Should My HDTV Receive All Clear QAM DT Channels On Charters Channel Lineup?

[STL332]

I have the no frills Charter Basic service in St. Charles MO, a suburb of St Louis. Charters website lists 40+ channels in their lineup including the following 7 Clear QAM: FOX, NBC, CW, PBS, TBS & ABC & CBS. Without a cable box and just using coax into my new Samsung HDTV LN46B630 auto tuning resulted in the first 5 being tuned and streaming at 720i or 1080i. Unfortunately, both ABC & CBS are only streaming at 480i instead of in HD while both looking like analog. I get exactly the same results with an EyeTV tuner on my computer which is fed with an another coax completely independent of the coax for the HDTV. This second coax is only shared with my cable modem.

Samsung tech support told me the HDTV could only work with the signal it's getting.

Charter tech support told me the only way to ensure I'd get all the Clear QAM channels as HD is using their cable box & / or their digital HD package, but old cynical me suspects they are blowing smoke and most likely there are some issues with my signal quality & / or signal strength for the Clear QAM ABC & CBS.

I know, long story long, however, is what Charter told me reasonable?
Should I only expect to be able to tune all the Clear QAM channels in HD via a cable box & / or their HD package?

Thanks in advance

 

[tigerfan33]

They are blowing smoke. They want you to pay. You do not get hd channels in the clear from a box but through coax like you have setup. You may need to scan from time to time as these clear channels may move around.

 

[thedamaja]

It could be a tuner issue. I have a 40 Samsung LCD that will only tune in ABC and CW HD while all the other locals are the SD digital feeds.

The 32 LG I also have will tune all local HD and SD digital feeds with no problems.

You may be able to manually add the channels.

Here's the lineup

http://www.silicondust.com/hdhomerun/lineup_web/US:63302#lineup_966056

 

[STL332]

thedamaja

Thanks.
Based on the info at the link the issue apparently is that my HDTV does not "see" either 66.1 for CBS KMOV (1080i) or 66.3 for ABC KDNL (720i) during it's set up channel scan and tuning. Interestingly, the EyeTV tuner on my computer does "see" both as channels 784 and 780 respectively, but displays both only at 480i instead of 1080i or 720i. The tuning also results in me getting the analog versions of each correctly as channels 4 and 12 respectively on both the HDTV and EyeTV/computer.

"It could be a tuner issue. . . You may be able to manually add the channels."
My HDTV manual did not discuss how to manually add channels that were not "found" by the HDTV during it's set up scan.

At this point I think its prudent to request Charter visit me and check out my signal. However, based on your experience with a Samsung and LG it may indeed be a tuner issue.

If it is a tuner issue I'm not optimistic it can be resolved. As a result, in order to get all the locals at HD I'll have upgrade my cable to Digital Home with an included cable box. That will make me a hero in the household by providing more channels but will also increase my Charter bill by about $40/month.

If my observations and rambling give you a clue to what my next action should be please include in a response back.

 

[Big Dawg 23]

I have Charter in Minnesota. My Vizio only finds the HD Locals plus a few digital only channels that are also local. It does not find any of the HD channels like Foodtv, ESPN, FOX News and so on.