KXTV channel 10 Sacramento analog shutdown

KXTV was the last full-power station in the Sacramento market (besides Spanish channel 19 KUVS, which I wasn't able to see the end of) to stop broadcasting its analog signal on June 12 2009- at 9 AM 2 stations went to 'nightlight' service, 2 more cut their signals, channel 13 went off around 5:30, but channel 10 stayed on til midnight which was the official cut-off time. They pre-empted Nightline at 11:30 to do a half-hour special on the DTV transition with newscaster Dale Schornack, which was a bit disappointing as they spent a lot of time showing some guy at the Comcast Cable call center talking about how everyone should just get cable if they wanted to keep getting TV. All the commercials aired during the show were from Comcast, including the final one shown here.

KXTV started in 1955 with call letters KBET, changed to KXTV (X being the roman numeral for 10) in 1959. It was a CBS affiliate from its beginning until 1995, when ABC was getting better ratings KXTV decided to go with that network instead, taking it from KOVR and leaving them with CBS. For the past few years KXTV has called its entire station "News10", even though their programming was never exclusively news. Of all the stations in the area it has sucked the least, having never even tried putting a bug on non-network programming (channel 13 'experimented' with it briefly a couple times but thankfully that never lasted), and running the least amount of infomercials compared to other stations. Their newscasts have had an annoying onscreen logo however, as seen here- it often covers up the names of towns on the weather map and makes it just plain irritating to try and watch their news.

I think their Hi-def digital signal went on the air in 1998, but as I've said previously I had lost just about all interest in TV by then thanks to all 3 networks ruining their picture with constant onscreen logos, along with the huge increase in commercial time. Their analog station started broadcasting in stereo around April 1985- check out the sign-off clip I have posted from that year to hear the annoying fake stereo processor they used for shows with mono sound. Channels 10 and 13 both transmitted from the same tower in Walnut Grove built in 1986, which they don't bother to show here.

Before the last commercial, they show a visit to resident Micheal Kennedy who shows us a special section from the Sacramento Bee newspaper printed in 1953 about the coming of television to the area. Unfortunately Mr. Kennedy gives the usual spiel about what a great improvement digital TV is, and nothing about the fact that programming-wise it's now an unwatchable mess and that we'd be better off going back to lo-def black and white with shows having NOTHING on the screen but the show and less than 10 minutes of commercials per hour.

The funny thing here is that the signal doesn't go off exactly as planned, so the last thing broadcast is Mr. Schornack saying that only people with cable were watching him at the moment. The signal reduces power for a second before cutting off completely. They had already reduced the signal somewhat around 10 PM that night (I have "20/20" recorded and the signal went nuts at the beginning, then when it stabilized the power seemed to have gone down), thankfully the reception from the roof antenna where this was recorded was still good. The stereo signal was on up til the end though there didn't seem to be any separation the last day I watched.

Category:

Entertainment

Tags:

• KXTV
• Dale Schornack
• Gannett
• Belo
• Corinthian
• DTV transition
• sign-off
• Walnut Grove

[southparkgtaca]

Are you going to be posting anymore transitions of the Sacramento/Stockton/Modesto market?

[eyeh8nbc]

I have the last hour or so of KCRA before they go to the nightlight service- it's not too exciting but I'll put it up eventually. I've also got channel 31 though it was recorded with my indoor antenna so quality isn't perfect- they went to a still picture for a few hours which I've got, and I also got the last few seconds before the signal went off. I've been going back to school so it might be another couple weeks before I have some free time- have to finish writing a paper right now!

[Yoshimitsu483]

Freaking scared me at the end lol

[zonemad96]

holy shit i could barely hear the damn dude and the static was so loud it fucked up my cheap headphones ... well back to the dollar tree

[thepasswordisfail]

Why does he say you're not seeing him if you're watching on satellite...

[jzcrandall]

@digitalmasterdata I was working for Comcast when those commercials launched. They pissed me off because they did nothing to address the negative perception of the company.

[digitalmasterdata]

loving the comercial of comcast ! americas favorite feed of telecom ! LOL

[SupositoryRepository]

Oh shi- the snow and white noise at the end scared the bajeebus outta me. haha

[southparkgtaca]

That's cool. It's nice to see this archived, I missed the transition because I was on YouTube. lol And I have Comcast, and had no antenna that could pick up the channels good enough to see it cut out, they were already out. BAD signal in the foothills. lol

Wish I lived on flat land again, back in Stockton. :(