TiVo Community Forums Archives - NBC screws up my closed-captioning

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NBC screws up my closed-captioning
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Posted by: megory

I use closed captioning all the time. It's great whether or not I have the volume on -- it helps me understand what people are muttering in the corner (like some of the newer West Wing episodes) and I can see what is happening when I single FF.

However, NBC SCREWS IT UP and gives me gobbledygook. All the other stations are fine and dandy--the garbage seems to be limited to NBC.

Is there any solution other than avoiding NBC (or turning off my Tivo to watch NBC--NAH)?

Posted by: NateO

I'm not an expert on the very technical side of captioning, but I do work for a captioning company, and I have heard of this problem before.
It sounds like your local NBC affiliate isn't passing through the captioning correctly. Perhaps they installed something that is interfering with Line 21 of the VBI signal. You should try to contact your local affiliate and let them know the problem you're having and ask them to look into it.

NateO

Posted by: PeteEMT

Is it screwed up including direct to TV (not through the Tivo)?
CBS has garbled captioning here but only when the signal is fed through the Tivo.

Posted by: devdogaz

I also use CC all the time and I have had no problems on NBC or any other major network. I don't think it's an NBC issue. It might be a local affiliate or a cable provider issue but there's no way it's from the network feed. I find that there is the occasional line of gobbledygook when it runs through the TiVo on all channels but no network that I watch is consistently sending bad CC data.

Posted by: TampaThunder

quote:
Originally posted by devdogaz
I also use CC all the time and I have had no problems on NBC or any other major network. I don't think it's an NBC issue. It might be a local affiliate or a cable provider issue but there's no way it's from the network feed. I find that there is the occasional line of gobbledygook when it runs through the TiVo on all channels but no network that I watch is consistently sending bad CC data.

I also think it's a cable provider issue. I don't get any CC on NBC and it works fine on all other stations. I have Time Warner (now Bright House) in Tampa and I've read of others having the same problem in other threads. It's very irritating but I've not yet gotten to the point of calling to complain. Maybe the next time they turn my cable boxes off in the middle of the night after doing maintenance and screwing up scheduled recordings I'll call and hit them with both barrells. :)

Posted by: megory

My only problem is when it is put through the Tivo -- not usually a problem when it is on straight-live TV. It seems that something about the delay scrambles it. Understand, I do NOT notice the CC when it is working right, I'm only conscious of it when it is garbled (e.g., on West Wing).

I'm in St Petersburg also using Bright House! And I'm irritated -- but just complaining to you all. I figure they'll just blame it on Tivo -- and I'd rather avoid NBC shows and keep the Tivo!

Posted by: PeteEMT

The TiVo decodes the captions, stores them as a text file and then re-encodes them to pass to your TV. This allows it to do the Captions in Fast Forward Trick as well as for other technical reasons that have to do with MPEG. (The format it stores video in)