Will Dish ever go full resolution HD?

[steve4810]

I don't think there's anything even slightly unreasonable about demanding that 1080-line channels be the full 1920 pixels wide. There are lots of affordable displays capable of displaying it these days, and I can certainly tell the difference.

Well a lot of folks can't and there are lots more affordable displays that don't display 1080. And even you can't tell 720 from 1080 beyond a few feet from anything but the largest displays so what difference does it make?

A good bit rate is whatever rate that doesn't lead to obviously visible compression artifacts most of the time, which disqualifies whatever they're running right now on, for example, HDNET.

I once heard of a musician with perfect pitch that jammed a pair of rough wooden chopsticks into his ears because he couldn't stand listening to a world full of off key singers. Just something to think about. Life is too short to be miserable because of 720p compression artifacts.

Something else to ponder: Isn't it just possible some of those obvious compression artifacts are just in your head?

 

[Jim S.]

Something else to ponder: Isn't it just possible some of those obvious compression artifacts are just in your head?

No.

 

[pduncan]

Right.

Me; when I look at my screen and see the bit bucket half full! And my wife is still a knockout after 40 years. Anybody want to argue?

You ARE the man!!

 

[aegrotatio]

BTW the Fox network is encoded by Fox and passed through affiliates without re-encoding. It saved the stations from needing HD encoders.

I seriousy doubt this statement.
How does the Fox affiliate insert local commercials and the station watermarks?

 

[broadcasttheworld]

I think the OP is talking about resolution not re-encoding. No one distributes uncompressed HD so thats moot. If the distribution feed fits in the space available why wouldn't a provider just pass it through? They need to re-encode the video otherwise.

BTW the Fox network is encoded by Fox and passed through affiliates without re-encoding. It saved the stations from needing HD encoders.

This is not true. Every local affiliate has to encode at some point. Infact they have Neilson equipment that requires it be decoded and re-encoded. Without the inserted data from that equipment they would not get the ad revenues. Also the signals from national networks usually come over as a RAW 270Mbps ASI feed SMPTE 259m. If they choose not to have direct fiber to the national content folks they will employ a downlink usually at 45Mbps since most of the birds in space are "TELSTAR" based running at DS3 rate for telecommunications. In this case they still run DVB-ASI however the feed is encoded and usually runs at between 15 and 30 Mbps with 2 audio channels of 15Khz However to get it into the SMPTE 310 / ATSC feed for OTA service they compress that 15-30 down to 19.34Mbps..... Any questions?

 

[BobMurdoch]

As long as D* is trying to emphasize quantity of HD channels vs. quality, E* will have to follow suit..... Don't hold your breath waiting for true HD quality unless you can receive it OTA...

 

[rad]

As long as D* is trying to emphasize quantity of HD channels vs. quality...

Who said that, since all reports are that D*'s not downrezzing/bit starving the new channels along with adding all of them.

 

[BobMurdoch]

Is this the case? Is HD Lite dead on D*?

What's the word?

 

[rad]

Is this the case? Is HD Lite dead on D*?

What's the word?

That's the word that Scott got and posted on the site, at lease for the MPEG4 HD channels.

 

[Kb Cool]

Where is the current E* bit rate chart.?

 

[WilliamC]

Come on!.

Which resolutions do you claim are true HD resolutions? And how many bits is a good rate?

The resolution that the channel is actually in. For example let's use HDNET. Its resolution is 1920x1080 and should be presented at that resolution not 1440x1080 or 1280x1080 like E* and D* do.

Understand now?

 

[WilliamC]

Well a lot of folks can't and there are lots more affordable displays that don't display 1080. And even you can't tell 720 from 1080 beyond a few feet from anything but the largest displays so what difference does it make?

I once heard of a musician with perfect pitch that jammed a pair of rough wooden chopsticks into his ears because he couldn't stand listening to a world full of off key singers. Just something to think about. Life is too short to be miserable because of 720p compression artifacts.

Something else to ponder: Isn't it just possible some of those obvious compression artifacts are just in your head?

Isn't it also possible that the non-percieved difference betweem 720p and 1080i/p is also in your head?

Seriously there is a difference on some displays it may not be as noticeable on others it is very noticeable. I easily noticed when E* lowered the res on HDNET and HDNET movies and a few days later came to the forums and found confirmation. Perhaps you may not see it, but there are those that do. Everyone is different! Remember that.

Right.

When mp3's made their debut there was a great hue and cry that compressed audio was crap compared to raw wav files. Now mp3 bit rates vary all over the place and most folk don't know the difference. And let's not even get into AACs and WMFs.

I can easily hear the loss of quality in MP3, which is the only reason I don't listen to them on my audio system. You are correct though most people don't notice a difference, but just because they don't does that mean that we should all conform and accept it? Heck no!

Like I said you may not notice it but others do and you can't argue there is a difference. You may not care if there is one and that is fine, but I do.

 

[pduncan]

The sad fact of the matter is that a lot of things on "HD" channels now, don't look any better than SD channels did on a good quality 27" crt about 20 years ago, even with the improvement in technology we have today. If the broadcaster and consumer are going to throw all that money into a new technology, it should be used at it's fullest potential. Otherwise, why bother blowing all that dough!

 

[steve4810]

Isn't it also possible that the non-percieved difference betweem 720p and 1080i/p is also in your head?

Seriously there is a difference on some displays it may not be as noticeable on others it is very noticeable. I easily noticed when E* lowered the res on HDNET and HDNET movies and a few days later came to the forums and found confirmation. Perhaps you may not see it, but there are those that do. Everyone is different! Remember that.




I can easily hear the loss of quality in MP3, which is the only reason I don't listen to them on my audio system. You are correct though most people don't notice a difference, but just because they don't does that mean that we should all conform and accept it? Heck no!

Like I said you may not notice it but others do and you can't argue there is a difference. You may not care if there is one and that is fine, but I do.

Everything you say is true and well stated. And I agree almost completely.

My point is that no one can posit that this picture is "right" or correct and another is "bad" or wrong which is what Jim S. was implying. Some are better, some are worse and we all like better but this shouldn't mean Charlie is bad or wrong because of the pictures he provides (And I don't even like the guy).

And the implication that anyone who doesn't have Jim's budget and isn't as picky as he is a lesser person or dumber or settling for junk is elitist on its face.

 

[kb7oeb]

I seriousy doubt this statement.
How does the Fox affiliate insert local commercials and the station watermarks?

This is not true. Every local affiliate has to encode at some point. Infact they have Neilson equipment that requires it be decoded and re-encoded. Without the inserted data from that equipment they would not get the ad revenues. Also the signals from national networks usually come over as a RAW 270Mbps ASI feed SMPTE 259m. If they choose not to have direct fiber to the national content folks they will employ a downlink usually at 45Mbps since most of the birds in space are "TELSTAR" based running at DS3 rate for telecommunications. In this case they still run DVB-ASI however the feed is encoded and usually runs at between 15 and 30 Mbps with 2 audio channels of 15Khz However to get it into the SMPTE 310 / ATSC feed for OTA service they compress that 15-30 down to 19.34Mbps..... Any questions?

Do some reading on the Fox splicer system, Fox is different.

 

[fz5j2r]

This is not true. Every local affiliate has to encode at some point. Infact they have Neilson equipment that requires it be decoded and re-encoded. Without the inserted data from that equipment they would not get the ad revenues. Also the signals from national networks usually come over as a RAW 270Mbps ASI feed SMPTE 259m. If they choose not to have direct fiber to the national content folks they will employ a downlink usually at 45Mbps since most of the birds in space are "TELSTAR" based running at DS3 rate for telecommunications. In this case they still run DVB-ASI however the feed is encoded and usually runs at between 15 and 30 Mbps with 2 audio channels of 15Khz However to get it into the SMPTE 310 / ATSC feed for OTA service they compress that 15-30 down to 19.34Mbps..... Any questions?

Boy, that sure clear things up for me on this issue. Now if we could only go back in time about two years when we had the awesome HD pictures on E.

 

[aegrotatio]

Do some reading on the Fox splicer system, Fox is different.

Ahh, interesting system.
It seems to explain why our local Fox affiliate does not seem to have any subchannels.

Here's the link:
Guide to Fox Splicing System

I'm curious, from a data perspective, is the FOX equipment actually re-encoding internally?
How do you insert the images onto the encoded MPEG stream without re-encoding it?

.

 

[kstuart]

1 - People who have a normal sized 1080p display cannot see any difference between that and a 720p display, according to mathematics:

http://www.carltonbale.com/wp-content/uploads/resolution_chart.png

2 - The difference between 1920x1080i and 1440x1080i is even less perceibable. Note that most of the programming on Discovery HD Theater and HD-Net that makes everyone go "wow" was shot with 1440x1080 cameras.

3 - People talk about the resolution numbers because it is easy to grasp, but in actuality the bitrate affects HD picture quality much more than resolution. And both MPEG-2 and MPEG-4 encoders automatically reduce the resolution when that is the best choice for overall picture quality.

Bitrate = bandwidth, and bandwidth is in very short supply amongst all providers, especially with all those national and local channels changing to HD, and thereby needing more than 3 times the bandwidth they neede before (because the SD channels still needs to be available).

4 - The only HD source that doesn't require a high bandwidth connection to your home is HD disk (HD-DVD and Blu-Ray), so those are your real choices for high picture quality.

 

[Jim S.]

So who is Carlton Bale, and where does he get his data? Everybody keeps posting that graph, but nobody ever explains it. (And no, it is not my responsibility to root around on his site to find out, it's the responsibility of the person making the claim.)

 

[wtb955]

nobody is broadcasting is 1080p. Nor will they be any time soon.

Who said anything about 1080P? The question concerned full 1080i resolution and bit rates.