Anybody Have Their TV On Antenna Tonight At 5:30 On Channel 5??

[Henry]

My sister called me about 6:15 all worked up because they ran some kind of test on Channel 5 to let you know if you were ready for digital.  When they did she lost her picture on Channel 5 and it said weak signal.  The strange thing is that she has had the digital converter box since Christmas and gets an excellent picture, except when they ran the test tonight.  I am wondering what kind of a test it was.  I told her we would have to wait until the 17th and just assume since she is getting 5.1 & 5.2 very clear that it should be the same after February 17th.

[JoeT]

Henry:

I'm not sure what exactly they did for the test.  I can tell you if she receives 5.1 and 5.2 (their weather channel) that means she *is* watching DTV and is all set.

Just guessing here, maybe they had a problem and ran the test incorrectly?  Their digital transmitter is on low power temporarily and perhaps the signal faded at the wrong time?

Mistakes do happen during this very confusing time: At VPT we had an issue back during January's market wide analog test and the folks up in the Northeast Kingdom saw the "test passed" message accidentally on their analog TV's.

Looking forward to the 18th,
Joe

[Henry]

Thanks Joe.  She is 4 years younger than I am, but like many other elderly individuals, very edgy about this.  I will print your response out for her since she does not have a computer and hopefully put her mind at ease.  She asked me what time they would be switching over and I told her I suspected at midnight.

My thinking was like you said and I told her that if she was getting the digital signal now, she should be getting it then. 

[Henry]

Was watching channel 5 tonight and they said to point your antenna towards Mt Mansfield.  Must be why it comes in on digital for me as I had problems with it when I had to point towards the West.  Never came in good here.  They did say also they were running on low power.

Wonder where Fox 44 comes from??