 
Matt
Take me down to the paradise city
Premium
join:2003-07-20
Jamestown, NC |  MPEG2 vs MPEG4?
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tsskiller
join:2005-07-24
Bronx, NY | Re: MPEG2 vs MPEG4? The rule of thumb (in my experience) is that MPEG-4 (H.264) is two times as efficient at the same bitrate than MPEG-2. | |
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| | russotto
join:2000-10-05
Collegeville, PA | Re: MPEG2 vs MPEG4? Maybe streaming is not as good, but for file compression I've transcoded MPEG2 (off the air) to MPEG4 for about 4:1 savings. | |
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| cornelius785
join:2006-10-26
Worcester, MA | in terms of mythtv and transcoding to h264, i've read 60% less space. i wouldn't put any money on it though. | |
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rv65
Let's just say I like Dublin Dr Pepper
Premium
join:2008-08-02
San Diego, CA | You could fit about 3 to 5 HD streams on 1 QAM256 channel. | |
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nukscull
@rr.com | Re: MPEG2 vs MPEG4? But they put 3 HD streams on a QAM with MPEG2 now. | |
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rv65
Let's just say I like Dublin Dr Pepper
Premium
join:2008-08-02
San Diego, CA | Re: MPEG2 vs MPEG4? Yes but 3 MPEG-4 HD streams would be of much better quality than the 3 MPEG-2 HD streams. | |
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| | | fiberguy
My views are my own.
Premium
join:2005-05-20
| said by nukscull :
But they put 3 HD streams on a QAM with MPEG2 now.
Not all 'hd' is created equal. There are obviously different resolutions (ie: 480/720/1080) Right now, Comcast, for example, is putting 2 1080i channels along with a single 720p channel. Yes, they are still compressing the signals some, but it's not putting 3 full 1080i channels on the same QAM. | |
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| | | russotto
join:2000-10-05
Collegeville, PA | A single QAM-256 channel should hold two 1080i channels or three 720p channels (using MPEG-2), to be comparable to over-the-air quality. Anything more than that and they're compromising quality big-time. | |
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rv65
Let's just say I like Dublin Dr Pepper
Premium
join:2008-08-02
San Diego, CA
1 edit | TWC is deploying MPEG-4 compatible boxes TWC has already deployed MPEG-4 compatible boxes by Samsung.
Model numbers are SMT-H3090 which is a HD-DVR that supports it. The SMT-H3260 HD-STB and the SMT-H3270 both support MPEG-4 but they haven't been deployed as of now. | |
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Alakar
Facts do not cease to exist when ignored
join:2001-03-23
Milwaukee, WI
 ·AT&T U-Verse
| Improved HD.... Maybe this will get Time Warner in this area to improve their HD quality. Last fall they added several HD channels but didn't drop anything. You could immediately see the drop in HD quality.
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"Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom; it is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves." William Pitt the Younger | |
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| Da Man
join:2008-05-08
Hanover, PA | Re: Improved HD.... AFAIK only HBO sends out a MPEG4 stream so everything will still have to be recompressed so this won't bring us FiOS quality. | |
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| | AJR
join:2009-03-18
Alabaster, AL
| Re: Improved HD.... said by Da Man  :AFAIK only HBO sends out a MPEG4 stream so everything will still have to be recompressed so this won't bring us FiOS quality. That begs the question, how does FIOS have such great quality?
Do they re-compress from MPEG-2 to MPEG-4? Or do they receive special high quality streams to start with? | |
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| | | Da Man
join:2008-05-08
Hanover, PA | Re: Improved HD.... FiOS sends the broadcast usually about 20Mbps MPEG2 unrecompressed. | |
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| | | | AJR
join:2009-03-18
Alabaster, AL
| Re: Improved HD.... said by Da Man :FiOS sends the broadcast usually about 20Mbps MPEG2 unrecompressed. Thanks for the info. | |
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NSA_CIA
@charter.com
| said by Da Man :FiOS sends the broadcast usually about 20Mbps MPEG2 unrecompressed. Wow... there's a big mis-statement.
MPEG2 is a compression scheme, by it's very use data is compressed.
FiOS sends out what they get. Since all of what they get is less than 20 mbps, that means none of what they send out is less than 20 mbps.
See this for a sampling of bitrates in use by FiOS and Comcast:
»www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthre···=1008271 | |
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NSA_CIA
@charter.com
| Re: Improved HD....
Exerpt from FiOS block diagram floating around |
said by NSA_CIA :said by Da Man :FiOS sends the broadcast usually about 20Mbps MPEG2 unrecompressed. Wow... there's a big mis-statement. MPEG2 is a compression scheme, by it's very use data is compressed. FiOS sends out what they get. Since all of what they get is less than 20 mbps, that means none of what they send out is less than 20 mbps. See this for a sampling of bitrates in use by FiOS and Comcast: » www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthre···=1008271 Wow, even my statements came out wrong and I can't edit them...
FiOS doesn't send out 20 mbps bitrates as they don't get any 20 mbps bit rates.
FiOS doesn't do alot of recompression, but they obviously have to do some. Some channels like HBO only broadcast MPEG4 now and since FiOS only broadcasts MPEG2, some transcoding has to be done. They also do some stat muxing... check out the diagram above. | |
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| | | sonicmerlin
join:2009-05-24
Cleveland, OH | Ah the beauty of fiber...virtually unlimited bandwidth.
If I recall the latest record for data transmission over a single fiber cable was set at 25 terabits/sec. | |
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NSA_CIA
@charter.com
| Re: Improved HD.... said by sonicmerlin :Ah the beauty of fiber...virtually unlimited bandwidth. If I recall the latest record for data transmission over a single fiber cable was set at 25 terabits/sec. Which in this case makes no difference.
FiOS is using 1550nm within that fiber to broadcast an 860 Mhz bandwidth RF feed filled with standard 256 QAM 6 Mhz channels transporting MPEG-2 streams. In that 860 MHz there is capacity for about 136 QAM channels. So in terms of video distribution, it's not very different than a run of the mill cable company.
FiOS has more of that bandwidth dedicated to HD channels though because they already forced their customers to abandon analog last year and each analog channel dropped frees up bandwidth for 2-3 HD channels. | |
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Vchat20
Landing is the REAL challenge
join:2003-09-16
Warren, OH
clubs: 
| Couple things... First of all, this is just the release of MPEG4 /CAPABLE/ set-tops. Means the ability is there but the content is not.
Almost all cable companies out there are hurting for bandwidth these days. So it is going to be very difficult for them to run MPEG4 and MPEG2 side by side. It's one or the other. So unless they have 100% MPEG4 capable set-top penetration, it's all gonna stick with MPEG2.
Secondly, the predicted death most likely means the death of MPEG2-only set-tops which anyone can tell you is dead obvious in this day. It costs little to nothing extra to build a box with an MPEG4 chip that is backwards compatible with MPEG2 rather than neutering the box with an MPEG4 only chip. So EVERYONE is going to be building set-tops that can do both for years to come until everyone goes 100% MPEG4 (Will we ever in the next 2 decades?).
Overall, this is old news. Time Warner has been slowly testing and rolling out Samsung equipment to replace Cisco/SA boxes for quite some time now and they have all been MPEG4 capable with embedded Docsis modems (not sure if they are D3. Probably only D2. But that can change) and various other key features including possible whole-home DVR functionality.
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I swear, some people should have pace-makers installed to free up the resources. Breathing and heart beat taxes their whole system, all of their brain cells wasted on life support.-two bit brains, and the second bit is wasted on parity! ~head_spaz | |
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Matt
Take me down to the paradise city
Premium
join:2003-07-20
Jamestown, NC
 ·North State Commun..
| Re: Couple things... said by Vchat20 :Almost all cable companies out there are hurting for bandwidth these days. So it is going to be very difficult for them to run MPEG4 and MPEG2 side by side. It's one or the other. So unless they have 100% MPEG4 capable set-top penetration, it's all gonna stick with MPEG2. They won't have to worry about running it side-by-side, both Comcast and Time Warner have migrated to switched digital video so the streams are sent on-demand to each household. | |
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Supafly
Premium
join:2000-07-15
Elk Grove, CA | Re: Couple things... I agree in principle, but SDV only applies to certain channels. | |
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Matt
Take me down to the paradise city
Premium
join:2003-07-20
Jamestown, NC
·North State Commun..
1 edit | Re: Couple things... said by sansri88 :Comcast has not migrated to SDV. The last we heard they were still testing in two systems, but that's it. That was what, way back in 2007? They seriously haven't migrated yet? Wow. | |
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Vchat20
Landing is the REAL challenge
join:2003-09-16
Warren, OH
clubs:
1 edit | Re: Couple things... Well, you do have the one region in Chicago was it? that has been all digital for some time now. I'm sure they recovered a boatload of bandwidth after tossing out 30, 40, or more analog channels. They probably have room to spare out in those parts without SDV or MPEG4.
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I swear, some people should have pace-makers installed to free up the resources. Breathing and heart beat taxes their whole system, all of their brain cells wasted on life support.-two bit brains, and the second bit is wasted on parity! ~head_spaz | |
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| | jmallory
join:2005-11-02
Clawson, MI
1 edit | said by Matt :said by Vchat20 :Almost all cable companies out there are hurting for bandwidth these days. So it is going to be very difficult for them to run MPEG4 and MPEG2 side by side. It's one or the other. So unless they have 100% MPEG4 capable set-top penetration, it's all gonna stick with MPEG2. They won't have to worry about running it side-by-side, both Comcast and Time Warner have migrated to switched digital video so the streams are sent on-demand to each household. Comcast has stated that they will not be rolling out SDV in any large fashion. Opting instead to remove analog channels to free up the bandwidth.
»Comcast's Billion Dollar Project Nets Big Bandwidth
Additionally, it will be a long time before you see MPEG-4 on cable in any large fashion. Going completely to MPEG-4 will break every Cablecard implementation as TVs can not process the signal. I am not sure if Tivo could support it. About the only device that I know for sure could is Windows Media Center and that will require Windows 7. | |
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cypherstream
Looking forward to the future of things.
Premium,MVM
join:2004-12-02
Reading, PA
clubs:
| Re: Couple things... Right. Axing 40-50 analog channels and reclaiming that bandwidth is much less complicated and costly then rolling out a fancy new SDV implementation.
Comcast has no interest in SDV. It's complicated, convoluted, prone to problems, and doesn't bring as big of bandwidth gains as analog reclamation. Plus they got a little fearful when the FCC hammered TWC for going to SDV in Hawaii and breaking cable card tuners. | |
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nukscull
@rr.com | SDV still has to be MPEG2 to get to the MPEG2 only boxes. So they would still be running MPEG2 and 4 side by side even if the MPEG4 channels were only on SDV. | |
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| Kearnstd
Elf Wizard
Premium
join:2002-01-22
Mullica Hill, NJ
| cable will take a ton of heat when everything above channel 13 needs a box.
but i really really do not get why people bitch and cry when cable goes to requiring a box, when all other pay TV competition requires one on every TV.
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[65 Arcanist]Filan(High Elf) Zone: Broadband Reports | |
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Vchat20
Landing is the REAL challenge
join:2003-09-16
Warren, OH
clubs:
| Re: Couple things... That's what I do not get either. Cable is pretty much shackled by the FCC against going all digital for whatever mindnumbing reasoning they think up. While on the other end Sat and IPTV providers are completely in the clear on such things and are legally allowed to force leasing of proprietary STBs for their service. Cable SHOULD be able to compete on those exact same factors.
God knows the likes of TWC, Charter, Comcast, etal. would be MILES ahead if they were able to go 100% digital.
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I swear, some people should have pace-makers installed to free up the resources. Breathing and heart beat taxes their whole system, all of their brain cells wasted on life support.-two bit brains, and the second bit is wasted on parity! ~head_spaz | |
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| | | Kearnstd
Elf Wizard
Premium
join:2002-01-22
Mullica Hill, NJ
| Re: Couple things... so the FCC can tell them no to digital? didnt think they would have that much control i mean cable is a private system, dont think it was even assisted by any sort of USF like the gimmie the telcos got.
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[65 Arcanist]Filan(High Elf) Zone: Broadband Reports | |
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PaulHikeS2
join:2003-03-06
Merrimack, NH
 ·Comcast
| Re: Couple things... said by Kearnstd :so the FCC can tell them no to digital? didnt think they would have that much control i mean cable is a private system, dont think it was even assisted by any sort of USF like the gimmie the telcos got. My understanding is that the FCC only has say in regards to the transmission of broadcast channels. There are several systems that are all digital with the exception of basic broadcast.
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Jay: What the @#$% is the internet??? | |
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eric87m
join:2003-12-07
Princeton, NJ | mpeg4 on fios I believe the Motorola 7100 and 7216 STBs deployed on FiosTV support MPEG-4. | |
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jmn1207
Premium
join:2000-07-19
Reston, VA
·Verizon FIOS
| Re: mpeg4 on fios said by eric87m :I believe the Motorola 7100 and 7216 STBs deployed on FiosTV support MPEG-4. Still, FiOS only sends MPEG-2, even to those STB's with MPEG-4 capabilities. Which means they currently transcode HBO MPEG-4 to MPEG-2, further increasing the opportunity for quality degradation. | |
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| | ravensfan55
join:2008-06-16
Severna Park, MD | Re: mpeg4 on fios The 6xxx series and 2500 QIP boxes only support MPEG-2, so if Verizon broadcasted HBO in MPEG-4, most FiOS customers would be left in the dark. | |
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jmn1207
Premium
join:2000-07-19
Reston, VA
·Verizon FIOS
| Re: mpeg4 on fios said by ravensfan55 :The 6xxx series and 2500 QIP boxes only support MPEG-2, so if Verizon broadcasted HBO in MPEG-4, most FiOS customers would be left in the dark. Verizon did send me a new STB | |
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Mari
@verizon.net | There are pretty good capabilities in place now to transcode from MPEG-4 to MPEG-2, to the point where you really can't tell the difference between a straight MPEG-2 stream and one that's been transcoded from MPEG-4. | |
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w0g
o.O
join:2001-08-30
Portland, OR
clubs: | ugh Great, so now they'll use this as an excuse to compress everything even more... | |
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rv65
Let's just say I like Dublin Dr Pepper
Premium
join:2008-08-02
San Diego, CA | Re: ugh MPEG-4 at 3 HD per qam should look pretty awesome. Heck, even 4 HD per qam with MPEG-4 would still look much better than most MPEG-2 HD. NBC and ABC are using MPEG-4 which gets converted to MPEG-2 by the station. | |
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nycnetwork
join:2000-11-12
Brooklyn, NY | Re: ugh The problem is that Cable Co's won't send 3-4 HD channels per qam but It'll be at least 6-7. Mark my word, it's gonna look like Dish Network h264 HD LITE.. lol.
I REALLY have a bad feeling about this, but hope that ain't gonna happen | |
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nonissue
| MPEG 4 compresses really well with little to no noticeable loss in quality even if they compress it even more. | |
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castsucks
@sbcglobal.net
| Direct tv is nearing the end of mpeg2 HD Direct tv is nearing the end of mpeg2 HD and has lot of mpeg 4 HD
Sd is still mpeg 2 so cable is likely to keep sd there and make a slow move to mpeg 4 hd but with a lot of head end, cable line, and set top boxes to swap out it will take a long time. | |
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Xela19115
join:2000-10-06
Richboro, PA
·Verizon FIOS
| Motorola DCX set-tops are digital only Motorola DCX series set-tops support MPEG-2 and MPEG-4 in hardware. Whether MPEG-4 is supported in software is upto Comcast and Time Warner since they create and deploy their own guides. Also DCX series is a dgital only set-tops. So if any given system has any analog channel still on lineup I doubt they'll deploy DCX boxes unless there is a digital simulcast.
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xela19115 | |
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Vchat20
Landing is the REAL challenge
join:2003-09-16
Warren, OH
clubs:
| Re: Motorola DCX set-tops are digital only Doing mpeg2 or mpeg4 in software on ANY of these boxes is absolutely impossible. They are running low spec chips that can just barely hold up the IPG let alone any video decoding abilities. Doing it in hardware is the only way to go as it is guaranteed to always work smoothly for video playback which is key for a 'just works' consumer oriented set-top.
Fact is that all the current cableco's are getting in boxes that are MPEG4 capable but they'd have to start deploying them to everyone and replacing older MPEG2 only boxes with them before it can remotely become a viable option.
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I swear, some people should have pace-makers installed to free up the resources. Breathing and heart beat taxes their whole system, all of their brain cells wasted on life support.-two bit brains, and the second bit is wasted on parity! ~head_spaz | |
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radougherty
join:1999-07-23
Austin, TX | What about cable ready hardware | |
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See 7 replies to this post |
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SDVChap
@comcast.com
| SDV and VOD It is true that SDV is troublesome and its system-wide deployment is questionable. However its distant cousin, VOD, can benefit from MPEG4 so an arrangement is possible where broadcast/multicast (i.e. SDV or IPTV) programs are encoded with MPEG2, and VOD assets are encoded with MPEG4. In such case the consumer device (TV or box) needs to support both. The importance of non-linear watching VOD is increasing so saving bandwidth on the VOD dedicated channels would be useful.
The problem with all technology companies is legacy deployed systems and how expensive it is to support them or replace them. | |
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travisc
join:2001-11-09
Port Perry, ON | Embedded DOCSIS 2.0 modems That's what the spec sheets say... And the DCX box has been deployed in the wild for several months now by Kincardine Cable in Canada. | |
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OSUGoose
join:2007-12-27
Columbus, OH
clubs: | embed modem The current boxes have embeded modems, but no carrier ever utalized them, so i doubt they will now | |
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rv65
Let's just say I like Dublin Dr Pepper
Premium
join:2008-08-02
San Diego, CA | Re: embed modem They use them for OOB. | |
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travisc
join:2001-11-09
Port Perry, ON | Re: embed modem Who does? The modems are not used for OOB by anyone I know of.. There's a different OOB carrier used. | |
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rv65
Let's just say I like Dublin Dr Pepper
Premium
join:2008-08-02
San Diego, CA | Re: embed modem In the US we have a standard called OCAP aka tru2way and it requires DOCSIS for OOB since it's a universal standard. DSG can be used for OOB. | |
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tmc8080
join:2004-04-24
Floral Park, NY
| Meanwhile... Back at the telco ranch, FTTP and FTTN keep growing, and growing by leaps and bounds. A small pissing contest between Verizon and Cablevision over the fastest upload & download speeds breaks out.
Time Warner and Comcast putz around with Mpeg4 transition, while satellite and the rest of the industry is been there, done that. Who would keep their foot in mpeg-2 forever, it's an obsolete encoding standard. Yes, transition equipment will be backwards/forwards compatible in lieu of turning segments of systems on in the upgrade path especially with a company's marketshare as vast as Comcasts (30% of all cable-tv households, satellite included). | |
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n2jtx
join:2001-01-13
Glen Head, NY
·Optimum Online
| Cable Ready Of course, no sooner have we been able to get TV's that can receive ClearQAM and we will suddenly be in a position for needing a box that can receive MPEG-4 because MPEG-2 is all the TV"s can decode. Plus, OTA DTV is using MPEG-2. I have a feeling it will only be a few short years before ATSC converts to MPEG-4 and we need to again get converter boxes to support broadcast TV.
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I support the right to keep and arm bears. | |
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hbo kid
@verizon.net | mpeg4 settops the cable co's don't have to replace all settops with mpeg4 boxes before they begin transition. They can swap all prem. ch. customers to mpeg4 boxes and then switch the hbo, etc. prem. channels to mpeg4. | |
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| Ulmo
join:2005-09-22
San Jose, CA
·Comcast
·SONIC.NET
| Re: mpeg4 settops said by hbo kid :
the cable co's don't have to replace all settops with mpeg4 boxes before they begin transition. They can swap all prem. ch. customers to mpeg4 boxes and then switch the hbo, etc. prem. channels to mpeg4. Right. This would still go slowly, but they can definately do this. For instance, they will have a new channel on each channel group, such as one HBO, one Cinemax, one Starz, etc., which would be an MPEG-4 only channel. During this process, they would probably eliminate some other MPEG-2 channels in the same group.
Some specialty channels like international channels with small numbers of subscribers would be incrementally pushed onto MPEG-4 with some amount of box swapping going on there.
By that time, it will be about 2011, and they could look into the numbers again.
It is true that Comcast will do this much slower than others.
I'm curious when ATSC will have it. | |
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Cable Begins To Embrace MPEG-4
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