Re: New Channels in LV? in RCN http://www.dslreports.com/forum/r17164964 en Wed, 03 Dec 2008 19:55:22 EDT Wed, 03 Dec 2008 19:55:22 EDT Re: New Channels in LV? http://www.dslreports.com/forum/remark,17175665 JimF : Actually, that is good to know. At least they have preserved the master in a high-quality format. They can then compress it as they wish. The U.S. can offer more channels if it wants, and the Europeans can have higher quality. Maybe we can have some of both.]]> http://www.dslreports.com/forum/remark,17175665 Sat, 28 Oct 2006 21:49:14 EDT Re: New Channels in LV? http://www.dslreports.com/forum/remark,17173453 alanisrox69 : Nah, they are doing their own fresh encodes from master material, not taking a mpeg-2 encode from another channel and re-encoding it.

More than likely they are getting a master HD format, something on a D1 tape or higher (not sure how HD content can be delivered) and then converting it from that "master" format straight to h.264. The h264 channels are even pre-encoding the material using multiple passes. HBO used to do in house transfers from film, but they don't anymore. Now, in the US the master gets played and is encoded in real-time to mpeg-2, this is what causes macroblocking and such (also the lower bitrate of US HD channels contributes to blocking). If you take a look at some of the h.264 samples on the net, you'll see macroblocking is reduced substantially (if it's there at all) versus a US mpeg-2 capture.

-Derek-
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CHECK YOUR FSLC TAXES!!!]]> http://www.dslreports.com/forum/remark,17173453 Sat, 28 Oct 2006 14:05:49 EDT Re: New Channels in LV? http://www.dslreports.com/forum/remark,17171796 JimF :
said by alanisrox69 See Profile :

right now h.264 streams in Europe are high bitrate. almost all of them are 17.57mbps with a 384kbps audio track.
That is interesting to know. There must be a reason they are using such a high bitrate. It may be because it was originally encoded in MPEG2, and they need to oversample it that much to maintain the quality. If they started out with H.264 encoding, they should be able to get a reduction in bitrate of about 2.5 or so over MPEG2 at comparable quality.]]> http://www.dslreports.com/forum/remark,17171796 Sat, 28 Oct 2006 08:36:49 EDT Re: New Channels in LV? http://www.dslreports.com/forum/remark,17168818 Stavs : Please no more Spanish channels! They could at least have the decency to have subtitles in English on these channels so we can understand whats going on.

I really want National Geographic HD.]]> http://www.dslreports.com/forum/remark,17168818 Fri, 27 Oct 2006 18:38:19 EDT Re: New Channels in LV? http://www.dslreports.com/forum/remark,17168700 Bane_ : Hey RCN, how about a spanish HD channel? Anything? Please? :uhh:]]> http://www.dslreports.com/forum/remark,17168700 Fri, 27 Oct 2006 18:18:58 EDT Re: New Channels in LV? http://www.dslreports.com/forum/remark,17167459 ESPN : Those markets pay a higher monthly fee than PA.]]> http://www.dslreports.com/forum/remark,17167459 Fri, 27 Oct 2006 14:41:38 EDT Re: New Channels in LV? http://www.dslreports.com/forum/remark,17164964 jcpudd : How about we get the channels by default that the other markets get and don't have to pay for like Discovery HD Theatre, ESPN HDTV, HD Net, and HD Net Movies.

I think its ridiculous that we have to pay for those when all but the NY markets do not have to.]]> http://www.dslreports.com/forum/remark,17164964 Fri, 27 Oct 2006 04:08:56 EDT Re: New Channels in LV? http://www.dslreports.com/forum/remark,17159428 topcatvtech : This follows an overall industry trend to eliminate analog premium channels. Don't know or want to speculate what that bandwith will be used for but it's always good to be proactive and free up bandwith and reserve it for future use.]]> http://www.dslreports.com/forum/remark,17159428 Thu, 26 Oct 2006 11:01:53 EDT Re: New Channels in LV? http://www.dslreports.com/forum/remark,17154234 alanisrox69 : Not necessarily...

right now h.264 streams in Europe are high bitrate. almost all of them are 17.57mbps with a 384kbps audio track.

so in essence it's the same size that a mpeg-2 would be because it's the same bitrate.

-Derek-
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CHECK YOUR FSLC TAXES!!!]]> http://www.dslreports.com/forum/remark,17154234 Wed, 25 Oct 2006 15:17:27 EDT Re: New Channels in LV? http://www.dslreports.com/forum/remark,17153053 jhlmsln : If we can't get anymore HD channels until RCN
eliminates some old analog channels, we are
DOOMED. In no way RCN is going to get rid of
those money makers just to satisfy us HD customers.
Personally i think all of the changes RCN is making
is to strengthen their for sale pitch.

jhl]]> http://www.dslreports.com/forum/remark,17153053 Wed, 25 Oct 2006 11:46:34 EDT Re: New Channels in LV? http://www.dslreports.com/forum/remark,17152612 JimF : Speaking of which, what about H.264? I hear that it is becoming the standard in Europe for HD over cable, and the satellites use it. It would pretty much solve the capacity problem.]]> http://www.dslreports.com/forum/remark,17152612 Wed, 25 Oct 2006 10:23:33 EDT Re: New Channels in LV? http://www.dslreports.com/forum/remark,17151461 alanisrox69 : Well, re: Dish.

While they may have more HD channels, not all of them are True Full HD. Some of their channels like MonstersHD, HDNet, HDNet Movies, and StarzHD are all compressed to 1280x1080i/1440x1080i. All of the old VOOM channels are 1280x1080i as well, but since Dish is the only one that carries them, I guess that's the best you're gonna get anyways. StarzHD looks horrible on Dish. It's not compressed right and always has ghosting and other artifact problems. Blech!

Over the summer Dish started compressing HDNet. As you may or may now know, HDNet is dedicated in providing the highest quality HD transfers at the highest bitrate. They send all of their content out at 1920x1080i with a bitrate of ~18.5mbps. Dish compresses HDNet now to 1440x1080i and ~11mbps. And in doing so, the audio is almost always out of synch with the video, and re-compressing on the fly makes HD looks like crap.

So here's a case where more is not always better.

One thing I like about RCN is that on all of their HD channels (at least in my area), they send them out uncompressed and untouched as they are sent out OTA or C-Band (I believe they pull in the premiums via C-Band, but I could be wrong).

Service Electric in my area compresses certain channels bitrate wise, but not resolution wise (720p channels are 1280x720p, and 1080i channels are 1920x1080i). I assume because they have limited QAM capacity. Channels like ABC and HDNet have lower bitrates than they should. ABC averages 7mbps where it should be 13mbps and HDNet averages 14mbps where it should be 18,5mbps. CBS and NBC average 15mbps where they should be 17.57mbps (like what RCN provides). Luckily Service Electric doesn't compress the premiums, they only offer 3, but those are untouched.

The difference on Service Electric is not much, but if comparing an RCN capture versus a Service Electric capture of the same show side to side you can see the difference in artifacting.

As for Dish, they should just ditch some of the SD channels to open more bandwidth up for the HD ones so they can return them to Full resolution and full bitrate.

-Derek-
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CHECK YOUR FSLC TAXES!!!]]> http://www.dslreports.com/forum/remark,17151461 Wed, 25 Oct 2006 01:26:24 EDT Re: New Channels in LV? http://www.dslreports.com/forum/remark,17151036 wbertram : Hmmm, whatever happened to that old saying re something like "the customer is always right..."?

Customer: I would like more HD channels, like DISH offers.

RCN: Sorry, how about some additional channels in a language you don't understand.

Can't we have some of each?

I realize you don't choose the programming, but I assume you do have some access to those who do make these decisions, and pass on the customer concern about the lack of HD channels.]]> http://www.dslreports.com/forum/remark,17151036 Tue, 24 Oct 2006 23:55:31 EDT Re: New Channels in LV? http://www.dslreports.com/forum/remark,17150832 jmirabella : I dont think thats an option]]> http://www.dslreports.com/forum/remark,17150832 Tue, 24 Oct 2006 23:26:36 EDT Re: New Channels in LV? http://www.dslreports.com/forum/remark,17149856 wbertram :
said by jmirabella See Profile :

or various other things that can go in those 5 RF channels..
Joe,

How about a subscriber vote on what the subscribers would like to see go in there?

RCN provide the options, the subscribers vote on which ones they prefer.]]> http://www.dslreports.com/forum/remark,17149856 Tue, 24 Oct 2006 21:01:58 EDT Re: New Channels in LV? http://www.dslreports.com/forum/remark,17149763 mjr : Like Cable Modem downstream bandwidth to support the people upgrading to 20MBPS service...

Though, I'd be hoping for more HD.. and/or digital simulcast... (read better pic quality, and probably more PVR storage space for SD content (the headend encodes more efficiently than the encoders in our STB's...)]]> http://www.dslreports.com/forum/remark,17149763 Tue, 24 Oct 2006 20:48:16 EDT Re: New Channels in LV? http://www.dslreports.com/forum/remark,17149474 jmirabella : or various other things that can go in those 5 RF channels..]]> http://www.dslreports.com/forum/remark,17149474 Tue, 24 Oct 2006 20:12:49 EDT New Channels in LV? http://www.dslreports.com/forum/remark,17148993 wbertram : I noticed today that RCN has finally pulled the analog carriers from channels 14-18 (The old analog premium channels that they announced back in June that they were droppin).

This leaves 5 rf channels available for:

30 new digital channels, or
10 new HD channels, or
Some combination thereof, or
Additional foreign language channels.]]> http://www.dslreports.com/forum/remark,17148993 Tue, 24 Oct 2006 18:59:18 EDT