Degraded Cable Signal from a Newbie (1 Viewer)

[David Geo]

Hello all,

I am new to the forum and HT in general so bear with me. I actually think I have everything hooked up right but this is the problem - I have digital cable service through at&t broadband...all my premium digital channels (in the 200's) are crystal clear but all my channels under 100 look like crap (they are fuzzy with snow). Does any one know what the problem is? I have a SONY 32" Flatscreen TV, SONY DVP-S330 CD/DVD/VideoCD player, a SONY STR-K502P Reciever, a SANYO DA-4Head VCR, and a SONY PS1. The cable connects to the cable box (CABLE IN). The cable box (TV OUT) connects to the VCR (ANT IN). The VCR connects to the TV. TV connects to the DVD player by S-Video. The DVD player connects to the Reciever by that orange cable. I have the playstation connected to the TV through a video input and the reciever for audio. My only other problems seem to be that even though the tv is wired through the reciever for audio i would have to turn the reciever audio to max to hear the tv through surround and it has a lot of background noise. Also, the vcr is not going through the surround at all... I would at least like the vcr wired through the surround sound if not possible or practical for the tv/cable too...

Any help would be appreciated...!

 

[David Geo]

Ok - I figured out the surround audio for tv/vcr so now all my components are wired into surround sound but I'm still wondering if my bad cable signal is the cable company's fault or something on my end...

 

[David Judah]

For the audio problem, you probably have the audio ouput set to variable on the TV. If that is the case, set your receiver volume up a bit and then turn the TV volume up slowly. The TV sound should get louder out of your sound system as the TV volume goes up.

You probably can also switch the TV audio out to fixed in the TV's audio menu, instead of variable. When that is selected, then the TV's sound level that is output through the receiver, is controlled by the receiver's volume level only.

Good luck,

DJ

 

[Mike Matheson]

David,

The video for your cable channels under 100 are probably sent analog (100+ are digital). If your cable company is service oriented, they could probably improve the image quality.

Running RG6 cable instead of RG59, eliminating any/all splitters that you can--these types of things can help. Ultimately you're sort of at the mercy of the quality of the signal arriving at your house, however (which, again, the cable company can potentially do something to improve by checking levels down the street).

 

[LewB]

David:
I had similar problems on my analog cable system where the higher channels would get 'snowier' the farther up in channel numbers I went. I got the cable co. out to the house, the guy stuck a meter on the line and said that my incoming signal was weak. He fixed that with a new wire from the pole to the house. He then told me to get rid of the cheapo splitters that I had that would only pass up to 900Mz. He gave me replacements for all my splitters for free. These pass signals over 1GHz. Viola, problems solved. Not sure how the signals are arranged on a digital system, but I figure you might as well start with the basics and make sure you have the best signal possible before driving yourself nuts.

 

[Bob McElfresh]

Step 0: Look at your low-channels and pick a Major channel (network affiliate) that shows snow/damage. Use this channel for all your tests.

Step 1: Decide if its the outside signal thats weak, or your internal connections.

Plug the CATV coax directly into the TV. Look at your worst channel. If it's still bad, its the CATV companies problem. Call them.

If it looks fine, it's part of your setup that is the problem.

You should basically un-screw every connection and examine the wire. If it's shiny copper, the cable is good. If the wire is dull-brown, or the connectors are loose, replace the cable.

Make sure to tighten the connectors hand tight- then use a wrench about 1/8 to 1/4 turn extra. The number one cause of poor CATV signal is loose connectors.

Let us know if this works.

 

[Michael Reuben]

The number one cause of poor CATV signal is loose connectors.

I can vouch for this. Sometimes even a half turn of an F-style connector can make a huge difference in picture quality.

M.

 

[David Geo]

I'd like to thank everyone for the info/suggestions...I did indeed have my tv audio set to variable and changing this to Fixed did the trick -now the sound is coming through the reciever clearly and is great! Also, I had the cable guy out today (an actual company man not a contractor) and we found the problem - the cable going from my upstairs set to the downstairs (hometheater setup) was RG59 or RG49? anyways it was old antenna cable and my reading for channel 3 was -15! He actually fished a new cable through the floor/wall and now all is well (I did try hooking up the cable directly to the tv before this and confirmed it wasn't my component setup)...

Dave

 

[Bob McElfresh]

Cool. The Cable TV guy comes through again.