Dish messing with Voom, All are now HD-Lite 1280x1080i: Discuss this issue HERE!

**BFG** · 12-17-2005 12:16 AM

Another interesting thing is if the 129 voom is suppossed to be an exact mirror of 61.5 how come the TP placement for the 5 new channels still not match that of 61.5

**Barry Erick** · 12-17-2005 09:56 AM

Originally Posted by Gary Murrell

I got a little comparison for your naysayers about 1280x1080i being ok
5 months ago I recorded one of my All Time favorite movies from MonstersHD "The Wicker Man"
This recording was 1920x1080i with 17 Mbps video
Just this evening I recorded a sample of "The Wicker Man", of course after these changes MonstersHD is now: 1280x1080i with 14.5 Mbps video
both frames from each recording were captured full resolution, I them zoomed in 200% on a specific area of the picture to show the difference, here is a picture of the entire frame for reference:

Here are the comaprison shots of each portion of the respective frames, see if you see a difference

this is comapring 1280x1080 to True 1920x1080i, the difference is not slight and is even worse on non-Movie material
-Gary

I assume you recorded 1 frame (2 fields), since this is "i"? If one field, then the pixs are not showing what the eye averages and why "i" works for the human eye.

**rad** · 12-17-2005 10:44 AM

The question I have is if you had to zoom an area x200 to show the difference, how many people wouldn't be able to see the differance sitting 10 to 15 feet from their TV?

**riffjim4069** · 12-17-2005 12:47 PM

I believe most HD enthusiasts will immediately see the lack of picture detail and depth when presented with HD-Lite. To me, it's most noticable when I am watching a live sporting event (oh say, a basketball game) and can clearly make out of the facial expressions of the fans in the background - that's picture clarity...that image depth...that's the WOW factor that will suck you right into the game!

**Gary Murrell** · 12-17-2005 04:28 PM

Yep basically HD-Lite is stripping away all the Wow factor of HD, leaving you with a decent looking image with no punch or detail

anyone who has seen D-Theater D-VHS would not have anything to say but negative comments about HD-Lite

-Gary

**rad** · 12-17-2005 04:39 PM

I only mentioned this because in the 1/06 issue of Sound & Vision there's a story on page 26 about progressive vs. interlaced signals. Now the story is talking about differences between 720p and 1080i but what caught my eye was that he says studies have been done by the BBC to see how much the human eye can actually see.

For example, it says that the BBC study said that using a 50 inch diagonal screen and 9 feet a 720p signal provides all the resolution that the human eye can see.

So I'm wondering why if that's the reason that some folks say that their PQ is fine while others are saying it's garbage

**JH1949** · 12-17-2005 05:00 PM

Originally Posted by rad

So I'm wondering why if that's the reason that some folks say that their PQ is fine while others are saying it's garbage

Can you see a difference on your TV between Voom versus HD Demo channel ?

If you cannot, then you are not seeing what some of the rest of us are seeing.

**riffjim4069** · 12-17-2005 06:11 PM

Originally Posted by rad

For example, it says that the BBC study said that using a 50 inch diagonal screen and 9 feet a 720p signal provides all the resolution that the human eye can see. So I'm wondering why if that's the reason that some folks say that their PQ is fine while others are saying it's garbage

It has been said that Ted Williams could detect which way the stitches were spinning on a baseball. His keen eyes and attention to detail were a major reason for his prolific hitting ability. I've also witnessed people who cannot pick-up the flight of a baseball until it smacks them right between the eyes. I would like to think of myself as more of a Ted Williams type when it comes to HDTV.

I guess it all depends on how the BBC study defines the "human eye" in conjunction with how well the "human brain" interprets this information. If this is the same study I read a while back (in another publication), it seemed to have focused more on the eyes ability to resolve images and less on how the brain processes movement and image depth.

I'm sorry, but I'll trust in what I see and in what I don't see.

**MikeD-C05** · 12-17-2005 07:09 PM

Originally Posted by rad

I only mentioned this because in the 1/06 issue of Sound & Vision there's a story on page 26 about progressive vs. interlaced signals. Now the story is talking about differences between 720p and 1080i but what caught my eye was that he says studies have been done by the BBC to see how much the human eye can actually see.
For example, it says that the BBC study said that using a 50 inch diagonal screen and 9 feet a 720p signal provides all the resolution that the human eye can see.
So I'm wondering why if that's the reason that some folks say that their PQ is fine while others are saying it's garbage

Yes, I posted this same information on the Dbstalk website about this article. It said that you get 60 frames per second with 720p vs 30 frames per second on 1080i. It went on to say that , depending on how far you sit from the tv , the human eye can't really tell the detail with interlaced 1080i vs 720p. And that all the hype about 1080 progressive is just that. The article went on to say that people with upscale , expensive state of the art hdtvs will appreciate the picture in 1080p , but to the average guy with an hdtv , the regular picture in either 720p or 1080i will do just fine.

My point when I posted this same article information was; that the set top receiver will upscale the signal to 1080i anyway if you have your sat receiver set to it. Maybe Dish is going to have all the hd in 720p and let the set top receiver do the upscaling , and are hoping that most people will not notice the difference .

Untill Gary informed us of the change on the Voom channels, nobody really noticed the change. Untill we all emailed Dish and they started to screw with the picture to "fix" it . Then all hell broke loose. I appreciate that Gary has kept up with the bitrate , picture quality that he has on the hd channels , but to most people I don't think anyone will notice if the picture is in 720p upscaled to 1080i over their set top sat receiver. As long as it looks good to the average person. Remember 720p is better than Hd Lite that they are using on the Voom channels presently and the hd lite that Directv is using on all of their hd channels, and is still an hd standard.

**rdinkel** · 12-17-2005 08:59 PM

Originally Posted by MikeD-C05

I appreciate that Gary has kept up with the bitrate , picture quality that he has on the hd channels , but to most people I don't think anyone will notice if the picture is in 720p upscaled to 1080i over their set top sat receiver. As long as it looks good to the average person. Remember 720p is better than Hd Lite that they are using on the Voom channels presently and the hd lite that Directv is using on all of their hd channels, and is still an hd standard.

Does the issue become going from 1080i to 720p and back again. My experience has been that anytime a conversion is made, quality is reduced to some extent. So to make the conversion twice (unless on the same exact digital processor that "knows" what was changed at the bit level) compounds the quality issue. The errors will increase. Perhaps for those folks with 720p native HDTVs there is not a problem, since potentially there is only a single conversion if they leave the set top box set for 720p output. But for those of us with 1080i or 1080p sets, it is a problem.