR21 to "stretch", switch to "pillar box" and see if you get the bars on the side. I'd bet you will.

I did that.

CBS stays in 16:9 even if I change the format on the D* to pillar box. The CBS logo is also pushed in a bit instead of in the corner of the screen.

NBC, CW and ABC all change to pillar box so they are in SD.

FOX isn't changing but what I'm watching is in pillar box anyways so I'll check it in a bit.

Now just gotta wait for the first of the year to get the rest in HD according to the rumors I've heard. Thanks for the help. I never thought to change the format.

Lanthom said:

I did that.

CBS stays in 16:9 even if I change the format on the D* to pillar box. The CBS logo is also pushed in a bit instead of in the corner of the screen.

NBC, CW and ABC all change to pillar box so they are in SD.

FOX isn't changing but what I'm watching is in pillar box anyways so I'll check it in a bit.

Now just gotta wait for the first of the year to get the rest in HD according to the rumors I've heard. Thanks for the help. I never thought to change the format.

Click to expand...

Networks have switched to putting the "bug" where it would fall if you cropped the 16:9 picture to 4:3. So in HD, the bug is no longer in the lower right corner, it's been shifted left.

Wheel of Fortune has the splash about being in HD, but if you didn't see it in HD OTA, you won't see it via Directv either. It's only in HD in markets where the station has upgraded their equipment to show syndicated shows in HD.

From playing around looks like CBS is in HD and all the others are in SD.

Doug Brott posted an announcement for Tri-Cities HD channels. I didn't read it because it did not apply to me.