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White streaks at top of some channels

Hi. For the past couple of months, I've been seeing flashing white streaks at the top of the screen on some channels. I first noticed it on Turner Classic Movies (STILL not available in HD - thanks, Verizon), but have also seen it on a selection of other non-HD channels. In fact, many of the channels I see it on seem to be Time-Warner/Turner channels, but I'm not sure if the problem is exclusive to those. I did a chat with tech support, which was, as expected, useless (a supervisor was supposed to call me back, but never did). All the diagnostics check out, and I've rebooted the system. No evidence of connection problems either. Since it's only on some channels, my suspicion is that it has something to do with the transmission of those channels, not with my particular system. So, what I'm wondering is if anyone else has experienced this problem. It's somewhat subtle until you notice it, and then it quickly becomes very distracting. Also, I'd love to hear from anyone who had the problem and fixed it. Thanks.

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PJL

@rgberg2 wrote:
Hi. For the past couple of months, I've been seeing flashing white streaks at the top of the screen on some channels. I first noticed it on Turner Classic Movies (STILL not available in HD - thanks, Verizon), but have also seen it on a selection of other non-HD channels. In fact, many of the channels I see it on seem to be Time-Warner/Turner channels, but I'm not sure if the problem is exclusive to those. I did a chat with tech support, which was, as expected, useless (a supervisor was supposed to call me back, but never did). All the diagnostics check out, and I've rebooted the system. No evidence of connection problems either. Since it's only on some channels, my suspicion is that it has something to do with the transmission of those channels, not with my particular system. So, what I'm wondering is if anyone else has experienced this problem. It's somewhat subtle until you notice it, and then it quickly becomes very distracting. Also, I'd love to hear from anyone who had the problem and fixed it. Thanks.

This is normal for some channels and is as supplied by the provider. You may be able to adjust it out by changing the scan setting on your TV, but then you lose some screen display on channels that don't have the issue.

jshfeb84

The lines are supposed to be there, you’re just not supposed to see them. If you have seen them, they will vary in size and shape depending on your TV.

These lines are like barcodes embedded in the picture. Closed captioning, teletext and programming guide information is represented by these white lines. Your TV can interpret them and display the information in a format that you can read.

Although this primarily affects HDTVs, it stems from variances in old Tube TVs (Cathode Ray Tubes). In the early days of television, there were extreme variances in production of television sets — some would cut off more of the picture than others.

Quoted from another site but yeah.. Thats what it is and unfortunately theres no way to get rid of it on your TV no matter who your provider is.

rgberg2

Thanks for the replies. I understand that these codes appear at the top and are part of the signal. However, they were not visible on these channels until a couple of months ago, which makes me think there's some kind of mis-alignment that occurred. I guess the TV itself (HD, LCD) could have nudged the image down somehow.

PJL

@rgberg2 wrote:
Thanks for the replies. I understand that these codes appear at the top and are part of the signal. However, they were not visible on these channels until a couple of months ago, which makes me think there's some kind of mis-alignment that occurred. I guess the TV itself (HD, LCD) could have nudged the image down somehow.

That's unlikely. It is more likely that the video source provider changed their formats. I've seen these scan line come and go often.

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