XHRIO-TV - History

History

The first incarnation of channel 2 operated in the 1960s as XETX channel 2. This was quickly shut down by its family ownership, Telesistema Mexicano (now Televisa).

In 1977, a joint venture was formed between the owners of KRIO (910) in McAllen and KRIX (99.5; now KKPS) in Brownsville and respected broadcaster Clemente Serna Alvear of Mexico City, holder of the license for the channel 2 transmitter. The venture returned channel 2 to the air on January 12, 1979 as XHRIO-TV, an English language independent station. It branded as XRIO-TV-2, running primarily reruns of older US shows and recent feature films. The studios were co-located in McAllen with KRIO. The transmitter was eight miles south of the Rio Grande and the Harlingen antenna farm. Since XHRIO-TV was perceived by its American competitors (KRGV-TV and KGBT-TV) as a "border blaster" or pirate station, both being unfounded, they set about to block live delivery of programming across the US border.

Although XHRIO-TV had a broadcast signal superior to its US counterparts, it suffered from serious underfunding and mismanagement by the ownership of the studio facility. During its first year, the technical staff which had created the facility against incredible odds slowly departed. Power to the transmitter site was sporadic and replacement technical people were not up to the task. Thus, XHRIO-TV was never able to establish an advertising base in the English market, despite extremely successful initial ratings. In 1981, the owners of the Mexican license ended the delivery of programming tapes across the border to the channel 2 transmitter, and converted XHRIO to a Spanish language station, first as a local channel for Matamoros viewers, and later as a Telemundo affiliate. In the late 1990s, the station reverted back to English language programming by becoming a UPN affiliate and changed it call signs to XHHUPN-TV. In 2005, the station reverted back to the XHRIO-TV calls and dropped UPN for Fox.

Fox programming had previously been seen on XHFOX (channel 17), from the 1994 until 2002, when station owner Televisa dumped the Fox affiliation and flipped that channel to a XEW-TV repeater as XHTAM-TV. Prior to XHFOX's arrival and before XHRIO took Fox, Lower Rio Grande viewers on the American side received the network from the nationwide Foxnet channel.

In 2007, XHRIO began broadcasting digitally on sister station KNVO's subchannel 48.3, but three years later, after KNVO began airing Univision in HD, XHRIO moved to its own digital channel 2.1

In 2011, low-powered sister station KSFE-LD began airing a simulcast of XHRIO on its main channel 67.1 with The Valley's CW 21 on 67.2. This was ironic because KSFE's primary affiliation was The CW but featured the Fox network more prominently.

In early 2012, KSFE's calls were changed to KFXV and on-air identification heavily emphasized the new call letters as well as channel 67.1. This could potentially lead to confusion as the station was branding itself as channel 2 while identifying itself as channel 67. Although the station was available on both channels, the XHRIO calls were reduced to small print beneath the KFXV calls on station ID bumps.

In 2012, it was announced a full power Entravision-owned station in the Rio Grande Valley would become a charter affiliate of the new Spanish language MundoFox station. This caused speculation that the Fox network would be removed from XHRIO in favor of MundoFox, although there was no confirmation. On August 7, 2012, FOX programming was interrupted so that XHRIO could air what they labeled a "señal de prueba" or "test signal" feed of MundoFox on 2.1. After numerous unconfirmed rumors that MundoFox would be on 2.1, Valley residents were finally given confirmation on August 8, 2012, when the station's official Twitter feed announced MundoFox would stay be on 2.1 and Fox would remain on KFXV 67.1, effectively splitting them off into 2 separate and distinctive channels. On August 13, 2012, MundoFox was launched on XHRIO, effectively ending their affiliation with the Fox network. Less than a week after dropping the Fox affiliation from channel 2 altogether, KFXV's standard definition feed was re-added to XHRIO on channel 2.2.