Nick Sayer <mrapple@quack.sac.ca.us> (06/13/91)
We have a monopoly here in Stockton. Continental Cable charges $19.54 a month minimum, and has 34 clear channels, 4 pay channels and one pay-per-view channel, but it's on two pieces of coax, which makes cable-ready equipment capable of only 'seeing' half the channels at a time. A converter to solve this problem costs $2/mo, a remote control is another $1, the first pay channel is about $10, and additional pay channels have decreasing costs. Needless to say, I am not happy with this situation but, of course, I live in a condo where no antennas are allowed, so there is no alternative. When (and if :-) ) I graduate from college, I'm gonna get a dish. Now if there was only a way to get phone service without having to get service from an RBOC. Speaking of dishes, has anyone heard from the Congressional inquiry concerning predatory pricing practices of cable programming suppliers? I was watching C-SPAN some time ago, and ran across such a hearing. One of those testifying said the average cable company paid $2 per subscriber per month for a package which satellite and wireless-cable providers paid an average of $10 per subsciber per month. Nick Sayer mrapple@quack.sac.ca.us N6QQQ 209-952-5347 (Telebit)
"Ralph W. Hyre" <rhyre@cinoss1.att.com> (06/17/91)
In article <telecom11.456.6@eecs.nwu.edu> mrapple@quack.sac.ca.us (Nick Sayer) writes: X-Telecom-Digest: Volume 11, Issue 456, Message 6 of 9 > pay-per-view channel, but it's on two pieces of coax, which makes > cable-ready equipment capable of only 'seeing' half the channels at a > time. A converter to solve this problem costs $2/mo, a remote control. > is another $1, the first pay channel is about $10, and additional pay > channels have decreasing costs. If your basic channels are unscrambled, then you can try what I did: (worked on a TCI system in Pittsburgh, and Warner in Cincinnati.) RUN, don't walk to a store where you can buy what's reffered to as a block converter. It shifts the cable channels up around 400Mhz, to the UHF band, where you can combine with the VHF and cable band channels into a single piece of coax. Your cable-ready set (and VCR) should be happy to accomodate it. Total cost around $30 (I got mine a Radio Shack). A cable ---------------------------+ +Coupler/combiner+----- single cable B cable -block converter+----------+ You will need to find the B cable channels on your TV/VCR. There is also potential conflict, since the box SUBTRACTS 400Mhz from the B cable channels, causing potential conflicts with the 'A' cable channels. In general if you put the least-loaded cable through the converter box, you will be OK.