High-Def Goes National on Fox Sports Net

[dkennedy]

High-Def Goes National on Fox Sports Net

August 31, 2006

By Glen thingyson, Broadcasting & Cable

Fox Sports Net has announced that it will now offer national HD telecasts in addition to its existing local and regional HDTV efforts, broadcasting 15 of its 23 national telecasts of Big 12 and Pac-10 college football games in 720p high-def. The games will be available on FSN HD, which can be seen nationally on DirecTV and on leading cable operators throughout the country.

High-def national coverage begins this weekend, with Utah at UCLA on Saturday, September 2 at 7:00 p.m ET.

FSN regional sports networks already offer 475 HD telecasts and over 1,425 hours of HDTV annually, featuring dozens of NBA, MLB, and NHL teams.

[bruces]

The problem with DirecTV is that for most of the FSN Sports networks they are using spot beams for the HD broadcast and only sending you the local sports network for your area.

Also, unless you already have your local channels available in HD from DirecTV, there probably is no spot beam for your area and you will not be able to receive any of the FSN networks in HD.

I know that the only reason I switched to DirecTV is because cable does not carry the games for my favorite baseball team.

This may change next year, since DirecTV is scheduled two additional satellites during 2007.