HD vs. HDlite

[klen]

Maybe it's just me, but I think some people here are just WAY too uptight about HD vs. HDlite. Is there a difference? Sure. Is it a huge difference? Not really. Still looks damn good to me. I would rather have more HDlite channels (variety) than
a few pure HD channels showing lame movies or close ups of grasshoppers screwing.

Is it worth getting all of the fuss that some people are making of it? To me, no. To other people, definitely. And to those people, I say, get over it. You watch too much TV. Get out of the house. Spend time with your wife and kids. Enjoy life.

Flame away.............

 

[T2k]

There's a huge difference, yes.

If it still looks damn good to you, compare it to your OTA HD.
And if it still looks damn good to you, you need medical help, we cannot help you here.

 

[tdillon]

If you can't see the difference, then maybe your set isn't really HD.

My original set displays 1388 x 768. On this set it is obvious when HD content is 1920 x 1080 vs 1280 x1080.

My new set is now 1920 x 1080p NATIVE.

There is no question that 1280 x 1080i looks like crap on this newer tv. I have saved some really good Discovery HD programs on my DVR in 1920 x 1080i, so I can compare the quality back to those recordings when I need to see the difference between 1280 and 1920 horizontal resolution.

 

[drummerguy]

For a while I didn't really see all that much of a difference, either, and didn't really care all that much. But then, just last night, I watched Filmscapes on Equator, and there were shots of soaring through clouds -- and it looked like utter crap. The edges of the clouds were highly pixelated. Call it my big wakeup call on how lousy this HDLite stuff is.
BTW, this is my first post here (after a couple months of lurking), so a big hello to everyone from Indianapolis!

 

[gutter]

Wow. I'll say there is a difference Like night and day. try looking at something you recorded in HD at full1920 X 1880I and then look at the same show now on VOOM. I have and it is like looking thru a cheese cloth the detail is so lost. I would say that you may need to get your set calibrated if you can't see the difference.

 

[gutter]

BTW, this is my first post here (after a couple months of lurking), so a big hello to everyone from Indianapolis!

I am sure we all welcome you and congraduations for great eyesight. I hope you write DISH as well. We need all the pressure we can get.

 

[klen]

If you can't see the difference, then maybe your set isn't really HD.

Damn! You got me there. I just took a good look at my TV. I never realized it, but MY TV ISN'T HD!
As a matter of fact, it is about 35 years old, and black and white. I just got done testing some of the tubes for it at my local Walgreens.
The guy I bought it from wrote "HDTV" in crayon in the upper right hand corner of it, so I believed him when he said the high price was justified.
I feel like such an idiot.
YOU MISSED MY POINTS.
1) I said there was a difference, but I said that I would rather have more variety than the same crap that I have been watching since HDTV started. I was a very early adopter for VOOM, (one of the first 5,000) and stayed with them until the end. The PQ was great, but the system was very buggy when they started up, and the programming was very repetitive. How much soccer can a non-soccer fan take? By the time they got most of the bugs out, they folded.
2) It's TV. Sure, its cool to look at, but I wonder why some people waste so much time worrying about some of this stuff. Is that all they have going on in their lives? Do they have wives? Kids? Families? or have they devoted their lives to searching for the perfect TV picture?
FOR THE RECORD:
I have TWO Samsung HDTVs. One in my living room w/a 942, and another in my bedroom, with an 811. So there.

 

[bdemz]

klen

Your are missing our point. Yes I'll admit it is just TV. But when you pay for something (HD) and get non-HD then that is what is upsetting and actionable.

I will equate this to buying the NHL package and not being allowed to view the entire game just clips. (SAME THING)

I am not a videohpile and I can definitly see the difference. Esp. from OTA-HD to the now SD+ crap DISH is shoveling

 

[RobertsD]

Is HD-lite really that bad?

I don't know, since I have the HD pack, and OTA HD locals. I don't have Voom, so I haven't seen HD-lite... Is it really as terrible as you guys are making it out to be?

 

[MikeD-C05]

I keep posting this and asking this and no one has yet to address it, but I will ask it again. Doesn't your hd receiver upconvert the signal or picture to what ever resolution you set it at? IF the picture isn't true hd resolution doesn't the receiver upconvert the picture to 720p or 1080i , which ever you set it at? This might be why the picture looks pretty damn close to true hd anyway to the average viewer.

I mean I have a upconverting dvd player form LG. It upconverts my dvds to 1080i and they look Damn good. I could swear it looks as good as true ota hd. This might be the same thing for the hd sat receivers. Maybe the providers like Dish and Directv are hoping if they present a pretty damn good picture which is little better quality than a dvd , the receiver itself will upconvert the picture to hd perceptions just like the dvd player does.

Granted, I would perfer true 1920 x 1080i hd , but if it looks as good as hd then does it really matter if it isn't true hd? In my opinion most people wouldn't really notice the difference if it wasn't for Gary posting the differences on the web boards. We don't all have 1080p tvs yet so the average viewer can't really see that much difference in regards to the changes.

Any thoughts?

 

[DJ Rob]

I guess I'll get over it since klen wants quantity over quality LOL
We all don't want the same things.

And since you can't tell that much of a difference how bad HD-lite looks on a Samsung set, I'll make sure to steer clear of those... I have 2 HD monitors I bought from dish. They are crappy RCA units but you can see the huge difference.

The point of all of this is we pay a premium for 1920X1080i HD content. It is still being advertised as 1920X1080i HD content on Dish's site. And their techs and phone people publically say it is not being downressed when it is.

The quality, it is bad. My wife commented to me that our TV was going out because the VOOM channels are downressed enough now to make them blurry compared to HDNET or Discovery HD.

Yes it is a better pic than SD, but it ISN'T HD content anymore. It is ED.

I've been a Dish customer since '96 or '97 when the 119 satellite was it. I remember when Dish's SD looked as good as a DVD. It was great and the reason why I switched to them. And it was one of their major selling points. I wanted quality and was willing to pay more for it instead of sticking with cable.

Then Dish started adding more and more channels. The people on the old DBS site that John L had starting saying the quality would come back once Dish got more satellites. That was said over and over. Just like how a lot are now saying on this board about once Mpeg4 is implemented. And each time a new slot was lit up, people were excited and hopeful.

Well, Dish did get more satellites and more slots. And better compression equipment and their SD has never looked as crappy as it does now. I had a friend who has cable come over and he noticed right away how bad and blocky Dish SD looks. He said it looked like a badly compressed computer video file.

So anyway, HD gets offered on Dish and they make promises of the quality of it.
It was great until a couple of months ago.

Charlie on the chat Monday said that the HD locals on satellite will look better than if you pick them up over the air. Yeah right.
That's techically impossible and shows either his lack of knowledge or how much he was willing to BS us.

A friend of mine who works at Dish here in Denver said he saw the HD locals from LA on a receiver they have in house and he said they look really soft and blurry even compared to the VOOM channels. So it looks like the HD locals are gonna be worse than even HD-lite.

So they need to either not advertise HD-lite as HD, or not downres.
And realize that they will lose cutomers if they downres content people are paying a premium for.

They can easily put the res back for VOOM back to 1920 without using any more capacity. They just aren't doing it.

As for what to do about the HD locals, I feel sorry for anyone that thinks the quality they will offer is as good as it gets. I do hope Dish has those channels looking better once they are launched but when I'm told they currently look worse than Hd-lite, it doesn't sound promising.

 

[wirenut]

Ah the good old days, when the picture was crystal clear. I have been a Dish customer since '97 and the picture was BEAUTIFUL!! I used to show all my family and friends the difference between cable and satellite and the difference was night and day. Ever since they started to add local stations the picture has been going down hill. Cable has a better picture now.
Receiving HDTV channels from Dish was a breath of fresh air. It reminded me of the old days. Now that they have start to down rez the Voom channels the picture is terrible. Yes there is a big difference between full HD and Hd-Lite. The old eyes don't lie.

 

[normang]

I am willing to bet that with rare exceptions, no one complaining about HD vs HDLite even has a TV set that can do 1900x1080i.. If you don't, you've never seen true HD ever..

 

[Sarang]

Damn! You got me there. I just took a good look at my TV. I never realized it, but MY TV ISN'T HD!
As a matter of fact, it is about 35 years old, and black and white. I just got done testing some of the tubes for it at my local Walgreens.
The guy I bought it from wrote "HDTV" in crayon in the upper right hand corner of it, so I believed him when he said the high price was justified.
I feel like such an idiot.
YOU MISSED MY POINTS.
1) I said there was a difference, but I said that I would rather have more variety than the same crap that I have been watching since HDTV started. I was a very early adopter for VOOM, (one of the first 5,000) and stayed with them until the end. The PQ was great, but the system was very buggy when they started up, and the programming was very repetitive. How much soccer can a non-soccer fan take? By the time they got most of the bugs out, they folded.
2) It's TV. Sure, its cool to look at, but I wonder why some people waste so much time worrying about some of this stuff. Is that all they have going on in their lives? Do they have wives? Kids? Families? or have they devoted their lives to searching for the perfect TV picture?
FOR THE RECORD:
I have TWO Samsung HDTVs. One in my living room w/a 942, and another in my bedroom, with an 811. So there.

Consider VOOM was all HD and besides the existing National HD they had to make the price worthwhile and one of the few ways to do that affordably would be in-house. Most of the reason the PQ on Dish is going to HD-Lite is so they can cram in as much HD-LiL's as possible in addition. VOOM wasn't trying to do that and offered almost ALL the National HD channels in the market at the time PLUS tried to offer the best PQ too on ONE satellite I think so your quantity argument is void considering you're complaining about repetitiveness on VOOM when I mention the large amount of American HD offerings at the time it had. Seriously NO amount of American HD will satisfy you right now because Dish offers LESS than VOOM. Cinemax, Starz, Encore HD? Not yet. 21 VOOM channels? No. Universal HD? Not yet. And VOOM was supposedly in negotiations to get the InHD channels. Someone clarify to me if they had the HDNet's. You want quantity in HD? Bug Dish to carry the HD feeds of SBS, KBS and MBC subtitled as WELL as TV Tokyo and you'd get enough HD to satisfy you.
edit: Exception MAY be placed to the 411 owners with Universal and ESPN2 HD.

 

[bpickell]

Well, I'm not a videophile either, however one thing I do know is if you have a 1080p set. Anything less than 1080p will look like crap. In order to have a good crisp picture you must watch programming in your native resolution.

I think most of the problem with the pq is that it is not a 16:9 picture coming across the waves. I haven't done the math yet but either your set or the receiver is stretching the picture which is making the pq look like crap. The only way to get the 16:9 picture is to receive either 1920x1080 or 1280x720. Anything other than that and you are either stretching the picture or squeezing it.

If I'm wrong feel free to let me know. But that is my perception.

 

[DarrellP]

I watch my HD on a 110" screen with a projector that is only capable of 720p output, yet I can tell a HUGE difference from full bitrate to downrezzed bitrate. The image is much sharper, crisp and colorful at full bitrate. The downrezzed crap looks soft and fuzzy.

Most people do not watch their TV's at the recommended viewing distance (normally they sit way too far back from the set), so they do not see the apparent loss of resolution. I watch my screen at the correct THX distance for my screen and it's like being in a movie theatre, the screen is in my face, so I see every little detail (or lack of).

I also have an upconverting DVD player and though it does a wonderful job, it looks about like the HDLite channels in terms of quality, it just lacks the crispness of full bitrate HD.

I leave my 811 in 1080i and let it pass the signal to my pj for conversion, that way I get the best possible picture.

 

[pampaul]

HDlite looks like ass period, PBS HD OTA should be benchmark for all providers.

 

[normang]

Your are missing our point. Yes I'll admit it is just TV. But when you pay for something (HD) and get non-HD then that is what is upsetting and actionable.
I will equate this to buying the NHL package and not being allowed to view the entire game just clips. (SAME THING)
I am not a videohpile and I can definitly see the difference. Esp. from OTA-HD to the now SD+ crap DISH is shoveling

While there maybe a viewing difference, if its 720P or better, its HD, whether you want to think it is or not.

 

[gutter]

I keep posting this and asking this and no one has yet to address it, but I will ask it again. Doesn't your hd receiver upconvert the signal or picture to what ever resolution you set it at? IF the picture isn't true hd resolution doesn't the receiver upconvert the picture to 720p or 1080i , which ever you set it at? Any thoughts?

If the picture is sent to our home in less than 1920 X 1080i or 1280 X 720P that means information was removed from the picture by the distributor from the original transmission. But your TV wants it to the resolution you set it for so it tries to make up the information by duplicating the information that it has. This is what happens on SD signals as they are displayed on a HD set and why most people can't stand the picture and would prefer watching SD on a SD set.

Same thing happens with HLITE...you let tries to cover the missing information by filling in as best it can. This is a very crude by simple explanation. If more techs out there can make it even simpler or correct what I say without making it more confusing to the average person... be my guest.

 

[Conner Dain]

Maybe it's just me, but I think some people here are just WAY too uptight about HD vs. HDlite. .............

I could not agree more. Don't get me wrong..I don't like that the quality of the HD VOOM channels has been intentially lowered. But I noticed a BIG difference in the quality of the channels when VOOM died.

But the question is: Just what better options do HD users have? Be it "true" HD or not, E* still has more and varied content than any other option.

Those of you who plan to jump ship over the change, I understand. But there's an old saying: Don't cut off your nose to spite your face. I'm honestly more interested in CONTENT than I am in a super-high detail picture. YES, I remember how crystal-clear the detail was on the old VOOM channels. I'm hoping it will return. Til then, I'll stick with the service that offers the most channels at the best price. Right now, that appears to be E*.