522 MPEG Artifacts and Aliasing

[internationaljock]

My first post!

I had a Dish Network 522 system installed last Saturday and am very disappointed in the picture quality. I just had a Dish technician out here and he tweaked the dish, swapped out the 522 box and tried everything he could think of but the problem remains. I am using a new, 32" Sony Wega KV-32HS510 TV on the main line (S-Video IN) and new Panasonic 20" LCD display (Coax IN)in the bedroom. Both satellites are registering over 100%.

Here's the problem: I am seeing MPEG artifacting on all stations. The premium stations look best, the local stations worst. You can see chunky, square blocks of compression in almost all images especially in areas of high contrast. For example, on the scrolling text at the bottom of CNN and other news channels you can see chunks of discoloration surrounding the letters. And forget about freeze-framing or using slo-motion. When doing so the overall resolution seems to decrease dramatically and you can see severe chunky compression artifacts and aliasing (stair-stepping) everywhere, especially on diagonal areas of high contrast. I swear I was getting better picture quality on the old analog Adelphia cable system that this one replaced.

I've tried adjusting the picture quality on the Sony, switching from progressive to interlaced to cinemotion, changing the clear edge and sharpness settings and nothing seems to help much.

I have a Dish Network Field Service Manager coming out on Saturday but I beginng to think that what I am seeing is just the "nature of the beast." I was expecting the image quality to improve by switching to satellite and am VERY disappointed.

Can anyone offer any suggestions? Am I just being too picky? Any comments or clarifications would be greatly appreciated. THANKS!

 

[ShadowEKU]

I really really hate to be the bearer of bad news but Dish, Direct, and most digital cable (not the analog side) compress their signal too much which is what this results in. Unfortunately as you go bigger and bigger tv wise you will notice this more and more.

If you were someone lured in by the "Digital Quality" let me apologize.

Unfortunately most DBS and Digital carriers prefer Quantity over Quality

 

[ShadowEKU]

However there is a thread around here somewhere about sony tv's

 

[internationaljock]

Hard Drive the culprit?

It seems that images played back from the hard drive are particularly bad. I don't know why they even supply us with freeze frame and slo-mo since the image quality really sucks. I guess I have been spoiled by my progressive scan dvd. I am thinking of snedning the whole system back to Dish and reverting to cable - but you are saying that digital cable is just as bad? Also, would a TIVO give me better freeze frame or slo-mo.

I can't tell you how disappointed I am.

 

[mboy]

Image quality is getting worse by the day on Dishnetwork.

 

[internationaljock]

Image Quality

Why is that?>>>>>

 

[tdti1]

Image quality is getting worse by the day on Dishnetwork.

For people that use the small dish, I heard that dtv will be doing something to get better quality next year, and dish network I think in 2006 will go to mpeg-4, but with those mini dish guys they will just cram more and more up there and once again it wil look like crap.

If you want top quality lower subsciption costs and way more movie channels, get a big dish with 4dtv and get these channels http://www.4dtv.com/Xcel/xcel.htm
cheaper and at a much higher qualty,if you don't have the room get netflix or go to cable, they don't seem to compress as much as the pizza dish guys do.

 

[mboy]

I have been with dish for years, and it is def. a lot worse then it was at any other point in the years I have been with them.

 

[mammothskier]

I've tried adjusting the picture quality on the Sony, switching from progressive to interlaced to cinemotion, changing the clear edge and sharpness settings and nothing seems to help much.

Tune your contrast WAAAAAAY down. Almost all new TVs (especially Sony) have picture settings with too much contrast and saturation to look "good" in the store. Try to compare what you see outside with what on TV. Better buy Digital Video Essentials or like and tune your set.

This will not fix compression artifacts, but would make PQ much better (even for DVDs)

 

[mboy]

Dish's IQ has been pretty soft lately. LOTS of compression. My contrast is down to 30 and brightness on 50 and it is still pretty soft. I agree tho, def. need to tune ANY TV with VE or Avia.

 

[internationaljock]

DVE and Avia

Excuse my ignorance - but what are digital video essentials and avia and where do I get them?

Also, you guys have any questions for me to pose to the Field Service Manager when he gets here tomorrow?

 

[mammothskier]

Excuse my ignorance - but what are digital video essentials and avia and where do I get them?

For example here:
DVE
Avia

 

[maximum]

Excuse my ignorance - but what are digital video essentials and avia and where do I get them?

Also, you guys have any questions for me to pose to the Field Service Manager when he gets here tomorrow?

Did you actually get a "Dish Network Field Service Manager"? Every time they said they would send one to my house I just got another contractor who didn't know anything more than the last guy.