Digital Dialog

What Channel are you?

Remember a few posts ago I made mention about data in our signal...and that this data was needed to tell your digital TV or converter box how to display the programming stream(s) that were in our signal ?  Well the device that does this malfunctioned.  In default of not having this information, the transmitter will stamp our signal with the actual over-the-air channel number and our default program numbering...in this case, for Oahu you now had to tune in to Channel 18.3 or 18.4 and on Maui that would be 10.3 and 10.4.

It's fixed now...but for a couple of days your TV may have seen a strong signal, but there was no picture...unless you rescanned and your TV found 18.3 and 18.4 or 10.3 or 10.4.

Sorry for all the confusion...but for whatever reason, the data generator decided to quit working...

Another digital moment...

Big Island Programming Restored

HILO -  PBS Hawaii announced today that normal analog programming has been restored to the Big Island.  "it was a very stressful time for me while Itried many things to get PBS Hawaii programming back on the air." said Steve Komori, V.P. of Content Delivery.  "Unfortunately the island-wide outage became a product of several pieces of equipment either not being shipped to Hawaii in a timely manner or the failure of devices to work right out of the box".

The problem began coincidentally with the statewide transition to digital broadcasting on Jan. 15.  Hawaii TV broadcasters were forced from the summit of Haleakala to a much lower site on the southwestern ridge of the mountain.  This reduction in elevation was the main culprit in the loss of television signals to many viewers from windward Oahu to the Hamakua Coast, analog or digital...

I would love to be able to tell you that all is working great, and it is for now, but this is only a temporary solution until all the correct pieces are here, installed and working...which means when it does arrive, there will be sporadic outages while we install and test the permanent equipment....So please stand-by...the system will get better...

What happened to the Big Island???

Ah, the Big Island...although I do not consider the Big Island a "Digital Transition Casualty" there are those that do.  The loss of TV signals to the northeastern part (Hamakua) of the Big Island was caused by the mandated move of our transmitters from the summit of Haleakala (10, 000 ft.) to Ulupalakua Ranch (4400 ft.) and would have happened even if we continued broadcasting in analog.  Unfortunately the move coincided with the switch to digital and added to the confusion.

Now PBS Hawaii has a unique obstacle to overcome.  Because of the elevation change on Maui for the digital transmitter, our signal would not reach the translator in Ninole, which begins the chain of translators all the way to South Point.  A new relay site was needed to get the digital signal from Maui to any translator in the system and from there I could activate the entire system.

Equipment was ordered and was due in Hilo on January 10.  When I called on the 12th to find out why we hadn't received the shipment, it was discovered that the shippers had lost the it somewhere between the pick-up at the manufacturing plant and the docks in L.A..  A search finally turned up the missing shipment a couple of days later and the earliest arrival date was now calculated to be the end of January...TIME TO PANIC...

It was less than two days to the transition and the final pieces to a successful transition was in jeopardy.  I pieced together some parts from Kauai and had the manufacturer send out other parts so that I could jury-rig something to get us through the transition, but overnight shipping (which is a misnomer, because nothing can get here overnight) took two and a half days, which meant I would miss the transition and the Big Island would have no service for a day or so...then came the high winds and rain...another day lost.  So it was to be Sunday late afternoon when we could restore service, but when we went to turn on the transmitter...nothing...NOTHING?  How could that be...it's straight out of the box!  A call to the manufacturer led to us having to ship the unit back for repair.  Can we use another unit in its place???  We tried but couldn't get enough power out of it to reach Hilo. What now?  The Big Island has been without service for about a week.  The manufacturer says they can send me a unit right away, but it's untested.  I tell them that I don't want another unit that doesn't work and the shipping time is killing me so they end up testing it through the weekend and now it's on its way to Hilo, right?...but shipping says it has to go on a barge...A BARGE???!!!  What is going on!  It gets straightened out and is now scheduled on an airplane to get to Hilo...arrival to be at the earliest on Thursday afternoon...Here's hoping the box isn't excessively dropped and damaged so I can get service restored by Friday...

As the Dust Settles...

It has been a very busy 49 days for me.  Beginning the week after Thanksgiving, I have been busy with the preparation of Oahu's final digital transmission system which is due to be activated on February 18.  In addition to Oahu, the Maui digital system was being prepared for its debut on January 15, the Kauai analog translator system needed to be modified to work with a digital signal and the Big Island translator system required major changes to keep operating in analog.

So how do I feel the transition went?  It was pretty much what I expected, except for the Big Island...more on that later.  We knew that the move of our Oahu transmitter from the KGMB tower to Palehua (above Makakilo) was going to cause a lot of people who could once get us to lose our signal and a lot of people who could not receive us to start getting a signal.  In addition, the temporary UHF channel we are licensed to use by the FCC would not be something most people are used to receiving.  But come this February 18, we will be returning to our beloved Channel 11 frequency and should make it more familiar to rereceive.

The Maui transition went off without a hitch.  At noon on January 15, we shutdown the analog transmitter, which was broadcasting on Channel 10, and switched on the digital transmitter, also broadcasting on Channel 10.  This momentous occasion was over 20 years in the making.  After many Public Hearings, meetings with special interest groups, propagation studies, site surveys, and governmental processes, the site at Ulupalakua Ranch was finally agreed upon by all.  All the broadcasters were aware of the loss of coverage on Maui, Molokai, Oahu and the Big Island, but due to the loss of a lease at the summit of Haleakala and the subsequent move to Ulupalakua Ranch, the loss of coverage would have happened even if we continued with analog broadcasts.  So in the end, our coverage ended up being pretty much what was predicted.

Kauai's translator system, though still analog, had to receive the KHET digital signal and convert it to analog to keep the system going.  This was done without notice in early January.  We will begin transitioning Kauai over to digital once we have completed the Oahu digital change mentioned above, and/or when the existing translators require replacement.

For the Big Island, please read my next entry.

Overall, the dust is settling on the transition of our full-power transmitters, but I am just starting to build the digital translator system...on both Kauai and the Big Island...anyone seen the Sawzall?