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Comments on news posted 2007-05-18 16:15:52: Time Warner Cable recently lost a lawsuit against DirecTV over an ad that claimed the satellite provider has three times the capacity to offer HD programming of a higher quality. ..
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JamesPC
join:2005-10-12
Orange, CA | word satellite sucks! | |
| rbiro
join:2007-05-10
Sunnyvale, CA
| Way too much compression on DirecTV The funny thing about HD is that it is just a image size and content standard - there is nothing in it that prevents DirecTV from way over compressing it.
Watching the NBA playoffs in HD (TNT-HD) just resulted in way too many pixelated scenes for the money I'm spending.
I'm hoping (praying?) Comcast does a better job - really I'm beyond pissed that Verizon FIOS is not available in California. My brother has Verizon FIOS in Massachussetts and he loves his picture.
And I was so happy 18 months ago when I left Comast for DirecTV... | |
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inteller
Sociopaths always win.
join:2003-12-08
Tulsa, OK
| DirecTV "bring it" DTV, I hope you are hungry for some crow, because this is going to turn out very ugly for you. I hope a judge orders an independent study and you get smeared big time for it.
--
"WHEN THE LAUGH TRACK STARTS THEN THE FUN STARTS!" | |
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Geo
@comcast.net
| Re: DirecTV resolutions I am so tired of this debate, and the Comcast/DirecTV marketing that blatantly tries to muddy the real facts on HD picture quality. the fact is fanboys in both camps are correct about some facts. Anyone who is interested in this should track a key 2004 class action lawsuit filed by California HDTV subscriber Phillip Cohen against DirecTV over downsampled HD resolutions and false advertising, and still is winding its way through the legal system:
Cohen v. DirecTV, Inc., B184630
The complaint alleges that DirecTV damaged its customers and engaged in unlawful, unfair or fraudulent business practices by switching some of its channels to a lower, sub-standard resolution in September 2004. Cohen had been a DirecTV customer since 1997 and began receiving HDTV services in 2003.
Most recently, (in November, 2006), DirecTV failed in a motion to force the case into arbitration. So my guess is that it now is proceeding to trial, unless DirecTV is trying to settle...
For what's it's worth, we are Comcast subscribers who hate the company's bandwidth limitations, slow adoption of HD technology, and refusal to communicate an HD roadmap to customers (for which DirecTV should be commended). But we've also compared Comcast HD to DirecTV HD on Pioneer plasmas connected via HDMI and I can tell you unequivocally that Comcast's HD quality is noticeably superior, with a sharper and crisper picture -- at least on the 1080i channels.
This is because DirecTV downsamples 1920x1080i/19.2 MBps signals to 1440x1080i or perhaps even 1280x1080i. No matter what doubletalk DirecTV offers, these are NOT native HD resolutions as specified by contemporary ATSC standards. However, I assume DirecTV does broadcast raw 1280x720p ATSC signals, and these channels should be comparable on either service. One anecdotal report on Wikipedia notes that in 2004, DirectTV removed the resolution-indicator from the user-interface of HD equipment after subscribers began noticing that some HDTV-programming was broadcast at reduced resolutions -- 1280x1080i.
I believe that DirecTV also converts MPEG-2 to MPEG-4, which means that in addition to downsampling 1080i material, the company is re-compressing MPEG-2 files (which already have been compressed). While MPEG-4 compression of original film or HD video files does produce better quality than MPEG-2, you can't recompress any previously compressed digital video file using a "lossy" compression algorithm without introducing a visible reduction in quality -- it is the nature of the technology.
So, it seems undeniable that DirecTV is attempting to redfine the prevailing resolution standards for less-than-honest marketing purposes -- to disguise their practice of squeezing more HD channels into a finite and limited amount of bandwidth. Similarly, Comcast is severely overcompressing their SD (standard defintion) channels to make room for HD until their entire nationwide network of local franchises all are updated with modern equipment, and this compromises SD programming as well as severely limiting the number of HD channels that can be offered right now.
Soon, Comcast will fall far behind DirecTV in the number of HD channels offered (at least for the short term). However, it seems likely that Comcast will continue to prevail in image quality, because DirecTV has to play with compression, resolution (and perhaps even streaming bit rate) levels to deliver those 150 channels promised for 2007. Unless DirecTV puts an end to this controversy and announces technological and policy changes and stops trying to obfuscate the facts, it appears the company will continue to deliver any new 1080i channels that are coming this fall using the downsampled resolutions.
Dish seems to be devising a level of service that falls somewhere between Comcast and DirecTV (in quality and the number of channels offered).
A pox on both the DirecTV and Comcast houses...
For more information, see:
»en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ATSC
»en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-defin···levision
»en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HD_Lite | |
| DaveT79
join:2007-05-31
Los Angeles, CA
| A reason for the use of HD-Lite Hey everyone,
Long time reader, first time poster.
While I can't say this is for sure a reason why providers choose to broadcast in HD-Lite, here is a theory I have. I work for a company who produces HD material for broadcast and the theory could possible shed some light on things.
Anyhow, my theory as to why providers often decide to use HD-Lite is simply because in the end the origin of the HD content itself is indeed HD-Lite.
This doesn't go so much for live feeds as that can easily passed to Satellite/Cable providers at full HD if they want.
But beyond that, you have to understand the source formats broadcasters get material in.
There are many formats from HDCam SR, to D5, down to HDV.
But in the end the widespread standard is HDCam and DVCPro HD
HDCam is 1080i only, and is 1440x1080, not the full 1920x1080
DVCPro HD can be 1080i or 720p. But it's 1280x1080i or 960x720p.
I imagine the big guns like HBO have movies on D5 tape and plenty of material is indeed from a full HD origin, but in the end the VAST majority isn't and I bet that's what the providers look at.
So in the overall picture and when it comes to satellite/cable providers weighing their options and trying to balace what they provide with quality, them providing HD-Lite is an easy option for them since most of the material that is broadcast out of the networks comes from a source that is HD-Lite in itself.
My thought process on this could be completely wrong, but it's the only excuse I can think of that the providers could use that I would accept.  | |
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