Dish messing with Voom, All are now HD-Lite 1280x1080i: Discuss this issue HERE!

[GeorgeLV]

I think Vurbano has hit the nail
at least that is why I always understood providers lowering the resolution, so bitrate could be lowered and no pixelization occur, lower bitrates(or more satellite space effeciency) is all about what Dish is after no matter how they can get it, sadly this is the price
anyone want to take wagers on how long it is before all HD on Dish is HD-Lite ??
-Gary

Probably when ESPN2HD is launched.

 

[riffjim4069]

Any wagers on how fast E* HD subscribers are going to flock to FiOS TV as soon as it's availabe if force fed HD-Lite?

 

[Gary Murrell]

Rave HD's bitrate is actually up, to match along with what Sean said, all Vooms are hovering around 15 Mbps now

PBS shows (like that tool Mayer on Soundstage) look so good in true 1920x1080i, PBS is top of the shelf in HD quality, on Rave this looks worse than DVD right now

it's all in the downrezing folks, not the bitrate, for example here are some numbers I posted over on DBS Talk to put things in perspective(GeorgeLV Corrected me on DVD):

Per each second of actual viewed video:

HD-Lite 1280x1080i: 1280x1080x30 = 41,472,000 pixels
True 1080i 1920x1080i: 1920x1080x30 = 62,208,000 pixels
720p 1280x720p: 1280x720x60 = 55,296,000 pixels
DVD 720x480i: 720x480x30 =10,368,000 pixels


True 1080i: 6X DVD quality
HD-Lite: 4X DVD quality
720p: 5.3X DVD quality

-Gary

 

[GeorgeLV]

However, when the temporal resolution is limited 24 frames per seconds (filmed movies) the pecking order changes (assuming proper pulldown flagging and no vertical filtering for the interlaced formats):

1080i = 1920x1080x24= 49,766,400 pixels/sec
"HD-Lite" 1280x1080i = 1280x1080x24 = 33,177,600 pixels/sec
720p = 1280x720x24 = 22,118,400 pixels/sec
DVD = 720x480x24 = 8,294,400 pixel/sec

1080i = 6x DVD quality
"HD-Lite" 1280x1080i = 4x DVD quality
720p = 2.67x DVD quality

 

[Stargazer]

Do you guys think that Dish should lower the resolution at first to fit in as many channels as they can in at least an enhanced definition then enhance it more and more perhaps to HD as space permits? Would this be better than only having a fraction of certain channels HD? They could still have a number of channels in higher resolution in HD like the VoOm channels were or are now.

 

[GeorgeLV]

Do you guys think that Dish should lower the resolution at first to fit in as many channels as they can in at least an enhanced definition then enhance it more and more perhaps to HD as space permits? Would this be better than only having a fraction of certain channels HD? They could still have a number of channels in higher resolution in HD like the VoOm channels were or are now.

I don't have any theoretical problems with reducing the horizontal resolution to from 1920 pixels a line to 1280 pixels a line. It is, however, vital to maintain the vertical information (sticking with 1080 lines). I'm against any EDTV channels with resolutions like 960x540 (quarter 1080i), 720x480 (dvd), or 640x360 (quarter 720p).

 

[Gary Murrell]

I don't have any theoretical problems with reducing the horizontal resolution to from 1920 pixels a line to 1280 pixels a line. It is, however, vital to maintain the vertical information (sticking with 1080 lines). I'm against any EDTV channels with resolutions like 960x540 (quarter 1080i), 720x480 (dvd), or 640x360 (quarter 720p).

I do not agree with this at all, on my display there is a major difference between 1920 vs 1280 horizontal resolution

-Gary

 

[Spike]

Well, I just sent my second email to dish quality. I also sent a copy to the CEO. I really doubt that I'll receive any significant response. I have to keep trying though. This is really unacceptable to me!!

!protest

 

[Stargazer]

I am sure they are receiving plenty of response by now. Maybe they will do something as a result but I doubt it.

 

[JIGGIEFLY]

This sucks i thought there was something up all of my channels are the same now very soft looking it was a very noticable differance here on my 53 inch pieoneer i guess ill be canceling also after the first of the year they have 30 days to do something i wont pay for this garbage and call it HD.

 

[jmcgee_jr]

Man what a pisser I just called and schedualed the 61.5 dish to be installed. ARGHHHHHH...and I have no other access to any HD cable provider "CHARTER" wont give us HD yet adelphia all around us has it.

 

[techweb]

Man what a pisser I just called and schedualed the 61.5 dish to be installed. ARGHHHHHH...and I have no other access to any HD cable provider "CHARTER" wont give us HD yet adelphia all around us has it.

I just put up a Dish 1000 to be able to get all the HD channels. If this Voom picture quality situation doesn't improve, I'll just cancel Dish and stick with cable, which has better picture quality on HD channels than Dish anyway. Cable is supposed to be adding National Geographic HD, Fox HD, and MTV HD after the first of the year.

 

[joverstr2]

I noticed alot of pixelation this weekend. Thought for a moment I was back with Mediacom Cable HD. I hope this is just testing going on and everything goes back to normal. If not, once again goodbye Voom.

 

[rdinkel]

Anyone tried to contact Voom directly about the quality of their pictures, rather than through Dish?

 

[BrettTRay]

I'm having a hard time understanding why dish puts Showtime HD, TNT HD, ESPN HD, HBO HD, and a few others at 1920x1080i at or below 14mb/s but they put the Voom channels at 1280x1080i with 14mb/s????? What am I missing here? The mb/s is the measure of how much space the channel uses so how are they saving space by doing this?

 

[rdinkel]

Perhaps it has to do with the relatively weak signal strength of the 129 bird and trying to reduce pixelization problems?

 

[rdinkel]

When I installed my Dish1000 last week, I got the feeling that Echostar should have made the dish a little larger to improve the gain of the 129 signal. I bet they went with the smallest size that they could get away with rather than adding any margin that would improve signal strength. For satellite dishes, I guess Echostar thinks smaller is better................

 

[JoeSp]

Gary, I believe that you have that a little wrong. On an interlaced picture the Verticle lines (1920) are scanned odd than even but the Horizontal lines (1080I) are not. So what you would have is 860x1080 pixels scanned on your viewing screen with all the odd then all the even scanned to give you 1920x1080i or one frame of the picture.

 

[vurbano]

I'm having a hard time understanding why dish puts Showtime HD, TNT HD, ESPN HD, HBO HD, and a few others at 1920x1080i at or below 14mb/s but they put the Voom channels at 1280x1080i with 14mb/s????? What am I missing here? The mb/s is the measure of how much space the channel uses so how are they saving space by doing this?

Because they are all basically movie channels without demanding video except TNTHD during Nascar and the NBA, you might see some problems there. And ESPNHD is 720p should not be so bad at 14 mbps. Not great, but certainly not at bad as 1920 would be. 720p can hide lots of problems IMO.

 

[vurbano]

There's not much justification for saying 1280x720p is HD, yet 1280x1080i is not.

Its the progressive nature of 720p that makes it HD and opens the arguement up to which is better 1920 x 1080i or 1280 x 720p. 1280x 1080i is just watered down interlaced 1080i. I dont see how you can compare that to the other two widely accepted formats. You have to stop looking strickly at the pixel count.