What Does It Take to Get HD Cable (1 Viewer)

[Keiwana]

For last several months, I have been asking my local Cox Cable representives about obtaining HD Cable in FT. Smith AR. The only cable service provider that offers HD Cable is Comcast Cable in Little Rock and Hot Springs.

Responses from Cox Cable have been from I don't know -to- today sets are unable to recieve unencrypted HD signals.

What does it really take to recieve the signal?

I believe that Cox Cable in my area have put in fiber optic cable. They currently provide the following services: "digital cable, high speed internet via cable modem, and telephone service.

Please Enlighten Me

 

[Bob McElfresh]

Your CATV company has to provide you a box that knows what channels the HD feed is on, and decodes it and converts it to component-output jacks at either 720 or 1080.

If they arent providing it, you cant get it I'm afraid.

 

[Scott Merryfield]

Talking with customer service reps from the various cable companies about their HDTV plans can be frustrating. If you call five different times, you will probably get five different answers (and probably all are wrong). I went through the same frustration with Comcast until they finally offered HD service, and even then finding a customer service rep who knew the scoop so I could order the service was still a challenge.

As Bob said, your cable provider would need to be offering HDTV service and would need to provide you with a special set-top box for decoding the channels. Most cable companies use a different encoding scheme than over-the-air HD broadcasts, so you cannot use an OTA HD tuner. If Cox Cable is not offering the service, your choices are either over-the-air (if the local stations are broadcasting DTV signals) or DirecTV/DISH. Tuners supporting the latter two satellite services also provide support for over-the-air DTV signal reception, provided it's available in your area.

 

[Jeff Gatie]

In addition to what Bob said, your cable company has to be broadcasting the HD signal through your particular network.

 

[Keiwana]

Thanks for the info guys.