TV Technical Issues

Tues 5/01: KQED Life programming returns

Red Dana — Tue, 01 May 2012 20:06:13 +0000

(Comcast 189, DT54.3 Over the Air)
As of today, Tuesday 5/01, the daytime programming for KQED Life has returned to its own independent scheduling. We thank you for your patience during our program files rebuilding cycle.

4/23: KQET DT25 OTA signal restored

Red Dana — Mon, 23 Apr 2012 20:12:24 +0000

UPDATE: We believe we have the faulty part replaced, and the KQET DT25 signal fully restored as of early Monday afternoon. Thanks again for your patience.

Original Post:4/23: KQET DT25 off air intermittently
Due to a mechanical problem, the KQET DT25 transmitter has been cycling on and off air intermittently, beginning Saturday 4/21. This affects predomininantly Over the Air (OTA) viewers in the 831 area, although a few paid service providers may be using that OTA signal as well. We are working on repairs, but a final fix time is not yet known. We thank you for your patience.

KQED Plus (DT54s) short interruptions Thu 4/19 & Fri 4/20

Red Dana — Thu, 19 Apr 2012 00:02:28 +0000

PG&E is planning two all-day outages on Monument Peak Thursday 4/19 and Friday 4/20 from apx 7:30am to apx 5pm each day.

Over the Air (OTA) transmission from our DT54 transmitter should experience very short interruptions for only a couple minutes each as we switch to the back-up generator in the morning, and back to the main power when PG&E concludes their work.

Most OTA receivers should automatically restore the signals after outages of such short duration, but some viewers, particularly those at quite a distance from the transmitter, may need to manually re-add the channel, or do a rescan, to restore their tuner’s lock on our signal.

KQED Life update

Red Dana — Mon, 16 Apr 2012 22:35:33 +0000

(Comcast 189, DT54.3)

Monday 4/16 Update: Our recovery process for the deleted program files is now well underway, and we believe we are on target to return KQED Life to its normal programming schedule effective May 1st. If that target date changes, this page will be updated. We thank you for your patience.
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Tuesday 4/10: As noted in the original post below, KQED Life will continue to “mirror” KQED TV9 6am-7pm and midnight-1am through the month of April. We are actively working on rebuilding the content inventory and solving the technical issues which caused the orginal malfunction in late March. We currently do not have a target date for KQED Life to resume its own schedule during non-prime hours, but hope to have a firmer timeline for the recovery by April 17th or so. Please keep an eye on this page for further updates. Thank you for your patience.

ORIGINAL POST FROM 3/27:
Due to a technical malfunction March 25-26, the computer which archives our copies of television programs started deleting program files, resulting in a loss of thousands of episodes. Since it began with shows in position #1 and worked forward, it means the loss is primarily of older programs and series, which generally air on KQED Life. Since these are older shows, most are not currently being fed out to stations, so it will take awhile for us to rebuild the inventory.

This means a significant change to the “non-prime” KQED Life schedule for the next 4-5 weeks at least, starting Thursday 3/29. From 6am to 7pm, plus midnight-1am, KQED Life will be a “mirror” of KQED TV9. Since 7pm-midnight is generally filled with newer programs, KQED Life will be able to maintain its own schedule for those 5 hours, plus maintain their early morning repeats the next morning 1am-6am.

We currently do not know how long the program recovery process will take, so will be working with this revised schedule at least through April. We are leaving the currently posted May 2012 schedule on the website for now, in hopes that we’ll be back to normal by then. Please keep an eye on this page for further updates.

Planned outages: KQET (DT25) 4/10, KQED Plus (DT54) 4/12

Red Dana — Tue, 10 Apr 2012 23:55:21 +0000

We will be shutting down the KQET (DT25) transmitter on Fremont Peak on Tuesday, April 10th, from about 11am to 11:30am, for planned maintenance work.

We will also be doing maintenance for KQED Plus (KQEH DT54 transmitter on Monument Peak) on Thursday, April 12th, also around 11am to 11:30am.

Comcast Cable customers will not be affected by these outages. Most Over the Air (OTA) TV tuners will restore the signals automatically at the end of an outage this short, but a few OTA viewers may need to manually re-add the channel.

KQED Plus (DT54s) short interruptions Wed 4/11

Red Dana — Tue, 10 Apr 2012 22:32:29 +0000

PG&E is planning an all-day outage on Monument Peak Wedneday 4/11 from apx 7:30am to apx 5pm. Over the Air (OTA) transmission from our DT54 transmitter should experience very short interruptions for only a couple minutes each as we switch to the back-up generator in the morning, and back to the main power when PG&E concludes their work. Most OTA receivers should automatically restore the signals after outages of such short duration.

KQED Life, starting Thurs 03/29

Red Dana — Wed, 28 Mar 2012 00:04:37 +0000

(Comcast 189, DT54.3)
Due to a technical malfunction March 25-26, the computer which archives our copies of television programs started deleting program files, resulting in a loss of thousands of episodes. Since it began with shows in position #1 and worked forward, it means the loss is primarily of older programs and series, which generally air on KQED Life. Since these are older shows, most are not currently being fed out to stations, so it will take awhile for us to rebuild the inventory.

early Wed 3/14: planned outage DT9 Over the Air

Red Dana — Mon, 12 Mar 2012 23:44:40 +0000

Sutro Tower is installing new equipment this week, which will require all stations (TV & Radio) to each spend a portion of one overnight period off the air. If all goes well, the outages will last only 2 to 4 hours, beginning shortly after midnight.

Stations have been divided into three groups, with Group 1 going off-air late Monday/early Tuesday, Group 2 off late Tues/early Wed, and Group 3 off late Wed/early Thur.

KQED TV9 is part of Group 2, so we anticipate DT9.1-3 being off-air Over The Air late Tuesday/early Wednesday, beginning shortly after midnight, for 2-4 hours.

Comcast Cable and satellite service viewers should not be affected by this work.

Sat 1/28: planned maintenance at Sutro Tower, SF

Red Dana — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 20:37:53 +0000

Sutro Tower needs all stations transmitting from there to switch to their auxillary antennas on Saturday (1/28) morning by 8am so they can do some tower work. This includes KQED’s DT9 signal. They hope to be done by noon.

Most OTA viewers should see little or no change in their reception during this time, but some more distant viewers may experience problems. If that happens, most tuners should automatically find the signals again once stations are back on their main antennas, but a few viewers may need to do a rescan.

Comcast Cable viewers of KQED TV9 will not be affected by this work.

Tues 1/24: KQET DT25 digitization problem resolved

Red Dana — Tue, 24 Jan 2012 22:08:21 +0000

As of 1:45pm Tuesday 1/24, we believe the KQET digitization issues affecting Channel 25′s signal delivery to viewers in the 831 area via most paid service providers have been solved. Other carriers are confirming a good signal. (Over The Air viewers and Comcast Cable customers were not affected by the problem.)