I Hate Digital Cable And Their Slow Channel Changing System
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That was exactly my point. There will ALWAYS be a delay. Some receivers are faster than others at decoding the stream, but there will always be a delay. Also, you have to remember that FTA and OTA isn't encrypted. Decrypting a stream takes additional time.
OKAY but....
okay but why is it so difficult to make a box that decodes them immedietly. Im sure they can make a faster processer or something. I read that AT&T uverse serivce changes channels immidietly, and they arent even as good as your average cable company, and defenitly not as good fios. att is fiber to copper phone lines, which sucks. Cable companies are fiber optic to coaxial which is better, and the FIOS is fully fiber optics the BEST. How do you explain that the worst service, ATT uverse service, is the best in channel changing???
okay but why is it so difficult to make a box that decodes them immedietly. Im sure they can make a faster processer or something. I read that AT&T uverse serivce changes channels immidietly, and they arent even as good as your average cable company, and defenitly not as good fios. att is fiber to copper phone lines, which sucks. Cable companies are fiber optic to coaxial which is better, and the FIOS is fully fiber optics the BEST. How do you explain that the worst service, ATT uverse service, is the best in channel changing???
It's still not "instantly". No digital tv system is or probably will ever be as fast as direct analog tuning. Uverse, like any other Digital TV service is still going to have to decode and decrypt the stream. Tey may have it faster than some others, but it still is not instant. Have you acually seen Uverse, or are you just going on what you've heard?
Again it has nothing to do with what the signal is arriving to your house on. It has to do with the converter box itself. ATT Uverse is true IPTV I highly doubt its "Instant" as their is a going to be a buffer delay, (It may be less then a second or whatever but not instant)
channel surfing is dead
There are technical reasons channel surfing is dead.
But first, some history.
Back when I had maybe a dozen analog channels, surfing made sense.
Now, here in LA, counting analog channels only , there are just under 30.
Well, some are in the wrong language, and some are shopping or religious.
But if I channel surf, I might have to go through those... or not... depends on how the receiver is set up.
Now we move to satellite.
I have literally hundreds of channels.
Even if I had instantaneous channel change, surfing through them all would kill a lot of time.
That's why we need guides, and personalized channel subsets.
So, maybe there's one 'personality' for the kid's shows, one for the daily soaps, and one for the sporting events...
If there aren't too many channels in each of those sets, you might try to surf them, but the guide is really quicker.
Well, I think I've made a good case for using the guide, without even explaining the technical details behind the channel surfing delay.
So, I'll rest on that note.
There are technical reasons channel surfing is dead.
But first, some history.
Back when I had maybe a dozen analog channels, surfing made sense.
Now, here in LA, counting analog channels only , there are just under 30.
Well, some are in the wrong language, and some are shopping or religious.
But if I channel surf, I might have to go through those... or not... depends on how the receiver is set up.
Now we move to satellite.
I have literally hundreds of channels.
Even if I had instantaneous channel change, surfing through them all would kill a lot of time.
That's why we need guides, and personalized channel subsets.
So, maybe there's one 'personality' for the kid's shows, one for the daily soaps, and one for the sporting events...
If there aren't too many channels in each of those sets, you might try to surf them, but the guide is really quicker.
Well, I think I've made a good case for using the guide, without even explaining the technical details behind the channel surfing delay.
So, I'll rest on that note.
I must respectfully disagree
I must respectfully disagree, because think about this. If you dont channel surf you always lock yourself into one thing. You always watch a few specific channels and never the rest, which you are actually paying a lot of money for. How many times have you fliiped the channels and seen something cool, on a channel you never thought you would watch? I like discovering new things in this 500 channel universe we live in. Whats the point of having all these channels if your just always going to watch the same few channels. I dont know about you, but if im paying for 500 channels, then by golly im gonna watch them. I never watch nbc, and i dont listen to the critics. One day i was channel surfing and i came across the office. I had no idea what it was, but it was funny, and now its my favorite show. I did this on a tv with no converter box. Now that i have a converter box i dont like watching tv. I just DVR my fav shows, and i pay a huge amount of money for channels i won't watch, because its such a hassel waiting to change channels. Now I think thats ridiculous. I might just go back to analog if they dont change this or at least start offering a la carte channel offerings. ITS A $$$$ issue, as much as it is a convinece issue.
I must respectfully disagree, because think about this. If you dont channel surf you always lock yourself into one thing. You always watch a few specific channels and never the rest, which you are actually paying a lot of money for. How many times have you fliiped the channels and seen something cool, on a channel you never thought you would watch? I like discovering new things in this 500 channel universe we live in. Whats the point of having all these channels if your just always going to watch the same few channels. I dont know about you, but if im paying for 500 channels, then by golly im gonna watch them. I never watch nbc, and i dont listen to the critics. One day i was channel surfing and i came across the office. I had no idea what it was, but it was funny, and now its my favorite show. I did this on a tv with no converter box. Now that i have a converter box i dont like watching tv. I just DVR my fav shows, and i pay a huge amount of money for channels i won't watch, because its such a hassel waiting to change channels. Now I think thats ridiculous. I might just go back to analog if they dont change this or at least start offering a la carte channel offerings. ITS A $$$$ issue, as much as it is a convinece issue.
I use to have charter cable, and their resolution use to change automatically when I had digital cable with them (The HD-DVR box) the new DCH 6416 (brand new box) It automatically changed the resolution when I changed from HD to SD channels, it use to go to 480p when I went to the Sd channels and automatically go to 1080i when HD channels came up.
Their channels use to flip faster, but thats about it, for DTV the channels change slow, but I could live with that, better channel quality and more selections!
The only thing I miss is the real time VoD thats about it.
The only service I have from them its telephone service and internet. Most cable companies at least they don't suck on High Speed Internet and Telephone service.
I use to have Motorola DCH6416 for cable
Here is the link: Motorola - Connected Home Solutions - Digital Video Solutions - DCH6416 Host Set-top
Their channels use to flip faster, but thats about it, for DTV the channels change slow, but I could live with that, better channel quality and more selections!
The only thing I miss is the real time VoD thats about it.
The only service I have from them its telephone service and internet. Most cable companies at least they don't suck on High Speed Internet and Telephone service.
I use to have Motorola DCH6416 for cable
Here is the link: Motorola - Connected Home Solutions - Digital Video Solutions - DCH6416 Host Set-top
Ala Carte is a money issue. Who would want to pay all those fees to have it?
Ala Carte sounds good, until you really start to think about it and the law of unintended consequences. 2 major problems. 1. Do you honestly think the channel providers are going to take a cut in revenue? Sure they'll let you choose the channels you want, but in the end, they will price them so that you end up paying the same amount of money you are now, for a fraction of the channels. 2. It will lead to further homoginization of TV. Niche channels and family programming have less overall viewership than the most popular forms of programming. Those will be the first to go, since it will no longer be profitable to put them on the air. So, in the end, TV will essentially consist of crime dramas, reality shows, Jerry Springer esqe shows, sports and 24 hr news. Discovery and Disney will stay around, but say goodbye to the large number of children's channels, scientific programming, outdoors and sportsman programming, and history programming. The channels that DON'T consist of reality tripe, celebrity obssession, sporting events and broken record "Republicans are evil. No Democrats are evil... etc etc... etc.." will start dropping off one by one. The providers of those programs will consolidate them into a handful of channels. Maybe that's a bit cynical, but given the nature of things, I'm afraid that will end up happening. If someone can tell me where I'm wrong, I'd love to hear it.
Yeah will never go back to cable TV one they raise their rates to often and their behind on times on allot of things in my market I live in. Which some Telco's are going to be the same way with their IPTV be the same as cable when it comes to certain things like on their rates so forth.
