Comcast Ditching Some Analog Channels

By Earle Cornelius

EARLE CORNELIUS

Thursday is Valentine’s Day – the perfect time for you and your sweetheart to curl up to a classic romantic movie.

But if you are a Comcast subscriber and want to watch any of Turner Classic Movies’ romantic films, you better have a digital converter box.

Beginning Thursday, Comcast is switching several cable offerings to digital. In order to watch TCM, Game Show Network, Country Music Television and TV Guide Network, Lancaster and Elizabethtown Comcast nondigital subscribers will have to obtain a digital converter box from the cable company.

Boxes are free to subscribers for the first 12 months with a $2 monthly rental fee thereafter. Converter boxes are available at Comcast outlets, or can be ordered through the mail from Comcast. They also can be professionally installed.

Comcast spokesman Gabe Weissman said the change to digital is being made to give customers a better picture, greater channel capacity, including high definition and video on demand, and easier ways to find favorite movies and channels.

In addition to TCM, which will be be seen on Comcast channels 71 and 169, Lancaster subscribers will need a digital converter box to see Game Show Network (channels 64 and 179), Country Music Television (channels 67 and 146) and TV Guide Network (moving from channel 61 to 100). Comcast also is moving Trinity Broadcast Network to channel 290, Cartoon Network from channel 69 to channel 61 and the Sci-Fi Channel from channel 68 to channel 59.

Other digital classic changes include Bloomberg Television on channel 103, Outdoor Channel on channel 270 and Oxygen (moving from channel 185 to channel 123).

Comcast subscribers in Elizabethtown will need a digital converter box for Country Music Television (channels 69 and 146), Game Show Network (channels 59 and 179) and TV Guide Network (moving from channel 19 to channel 100). Also, Eternal Word Television Network will be available on channel 291.

Comcast also is adding eight new high definition channels to its expanded basic service Thursday at no additional cost to subscribers. The new high definition channels include A&E, HGTV, Food Network, TBS, USA, Discovery Channel and Sci-Fi. A high definition converter is required to view those channels on expanded basic service.

Those same channels remain available on standard cable.

Weissman said the digital changes are in response to surveys in which subscribers have indicated they want expanded programming, including HD offerings.

He said roughly 70 percent of Comcast’s subscribers now use digital service – a figure that is expected to reach 80 percent by year’s end.

He stressed that Thursday’s changes are a separate issue from the federally mandated transition from analog to digital that will take place in February 2009.

When that occurs, Comcast subscribers will not need a converter box.

“Customers connected to cable” he said, will be “completely covered” when the transition occurs.

Originally published by Intelligencer Journal Staff.

(c) 2008 Intelligencer Journal. Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning. All rights Reserved.