Patent ID: 8305887

Claim:
A method comprising: determining at a server device an amount of allocated and unutilized bandwidth for services already provided at first and second bandwidths on each of a plurality of quadrature amplitude modulator (QAM) channels of a QAM device in a cable television transmission system; selecting one of the plurality of QAM channels as a selected QAM channel to increase capacity for future service requests requiring the second bandwidth based on a determination that the selected QAM channel can have bandwidth deallocated to support a service at the second bandwidth; and deallocating a sufficient amount of the allocated and unutilized bandwidth for services already provided on the selected QAM channel such that the service at the second bandwidth is thereafter supportable on the selected QAM channel, wherein determining, selecting, and deallocating are performed when a request is received for an amount of bandwidth for the service provided at the second bandwidth, and wherein the second bandwidth corresponds to a high definition program bandwidth and the first bandwidth corresponds to a standard definition program bandwidth.