HD Picture Quality

I guess I will just have to live with the poor HD picture on my 58 inch plasma. Its probably to big for Dish's Downrezzing
On their good HD channels, Dish looks great on my 65". That's not on every channel they send, mind you. For example, TNT-HD is pretty much a joke for the few times I've tuned in to it. However, my locals look great in HD. Realize that they're not always broadcasting HD though. Outside of primetime, it's hit or miss. Watching the news, the studio shots look great, but you can tell when they have the street interviews and human interest stories that they're not using high resolution cameras.
 
I know people who demand 1080p in 46" sets that they will be watching from 10'.
I was just the opposite. I tried to demand 720p for the 65" set I just bought, but couldn't find anything like that. They were all 1080p. So that's what I ended up with. I sit 13-14 feet back and knew 1080p would be a waste of money, but couldn't find anything in the 65" size range currently for sale that wasn't 1080p.
 
As i stated before the settings are correct all of them are.

I guess Dish HD just sucks

I wouldn't go that far. Sometimes I think Starz's looks pretty good so I think the Mpeg4 encoders can deliver an excellent picture at this bitrate. A lot of the new HD channels content is upconverted and stretched. I don't think I'v seen real HD on the history channel yet, animal planet meerkat manor and corwin's quest look pretty good but most others shows are upconverted.

TNTHD, HDNET, HDNMV, ESPHD, DSCHD, HBOHD, SHOHD, HDPPV are still Mpeg2 at 4 channel's per transponder so their pretty bad, ShowTime's Dexter and Weeds used to look excellent at previous 3 channel's per transponder same with DiscoveryHD Theater Sunrise Earth. These channels should show a big improvement when their switched to Mpeg4 later.

Dish Mpeg4_______6.604Mb/s (-6.0%)
Nominal__________7.000Mb/s ( 0.0%)
DirecTV Mpeg4____7.679Mb/s (+9.7%)
HBO Mpeg4 feed
with 1Mb/s
overhead_________8.000Mb/s

Zitter also said HBO intends to transmit its MPEG-4 video at 8 Mbps. When asked how HBO arrived at that rate, Zitter said it was a subjective decision, based on what looked good, with some added overhead for transcoding.
 
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if i can get pictures of what im seeing i will, but i dont know how.

what do i use?



Also is there anything in the works for new or more satellites to improve bandwith or open more transporters?

that would alow for NO downrezzing of HD channels?
 
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On their good HD channels, Dish looks great on my 65". That's not on every channel they send, mind you. For example, TNT-HD is pretty much a joke for the few times I've tuned in to it. However, my locals look great in HD. Realize that they're not always broadcasting HD though. Outside of primetime, it's hit or miss. Watching the news, the studio shots look great, but you can tell when they have the street interviews and human interest stories that they're not using high resolution cameras.

Right now, I think HBO, Showtime, and the HDNets look the worst by far. HBO and HDNet especially - it looks like there is always a gloomy hazy over the picture. If you stand next to your display you can see all the compression artifacts jumping around on the screen.

ESPN always looks great to me.
 
I was looking at various HD channels through out the day and all of a sudden a lot of the channels look better. NBC Nightly News looked really good and so did HDN, food HD, HGTV HD, so please explain to me why all of a sudden the HD channels look better. I didnt do anything to the adjustment on my tv, dish VIP211, satellite, or switch wires or inputs.
??
Can channels look better at certain times and certian days??



Oh ya why is it that jeopardy and wheel of fortune are never in HD even though it says they are, there are the black bars on each side when i watch the HD channel?
 
Your local station has to have the equipment to receive Jeopardy and Wheel in HD before they they can retransmit it to you in HD. So you need to talk to your local station about upgrading their equipment.
 
Your local station has to have the equipment to receive Jeopardy and Wheel in HD before they they can retransmit it to you in HD. So you need to talk to your local station about upgrading their equipment.

If they broadcast the prime time programming in HD, wouldn't they also be able to do Jeopardy and Wheel??? I know our local CBS does most of their prime time line up in HD, but Wheel and Jeopardy are in SD.

Just wondering,
Geoff
 
No they just pass the hd signal through from the network. Jeopardy and Wheel are syndicated. They have to be recorded, stored and played back later. Our local station made these upgrades at the beginning of the last season when Jeopardy and Wheel first went HD, and at the same time made the upgrades so they can overlay the weather graphics and warnings onto the HD feed and not have to drop it to sd during tornado season in Oklahoma.
 
That sounds like a cabling issue to me. When a cable or a connector has a flaky connection, then it can be degraded at times and crisp & clear at others. This can be due to the cable not being seated properly into the connector, perhaps one pin in the connector is a little loose, the grounding might not be soldered or connected properly, etc.
 
Your local station has to have the equipment to receive Jeopardy and Wheel in HD before they they can retransmit it to you in HD. So you need to talk to your local station about upgrading their equipment.

I used to get Jeopardy and wheel in HD with Comcast most of the time.
 
That sounds like a cabling issue to me. When a cable or a connector has a flaky connection, then it can be degraded at times and crisp & clear at others. This can be due to the cable not being seated properly into the connector, perhaps one pin in the connector is a little loose, the grounding might not be soldered or connected properly, etc.


Is this someting the tech can find?
I also had called dish about this and they said they would mark this on my account and check things out on there end to, so is it possible they could have done something on there end for me with the signal?

by the way the HD still looks good today. People that are calling me Dish hatter and troll are a**holes and dont give me a chance to explain my self. I had a real problem with my Dish HD. I like DISH way better the Comcast.

I install home theaters for a side business and know quite abit about settings and connections. So I knew all of those we set right on all my equipment.

But thanks very much for the help to the people that actually tried to help me:)
 
...
Dish Mpeg4_______6.604Mb/s (-6.0%)
Nominal__________7.000Mb/s ( 0.0%)
DirecTV Mpeg4____7.679Mb/s (+9.7%)
HBO Mpeg4 feed
with 1Mb/s
overhead_________8.000Mb/s
...

Very interesting info. I'm currently on TWC cable, and torturing over a switch to D* or E*, comparing all the pros and cons of each, and I have slowly come to the realization that bitrate, not resolution, is the dominant factor in PQ.

I'm curious about how these bitrates were derived. Do you know if they represent an instantaneous snapshot, or an averaged value? Were they calculated using some measurement equipment, or by extrapolation?

Also, with all the recent HD channel activations at Direct TV, and the apparent improved satisfaction with PQ, the timing of data collection could make a difference. Do you know when the data were captured?
 
Is this someting the tech can find?
It might help if you suggest it to him as a possibility.

I have an SD DVR that is connected by S-Video cable (in addition to my HD DVR). Whenever someone walks past the TV (or perhaps even on the same floorboard or joist), it was just enough vibration to shake the connection a little, and the picture would go black-and-white. I finally replaced the S-Video cable with one with a slightly different style connector and it no longer happens.

You could have a similar situation with your Component cable, or with the cables between the dish and the DVR. If you search the Dish Technical Forum here (or the DirecTV ones), you'fl find threads going back years of people changing a cable and having their problems go away - so it's a possibility (but not a certainty either).
 
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