So is it HD-lite or not?

[vurbano]

Yeah, when Starz showing HD it almost looks like a Blu-ray. I flipped to the The Wild and you could see every little 3D animated hair on the animals.

One of the memories I have of Voom was watching The HULK on StarzHD. This feeling reminds me a lot of that. Finally I am getting the PQ that I bought my set for. Things are really looking up. I dont think Ill have to watch HDlite for a long time. ANd if D* starts downrezzing in a couple of years my contract will be over and I can move right to FIOS who will probably have a better DVR by then.

 

[Ricknau]

I guess I've just been in the dark. I didn't know these were turned on in HD.

Pity the folks who don't frequent any forums.

HOW FUNNY!!! RFLMAO!!!

My, you're easily amused!

Finally I am getting the PQ that I bought my set for. Things are really looking up.

Vurbano, I've been a closet fan of yours for some time. You don't mince words. If you're liking it I know I will too.

 

[ONUOsFan]

But I'm still curious as to when the turn on day was.

You didn't miss much... they just came on Wednesday morning.

 

[mkottman]

One of the memories I have of Voom was watching The HULK on StarzHD. This feeling reminds me a lot of that. Finally I am getting the PQ that I bought my set for. Things are really looking up. I dont think Ill have to watch HDlite for a long time. ANd if D* starts downrezzing in a couple of years my contract will be over and I can moove right to FIOS who will probably have a better DVR by then.

I too would never have thought that I would be comparing the looks of D*with that of Voom. It's finally payback time for having to choose one of the two evils and having to deal with HD-Lite for 3 years.

Whats funny is I hired some help to fix the reception of the newly enabled D* channels, and they were really working on me to switch to E*. I explained to them that E* was not the thing to do at this point. They were clueless.

 

[Matt9876]

FYI: The Weather Channel people are building a new studio just for HD broadcasting.

It's gonna get better !

Matt

 

[paulman182]

Uh, no, TWC doesn't have an HD channel, the are picking up the normal channel that we all watch and upconverting it to HD. Can't you read ?????? So dish picks up speed right now or Lifetime and upconverts it and send it accross, instant HD, WRONG !!!!

The HD graphics look great and even the upconverted SD looks a lot better than the regular SD channel.

Tune it in yourself and see...oh, you don't get it!

Maybe Charlie will add it someday if it doesn't cost too much!

 

[Ronnie-]

The HD graphics look great and even the upconverted SD looks a lot better than the regular SD channel.

Tune it in yourself and see...oh, you don't get it!

Maybe Charlie will add it someday if it doesn't cost too much!

Exactly, ALL of the new graphics pages are in HD, and the rest is upconvert, which looks worlds better.
I love how people that havent seen it bash.

 

[gadgtfreek]

Many just like to complain, no way around it.

 

[Ronnie-]

Many just like to complain, no way around it.

True, and ive yet to figure out what some channels showing part time upconvert has to do with what most people call HD-lite

 

[rplenty]

CNN Studios

Actually the whole New York studio operation is HD including five+ large studios and their many cameras and many large control rooms. Even the Headline News shows that originate in New York are HD but down resed since HN is still SD. I am told there will be much more HD in the future as they ramp up.

 

[ehren]

Shame on Dish for being the HD-Lite leader now. They could have stayed at 1920x1080 with 19.2 bitrates but they stooped to Directv's low. Now Directv is back on top and Dish has to scramble now.

 

[Chris_R]

Shame on Dish for being the HD-Lite leader now. They could have stayed at 1920x1080 with 19.2 bitrates but they stooped to Directv's low. Now Directv is back on top and Dish has to scramble now.

Scott was going to do a side-by-side comparison of the HD channels on D* vs E* but I haven't seen a report from him yet. I just recently signed on to D* myself in addition to Dish for "the best of both worlds" and strictly from a viewing perspective, DirecTV's new channels are a tad sharper than those on Dish, which are a bit softer & in some cases lacking in detail. Wish I had all the hobbiest equipment to tell what bitrate each service is using, but I'm sure we can all pretty much make an educated guess at that one.

 

[Kevinw]

Did we ever find out if Direct is still doing HD Lite?

 

[rad]

Did we ever find out if Direct is still doing HD Lite?

Months ago Scotts sources said no, I haven't seen anything since they saying differently. AFAIK nobody yet been able to "hack" into the stream to see what actually is going on. Many folks here and other sites say the picture looks great so if it looks good I'd say don't worry about it.

 

[Kevinw]

I wonder why Direct does not use it in a sales pitch. " Not only 100 channels but full resolution too"

 

[Indiana627]

Most people probably don't know what HD Lite is, so why would D* advertise that their HD isn't Lite? Just needlessly opens a can of worms IMHO.

 

[richiephx]

I wonder why Direct does not use it in a sales pitch. " Not only 100 channels but full resolution too"

All that matters is that what you are seeing looks good to you. Other than speculation, it has not been established what resolution or bitrate D* is actually sending. It is also known that a higher bitrate creates a better picture regardless of resolution. So, if D* is in fact using a resolution less than 1920x1080i, who cares because the average viewer can't tell the difference anyway.

 

[agregjones]

All that matters is that what you are seeing looks good to you. Other than speculation, it has not been established what resolution or bitrate D* is actually sending. It is also known that a higher bitrate creates a better picture regardless of resolution. So, if D* is in fact using a resolution less than 1920x1080i, who cares because the average viewer can't tell the difference anyway.

Wrong about higher bitrate meaning better resolution. This would mean that MPEG4 was always inferior to MPEG2. The real answer is the amount of picture information available after the image is decoded. This is why it is much more difficult to get a handle on the "quality" of the new MPEG4 feeds numerically. Also, keep in mind that once all the picture information is present, getting more data will increase the bitrate but not the picture quality.

The only way to numerically express the quality would be to take the decoded picture from upstream versus the decoded picture after being processed at our receiver. I am not aware of any hardware that makes this a possibility.

For now, appreciate the fact that the picture is considerably better.

 

[Ronnie-]

Wrong about higher bitrate meaning better resolution. This would mean that MPEG4 was always inferior to MPEG2. The real answer is the amount of picture information available after the image is decoded. This is why it is much more difficult to get a handle on the "quality" of the new MPEG4 feeds numerically. Also, keep in mind that once all the picture information is present, getting more data will increase the bitrate but not the picture quality.

The only way to numerically express the quality would be to take the decoded picture from upstream versus the decoded picture after being processed at our receiver. I am not aware of any hardware that makes this a possibility.

For now, appreciate the fact that the picture is considerably better.

I think what he meant was, a higher bit rate (when comparing the same codec) will produce a better picture than a lower one if the resolution is pretty close ( a slightly reduced rez wont make much if any difference).

 

[goaliebob99]

There are ways of telling if a stream is in hd lite or not with the right equipment and mods.. as of today the mpeg4 channels are not..... and the mpeg 2 channels are.