I’m talking about the BTQ feeds, not the regional NEN feed. That will still operate, for the sake of local ads. I was referring to the BTQ-7 Brisbane relays. Those metro feeds did occasionally have a QLD Country Health fund ad, but the Gold Coast is not really a country town, rather the 2nd capital city of QLD.
Also, any airings of that ad would’ve been during The Chase Australia (4:30pm) and 7NEWS Gold Coast (5:30pm) when there were opt-outs. Outside of that it’s an exact copy of BTQ-7 Brisbane (apart from a few Brisbane updates with a Gold Coast background). With the axing of the bulletin means no more customised BTQ feed. The Regional QLD stations get the Brisbane background. Simple.
Huh? QLD Country Health Fund and “Gold Coast is not really a country town” I have no idea what you are talking about?
You are spending way too much time on this.
The 7GoldCoast feed is 99% mirror of the 7Brisbane feed anyway break wise with the occasional Gold Coast tag on same content airing in Brisbane at same time.
Being there is no more Gold Coast News, Seven may opt to cease separate playout for Gold Coast at some point as there is no separate Gold Coast feeds for 7TWO/7mate/or 7Flix as you already state.
The 7GoldCoast transmitters will stay switched on with same LCN names as now, business as usual. Seven may still do the occasional Gold Coast only opt-out in the future again, who knows.
WIN TV Bendigo isn’t on lower power than the other stations - it could be just a slight variation in the polar pattern from the Mt Alexander antenna towards where you were, or even a localized null due to reflections.
Regarding bitrates - I remember at one point (circa 2004-06) the Capital City stations would broadcast their main MPEG-2 SD stations at up to 8 Mbps. High bitrate DVD quality. Looked mint on a widescreen CRT.
IMHO, the main HD stations today should look at going to 8 Mbps h.264, and cut out the extra channels.
I can confirm from an antenna installer friend in Central Vic that he’s been getting quite a lot of calls from punters complaining about the loss of the Prime7 Mpeg-2 channels.
Those people are out there, still living in 3G and MPEG-2 land…
Though I note, not enough complaints to force 7 and WIN to reinstate MPEG-2 on the main channels.
Which reminds me, I was in the Central West of NSW earlier this week and can confirm 7HD Orange and 9HD Orange occupied LCNs 6 & 8 there… 10 Central West on LCN 5 was still in glorious MPEG2 SD.
Incidentally, Bendigo WIN is all H264 now. My old Panasonic EX77 DVD recorder has fewer channels it can record now. (That said, it hardly gets used these days).
Funny you say that… because i bought this Panasonic unit a year ago and only recorded my first show on it last week (the Countdown special on the ABC).
But I use the live pause/rewind feature all the time, I cant watch TV without it.
Then again, no one in the metros really care about MPEG-4 as such. As I said in many posts in probably this and a few other related threads, this is a regional trend.
Regional stations are upgrading their technology to MPEG-4 because their viewers love having the best picture quality possible, as well as sound quality, and that means doing away with the SD simulcasts that these stations have long held onto.
The metropolitan areas will continue to simulcast their SD channels because that’s just what they do and their viewers just don’t care. Heck, even NBN Newcastle has an SD simulcast on Channel 8, and that’s only because Nine owns and operates them.
I agree. The regional areas are usally a test bed for the metros. Remember it was the regionals that started fulltime watermarking. The metros followed suit over time.
