Question on Directv's NFL Sunday Ticket

[Piratefan98]

I posted this in the Directv forum .... but thought maybe it would be better placed in a Sports forum. Anyway, here goes:


I've been really disappointed in the picture quality of NFL Sunday Ticket. I have a 42" Panasonic Plasma EDTV, which I use to watch the Sunday Ticket games on standard definition Directv.

When I flip back and forth between source 1 (Directv football game), and source 2 (football game on my Adelphia cable), the cable is ALWAYS better quality. In fact, it's not even close. The AFC games on CBS, the NFC games on Fox, Sunday night game on NBC, Monday night game on ESPN, they ALL have better PQ than the lineup of Sunday games on Sunday Ticket.

When doing a signal test on my Directv receiver, I consistently get a strong 88-91 signal. Receiver is an older one ..... an RCA DRD435RH. Cable is provided by Adelphia. Just standard/basic cable. No HD.

Anyone know why Directv falls so short of cable on standard definition football game transmissions? And is there anything I can do (short of subscribing to HDTV packages) to close the gap? If my Directv could just "equal" my standard cable, I'd be happy as hell. To listen to Directv's ads, you'd think they were always superior to cable, but they sure aren't on Sunday Ticket NFL games.

Thanks for any and all suggestions.
Jeff

 

[Ramy]

Because they simply are downrezzing the picture to 1280 x 1920 instead of 1080 x 1920 and probably not sending the max bitrate either.

 

[Digital Dude]

DirecTV's Standard def is wayyyyyyy over compressed. They jam a ton of channels on each transponder and PQ has gone into the toilet over the past decade. Their SD used to be really good, not anymore.

 

[kvchief]

Because they simply are downrezzing the picture to 1280 x 1920 instead of 1080 x 1920 and probably not sending the max bitrate either.

Just to clarify, I think the rate they are using on 1080i stuff is 1280x1080 instead of 1920x1080. You probably just mistyped.

 

[Ramy]

Just to clarify, I think the rate they are using on 1080i stuff is 1280x1080 instead of 1920x1080. You probably just mistyped.

Yes, sorry about that.