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Turbocpe
Premium Member
join:2001-12-22
IA

Turbocpe

Premium Member

[Cable TV] Mediacom - WGN - "Poor Signal" and freezes

For some time now (weeks), whenever I tune to WGN, the picture is either frequently freezing, audio skipping, or displaying a "Poor Signal" error with no picture.

As I only have analog (no digital), I'm confident the issue is not on my end, especially since the "Poor Signal" is not something my TV displays by itself.

Is this a problem with WGN, or at the headend? Due to the other issues Mediacom is experiencing at the headend with the digital simulcasting (other channels skipping, freezing, blacked out, or audio-video synchronization issues), I'm not sure if this is a WGN wide issue or part of Mediacom's digital simulcasting problems. Doing a brief search, I don't see other cable TV users (non-Mediacom) reporting this issue. I would think if it was WGN's side, affecting a lot of viewers, it wouldn't continue going on for weeks.
wth
Premium Member
join:2002-02-20
Iowa City,IA

wth

Premium Member

What analog channel is it on?

Anonymous88
Premium Member
join:2004-06-01
IA

Anonymous88 to Turbocpe

Premium Member

to Turbocpe
It's a headend issue. It's on channel 21 AFAIK.
Turbocpe
Premium Member
join:2001-12-22
IA

1 edit

Turbocpe

Premium Member

Yes, WGN is channel 21 in DSM.

Thanks for the reply, Anonymous.

They sure appear to be having a lot of trouble at the headend providing the analog content, lately.

burner50
Proud Union THUG
Premium Member
join:2002-06-05
Iowa

burner50

Premium Member

just because you have cable, doesnt mean it doesnt come from a satellite...

mediacom just has bigger dishes
Turbocpe
Premium Member
join:2001-12-22
IA

2 edits

Turbocpe

Premium Member

Burner, while I'm not in the cable business, that was my general understanding.

However, it appears that Mediacom's headend has been having a lot of difficulty providing the analog cable channels since "digital simulcasting" has started. Ever since, the following randomly occurs, frequently:

1) A chunk of analog cable channels will either completely freeze for several seconds, display digital artifacts, or have no picture (blank picture). A "chunk" means that a lot of the analog cable channels will display this behavior at the exact same time.
2) Some analog channels will have a quite noticeable audio and video sync issues.
3) All of the analog cable channels, except for the locals, will periodically go completely offline (complete static), for several seconds, then return to normal. The local channels appear to be unaffected when this happens. Cable modem stays online, so I know it's not a loss of signal to the home when that occurs.
4) WGN has been so bad, especially in the AM, that it's sometimes impossible to watch any content as the picture is either continuously freezing, skipping, or display "Poor Signal". I'm not taking about a couple seconds here and there, I'm talking about it occurring off and on throughout several shows back-to-back (hours).

So while I understand that Mediacom, and other cable companies, uses satellite to provide content to their customers, that really doesn't appear to be the explanation here.

And I should add, I rarely watch the TV. The issues above could be happening a lot more than I'm aware of. But when I do have the TV on, I'm simply amazed that these issues have been randomly, and frequently, occurring. I understand Mediacom is doing something different here (digital simulcast), and that such often means bugs need to be worked out. But I've never seen so many problems with the analog cable channels throughout all these years, as I have in the past couple months.

burner50
Proud Union THUG
Premium Member
join:2002-06-05
Iowa

burner50

Premium Member

Yes i understand, but i dont think it has anything to do with the simulcast.
said by Turbocpe:

All of the analog cable channels, except for the locals, will periodically go completely offline (complete static), for several seconds, then return to normal. The local channels appear to be unaffected when this happens. Cable modem stays online, so I know it's not a loss of signal to the home when that occurs.
You are correct, it is not a loss of signal to the home, generally the locals all come from an antenna, or a direct connection to that particular studio, and the internet is fiber to your master headend. Which means everything else comes from satellites, and everything else has been dropping out on you. I never messed with the satellites so i dont have the fondest idea why this would happen, but that is the professional satellite reciever in the master headend displaying the "poor signal" on your screen.

OldCableGuy
@ncs.com

OldCableGuy to Turbocpe

Anon

to Turbocpe
Blocks of channels will come through one or two (or three) specific feeds off separate satellites. Probably one of Mediacom's dishes or feedhorns is not aligned properly, which means that suddenly, an entire bank of receivers will lose signal (all the ones fed off that dish or feedhorn). Most of the cable channels are transmitted to Mediacom digitally, and then decoded into NTSC for analog subscribers. I'm guessing when all the channels "go off the air" its some sort of watchdog service kicking an entire rack of sat receivers and NTSC transmitters because a threshold of "somethings wrong" may have been met.

I'd call Mediacom they should be able to check the signal on some of the sat receivers and schedule a time to adjust the dish.
JasonU
join:2006-01-06
Memphis, TN

JasonU to Turbocpe

Member

to Turbocpe
I have also been noticing these problems for some time. Good to know it wasn't just me.
said by Turbocpe:

1) A chunk of analog cable channels will either completely freeze for several seconds, display digital artifacts, or have no picture (blank picture). A "chunk" means that a lot of the analog cable channels will display this behavior at the exact same time.
2) Some analog channels will have a quite noticeable audio and video sync issues.
3) All of the analog cable channels, except for the locals, will periodically go completely offline (complete static), for several seconds, then return to normal. The local channels appear to be unaffected when this happens. Cable modem stays online, so I know it's not a loss of signal to the home when that occurs.
4) WGN has been so bad, especially in the AM, that it's sometimes impossible to watch any content as the picture is either continuously freezing, skipping, or display "Poor Signal". I'm not taking about a couple seconds here and there, I'm talking about it occurring off and on throughout several shows back-to-back (hours).