Any way to cut down on Comcast cable digitization?

Question

Its been happening more and more from what ive noticed.

You are on a channel and then the audio will cut out, the video will slow and you get those squares on the screen.

I dont know if its just comcast but im ready to move on to verizon because of this problem...

Anyone know how to cut down or stop this problem?

Comcast has been at our house 4 times now this year and they tested our lines saying they are great.

We have one line run to the house which splits to the cable modem for internet and the other splits to three comcast digital boxes.

Answer 1

Have comcast run a direct rg6 coax line from the source to your set top box.

Answer 2

the problem is not with your cable it is from sunspots causing disruption in the lines we have the same problem with our charter cable and that was there explanation to us

Answer 3

That problem is called "tiling". It happens all the time. Its NOT sunspots. Its when the loss/noise on the line is too great and causes signal issues. They cable company needs to come out and fix it. Raise heck until they do because they may try not to fix it because its cheaper not to and make the customer deal with it.

Answer 4

u have signal issue. the real problem is u have 2 much loss and the signal is split way too many times. u more then likely have prolly 18mghz coming into ur house, when its split 4 times (the 3 boxes and modem) it goes down to prolly less then zero. u need at least 5mghz signal with cable boxes and especially cable modem. best solution is to prolly get a house amp. it will boost ur signal to ur boxes and modem and u shouldnt have a problem anymore. u can get it from comcast and they will install it.

Answer 5

Tommy do you mean dBmV? or mGHZ?

But yes, tommy is correct sounds to me  you are getting 'Macro-blocking' This is those tiny little black boxes appearing on the screen.  From what you have described you are having a signifigant loss in your return signal.  Something a Drop amp won't actually resolve there.  It is possible your SNR (Signal-Noise-Ratio) is out of spec as well. Possible causes for this could be a staple after going through the shielding of the cable.  

The prospective Losses you are looking at for a 4-way splitter are.. -7.5 dBmV, -7.5 dBmV, -3.5 dBmV, -3.5 dBmV. So in reality a total loss in excess of 22.0 dBmV.  Now I'm sure Tommy can add into this, but what is the Spec on Comcasts return? I know ours is between +15.0 dBmV and -15.0 dBmV. I would assume they are the same.

Now, unfortunally Comcast will check the signal at the CSE (junction to your house) If it is strong there they will simply say "Well it must be a problem with the internal wiring of your house, so that's your problem" One thing i would probably mention to comcast, is to have them come out and check your drop. If you are not getting a strong enough signal in your house that would cause this.   I know it is a huge pain, but if Comcast happens to run your Level's again. Say to the tech "What are there? can i have the numbers?" Then update on here so i can have a look. Also ask the technican what their specifications for it to be considered a ''great strength'

The only other plausible resolution i can think of, would be to have Comcast run the new line for your internet, that will save roughly -7.5 dBmV off of your signal strength.  It is sad when provider's pull that stunt. I know with our company if i went to your house for that issue i would run the cable long before it got to this point.  Pro-activity prevents costly and repetitve trouble calls.   From a business factor, comcast should look at it this way. They are probably going to lose a customer over this.  And it would be so simple to resolve it.

I hope this helps a little bit

Matt