Dish Network HD Picture Quality?

[DS0816]

I'm a DirecTV subscriber. And I'm considering bringing that to an end because it is too behind on national non-premiums such as: AMC, E!, Oprah Winfrey Network, BBC America, Turner Classic Movies, Headline News, Sportsman Channel, Outdoor Channel, Investigation Discovery, Lifetime Movie Network, HSN, QVC, History International, DIY Network, Cooking Channel, Fuse, We TV, Oxygen, Ovation, Reelz Channel, Style Network, etc.

I know Dish Network has a good 20 (round number) of non-premiums in HD that are only on DirecTV in SD. AMC is, no doubt, DirecTV's biggest blunder. And I think the problem is with the people in the important positions at DirecTV. That's where to lay the blame.

I would like ask the following with Dish Network subscribers: Is the picture quality good enough with high definition for your locals and nationals? (Or do you find major problems?)

Thank you!

 

[KAB]

You do realize, such a question opens up a can of worms! You will undoubtedly get D* crossovers claiming theirs is best, and vice-versa. So, when the dust clears, rest assured the PQ is just fine on either.

 

[SaltiDawg]

You do realize, such a question opens up a can of worms! You will undoubtedly get D* crossovers claiming theirs is best, and vice-versa. So, when the dust clears, rest assured the PQ is just fine on either.

I have an excellent quality TV (Pioneer Elite 60" Kuro) and I am hard pressed to see any difference between OTA locals and locals from Sat.

 

[NotMe546]

You do realize, such a question opens up a can of worms! You will undoubtedly get D* crossovers claiming theirs is best, and vice-versa. So, when the dust clears, rest assured the PQ is just fine on either.

And the equipment is so much better. Never mind the basic functions work, something d* keeps forgetting about.

 

[myron243]

Not having seen D* HD I can't comment on that comparison. But I can't imagine there being that much difference in spite of what some of the die-hards will tell you. On our Mits 82 and 60 DLPs and the Panny 50 plasma the quality is very, very close to Blu-ray. Especially when I use my Onkyo TX-NR609 to punch it up to 1080p on the 82. But then my eyes are 73 yrs old and have had cataracts removed so they probably aren't as good as the eyes of the folks who swear D* is better because...

 

[lparsons21]

I would like ask the following with Dish Network subscribers: Is the picture quality good enough with high definition for your locals and nationals? (Or do you find major problems?)

Thank you!

I've had both service, and at one time had both at the same time. Yes, there is a difference between D* and E* in HD picture, but the difference is slight and not very noticeable to many, including me. Currently looking at both my satellite channels in HD and my locals over the air in HD, the OTA is a little better.

But when all the dust settles, the picture is more than good enough and after a day or two you won't even notice that there was a difference.

 

[Teehar]

Beauty is in the eyes of the beholder...Dish HD is awesome!

 

[mdram]

having switch the other way
i didnt see much difference between the 2 services for nationals
cant comment on locals dish dint have mine

you need to pick the provider that best serves you

 

[JohnL]

I still have both and I will say that the DirecTV HD channels are slightly sharper, but I will see some macroblocking and artifacting once in a while. Dish hardly ever has artifacting but their PQ is slightly softer.

Dish does have a number of HD channels DirecTV doesn't the biggest reason for me to get DirecTV as well as Dish is because Dish does NOT have any RSN's for New York subscribers.

In the end it comes down to what trade-offs you are willing to accept.

John

 

[mdavej]

Former D* sub here who, like you are considering, left for more non-premium HD content. Like most have already said, I see practically no difference and no compression artifacts on my 60" screen. Dish HD PQ is excellent. Because of the lower horizontal resolution, I was expecting the worst. But to my surprise, I could see almost no difference. And a nice bonus was, at least on the eastern arc, Dish SD PQ is significantly better than D*. I do miss MRV, but that should be coming soon enough.

 

[Tampa8]

I don't understand why that question gets asked. No, it's a horrible picture, worst in the known world. All of us just put up with it, we don't want a better picture somewhere else and just stay with Dish.

 

[mdavej]

It does seem ridiculous, but many posts in the DirecTV forums actually say that kind of thing. Countless D* subs have endured D*'s abysmal HD line-up for years because of the false notion that Dish PQ is horrible. So if you believe the rhetoric and don't use common sense, then the question will get asked. Even though my head said Dish PQ can't be as bad as they say, I was genuinely worried that Dish subs simply put up with horrible PQ because they didn't know any better or didn't care, like cable subs. Of course when I finally saw it with my own eyes, I could see that all the vitriol in the D* forums is not based in reality.

 

[lobosrul]

Hmm, I for one find E*'s HD PQ to be quite soft, and blocky during fast motion, in fact I was disappointed the moment the installer flipped it on. News/talking head programs and documentaries without much motion look pretty good, but sports can be awful (some of that is due to the channel itself I'm sure). Flipping between locals OTA and sat reveals a HUGE difference in PQ. E* is cramming 8 or even 9 HD channels sometimes per 40Mbps transponder, even with MPEG-4 thats just not even close to a high enough bitrate for 1080i. Also, SD is completely unwatchable to me.

If your watching on a 42" or smaller TV at 10 feet or more, you'll probably never know the difference. Before anyone asks i'm connected via HDMI, and everything is for sure setup correct.y

I've seen D*, but not on my TV, and can say the pic quality seemed better on some channels, and about the same on others.

Why do I stick with Dish? Channel lineup is far better than D* and I'll never ever ever go back to Comcast (long story).

I don't understand why E* doesn't start using their capacity on Echostar 14?? Don't they have something like 20 Conus beams on it? They would easily be able to have their national HD channels at 4 per TP, making their pic quality far superior to D*, and then they can run an advertising campaign showing how much better their pic quality is. I guess there just aren't enough people who care about such things.

 

[whatchel1]

Hmm, I for one find E*'s HD PQ to be quite soft, and blocky during fast motion, in fact I was disappointed the moment the installer flipped it on. News/talking head programs and documentaries without much motion look pretty good, but sports can be awful (some of that is due to the channel itself I'm sure). Flipping between locals OTA and sat reveals a HUGE difference in PQ. E* is cramming 8 or even 9 HD channels sometimes per 40Mbps transponder, even with MPEG-4 thats just not even close to a high enough bitrate for 1080i. Also, SD is completely unwatchable to me.

If your watching on a 42" or smaller TV at 10 feet or more, you'll probably never know the difference. Before anyone asks i'm connected via HDMI, and everything is for sure setup correct.y

I've seen D*, but not on my TV, and can say the pic quality seemed better on some channels, and about the same on others.

Why do I stick with Dish? Channel lineup is far better than D* and I'll never ever ever go back to Comcast (long story).

I don't understand why E* doesn't start using their capacity on Echostar 14?? Don't they have something like 20 Conus beams on it? They would easily be able to have their national HD channels at 4 per TP, making their pic quality far superior to D*, and then they can run an advertising campaign showing how much better their pic quality is. I guess there just aren't enough people who care about such things.

Sounds allot like you've never switched the resolution from 480 to 1080 to me. Menu 6-8 and what does it say on TV type.

 

[lobosrul]

Sounds allot like you've never switched the resolution from 480 to 1080 to me. Menu 6-8 and what does it say on TV type.

1080i, I've also tried 720p. Like I said, as long as its a pretty static video, ie the Daily Show on Comedy Central, the picture is adequate; something like a basketball game on TNT, and it sucks IMO.

Everything is relative I guess, I've had people show off their new HD TV's and comment on how awesome it looks, when its obviously a stretched out SD channel.

 

[whatchel1]

1080i, I've also tried 720p. Like I said, as long as its a pretty static video, ie the Daily Show on Comedy Central, the picture is adequate; something like a basketball game on TNT, and it sucks IMO.

Everything is relative I guess, I've had people show off their new HD TV's and comment on how awesome it looks, when its obviously a stretched out SD channel.

Then something isn't right somewhere as many have said here that there is little difference between the two. Do you have other sources going thru the TV?

 

[lobosrul]

Then something isn't right somewhere as many have said here that there is little difference between the two. Do you have other sources going thru the TV?

I have a bluray player connected the same exact way: HDMI from the box straight to the TV, and SPDIF audio to my 5.1 receiver (its too old for HDMI in). Bluray picture blows E* away, but that's to be expected.

Also I had Comcast before E* and the pic quality was a good deal better. Before anyone flames me, please realize that cable video quality varies greatly across the nation. I saw what comcast HD looked like at a friends house in Olympia, WA and the video quality was absolutely abysmally bad.

 

[whatchel1]

I have a bluray player connected the same exact way: HDMI from the box straight to the TV, and SPDIF audio to my 5.1 receiver (its too old for HDMI in). Bluray picture blows E* away, but that's to be expected.

Also I had Comcast before E* and the pic quality was a good deal better. Before anyone flames me, please realize that cable video quality varies greatly across the nation. I saw what comcast HD looked like at a friends house in Olympia, WA and the video quality was absolutely abysmally bad.

I just wonder if there is something wrong w/ your box. As PQ for E* isn't bad like you describe.

 

[lobosrul]

I just wonder if there is something wrong w/ your box. As PQ for E* isn't bad like you describe.

Hehe, I actually have two boxes, second one in my bedroom. Different model TV but PQ is comparable. I've also seen E* in several friends, and families houses. Hell I generally recommend it to anyone complaining of high cable prices.

Look, dish is sending out around a 5mbps signal in MPEG-4/AVC on their HD channels. They're "stat muxed" on each TP so the bitrate varies quite a bit when needed but thats just not enough for really pristine looking 1080i video. Everything gets a kind of soft, smeared look to it by my eyes. By way of comparison, a Bluray is capable of 40mbps and most discs average in the high 20's. I've also played around with video encoding (x264 which is a software encoder and better than any realtime encoder), so I do know a bit of what I'm talking about.

Also for the local channels (except FOX) on E* (D* as well), your getting a THIRD generation encode. The network is encoding a high bitrate MPEG-4 stream and sending it to their affiliates, who then take that and encode it to MPEG-2, sometimes pretty low quality due to their sub channel broadcats, THEN dish takes that stream and re-encodes it to low bitrate MPEG-4.

 

[SaltiDawg]

I just wonder if there is something wrong w/ your box. As PQ for E* isn't bad like you describe.

I have a 60" Pioneer Elite (PRO-150FD) plasma panel that I had ISF Calibrated - I have often had guests over and remark about the picture quality. I have only once or twice had a guest that could consistently tell the difference between OTA and Sat originated picture quality... and in those few cases that the difference could consistently be seen, at least one pair of guests thought the quality of the sat signal was the better.

I really can not make any kind of comparison between D* and E*, but the gentleman that suggests that you'd need to view the Dish signal on less than a 42" panel at ten feet or more has some kind of "issue" with his gear that he seemingly needs to address.