# Why do cable companies list the same channel multiple times in the guide?



## barnabas1969 (Aug 22, 2013)

I just finished deactivating duplicate channels in the Guide on my Tivo Bolt VOX.

Why do cable companies list the same channel multiple times in the Guide?

Many channels were listed as SD and HD. In today's world, it doesn't make sense to have an SD channel.

And... many channels were listed two or three times as HD channels.

Why do they do this?


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## JoeKustra (Dec 7, 2012)

No one knows why TiVo does things. My cable feed has some duplicates. You have the power with the Channel List to control what the guide shows.


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## compnurd (Oct 6, 2011)

JoeKustra said:


> No one knows why TiVo does things. My cable feed has some duplicates. You have the power with the Channel List to control what the guide shows.


What does his question have to do with Tivo?


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## dianebrat (Jul 6, 2002)

compnurd said:


> What does his question have to do with Tivo?


A Tivo will show multiple channels/feeds for the same SD channel in a way that the Cable boxes hide, so I view this as a decently Tivo related question.


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## schatham (Mar 17, 2007)

compnurd said:


> What does his question have to do with Tivo?


You misunderstand his question. He's referring to the guide channels that the cable company provides to Tivo. Tivo then inserts them in guide and all the work of removing them.

But I notice you do post that a lot, maybe ease off a little.


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## ManeJon (Apr 14, 2018)

One of he nice things on DirecTV was the ability to hide SD duplicates - so if there was an HD channel you didn't see the SD.


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## JoeKustra (Dec 7, 2012)

ManeJon said:


> One of he nice things on DirecTV was the ability to hide SD duplicates - so if there was an HD channel you didn't see the SD.


One of the nice things about a TiVo is the Channel List where you can block any channel for any reason. Then set the guide "A" option to My Channels.

With TE3 you can select favorites there too. With TE4 it's a different list.


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## wmcbrine (Aug 2, 2003)

On Verizon Fios, they had duplicated channel numbers because one set was for use with the English language packages (although those still included some Spanish channels), while another set was for Spanish channel packages (though those still included many English channels). The numbers allowed them to present the packages as continuous ranges. It wasn't a very good reason, IMHO, but they didn't ask me.

On Comcast, in addition to the above -- after many years of fitting in new channels wherever they could*, at some point they tried to reorganize them into more rational groupings, which did they in the 1000+ range... while still keeping all the old numbers at their old (< 1000) locations, presumably so as not to disturb people who'd memorized the old numbers. (Since I hadn't been on Comcast for 20 years when I came back and found it this way, I just removed all the sub-1000 channels from the TiVo's list.)

* Or so I infer.


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## barnabas1969 (Aug 22, 2013)

Holy crap.

Back when I used the DVR from the cable company, some channels were duplicated in the Guide. For example, the local CBS channel was listed as channel 6 (SD), channel 806 (HD) and channel 1060 (HD).

Today, everyone has a TV that is capable of HD. So... two questions... 1) Why list the SD channel?

Secondly, why is the same channel (806 and 1060) listed TWICE?

i spent four hours going through each channel to eliminate duplicates from my guide.


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## compnurd (Oct 6, 2011)

barnabas1969 said:


> Holy crap.
> 
> Back when I used the DVR from the cable company, some channels were duplicated in the Guide. For example, the local CBS channel was listed as channel 6 (SD), channel 806 (HD) and channel 1060 (HD).
> 
> ...


The reason for listing the SD channels is most cable companies still have a ton of people using SD boxes. They can't shut the channel down until they convert everyone to newer hardware. The HD channel being duplicated definitely sounds like something weird your cable company is doing


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## lhvetinari (Jun 24, 2019)

Spectrum has this - in addition to the baggage of being effectively three systems in one company, years of “shove it in wherever” led to a mess in the listings. SD/HD makes no difference, as the SD numbers still deliver HD feeds on my TWC system. They’re just there so we don’t have to re-memorise numbers. 


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


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## barnabas1969 (Aug 22, 2013)

compnurd said:


> The reason for listing the SD channels is most cable companies still have a ton of people using SD boxes. They can't shut the channel down until they convert everyone to newer hardware. The HD channel being duplicated definitely sounds like something weird your cable company is doing


BS. Everyone nowadays has a device that adapts HDTV to a standard TV.... OR... they have a HDTV.


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## compnurd (Oct 6, 2011)

barnabas1969 said:


> BS. Everyone nowadays has a device that adapts HDTV to a standard TV.... OR... they have a HDTV.


Welcome to the real world. No they don't


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## TonyD79 (Jan 4, 2002)

barnabas1969 said:


> BS. Everyone nowadays has a device that adapts HDTV to a standard TV.... OR... they have a HDTV.


No they don't. Example: my brother has five TVs. Two of them are old SD tube sets. Comcast provides him with two tuners for them that are SD only. Comcast would have to replace those with newer devices. They don't do it because of cost. While most (not all) people have an HD TV for their primary TV, many (if not most multiple tv households) still have at least one SD tv.


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## randyb359 (Jan 3, 2009)

Comcast list the HD channels twice. The second set it arranged so similar type channels are grouped together.


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## TonyD79 (Jan 4, 2002)

randyb359 said:


> Comcast list the HD channels twice. The second set it arranged so similar type channels are grouped together.


Comcast is in transition. They are supposed to remove the lower HD channels but haven't yet.


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## SNJpage1 (May 25, 2006)

The way Comcast groups listings in different number ranges makes no sense. Let the customer create a FAV list if they don't want to view things by groups.


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## TonyD79 (Jan 4, 2002)

SNJpage1 said:


> The way Comcast groups listings in different number ranges makes no sense. Let the customer create a FAV list if they don't want to view things by groups.


Practically every cable and satellite system groups channels by type. How would you do that with a favorites list? You need one for sports, one for movies, one for news, etc.


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## kdmorse (Jan 29, 2001)

TonyD79 said:


> Comcast is in transition. They are supposed to remove the lower HD channels but haven't yet.


Comcast is in perpetual transition. They hadn't even finished migrating from the 00's to the 800's, when they decided the world really needed four digit numbers for everything, and by the time they almost get everyone into the 1000's, someone will decided that the original numbers were best, and migrate us back to the 00's.


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## barnabas1969 (Aug 22, 2013)

compnurd said:


> Welcome to the real world. No they don't


The FCC-mandated devices (I can't remember what they are called) will down-convert HD channels to an SD TV set. Each household was entitled to receive two of them for free.


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## JoeKustra (Dec 7, 2012)

barnabas1969 said:


> The FCC-mandated devices (I can't remember what they are called) will down-convert HD channels to an SD TV set. Each household was entitled to receive two of them for free.


DTA. I still have one. They were first used to convert digital to analog. Now they are multifunction.


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## barnabas1969 (Aug 22, 2013)

JoeKustra said:


> DTA. I still have one. They were first used to convert digital to analog. Now they are multifunction.


Yes, now I remember... DTA.

So, does the SD channel display differently on your DTA (connected to a SDTV) when compared to the HD channel for the same TV network?


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## TonyD79 (Jan 4, 2002)

barnabas1969 said:


> The FCC-mandated devices (I can't remember what they are called) will down-convert HD channels to an SD TV set. Each household was entitled to receive two of them for free.


Not sure where you are getting your information from but Comcast DTAs only tune SD channels. Go to their website. Pretty sure the same is true for fios.


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## JoeKustra (Dec 7, 2012)

barnabas1969 said:


> Yes, now I remember... DTA.
> So, does the SD channel display differently on your DTA (connected to a SDTV) when compared to the HD channel for the same TV network?


I do not own an SDTV. But if I tune an SD channel it displays with boarders on all sides (postage stamp display) and DD2.0 audio. It's a newer model. I don't pay for it. It will display HD through HDMI.


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## My Cape is a Recliner (Oct 5, 2019)

I liked that they had the duplicate channels. Every channel I watch (about 40 or so) goes into my favorites list. From there most of the basic cable channels had duplicates. Those that I use the most frequently or liked more than the others I kept in the first set. Those that I rarely watch, but still want on my favorites list, went in the second set. 

Not everyone has all HD tvs. I have a small 30 yr old 13" tv in the garage that was there when I bought the house. Its great for putting on the news when working in there. I may look up and see a minute or two out of a half hour program. I'm not upgrading that until that one goes bad, and even then I might not. 

Don't you have a station or two that only has one or two programs you record that don't need to be in HD. What would be the point in recording something like TVLand, game shows, news, where you don't need it in HD, and would rather conserve space.


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## Wigohwt (Jun 9, 2019)

barnabas1969 said:


> i spent four hours going through each channel to eliminate duplicates from my guide.


Next time use kmttg, you can sort by channel name and turn off the duplicate ones much more quickly.
Don't forget to save the channel list when you are done.


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