I tried to record an NFL preseason game yesterday. It was on Fox. I don’t watch Fox often and the last time I tried watching in the morning it worked fine. But the recording did not happen because the signal was weak. So I checked the channel myself from Tablo and sure enough it said weak signal. I unplugged the antenna from the Tablo, ran the channel scan again, got not channels (which is expected with the antenna off), plugged the antenna back in, rescanned, picked my channels again. Fox was showing 5 green circles…which is supposed to mean it is a strong signal, right? Well…still a weak signal when I tried to watch the live channel. In the past these steps have worked before but aren’t now.
The reception is fine. Has been for most of the last 10+ years. I can plug that same antenna to a TV and get that channel just fine. This channel worked fine via Tablo just a week or so ago
The same thing has happened to me. You need to connect the antenna to the TV and check the signal strength with your TV, not Tablo (if it has it) and get the strongest signal you can for the channels you want by re-aiming your antenna. then hopefully it will work when connected back to your Tablo.
You can’t always rely on the green dots on the Tablo.
I tried a few different things. I tried the scan probably a dozen times without the antenna and rebooted it. When it came back up I tried another scan, took the results, and it seemed to work fine. No idea why a single scan without a reboot wasn’t enough.
As for using a tv to find the best signal strength…tried it. The is no doubt the direction the antenna is pointing is the right one. Nearly all braodcast signals are coming the Sears Tower (I will never get use to calling it Willis Tower) so the direction is quite clear for me.
It could be interference from another station. My TV has a good meter with separate SNR and AGC. I sometimes lose a channel, even though the signal strength is near normal, but SNR can be poor to dropping out. It’s usually due to atmospheric issues causing further stations to skip closer. The repack a few years ago made it much worse.
It’s likely the no-antenna scan and constant reboot is pointless here.
Others have encountered similar “all of a sudden” after years of no problem.
Some suggestions have to do with “upgrades” requiring power adjustments. Some stations have added more sub-channels, not impacting reception, but indicates they are doing “something”.
New obstructions, including various signal towers. Less likely, occasionally users discover obscure household devices interfering with a single channel.
There are numerous posts with as many explanations regarding TVs receiving channels while tablo give the ambiguous weak signal notice (at times I get the feeling this is a generic catch-all error message).
That “weak signal” notice is too general, and really means “I can’t decode the digital signal.” A weak signal that is too noisy is the most common reason, but as noted, interference from another station or nearby devices can also cause it.