tuned to the rf channels within the bands allocated to the digital scanning receiver 13 including for example any of the rf channels in any of the bands allocated for digital television viewing in operation the digital scanning receiver 13 receives a digital vsb broadcast signal which is defined to include any of a 2 digital vsb a 4 digital vsb an 8 digital vsb an 8t digital vsb or a 16 digital vsb signal transmitted via one of the rf channels as will be discussed in further detail herein the digital scanning receiver 13 may be an existing receiver of a device such as a digital television or personal computer or may be a separate receiver dedicated to the data guide system 10 referring to fig2 a sample portion of a digital vsb broadcast signal 22 to which the digital scanning receiver 13 may be tuned is depicted as shown therein the digital vsb broadcast signal 22 includes a set of digital television dtv programming packets 24 having audio and video components multiplexed with a set of data packets 26 the dtv programming packets 24 and data packets 26 are both formatted in conformance with the atsc standard and thus have symbols and symbol rates as specified therein the digital scanning receiver 13 scans through all available channels and at each channel tunes to the corresponding digital vsb broadcast signal 22 the demodulator 14 demodulates the digital vsb broadcast signal 22.