Why does FOX HD look the best out off all the hd channels

[BASDSucks]

My local channel FOX53-HD to me has the best HD picture quality from any of the HD channels dish network has.. I dont have a OTA antenna so i cant compare with OTA stuff, but from all the channels, to me, the picture is the best HD ive seen through dish network..

I just find it strange that a local channel looks better then every other hd channel...

 

[rockymtnhigh]

It may be that your FOX affiliate has the best PQ of YOUR locals. I have thought that ABC, FOX, and CBS have generally excellent PQ in my locals. But NBC is just ok. It all depends on what resolution they are broadcasting at, as well as the quality of their equipment.

 

[Captain Spaulding]

That's an interesting observation. On Sunday I was watching the afternoon football game and the Emmy awards on my local Fox affiliate in HD via OTA antenna. I remember thinking to myself how good both of those programs looked.

 

[DefDude]

NBC is Very Sub-Par

I agree nbc is the worst and was able to confirm this again over the past 2 weeks. If you watched the FEDEX golf over the last few weeks "go Tiger" on the golf channel"versus",NBC, and the rebroadcast on UNIHD you will notice that the picture quality sucked on all of them. the cameras and broadcasting is all nbc so it did not make a difference which channel you were watching. On every channel whenever they showed a ball in flight the tree's in the background were all fuzzy and pixalated and everybody that was wearing white had a shadow along with the balls rolling on the green,this is just a few of the problems all of which can be seen on almost all nbc broadcasts with any motion, even jay leno. Cbs has some of they same issues but not as bad. they both broadcast in 1080i so that may be why. Fox, espn and abc are 720p and always look better. I'm able to pull in 2 nbc stations OTA and from local cable all in HD, one looks a little better but they both have the same issues as I have outlined from nbc. I saw on another post that this could be due to the stations having more then 1 digital broadcast but that doesn't explain the same poor quality on versus and UNIHD, so I really think nbc should watch fox,espn and abc to see what HD is suppose to look like and get their act together. their sunday football is pitiful compared to the others.

 

[Dr. Med]

The HD content that Dish Network re-transmits is heavily compressed, thus the poor quality. The signals are typically butchered this way so the satellite provider can fit more "channels" on the same transponder. In addition, everytime a signal is processed a small amount of distortion is introduced.
Thus a local HD OTA signal will almost always be of better video quality.

 

[SKrueger]

I agree nbc is the worst and was able to confirm this again over the past 2 weeks.

Have to agree there. Regarding HD, where I live FOX is great and so is the CW (OTA only). ABC and CBS are very good. NBC is poor, I actually think the LIL feed is better than the OTA. Considering in Los Angeles all the networks come out of the same antenna farm, NBC has by far the weakest signal.

 

[Dr. Med]

NBC Feed - FEDEX Cup - : On Sunday I was half-way watching the Feed and I didn't notice what you mentioned but I did plainly see the use of different resolution cameras. This was very obvious. Since I was watching this before conversion to 4:2:0 video, those cameras might have caused those issues.

 

[DefDude]

NBC needs help

I'm glad to other people have noticed this problem but I think it goes thru-out all their broadcasts, just watch the office in prime time they use a lot of quick pans, and you will see the background fuzzy and pixalated"especialy red" just like the golf, football and the tonight show. When there is nothing moving it sort of looks OK.

 

[DefDude]

NBC Feed - FEDEX Cup - : On Sunday I was half-way watching the Feed and I didn't notice what you mentioned but I did plainly see the use of different resolution cameras. This was very obvious. Since I was watching this before conversion to 4:2:0 video, those cameras might have caused those issues.

record and watch the replay on unihd tonight at 7 central. those are hd cameras but it still has shadows and fuz.

 

[mike123abc]

some of the locals also cut the bit rates to their primary feed to put in secondary channels. Here the CBS has a WB channel, and ABC has a spanish and another channel, 3 channels on one feed.

 

[DefDude]

I'm watching the replay of the fedex cup on uhihd right now and the all white shirts, balls etc have a ghosting or halo effect around them , the reds are all fuzzy the trees in the background on the tee shots are a mess. try a pause while the ball is in the air with the trees in the background it looks horrible. this is a nbc camera and broadcast problem because this is the original footage with no rebroadcast thru locals. you can watch a rebroadcast of a fox game on NFLHD and it looks as good as the original maybe better.

 

[digiblur]

The HD content that Dish Network re-transmits is heavily compressed, thus the poor quality. The signals are typically butchered this way so the satellite provider can fit more "channels" on the same transponder. In addition, everytime a signal is processed a small amount of distortion is introduced.
Thus a local HD OTA signal will almost always be of better video quality.

I have to disagree here. A typical HD local transponder has the bandwidth of 40 megabits. With there being 4 streams of HD, that equals to each channel having the ability to run at 10 megabits a piece. Since Dish runs these in MPEG4 mode we will have to almost double the bit rates to compare with MPEG2. I'll use 1.75 as the multiplier to be safe as most people say it should be 2. So basically each channel has the ability to run at 17.50 megabits of MPEG2. I bet you'll be hard pressed to find a OTA channel with their HD stream at 17.5 megabits.

 

[primetimeguy]

I'm watching the replay of the fedex cup on uhihd right now and the all white shirts, balls etc have a ghosting or halo effect around them , the reds are all fuzzy the trees in the background on the tee shots are a mess. try a pause while the ball is in the air with the trees in the background it looks horrible. this is a nbc camera and broadcast problem because this is the original footage with no rebroadcast thru locals. you can watch a rebroadcast of a fox game on NFLHD and it looks as good as the original maybe better.

I agree NBC has issues and I think it is pretty well known, especially for sporting events. Also keep in mind that they mix SD and HD cameras during golf events, which to me is the biggest blunder. My local CBS affiliate does not multi-cast and their PQ is fantastic. So that shows 1080i can look awesome, even for motion and sports. To me ABC, ESPN and FOX all look soft compared to CBS, NBC (stills) and NFL Network.

So I've learned to deal with a softer and less detailed picture for 720p broadcasts and more artifacting for 1080i broadcasts.

But there's just too many variables to say any one station is better than the other as it changes on any given day and program. But I ALWAYS see artifacting on NBC and the PQ on FOX is always softer than CBS for me.

 

[DefDude]

I have not seen any shot in any of the golf broadcast that did not have the problems I'v seen, even close up interveiws have ghosting on the whites. the NFL game on espn monday night was the best I'v seen since dish started HD back when it was full 1080i so I was wondering since espn is broadcast in 720p is it upconverted and then rebroadcast thru dish in 1080i because it sure looked good?

 

[Paradox-SJ]

I have to disagree here. A typical HD local transponder has the bandwidth of 40 megabits. With there being 4 streams of HD, that equals to each channel having the ability to run at 10 megabits a piece. Since Dish runs these in MPEG4 mode we will have to almost double the bit rates to compare with MPEG2. I'll use 1.75 as the multiplier to be safe as most people say it should be 2. So basically each channel has the ability to run at 17.50 megabits of MPEG2. I bet you'll be hard pressed to find a OTA channel with their HD stream at 17.5 megabits.

My local CBS...they have no subchannels so there is stream is 19.something...and they are flat out the best in my market. Even dish retransmision of it in mpeg is better than all the other mpeg4 locals.

grabage in grabage out as they say

 

[kstuart]

The HD content that Dish Network re-transmits is heavily compressed, thus the poor quality. The signals are typically butchered this way so the satellite provider can fit more "channels" on the same transponder. In addition, everytime a signal is processed a small amount of distortion is introduced.
Thus a local HD OTA signal will almost always be of better video quality.

The only problem with this analysis is that the original poster stated that he does not have OTA.

 

[digiblur]

My local CBS...they have no subchannels so there is stream is 19.something...and they are flat out the best in my market. Even dish retransmision of it in mpeg is better than all the other mpeg4 locals.

grabage in grabage out as they say

I doubt it's the full 19. Maybe 17 at the most.

 

[Dr. Med]

The "as for now" fake MPEG4, really MPEG2 with a MPEG4 header does turn into MPEG4, the video quality is not the issue. It just gives almost double the transponder space, so, twice as many "channels" per transponder. Where I live my locals are cleaner and less compressed. And of course I'm using a quality OTA receiver.
I hate to say this but I've seen better 3979 symbol rate news feeds on my Nokia 9200.

FEDEX, I think what your seeing is the use of SD cameras. I saw there use many times on the T-box.

 

[digiblur]

The "as for now" fake MPEG4, really MPEG2 with a MPEG4 header does turn into MPEG4, the video quality is not the issue. It just gives almost double the transponder space, so, twice as many "channels" per transponder. Where I live my locals are cleaner and less compressed. And of course I'm using a quality OTA receiver.
I hate to say this but I've seen better 3979 symbol rate news feeds on my Nokia 9200.

FEDEX, I think what your seeing is the use of SD cameras. I saw there use many times on the T-box.

Fake MPEG4? There's no fake MPEG4 that I know of on the system.

 

[Dr. Med]

Read the stream
Last I heard MPEG4 was still under test
We don't use Turbo 8PSK much and that equipment is in the truck that is headed to the next MNF location.