Welcome!  This page is maintained by the Town's appointed "Cable Advisor" (a Sudbury volunteer)


+For questions about our Access Channel (COMCAST 8/FiOS 31),
including program listings, Community Bulletin Board posts, how
to get involved, and other questions, please contact
SudburyTV.

+For questions or problems related to your cable service, check:
-Cable TV Frequently Asked Questions
-Information about Cable TV and Broadband in Sudbury or



+Cable Company Contact #s:   
    1-800-COMCAST (1-800-266-2278)   
    1-800-VERIZON (1-800-837-4966)


+Program Schedules and Channel Lineups:
SudburyTV Program Schedules (COMCAST 8,9 / FiOS 31,32)
COMCAST Channel Lineup for Sudbury 
FiOS Channel Lineup for Sudbury.

+Other Documents:
Current Sudbury COMCAST License (2009)
Current Sudbury Verizon License (2007)
Sudbury Cable Advisor Annual Report (2008)
Sudbury Cable Advisor Annual Report (2009)
(The links above require Acrobat Reader)

FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS:
    [last update 12/24/09]

1. When will Verizon provide FiOS to my neighborhood?
Although they have been building as fast as they can, Verizon contractually has until February 2012 to provide service to the entire town.  All homes with aerial utilities, and many with underground utilities, should have access to FiOS.  Please contact me if you have aerial utilities and cannot get FiOS.  If you have underground utilities, but cannot get FiOS, there is little the Town can do.  Construction stops in November and resume in the spring.  Verizon will not share their construction schedules with the Town, so the Town cannot access their specific plans. 


2.  Why is COMCAST telling me that I have to start using a cable box?  If you have a non-digital (i.e., does not contain a digital tuner) "cable-ready" TV that you have been using to watch COMCAST's programming without a cable box,  you are going to have to start using digital cable boxes, as COMCAST is converting all their remaining channels to digital starting in mid-January 2010.  Basically, rather than sending the channels down the cable in a form that looks like over-the-air TV, they are encoding the data digitally.  This improves quality, and, more important, allows them to pack more channels into the same bandwidth, allowing them to provide more channels, especially more HD channels.  The Basic Tier (consists primarily of over-the-air channels, costs ~$14/month) will be unencrypted, but the Extended Basic (a.k.a. Standard) tier will require a cable box of some type (the lowest-end cable boxes are now called "Digital Adapters").

COMCAST has sent notification letters to all subscribers.  You do not need to pay attention to the letter if
  •   you already have a digital cable box, or cablecard device (like an HDTivo). attached to every TV that uses cable, or
  •   you have digital TVs (recent models with a digital tuner) that are attached to the cable directly and are used to watch only the lowest (Basic) tier (~$14/month) of service. 
Otherwise, you will have to get a digital cable box of some type from COMCAST for each of these TVs.  In most cases, COMCAST will supply these cable boxes at no additional charge.  You can program the cable-box remote to control volume and other basic functions on your TV, and you should be able to configure a TiVo or similar device to control the box by having the device emulate the remote control. 

Unfortunately, COMCAST doesn't have a current webpage on this topic, but you can get more information by calling them (1-800-COMCAST).


Page maintained by Jeff Winston, Sudbury's "Cable Advisor".

Copyright 2008, 2009, 2010   Town of Sudbury