WOI-DT - Des Moines, IA

Just picked up a used Tablo from Amazon and am about to plunk down $150 for the lifetime guide data, but one thing is stopping me. My channel scans will not pick up WOI-DT. I am coming from a Simple.TV, which picks up the channel just fine. I also have 2 SiliconDust tuners that also pick up WOI-DT. I also have coax ran to all my TVs and they all pick up WOI-DT.

I have bypassed all splitters and gone direct from antenna to the Tablo, a scan will still not show WOI-DT. I have even hooked up an amplifier and still no WOI-DT.

WOI-DT is an interesting station. They are assigned to 5.1, but they also broadcast on 50.1. I wonder if Tablo’s DB of channels is aware of this fact.

Is there any trick I can do, or a manual way I can add this channel? I really like the Tablo and the new Roku interface, but if I can’t get ABC, I’m afraid it’s gonna have to go back to Amazon.

Very weird.

I say open a support ticket directly with Tablo and let them sort it out.

If you did a direct antenna to Tablo connection and you can’t get the channel that’s odd.

How far away is the transmitter for said channel?

I’m less than 20 miles from the tower. They broadcast in VHF. My HD Antenna is mounted outside and is a VHF/UHF antenna (specifically bought so I could pick up this channel). They rebroadcast on 50.1 so people with UHF-only antennas can pick it up, but I think it’s a lower signal strength on 50.1.

I’m about 21 miles from the tower (north) and have no problem receiving WOI. It seems odd that one station would give you a problem since all the main stations are broadcast from that location.

Do you mind me asking for your zip code? I’d like to plug it in and see if I get any different results in the scan. I’m in Altoona (50009).

Do you mean directly on your TV that you see WOI-DT on both 5.1 and 50.1? They really might be broadcasting on both depending on where both are located. For example, in Austin, TX there is a station in Kileen, TX and they have a repeaper station on 31.1. It’s a Spanish station and I don’t watch it. The 31.1 is located in Austin and of course comes in perfect while the 62 one comes and goes (same station that has GetTV and Escape that are in Kileen except those two are English).

I think it has to do more with the fact that 5.1 is on VHF. They broadcast a little ways north of Des Moines (biggest city in Iowa) and a lot of people have UHF-only HDTV antennas. I think they do a low-power UHF broadcast on 50.1 to get Des Moines covered. Since I live in a suburb, I don’t think the signal is strong enough, but I do have a VHF/UHF antenna so I can get the VHF signal where I am.

My Simple.TV lists the channel as WOI-LD, not sure why that is, it should be WOI-DT. Perhaps LD is the lower power output channel?

It’s listed as WOI-DT on my Tablo. Zip is 50105, just north of Ames. I have a directional antenna in the attic pointed pretty much straight south. AntennaPoint does show it as lower power than the rest of them.
It still seems odd. I would as theuser86 says and open a support ticket. Good luck!

I have sent an email to support. We’ll see what they say. I tried your zip and no difference. I did some more troubleshooting today. I went as climbing up my house to the antenna, using another coax cable from the antenna and replacing my coupler, same results.

About the only thing I haven’t done is try another antenna, but since outdoor antennas are somewhat expensive, I don’t have another laying around.

With my SiliconDust TV tuner and Windows Media Center, I am able to determine that I cannot get 50.1, which is the UHF signal for this station. I can only get 5.1, which is VHF. There is an option to edit the sources for the channel. It listed both 5.1 and 50.1. When I disabled 5.1, I could not get the channel to come in.

This is contrary to this thread in Reddit:

They suggested using 50.1. I doubt they had a VHF antenna. I am hopeful that the Tablo is trying to use 50.1 and not 5.1 and this can hopefully be fixed.

Edit:

More info here: http://www.rabbitears.info/market.php?request=print_station&facility_id=8661

Looks like WOI-LD is actually only about 10 miles from my house! It looks like they broadcast out of downtown Des Moines. The way I have my antenna positioned, I wouldn’t be able to pick it up, as I point my antenna almost directly north (where the majority of the towers are, including WOI’s VHF tower). I’m willing to bet if I rotate my antenna about 45 degrees to the west, I would be able to pick up the stations to the north as well as WOI-LD. I’m going to give this a try tomorrow.

Good luck & let us know if it works…

WOI broadcast main tower is right along with the others, KCCI, WHO and so on.
You are looking at 5.1 LD if you are seeing it in Des Moines.
WOI is low power and we have troubles with them a lot, or used to. They seem to be better since I put an amp in place and redid all my cable and such.
But their antenna for HD, WOI-HD is indeed between Ankeny and Huxley. Here’s the list I get when using antennaweb.org

Note the exact same distance at 22 miles and 330 degrees as WHO and so on, so they are up there north of Ankeny. But they are LOW POWER, a low budget station, ever since they were run by ISU all those years ago. (also note the colors - they require a different antenna than all the others due to their lower power, I suspect - antennaweb suggests antennas and color codes them - all yellow until you get to WOI-DT - then it needs a different antenna. That would suggest to me a problem station.

KCCI-DT 8.1 CBS
RF Channel: 8
22 miles at 329° Yellow
KCWI-DT 23.1 CW
RF Channel: 23
23 miles at 332° Yellow
KDIN-DT 11.1 PBS
RF Channel: 11
22 miles at 330° Yellow
KDMI-DT 19.1 MNT
RF Channel: 19
23 miles at 332° Yellow
KDSM-DT 17.1 FOX
RF Channel: 16
23 miles at 332° Yellow
WHO-DT 13.1 NBC
RF Channel: 13
22 miles at 330° Yellow
WOI-DT 5.1 ABC
RF Channel: 5
22 miles at 330° Green
WBXF-CA 4 BOX
RF Channel: 4
12 miles at 287° Violet
WOI-LD 5.1 ABC
RF Channel: 50
12 miles at 287°

Right. I’ve always had issues with them until I mounted a VHF/UHF antenna outside on my roof. I could get all the other main stations (NBC, CBS, Fox, PBS, etc) with an antenna located in my house.

The odd thing is, with my SiliconDust tuner, Windows Media Center reports “green” signal (one bar from max) for them. I don’t get why the Tablo doesn’t pick it up. I’m hopeful that if I change my antenna to be able to pick up the Des Moines tower, perhaps the Tablo will pick that up.

I really hope it works, as I love the Tablo. Tonight, my Internet went out for a while and I couldn’t do anything on my old Simple.TV, but the Tablo worked like a champ.

Well, I adjusted my antenna some and I was able to pick up additional channels I could not on my SiliconDust (ION). All the other channels came in OK on my SiliconDust, but the Tablo lost channel 8 (KCCI) and still couldn’t find channel 5. I’m thinking I either got a bad Tablo, or Tablo devices in general have lower-than-average reception.

I’m just gonna return it and continue with my SiliconDust + Simple.TV setup.

On second thought, I’m just gonna live without channel 5. I like the Tablo so much, I’ll keep my Simple.TV just for Channel 5, but gonna ditch the media center PC and my SiliconDust tuners :smile:

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I did open a support ticket with Tablo. They tried helping by remoting into my Tablo and asking a few questions, but then I got a sort of canned reply about general signal issues (have your antenna high, etc) and they closed my ticket.

I would buy that explanation if I didn’t have 3 TVs and a Simple.TV that all can pull the signal. I’m considering returning the 4-tuner to try a 2-tuner. I see some people have had better luck with reception on the 2-tuner. My TV hooked to the same coax outlet shows 100% signal quality and 84% signal strength. I’ve even bypassed the splitter on the outlet (which should increase signal further) and still no channel in the scan.

Edit: Also, does anyone else know why my channel scan finishes saying it scanned 72/69? I read that as it scanned 72 channels out of 69 channels?

You need to remember that the 4 tuner Tablo splits the signal 4 way, while the 2 tuner Tablo only splits it to 2. The TVs don’t split the signal. Maybe an amplifier before the connection to the Tablo will solve the problem.

I have an indoor antenna for the Tablo 4 tuner, and another indoor antenna for watching direct on the TV.

I went ahead and ordered a 2-tuner. If it works, I’ll be returning the 4-tuner. I’ll put up with less tuners to be able to get ABC. It’s going to arrive on Tuesday. I’ll update this thread with my results.

I do have an amplifier. I’ve taken the direct feed from the antenna with no amp, and an amp to the Tablo (zero splitters), no difference (still can’t get the channel)

There is one VHF station (actually 3 counting the sub channels ) and depending on where the antenna is i get everything but 7.1, 7.2 and 7.3. I found the perfect place for the antenna to get everything but 62. If i had an outdoor antenna everything would come in.