[JerryMeeker]

I recently made several posts regarding occasional picture break-up and pixilation, which prompted me to replace my external eSATA hard drive with a 2TB SSD (also eSATA). The jury is still out WRT whether this has completely resolved the pixelation issue.

However, over the past several weeks I have been experiencing a different signal quality issue on my local NBC station. It only occurs several times a week. The TV screen completely goes blank for a second or two and repeats the screen blanking several times before returning to normal. The NBC signal will then return to being stable for the rest of the evening. I have attached a link to a 30-second video on Dropbox of an occurrence of this strange issue that occurred last night. I would appreciate it if someone would view the video and suggest what might be happening.

Fortunately, the issue happened when I tuned into last night's live broadcast of Saturday Night Live on my bedroom HR24 at the same time the program was recording on the downstairs HR54. After experiencing the glitch on the HR24's live feed, I played the recording from the HR54, and the glitch was in the recording at the same spot as well. This seems like it rules out the DVR hardware as the root cause. So, what is the opinion--is it likely the actual local NBC signal, or could it be the LNB?

And suggestions would be appreciated.

Video: https://www.dropbox.com/s/0axd2sxh93s6wfq/DTV_Glitch.MOV?dl=1

Edit: Let me add that I have only seen this on the local NBC station, no other channels.

 

[James Long]

Edit: Let me add that I have only seen this on the local NBC station, no other channels.

That seems to narrow it down to the feed from that station. Do you watch other locals in your market enough to notice glitches?

 

[harsh]

That seems to narrow it down to the feed from that station.

It may also be an issue with the Genie but I'd start with the TV station.

Because the problem seems to be unpredictable, this will likely be a tough one. Does DIRECTV carry any of the NBC station's subchannels (or do you have an OTA adapter -- AM21 or LCC)? If so, you could record the NBC feed and the subchannel and see if they drop out at the same time. If they don't, the problem may be with the Genie or it may be the station temporarily hosing their NBC feed.

 

[James Long]

It may also be an issue with the Genie but I'd start with the TV station.

Does your Genie ever have a problem with a single channel?

 

[harsh]

Does your Genie ever have a problem with a single channel?

Does yours?

 

[James Long]

Can you post helpful information and not simply contradict posts you read on the forum?
Otherwise you are just adding noise and misdirection when you participate in.

 

[JerryMeeker]

That seems to narrow it down to the feed from that station. Do you watch other locals in your market enough to notice glitches?

It may also be an issue with the Genie but I'd start with the TV station.

Because the problem seems to be unpredictable, this will likely be a tough one. Does DIRECTV carry any of the NBC station's subchannels (or do you have an OTA adapter -- AM21 or LCC)? If so, you could record the NBC feed and the subchannel and see if they drop out at the same time. If they don't, the problem may be with the Genie or it may be the station temporarily hosing their NBC feed.

Thanks for the feedback. Yes, I watch a number of shows on the other local channels as well, but the picture blanking issue has never occurred on any channel other than NBC.

Yes, I have an AM21 and have already planned to record NBC shows on both the satellite feed and the OTA feed to see if the issue is happening on both, or only the satellite feed.

I am also planning on forwarding a link to the video to the local NBC station's engineer to see if he can shed any light on the issue.

I am not sure how the Genie could be causing the issue to occur on the bedroom HR24. Can someone explain how the two DVR's might be linked?

And just curious, has anyone else ever seen a similar issue as the one in the video?

 

[texasbrit]

Highly probable this is a problem in the signal from that one ststion.
Harsh - it can't be the genie because it happens on the Hr24 AT THE SAME TIME.
There have been other reports of dropouts on NBC recently so it might actually be a problem in the network feed from NBC to some of the affiliates.
Whatever unless it contunies to happen I would just ignore it.

 

[JerryMeeker]

I reported the issue to the TV station's engineer to see if they can shed any light.

 

[harsh]

Can you post helpful information and not simply contradict posts you read on the forum?

My post didn't contradict any posts in this thread. I added specific diagnostic procedures to aid in homing in on a diagnosis.

Otherwise you are just adding noise and misdirection when you participate in.

You say that as if post #4 isn't noise and misdirection.

 

[litzdog911]

It's an issue with the feed from your NBC station, I sometimes see the same issue on my local CW station here in Seattle (Ch 11). It doesn't happen with the off-air signal. It's been happening for over a year now despite my reports to the local station engineering manager. They keep saying they're aware of the issue and working with DirecTV to fix it. But it's not fixed.

 

[harsh]

It's an issue with the feed from your NBC station, I sometimes see the same issue on my local CW station here in Seattle (Ch 11). It doesn't happen with the off-air signal.

I'm not sure I follow your reasoning unless DIRECTV has a hardwired feed from KSTW that is dropping out. Seattle is a poster child for difficult OTA reception so hardwiring may well be the case there.

If, as is more often the case, DIRECTV is uplinking from an OTA tuner, the problem would seem to rest with DIRECTV mishandling the uninterrupted off-air signal.

 

[inkahauts]

I agree it’s likely the station. There’s is a very very outside slim chance it’s with your system. If it is then it’s like the lnb, or any wires up to the splitter that links the he24 and genie and possibly the splitter. Doesn’t hurt to make sure the wires are all good and the connectors aren’t damaged etc.

One other outside possibility would be a power issue but that’s unlikely if it’s so rare and only one channel.

 

[texasbrit]

I've seen a couple more NBC dropout posts since yesterday. Very unliklely its anything but an issue at the affiliate , but seems to be at different affiliates so it'd probably not the feed to directv.

 

[JerryMeeker]

Still waiting on a response from the local station engineer.

 

[harsh]

Still waiting on a response from the local station engineer.

Modern station engineers are typically very busy people as many of them are responsible for more than one station. Keep breathing while you await an answer.

 

[James Long]

I added specific diagnostic procedures to aid in homing in on a diagnosis.

You suggested that an issue seen at the same time on two separate receivers was the fault of one of the receivers. Are you claiming a glitch on the HR54 caused a problem on the HR24s live viewing? Seems like a stretch.

It's an issue with the feed from your NBC station, I sometimes see the same issue on my local CW station here in Seattle (Ch 11). It doesn't happen with the off-air signal.

I'm not sure I follow your reasoning unless DIRECTV has a hardwired feed from KSTW that is dropping out. Seattle is a poster child for difficult OTA reception so hardwiring may well be the case there.

If their feed is not "hard wired" it could be a factor of where their OTA reception is attempted. DIRECTV's local facility is listed as 5544 North 35th Street, Tacoma, WA 98407. It is possible for a receive antenna in one location to suffer interference while receive antennas in other locations to not see interference.

 

[JerryMeeker]

I am currently recording each NBC broadcast on both the DTV channel and the OTA channel In the hope that this will provide additional clues as to the root cause. Since starting this several days ago, I have not seen a picture dropout as shown on the video I posted. As I said, the issue doesn't occur very frequently, and other than news programs, there have not been many NBC shows that I watch over the last several days.

 

[harsh]

If their feed is not "hard wired" it could be a factor of where their OTA reception is attempted. DIRECTV's local facility is listed as 5544 North 35th Street, Tacoma, WA 98407.

This is generally a reasonable conjecture but given the particulars of this situation, I would expect excellent reception by DIRECTV. Here's the Tacoma receive location (Google Street View):

The tower is located in North Tacoma and is 25 miles away from the Capitol Hill (Seattle) broadcast tower. Most of what is in between is the Puget Sound.

KSTW operates on VHF channel 11 and the rabbitears prediction model places the field strength at 92.86dBuV/M. Anything over 86dBuV/M is considered "Good".

RabbitEars.Info

RabbitEars, where you can learn all about local, over-the-air TV channels.

www.rabbitears.info

The Pacific Northwet has been experiencing some "atmospheric rivers" of late so that may be an issue but I reason that they would more likely impact the UHF channels first.

 

[carl6]

The tower you show is a broadcast tower, and there is no information as to where DirecTV might have placed receive antennas for off-air reception (they would most likely be near ground level). The two locations you reference are 25 miles apart, and there is not necessarily perfect line of sight between them. The Puget Sound area is difficult for reliable RF paths due to many hills and valleys, we vary from sea level to well over 600 feet elevation in the lower parts of the area, with many much higher peaks (and mountains) that could easily result in multi-path reception on a 25 mile link. I also do not know the HAAT or HAGL of the transmitting antenna (some research could provide that information). I believe off-air reception is the least reliable method for DirecTV to obtain a signal from a broadcaster, but it is also by far the least expensive. I live less than half that distance from KSTW, and have difficulty with off-air reception using a decent indoor antenna in a residential house.