KTFN
 | |
| El Paso, Texas/Las Cruces, New Mexico/ Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua United States/Mexico | |
|---|---|
| City | El Paso, Texas |
| Branding | UniMás 65.1 |
| Channels |
Digital: 51 (UHF) (to move to 20 (UHF)) Virtual: 65 (PSIP) |
| Subchannels |
65.1 UniMás 65.2 Justice Network 65.3 Quest |
| Affiliations | UniMás (2013–present) |
| Owner |
Entravision Communications (Entravision Holdings, LLC) |
| First air date | June 22, 1991 |
| Call letters' meaning | TeleFutura Network (former affiliation) |
| Sister station(s) |
TV: KINT-TV Radio: KHRO, KINT-FM, KOFX, KYSE |
| Former callsigns |
KJLF-TV (1991–1998) KKWB (1998–2002) |
| Former channel number(s) |
Analog: 65 (UHF, 1991–2009) |
| Former affiliations |
Primary: Independent (1991–1995) The WB (1995–2002) TeleFutura (2002–2013) Secondary: UPN (1998–2001) DT2: SD simulcast of channel 65.1 (2010–2012 MundoFox/MundoMax (2012–2016) DT3: LATV (2010–2012; moved to DT4) ZUUS Latino (2012–2013) DT4: LATV (2012–2014) |
| Transmitter power |
250 kW 130 kW (CP) |
| Height |
525 m (1,722 ft) 524 m (1,719 ft) (CP) |
| Facility ID | 68753 |
| Transmitter coordinates | 31°48′18.9″N 106°29′0.7″W / 31.805250°N 106.483528°W |
| Licensing authority | FCC |
| Public license information: |
Profile CDBS |
KTFN, virtual channel 65 (UHF digital channel 51), is a UniMás-affiliated television station licensed to El Paso, Texas, United States and also serving Las Cruces, New Mexico. The station is owned by the Entravision Communications Corporation, as part of a duopoly with Univision affiliate KINT-TV (channel 26). The two stations share studios on North Mesa Street/Highway 20 in northwest El Paso; KTFN's transmitter is located atop the Franklin Mountains on the El Paso city limits.
History
The station first signed on the air on June 22, 1991 as KJLF-TV; it originally served as an English-language outlet, formatted as religious independent station. The station was founded by Pete E. Meryl Warren III—who had signed on KCIK-TV (channel 14, now KFOX-TV) in August 1979—and was run by the Warren family, with John Warren serving as the station manager. Initially, KJLF-TV ran mostly Christian-oriented programs mixed with several hours of secular programs such as sporting and hunting shows, westerns, some older sitcoms, public domain movies and low-budget barter cartoons. Gradually, the religious programming decreased and was replaced with more classic sitcoms and cartoons, causing the station to evolve into a more traditional independent.
KJLF became a charter affiliate of The WB upon the network's launch on January 11, 1995. The station was sold to White Knight Broadcasting in 1998; afterward, its call letters were changed to KKWB (in reference to the station's network affiliation). After KMAZ (channel 48, now KTDO) dropped its affiliation with UPN and switched to Telemundo in 1998, KKWB began carrying UPN programming as a secondary affiliation and acquired many of the syndicated programs that were part of KMAZ's inventory.
The station was sold to the Entravision Communications Corporation in 2001; White Knight had originally agreed to sell KKWB to Univision Communications, who assigned their right to acquire the station to Entravision that October.[1] The sale was opposed by The WB, who filed a lawsuit seeking to block the sale and the concurrent sale of Killeen sister station KAKW to Univision, as KKWB's contract with The WB was not slated to expire until January 11, 2005, and the terms of the sales called for both stations to drop their WB affiliations in favor of Spanish-language programming supplied by Univision.[2] On January 29, 2002, the station became an affiliate of TeleFutura (the forerunner of UniMás) and changed its callsign to KTFN in reflection of its new affiliation. After the switch, WB network programming was only available in El Paso by way of the network's Los Angeles affiliate KTLA, while UPN programming was only available in El Paso by way of the network's Los Angeles affiliate KCOP-TV—both of which were carried on Time Warner Cable in the area—for the remainder of their runs (The WB and UPN ceased operations in September 2006 and merged their programming as part of a joint venture between CBS Corporation and Time Warner to form The CW, whose affiliate is KVIA-TV (channel 7), which carries the network's CW Plus feed on its second digital subchannel).
Digital television
Digital channels
The station's digital channel is multiplexed:
| Channel | Video | Aspect | PSIP Short Name | Programming[3] |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 65.1 | 1080i | 16:9 | KTFN-HD | Main KTFN programming / UniMás |
| 65.2 | 480i | Justice Network[4] | ||
| 65.3 | Quest |
On July 8, 2012, KTFN announced that it would begin airing newfound TeleFutura competitor MundoFox (later MundoMax) on digital subchannel 65.2, when the network formally launched on August 13, 2012. However, the station began carrying the network upon MundoFox's soft launch two weeks earlier on August 1.
Analog-to-digital conversion
KTFN shut down its analog signal, over UHF channel 65, at noon on June 12, 2009, the official date in which full-power television stations in the United States transitioned from analog to digital broadcasts under federal mandate. The station's digital signal remained on its pre-transition UHF channel 51.[5] Through the use of PSIP, digital television receivers display the station's virtual channel as its former UHF analog channel 65, which was among the high band UHF channels (52-69) that were removed from broadcasting use as a result of the transition.
After regular programming was discontinued on its analog signal, the station, as well as sister station KINT-TV, transmitted a repeated crawl in Spanish informing viewers about the digital transition and advising viewers of their options to continue receiving programming, which ran until KINT permanently ceased analog transmissions at 11:59 p.m.
References
- ↑ "Changing Hands". Broadcasting & Cable. October 28, 2001. Retrieved September 28, 2018.
- ↑ Schneider, Michael (January 2, 2002). "Nets gird for Spanish war". Variety. Retrieved September 28, 2018.
- ↑ RabbitEars TV Query for KTFN
- ↑ http://www.justicenetworktv.com/find-justice/
- ↑ "DTV Tentative Channel Designations for the First and the Second Rounds" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2013-08-29. Retrieved 2012-03-24.