About Our Online Hook-up Help

[Jonathan Kramer]

If there's anything we've learned about how many ways there are to hook up equipment, it's this: There are more ways than you can imagine, but far fewer that actually work, and even fewer that work the way the people want them to work.

Jody Brewer (CableWithAView) and I handle these questions as best we can. It's tough since most of the time the people asking the questions don't have much technical knowledge, and can't adequately describe their own existing set-ups. If this was a for-fee venture, we'd gladly answer questions all-day, every-day, but this isn't a commercial venture. Jody is in technical operations of a major MSO cable system in Alabama, and I'm an telecom attorney, cable system inspector, and RF engineer based in California.

Over the past year, Jody and I have handled hundreds of hook-up questions posted in the Forum, sent via private mail, and email. One recent email contained the statement, "Could you give me a detailed, line by line of how to hook everything up so that we. . ." No, we can't.

Well, you get the idea. If you're not technically inclined, no website can substitute for good on-site help hooking things up. If the satellite or cable tech comes out and screws up your pre-existing hook-up, or doesn't know how to hook things up, you need to get on the phone and call the management to get things straighted out. If you've screwed-up a connection, or added new equipment that doesn't work, you need to get on the horn and call a local service tech or the equipment manufacturer.

Jody and I have decided to leave the Hook-up help open for visitors to research. We'll also leave the Hook-Up Guides link, which references back to the Tech Q&A Section active. From time-to-time we'll update both the Q&A and Guides sections.

We hope you'll continue to find the site a useful resource for cable and satellite industry news and discussions.

Best regards,

Jonathan Kramer and Jody Brewer
Your online hosts at CableTV.com