DVBS2 Master's Poll

[goaliebob99]

In tonight radio chat, it was brought up that there has been a lack of demand as the reason why HD feeds are not offered through 4DTV as well as a financial one. I contend that the lineup wasn't a serious one to begin with, and that because there wasn't a competitive lineup produced, the demand was low because no one produced a lineup that would allow people to subscribe and be happy!

This thread is meant to show that there can be a demand and get discussion going. If there is enough demand and Motorola can devise a way to bring us either the S2 masters or Comcast Hits master (or both) that it could be profitable, especially now that HD is the new standard.

If you currently don't sub, but a HD master package like this would cause you to sub please mention that. Let the programmers know that you want something like this as it could benefit you and your pocket book, as well as theirs.

 

[Kb Cool]

I think they are judging demand by how many HDD-200 decoders were sold. Which were produced in 1999 or something and most people didn't even own a HDTV back then. And if they did. They most likely didn't have any money left to purchase the Hdd-200 anyways. An all in one HDbox capable of receiving the new formats would have kept the ball rolling. In fact i would have never got a Dish sub, if they did.

 

[truckracer]

the whole situation with the hdd-200's was there really was never that many hd channels anyway and like stated above no one really had an hd tv yet. They need to do a current survey and not some 12 year old outdated business model


With the major program providers all participating in HD currently...there is a real market for the videophiles who want the best picture and audio. its quite obvious that pizza dishes cannot provide the bandwidth needed to give us the best quality nor do i think that is really their goal.


The pizza pan co's marketing roots have grown deep in our society making people think that is the only way to get HD other than cable. For motorola ...maintaining a small c band segment wouldn't cost them that much...the infrastructure was already there. they are a typical large corp who is sharp at cutting anything that is not making them hefty returns. Loyalty and dedication means nothing to co's like moto unless your building their bottom line generously.

HD Shaw receivers which are already tried and true would provide us everything we need. we could use a dish positioner externally and we could watch the masters and pay for them

 

[johnnyglobal]

That's why during the show, I asked if there was anyone else who could manufacture a reciever that works like the 4dtv. Mike said that it was all about the patent. Motorola owns the DCII Patent. So I guess we have to wait until the patent runs out. Lets see, Patents usually run about 50 years, so if memory serves me right....Motorola (General Instruments) came up with it around 1995 and here we are 15 years later.... If we can hold out for another 35 years, I think we might have a chance then.

OR, we could all get together to decide what we want in a new reciever. Pitch it to Motorola to see how much it would cost to make a certain amount of recievers. Then somehow we raise a large sum of money to pay them to make it. Granted, we would each get a reciever for free and sell the rest to make up for the cost of making it.

Granted, it seems we are at the mercy of Comcast. Skyvision and Programing Center are the middle men of this situation. I am not saying this situation is wrong, but it don't seem right the way motorola is doing to us. I also know it's not entirely OK with the way the programmers are doing us, especially the ones who are already using the DCII platform. Maybe (boy I am really dreaming here), Motorola could just "open up" all the DCII channels like it once was for us. Just as a little "parting gift" for us. If not that, I would not be opposed to someone "testing" the DCII signal. I can't imagine there are those who haven't tried. Again, I am just dreaming.

I do want to say a big THANK YOU to the folks at Skyvision and Programming Center for their help with this. Without them, we wouldn't be this far. Keep up the good work guys!

 

[trinidex]

the whole situation with the hdd-200's was there really was never that many hd channels anyway and like stated above no one really had an hd tv yet. They need to do a current survey and not some 12 year old outdated business model

With the major program providers all participating in HD currently...there is a real market for the videophiles who want the best picture and audio. its quite obvious that pizza dishes cannot provide the bandwidth needed to give us the best quality nor do i think that is really their goal.


The pizza pan co's marketing roots have grown deep in our society making people think that is the only way to get HD other than cable. For motorola ...maintaining a small c band segment wouldn't cost them that much...the infrastructure was already there. they are a typical large corp who is sharp at cutting anything that is not making them hefty returns. Loyalty and dedication means nothing to co's like moto unless your building their bottom line generously.

HD Shaw receivers which are already tried and true would provide us everything we need. we could use a dish positioner externally and we could watch the masters and pay for them

This is spot IMHO

We didn't have an abundance of HDTVs back then, there wasn't the abundance of HD channels.

Kindof egg&chicken scenario!

I think we should be allowed to use existing Shaw boxes with different EMM or they could make a box based on today's tech.

I would sign-up today if I could, I have a HD setup that has no broadcast TV - such a waste!

 

[goaliebob99]

What about the possibility of dumping the DCII base all together and possibly doing a retransmission encrypted with IRDO or even a Powervu based service. I think the real issue was that Motorola wasn't shown the money, and Motorola is missing out now, thinking that the cband isnt going to be profitable. When in reality if Motoroloa would have rolled the HD wave and if they would have provided a lineup of 50+ channels in HD then the sub rate would have been more! Also, I dont need to worry about my locals as I can get those from OTA or a local source like comcast!

 

[Scott Greczkowski]

Bob what kind of receivers are you going to use? There is nothing like that for the consumer marketplace. And who is going to pay all the broadcasters to change their HD signals (a lot of them which are NOT in DC II format) to something else just so Big Dish owners can subscribe.

With the small number of C Band Dishes out there, I don't see it being worth their wild, ultimately the money is not there.

 

[tvropro]

It would be great if there was a way to at least access the Comcast HITS HD channels. It would require a new receiver. We had some great positive input on a lot last night from Mike, I'm glad you guys put the questions to him and he answered them. I have had a lot of those questions answered to me privately already through sources but wasn't allowed to let most info out. Now at least you guys see where I'm coming from with all of this and what is involved. One of the biggest things is Money. Money comes from support by subscribers. So if you want to see more Support it. even if you have another source of programming (like I do). Get something to show you want it to fly and expand. Lets get the numbers up there

 

[tdti1]

Hey goaliebob99 sounds like a good idea, oh wait... Dish and DTV already did it We are really after the distro, come Jan 4th this will be the end of an era. Unless we can get back to subbing direct to the main distro it's never going to be the same. If comcast switched there sd to a 4d mod a few years ago, who knows we would probably already be using a modded Shaw direct board for HITs HD and maybe the main ones to,

 

[Newbie_McNoob]

That's why during the show, I asked if there was anyone else who could manufacture a reciever that works like the 4dtv. Mike said that it was all about the patent. Motorola owns the DCII Patent. So I guess we have to wait until the patent runs out.

Motorola does have the patent, but if they wanted to they can license the DCII technology to another manufacturer to make receivers if Moto does not want to build the boxes themselves. All it takes is money.

I would gladly buy a consumer DCII box that could get the DCII DVB-S2 masters.
I would also like to subscribe to the DVB-S2 PowerVu masters with my D9865, that box already exists, just need a way to buy programming for it.
To keep things cheap the receiver doesn't even need a guide or a dish mover. An eSATA port would be nice for recording, in place of a built-in hard drive.

 

[Anony55]

It seems to me that full blown C-Band masters access like the good ole days could only be done one of two ways. 1) get all the masters to uplink using the same format. Or 2, get a box that will receive all the formats that the masters already use.

Both ideas are a loooong shot. But idea #1 would be impossible. That just leaves us with the need for an HD/SD unit that does DCII, DVB-S, and S2. Then it would need a controllable CA system for DCII, PowerVu, and possibly others... and someone to manage it.

That would take quite a commitment. But if it could be done, and the unit would also position the dish, control a polarity servo, and handle C/Ku switching... I'd go that route in a heartbeat. Heck, while we're building this hypothetical dream box, why not throw in full DiSEqC 1.1 & 22khz control, eSATA ports for DVR, a 2nd tuner, and TV2 outputs.

Personally, I'd pay a grand for a unit like that (presuming the CA support was in place). But I may be in the minority. Oh, and one more thing... this time, I want to be able to add/delete/manage my own channels & satellites!

Cheers

 

[ZetaMale]

In tonight radio chat, it was brought up that there has been a lack of demand as the reason why HD feeds are not offered through 4DTV as well as a financial one. I contend that the lineup wasn't a serious one to begin with, and that because there wasn't a competitive lineup produced, the demand was low because no one produced a lineup that would allow people to subscribe and be happy!

This thread is meant to show that there can be a demand and get discussion going. If there is enough demand and Motorola can devise a way to bring us either the S2 masters or Comcast Hits master (or both) that it could be profitable, especially now that HD is the new standard.

If you currently don't sub, but a HD master package like this would cause you to sub please mention that. Let the programmers know that you want something like this as it could benefit you and your pocket book, as well as theirs.

Does it really matter how many would subscribe when they're uplinking the DC2 HD feeds anyway? It's costing the providers transponder time regardless, so how would authorizing us HD have anything to do with the number of 4DTV subscribers? Would it really cost them that much to authorize the feeds to us? I do have an HDD-200 but I doubt I'll use it again. I once subbed to Showtime-HD, HBO-HD, etc, but I couldn't justify the cost because of the repetative programming - I might have watched 3 programs a month - it just wasn't worth the additional expense. Maybe if they offered HD PPV that competes with Netflix or if all programming was HD I might consider a 4DTV sub to HD content. Of course, an HDD-200 will be hard to acquire these days for those that don't have one or have to replace a defective unit. Also, when people start talking about the cost of doing this stuff it makes me wonder how DN can offer free HD "for life" - if I were a DN customer I'd be wondering just how much it really costs to provide programming and how much I'm getting ripped off. My point is, how much does it cost the providers to provide and authorize reception? I'd like to see a lot of programming offered but at a truly reasonable cost.

 

[truckracer]

The thing is it wouldn't cost them hardly a penny to activate the HD masters but Motorola and most large corporations run on a limited narrow minded system. In all reality all it takes is a stroke of a keyboard to turn on our boxes-but that would require thought "outside the box". You have these government type employees who have little imagination left and do nothing more than the Same thing they have been doing for years...they are not likely to "break the groove".

 

[wildbill47]

I have seen that Motorola is slowly loosing accounts as customers switch over to DVB format. I had looked at a 4dtv HD converter box but was too expensive and occupied too much space. Now Motorola should have produced a 4DTV receiver with HD standard installed. I have a Sonicview 8000hd receiver and the HD standards are built in for DVB. We watch HD on PBS as an example.
To prove the point I use a DSR4200 receiver for background music this model was used by schools until the switch to DVB Mpeg2. If you look at services a lot are on Powervu. I was in a cable head end recently and the majority of commercial receivers were DVB. I was told the dumpster was filled with the videocypher and digicypher receivers.

 

[goaliebob99]

Bob what kind of receivers are you going to use? There is nothing like that for the consumer marketplace. And who is going to pay all the broadcasters to change their HD signals (a lot of them which are NOT in DC II format) to something else just so Big Dish owners can subscribe.

With the small number of C Band Dishes out there, I don't see it being worth their wild, ultimately the money is not there.

Scott why not use Irdeto, AZboxes Ultra's have cams built in for access cards. That could potentially get around the hardware issue.
Also IDRO is already apart of the DVB spec, its almost as simple as insuring the key into the transport stream allready in place. They do this all the time in Europe, have more than one CA system on a given feed.

 

[TheTechGuru]

I think it might be better to wish for a consumer PowerVu HD receiver.

Thing is, HD PowerVu is DVB-S2 with PowerVu on top and DCII is in the process of switching to the same method of using DVB-S2 and putting the DCII on top instead of using a DCII modulation that our DVB receivers can not receive.

If you do a DVB-S2 blind scan on W5/X4 right now you will find many HD encrypted channels that are actually encrypted with DCII. I have also heard that the DCII masters of channels like HBO now use this method and when they are rarely ITC you can receive them in full master quality HD with a DVB-S2 HD receiver.

So in summery what is actually needed here are DCII and PowerVu CAM's (Conditional Access Modules) available to lease us to install in a 3rd party made DVB-S2 receiver. Then of course someone to call to pay for programming and activate those CAM's.

 

[tvropro]

Unless Motorola & Scientific Atlanta (Cisco) allow their technology to used like that it won't happen. I think the only way something will ever happen to that extent is someone with very deep pockets will have to burn through money like crazy to make it so attractive to those big giants and other parties involved that they can't turn it down. Any Billionaire bud owners that have nothing better to do with their money out there

 

[truckracer]

I have over the years watched moto losing the headend game. That's why they sell phones and two way radios

 

[merkin]

Unless Motorola & Scientific Atlanta (Cisco) allow their technology to used like that it won't happen.

tvropro gets it, Leslie Ellis gets Unscrambling Conditional Access and Encryption (and look at the date), just read it.
The back-door politics between MSO's and content providers to take down consumer c-band means tvropro is doing what he set out to do and they see us as a threat still.

One thing has changed though, the cable card. I have one in my first HDTV from 2003.

So in summery what is actually needed here are DCII and PowerVu CAM's (Conditional Access Modules) available to lease us to install in a 3rd party made DVB-S2 receiver. Then of course someone to call to pay for programming and activate those CAM's.

This is what is upsetting. The technology already exists. Motorola makes the DCX3400, and SA makes 8300HDC, and Ceton makes the infinity 4, and TIVO makes well TIVO. All these devices have one thing in common. THE M-CARD (V2 of the cable card).

There is no reason why some keen engineer(s) cant slap broadcom's DVB-S2 NIM solution into these setops, and redo the firmware, and sell to us junkies.

BTW who are the jerks who voted maybe or no to the poll? j/k

Happy New Year everyone.

 

[scottxray]

I am one of the jerks...voted Maybe. If I could receive them then YES.

But the reason is, I have not been able to lock any S2 feeds with my 8 1/2 foot orbitron, because I have almost all birds at least partly obstructed by darn trees ( douglas firs mostly) or other objects.
I Moved a 7.5 foot dish all around my property trying to get a lock on W1 for the Denver feeds after they moved from 137 position.
Finally found a hole between two trees from my backyard deck where I could lock 101, 103 and 105 last summer. So, I moved the Orbitron from my roof to that spot.

Amazingly enough I can also lock GB (91) from there (shoots through a hole in an oak tree at that spot), and still manage to get everything west of Morelos 5 shooting over my roof. But signal on W1 is 90, quality 30-35 and thats as high as it gets. W5 signal is about 80 and quality never over 25. Regular FTA qpsk signal is aout 40-50 , Quality 20-30. Ku...pretty much forget it althugh I can lock some of the stronger feeds. S2...nope. Signals only in th 10-20 range.

I'm waiting for the Jan 4 date to see what happens. I have a Winegard Quad 10 that will go in place of the Orbitron. I was dragging it around instead of the 7.5 footer for a while, and failed to find anyplace useful so diassembled and stored it. I just went through it and repaired all the panels (some of the mesh had popped out of the guide rails and there were two small tears in the mesh) I might put the Orbitron back on the roof , but I never locked any S2 with it up there either, and I tried. The trees block everthing
that would be useful (all east of 91, 97,99,101,103, and partially 105. Clear sky to the west of 105...whoopee) from my roof. The Quad 10 is a little too big for my sloped roof and my main desire is to keep the networks form Denver. Wish they would move them to W5, or make the W1 feeds available on 4D Hits after January 4.


anyway if I can't lock S2 then the master feeds won't do me much good. Hence...maybe.