New York City television market selected as The Weather Channel's first HD STAR test area

For those of you who rely on The Weather Channel to find detailed information on your local current conditions and forecasts know that its high definition channel made its debut on June 2nd. Being able to see The Weather Channel HD with all the visual eye candy for graphic presentations (yes, including all the maps) in that crystal clear picture is a dream come true for all the weather junkies.

What maintains a relatively high viewership is an important feature on The Weather Channel. It is the Local on the 8s segment. Here is where you can see your local current conditions and forecasts you need on the 8s of every hour. But you've only been able to see it on the original standard definition (SD) channel.

Fans of the HD feed to The Weather Channel are in for a serious treat. You think you loved the live segments on there? Get ready soon for another feature that you will enjoy. It's TWC HD's version of the Local on the 8s coming to a local cable system near you.

On Thursday, it was a privilege for Cablevision customers in the New York City metropolitan area to have been selected as the first to see a "beta testing" launched in debuting the new HD WeatherSTAR version of Local on the 8s.

What is a WeatherSTAR, you ask? To quote what is posted at Wikipedia:

WeatherSTAR refers to the technology used by The Weather Channel (TWC) to generate their Local Forecast segments (currently known as Local on the 8s) on cable TV systems nationwide. The hardware takes the form of a computerized unit installed at the headend of a cable TV company which receives, generates, and inserts local forecast and other weather information, including weather advisories and warnings, into TWC's national programming.

Now that you understand what a WeatherSTAR is, this test run is not for any specific localized location... yet. Right now, this is a new HD WeatherSTAR being tested where everyone across the entire metropolitan area will see the same information. This means someone in Islip, New York is seeing the same thing right now as someone in White Plains, New York. Those in New York City and Newark, New Jersey, it's the same deal. For the SD feed of the Local on the 8s, you have your own localized conditions and forecasts (such as within the same county), not the entire metropolitan area.

For me, this is great. Those of you that watch The Weather Channel often and enjoy the Local on the 8s segment's presentation for what it provides, you will like the potential of the HD version. Someone in cyberspace has recorded video clips of it. Note that this person mistakenly said in his or her YouTube video clip information that it debuted yesterday and is not the case. It was Thursday as I mentioned.

Here is a sample of HD WeatherSTAR test as seen by yours truly and other Cablevision customers in the New York City metropolitan area. It's from yesterday. A number of new features are shown and the graphic look much resembles the new graphics we see on the live segments ever since the debut of The Weather Channel HD.



My favorite part, you ask? The separate forecast maps of each part of the metropolitan area showing New York City, the Hudson River Valley, Long Island and central New Jersey. Hopefully it will stay.

Just to let you know, this is just the test so far, not the final product. The official launch of your local HD version of Local on the 8s is coming very soon, sometime during the fourth quarter of 2008.