In my opinion the recent events of channels like HDNET and HDNMV being down-rezzed, along with the obvious bit-starving on many channels, is confirmation that the best days of HD picture quality from E* are now behind us.
A year ago the PQ was quite good. We had several full 1920x1080i and 1280x720p channels that were getting good bit rates. This list even included 4 VOOM channels - I remember watching some great shows on VOOM EQUATOR last summer.
The overall PQ now is decidedly lower. Only a few good channels remain. None of the channels added since last summer have good PQ.
(As far as this message goes, I'm going to use the term HD-lite to include BOTH down-rezzing and bit-starving.)
At first when some of the VOOM channels were changed to HD-lite, it felt temporary. And I had hope that a groundswell of complaints could influence E* from heading down this path - although I wrote multiple times here that I strongly suspected it would not deter them.
Well, it certainly hasn't detered them.
It appears quite clear to me that HD-lite is the new official E* standard for HD.
And any true/high quality HD that we enjoy from this time out is to be relished, for the days are likely numbered for this level of quality from any channel.
I expect E* to continue to optimize their encoders and compression algorithms. They do try to get as good a quality as they can out of the insufficient bandwidth that they allocate to channels. Over the past 3 years the PQ on the SD channels has improved. Over the past 6 months the PQ on the VOOM channels has improved.
I guess it is possible that if E* could come up with some super efficient MPEG4 encoding that higher quality HD could return ... but my money would then be on them squeezing yet another HD channel on each transponder.
It is unfortunate timing that the better quality HD is disappearing right as higher quality HDTV sets are becoming more affordable. In a couple of years true 1080p sets are going to be much more popular, but all we will have from E* and D* will be HD-lite.
So I'm ready to accept the obvious ... E* HD will all be HD-lite. It took me long enough to swallow this, and I certainly don't like it. I would bolt E* in a second if I had a true HD alternative, but I don't have one. So I will watch my watered-down HD-lite and I will grimmace and moan and curse from time to time, but it is time for me to accept it.
A year ago the PQ was quite good. We had several full 1920x1080i and 1280x720p channels that were getting good bit rates. This list even included 4 VOOM channels - I remember watching some great shows on VOOM EQUATOR last summer.
The overall PQ now is decidedly lower. Only a few good channels remain. None of the channels added since last summer have good PQ.
(As far as this message goes, I'm going to use the term HD-lite to include BOTH down-rezzing and bit-starving.)
At first when some of the VOOM channels were changed to HD-lite, it felt temporary. And I had hope that a groundswell of complaints could influence E* from heading down this path - although I wrote multiple times here that I strongly suspected it would not deter them.
Well, it certainly hasn't detered them.
It appears quite clear to me that HD-lite is the new official E* standard for HD.
And any true/high quality HD that we enjoy from this time out is to be relished, for the days are likely numbered for this level of quality from any channel.
I expect E* to continue to optimize their encoders and compression algorithms. They do try to get as good a quality as they can out of the insufficient bandwidth that they allocate to channels. Over the past 3 years the PQ on the SD channels has improved. Over the past 6 months the PQ on the VOOM channels has improved.
I guess it is possible that if E* could come up with some super efficient MPEG4 encoding that higher quality HD could return ... but my money would then be on them squeezing yet another HD channel on each transponder.
It is unfortunate timing that the better quality HD is disappearing right as higher quality HDTV sets are becoming more affordable. In a couple of years true 1080p sets are going to be much more popular, but all we will have from E* and D* will be HD-lite.
So I'm ready to accept the obvious ... E* HD will all be HD-lite. It took me long enough to swallow this, and I certainly don't like it. I would bolt E* in a second if I had a true HD alternative, but I don't have one. So I will watch my watered-down HD-lite and I will grimmace and moan and curse from time to time, but it is time for me to accept it.
(1440 x 1080)
