Home › Forums › Open Discussion › TV Help – Channels 4-1 and 9-1 are now just black
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July 30, 2013 at 6:49 am #608461
ylekyoteMemberOn both TVs in our house, channels 4-1 (Komo HD) and 9-1 (PBS HD) are now coming in solid black. I don’t know if its no signal, or whether its blocked, or encrypted, but bottom line is we can’t watch those channels now.
So quick back history:
Comcast provides our cable connection, however, we don’t pay Comcast for Television. We only pay for internet. The channels we get are basically the free channels that also happen to pass through on Comcast’s cables. We also dont get any standard def channels anymore, (i.e. we get 7-1, not 7). We do not have a cable box, DVR, or any hardware provided by comcast in our house. Our cable modem is even our own.
Anyway, this has been this way since we moved into our new house in November. At first we just had basic channels, both SD and HD. Then SD went away (and if you go to those channels now it tells you to contact Comcast). And now we are left with HD. The channels we used to get were (or at least the ones I left programmed):
4-1
5-1
7-1
9-1
11-1
13-1
16-1
then there are a few more like 22-1, 24-1, and random channels farther up like ion. Never watch those so I can’t tell you what they are.
Anyway, are we the only people in Seattle with this problem? Is there a way to fix it? If I went to bunny ears, would 4-1 and 9-1 still be blocked?
July 30, 2013 at 6:54 am #795151
clark5080Participantsounds like Comcast finally figured it out and blocked you
July 30, 2013 at 7:56 am #795152
ylekyoteMemberNevermind, I figured it out. I just had to rescan my channels.
I guess they reshuffle signals time to time and that can screw it up.
Also thanks to this post and link from another site:
As far as I know the FCC has not authorized Comcast to encrypt “Limited Basic” channels. Try goin to:
http://www.silicondust.com/support/channels/ and enter your zip code. That should give you the Over The Air channels in you area and the Comcast Clear Qam channels in your area.
July 30, 2013 at 6:16 pm #795153
biankatParticipantWe’re on limited basic cable too. We rescanned our channels over the weekend but this morning I see that several of our channels are now gone. Fox (13-1), KIRO (7-1), and CW (11-1). ylekyote, are these coming in OK for you at this point?
July 30, 2013 at 8:22 pm #795154
trickycooljParticipantI’ve had limited basic for years (grew up on it too). If you have scanned and more channels have disappeared make sure you are using the long scan setting. Many TVs come with a few different scanning settings (cable, antenna, dual, quick, etc) make sure you are using the longest or most detailed scan setting (there may be a warning about scanning time) and let it run the entire course of the scan. My newer Vizio TV has a scan that takes about 20 minutes and it doesn’t find the local HD channels until it’s gotten all the way to the end almost and then the number of found channels shoots up really quickly. I will admit I’ve been watching a lot of Netflix in the last week but I haven’t had any issues with 5-1 when I turn on the news after work and before bed. I do have all the blue screen SD channels that say I need to call comcast and get a converter box but I refuse to get one, they force you to watch SD in 4:3 and the box overrides the local HD signal you can get antenna-free.
July 30, 2013 at 10:06 pm #795155
biankatParticipantThanks, tricky. Yup, we did the long scan – took about 30 minutes. I guess we’ll run it again. We’re normally HuluPlus and Amazon watchers. I only watch network news on Tuesday and Thursday mornings so it wasn’t noticable until now.
July 30, 2013 at 10:29 pm #795156
SueParticipantI’ll have to do a rescan this weekend too. Also have limited basic. We’ve been taping stuff off 28-1, which we can’t see through cable, but our DVR seemed to pick up Dr. Who. But the last week or so we get messages that there is no signal on that channel. So I’m guessing our access to it is gone. I do find that our reception often has interference (breaking up picture) on 4-1 and whatever channel “Joe TV” is on.
July 31, 2013 at 1:33 am #795157
trickycooljParticipantFinally changed the channel off 5-1 (guess I really only watch NBC in real time) and I’m missing a ton of my usual network HD stuff and oddly the Comcast guide channel is showing on 9-1 the one with video only in the corner for the cable box guide. I noticed the blue “call Comcast” screen is finally gone and showing “no signal” too. I’ll post what happens when I remember how to find the scan. Dang it Comcast.
July 31, 2013 at 2:17 am #795158
trickycooljParticipantHere’s what I got.
3-1 CSPAN
4-1 KOMO
4-2 This
5 (SD with Comcast blue screen digital conversion message)
5-1 KING
5-2 LWN
6 blue screen
7-1 KIRO
7-2 KIRO 2?
7-2203 Discovery (4:3 see ch 71-1 for 16:9)
8-2309 jewelry TV
8-2310 hallmark
9-1 KCTS
9-2 V Me (Spanish)
9-3 KCTS Create
10-2101 CSPAN (again)
10-2102 CSPAN2
10-2109 HSN
10-2110 QVC
11-1 KSTW CW
12-1 Me TV KVOS
12-2 The Cool TV (music videos?)
12-306 UW TV
12-307 UW TV 2
13-1 Q13 Fox
16-1 KONG
18-1 Xfinity (top right video for guide channel on cable boxes)
18-2 Emergency Alert System Channel
18-3 LC? (More jewelry shopping, secondary audio source buzzing in)
18-421 thru 18-426 music only
20-1 Religious channel
All of these 21-* channels are in 4:3
21-101 Ion
21-102 KOMO
21-103 KING
21-104 KONG
21-105 CBC
21-106 KCTS
21-107 Joe TV
21-108 KSTW
21-110 Mundo Fox? (El Factor X is playing)
22-1 Joe TV HD?
22-3 retro channel of some sort? Don’t see station ID playing WKRP in Cincinnati
22-201 Q13 (4:3)
Lots of repeat channels
22-205 NWCN (cool haven’t had this one in a while)
22-206 KBTC (Tacoma PBS)
22-207 TVW
22-208 Arts
24-1 NBC shopping
28-1 KBTC HD
28-2 KBTC 2
33-13 Emergency Alert again
35-* more repeats mostly CSPAN & shopping
36-2203 Discovery
Repeats
44-2 Azteca
44-3 AAT-TV
44-4 Sports? Poker tournament on
More repeats
51-1 Univision
60-2 CBC HD
65-70 Weather Channel (hmm not limited basic)
71-1 Discovery HD (yay haven’t seen this in a while!)
74-3 ion HD
97-462 RT?
117-1 Seattle Channel
117-1059 King County
117-1061 Seattle Public Schools
Few more repeats and that’s it.
I have a fairly new Vizio Smart TV that I got around Thanksgiving and live in High Point with a good view of the Queen Anne TV towers. I do not have any comcast converter equipment, this is cable straight from the wall. I also have high speed blast internet. YMMV… Good luck!
July 31, 2013 at 1:18 pm #795159
SueParticipantLast night I was flipping channels and realized that many of them were missing (I was getting a screen that said “scrambled” on 4-1, 7-1, 11-1 and a few others that I could watch days ago). I decided to run a re-scan before calling Comcast, and had a similar experience to trickycoolj – the missing channels came back, plus some new ones. I’ll have to sit down and figure out exactly what I have. I guess I may have to make it a point to periodically re-scan my channels to avoid this.
July 31, 2013 at 4:17 pm #795160
biankatParticipantFollow-up: another rescan did the trick for us.
August 1, 2013 at 7:37 am #795161
ylekyoteMember@biankat, i did not have trouble after I rescanned the first time. It sounds like you got it all figured out, so glad to hear it.
Cheers!
August 1, 2013 at 7:40 am #795162
ylekyoteMemberFWIW, Tricky, you can remove those blue screen channels (generally) but you have to do it manually. I was kinda bummed I had to rescan because I had previously removed all the channels I didnt want/need from the list. That saved me the hassle of flipping through those blue screen channels telling me to call comcast, as well as all teh home shopping channels.
Anyway, its a bit of a pain, and may not be worth it if you need to rescan all the time… but, you may want to.
August 1, 2013 at 1:16 pm #795163
SueParticipantWe have a homemade DVR using a computer and Windows Media Player, so while rescanning the channels for the TV was successful, I forgot it wouldn’t affect that setup. We rescanned the channels there last night, and noticed that we lost the ability to record 11-1. Fortunately there’s only 1 show on CW that we watch and I can watch it online. I also noticed that in the past I could record a show on 28-1, but I could not watch it on the TV (blue screen), which I thought was weird. But now I can watch it live as well as record it.
August 1, 2013 at 5:12 pm #795164
trickycooljParticipantPost #13 has a great explanation about how the clear QAM channels work and why they get shuffled around sometimes. TL:DR a cable box has a lookup table to translate the channels from the funky numbers to the numbers we know and it updates now and then, without a box it requires a rescan. Whatever saves me another $40-60!
@ylekyote I haven’t actually figured out how to do the channel edits on my new TV but planned to dig up the manual and figure it out after they finally took away the blue screen, which they only partially did this time. I’ve been doing so much Hulu+/Netflix/YouTube off my Apple TV I’m not in much of a hurry just yet. Glad I got discovery back.
It’s funny, my mom didn’t know the rescan trick and got suckered into the “free” SD converter box and now she has to watch “fat people TV” referring to the 4:3 picture stretched at 16:9. I should tell her to take off the box and rescan. I only use the little box on my 13″ non-digital TV.
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