Low HD picture quality, high compression or what???

[ChetK]

Obviously, this PQ IS an issue. I don't think people subscribing to Voom would actually make this up. What would be the purpose?
[scenario]
Hi, I pay this company $80+ a month. In fact, I switched from another provider to give this NEW endevour a chance. Geeee...I know. I'll go onto a bulletin board and totally dog it's picture quality!!!
[/scenario]

People aren't lying. There is a compression problem here folks. :shocked Who knew?

 

[Conjuror]

Guys,

You cannot compare HDnet on Dish to WorldSport on V*. Sorry but that's the wrong comparison. HDnet happens to be the best looking channel in any DBS or Cable system. When VOOM gets HDnet, you may compare it but for now you are not making a fair comparison. If you want to make comparisons, compare channels common to both providers.

Sean,
You are nice guy and we are glad to have you here but you are badly wrong on this one. We MUST compare HDNet with all other HD channels. HDNet is what HDTV is all about. If we are going to lower their standards, then we are not watching HDTV anymore.
Beside HDNet, we compared all other common HD channels and Dish's PQ is still better.

 

[Sean Mota]

Sean,
You are nice guy and we are glad to have you here but you are badly wrong on this one. We MUST compare HDNet with all other HD channels. HDNet is what HDTV is all about. If we are going to lower their standards, then we are not watching HDTV anymore.
Beside HDNet, we compared all other common HD channels and Dish's PQ is still better.

If you expect HDnet picture in all HD channels, please let E* to do the same with ESPN, HBO, and Showtime. There is no way that every DBS or cable for that matter has the capacity to send 16mbps bitrate for every single channel. Sorry but that is reality.

 

[Mr. Biggles]

If you expect HDnet picture in all HD channels, please let E* to do the same with ESPN, HBO, and Showtime. There is no way that every DBS or cable for that matter has the capacity to send 16mbps bitrate for every single channel. Sorry but that is reality.

Your wasting your breath Sean. It's like talking to a brick wall at times.

You've made direct comparisons to other Sat providers, I've done the same as have others. We say the difference isn't appreciable but our opinions get shoved aside since we aren't in agreement with those that do. So we are wrong, not them. Go figure!

 

[Dvlos]

I am still waiting for where the pixelation was on the "dark" part of the screen. Was it the white lines, the white ball, the light/lime green soccer field, the white net. I assume it had to be the red jerseys? or the black officials jerseys? It happened , according to the complaintant, on zoomed out shots so all you could see is the field. where was the dark part?

Calm down there cowboy, dark parts of the screen, like darker areas of the stadium, not so much the officials or the jersey smartass. Was watching Discovery HD Theatre today and I'm not sure if it was the show or the transmission but switching between high action shots to wide angle shots there was a brief instant of "mosaics" then it cleared. I don't see it as something to blow my load over on the internet though. If they improve that with MPEG4 and WM9 at the same cost, then the more the merrier.

 

[Dvlos]

Twice would be a little bit too much. When I watch a soccer game on HDNet, I know what is HDTV thing all about. I don't know it on Voom.

You didn't answer me about the cost, what does Dish's comparable HDTV service cost?

 

[andrzej]

Somebody suggested here that maybe Voom STB is inferior. I just finished watching the Stanley Cap final game on ABC - HD OTA signal. I was switching between Voom and DirecTv (Sammy 160 STB) both getting same OTA signal both via identical component cables. The PQ was excellent on both and very similar. If I had to choose, I would say I liked the Voom PQ somewhat better - the color palette was cleaner IMO. Am I saying that you guys complaining about Voom PQ are wrong? No, I am just reporting my observations about HD OTA received with D* STB versus V* STB.

 

[barth2k]

There is no way that every DBS or cable for that matter has the capacity to send 16mbps bitrate for every single channel. Sorry but that is reality.

Well why not? Comcast passes through HD channels without additional compression. E* apparently uses 19mbps for its HD channels. V* could have gotten better PQ at the cost of boasting a lower channel count, but it chose not to. If you're saying we shouldn't expect PQ we pay for to be as good as what we get for free OTA ... well, I'm going to leave it at that.

 

[rexoverbey]

Time for the troll to pipe in You know what.... all satellite providers have close to equal picture quality. All have their problems with set top boxes. All have Customer service problems. I had a bad experience with voom and took it out on everyone. Was it that bad of an experience probably not. But I got upset with one aspect and then dropped it. And you know what??? Voom is just satellite... HDTV is just HDTV... and TV is just TV. It's not your life, your family, or family, or your wife. Just enjoy what you have and be greatful. If you want reality, and have the feeling of looking outside, then go outside. Spend some time with someone you love. Buy your loved one something instead of buying electronic gadgets. Again be happy with what you have instead of bickering about Picture quality. Is it going to solve your life problems? What does it acomplish but getting everyone upset with you? HDTV will improve in the future. So be happy with you have now. I'm sure everyone at Voom, Dish, DirecTv is trying to provide you with the best service they can. There's not a conspiracy against you or HDTV so quit acting that way. If you go to other forums there isn't bickering this way. I'm sorry I posted a bad review of Voom, and I'm sorry you have to read this post. But man this is just tv.

BTW I would like to change my handle to the troll. (with a cool picture of troll)

 

[Seawaves]

See Rex... I told you that high colonic would do you a world of good!

Welcome to the calming world of perspective.

 

[Sean Mota]

Rex,

I am really glad to hear you speaking this way. Not that we should accept lower quality at all but keep any satellite in check to let them know that we do care about a great picture.

 

[Conjuror]

If you expect HDnet picture in all HD channels, please let E* to do the same with ESPN, HBO, and Showtime. There is no way that every DBS or cable for that matter has the capacity to send 16mbps bitrate for every single channel. Sorry but that is reality.

I am not sure about that. My understanding is that most of them do have enough bandwidth for HDTV but not for the transition period when they suppose to supply both SD and HDTV at the same time.

And I can't really buy that as an excuse for PQ issue on Voom. They are committed to HDTV and already don't have enough bandwidth for 30 something HDTV channels?! I doubt it.

But even if your statement is true, then cable and DBS operators should listen to their consumers (us). If they don't have enough bandwidth then they can cut 90% crappy channels we must take because they "come with the package". I would (and I believe most of us) rather have 15-20 "wow" HDTV channels than one million cinema10-like channels.

Still, the PQ issue on Voom must not stop here. They must find enough bandwidth for 30+ HDTV channels or they will be out of business as a customer non-friendly SD provider.

 

[andrzej]

...
But even if your statement is true, then cable and DBS operators should listen to their consumers (us). If they don't have enough bandwidth then they can cut 90% crappy channels we must take because they "come with the package". I would (and I believe most of us) rather have 15-20 "wow" HDTV channels than one million cinema10-like channels.
...

They do listen to their customers. Remember that 90% (or more) of the customers of D* and E* don't give a s**t about HDTV and they watch those 90% crappy SD channels anyway. V* is different and I hope they will become the leader in HD quality as well. Give them a chance.

 

[ChetK]

Give them a chance.

I think the problem lies not in the fact that we're not giving them a chance (because we are), but because they deny the fact that their picture quality is inferior to other providers.

 

[ChetK]

How can we expect it to get better if they deny that it's worse?

 

[owlbox]

Kava Kava dudes

 

[mike123abc]

I know a lot of people are griping about the current PQ of VOOM. Yes they have overloaded their transponders and are compressing all the HDTV. But, don't forget in 4 months they will have the lease going with part of another satellite, and over a few years they will lease the entire satellite. This should allow them to unload some of the channels from 61.5 and ease up a bit on the compression.

I know they are touting WMV9, and that is exciting tech, but in no way shape or form can it take a picture that has already been compressed (remember HDTV is already really compressed) and compress it more with WMV9 and get a better picture in less bandwidth. They only hope is that you do not notice the extra compression. Where WMV9 will help is with their own channels, they can do the first compression with WMV9. This should allow things like C10 to use even less bandwidth.

Unless the providers (like HBO/SHO/ESPN/...) compress in WMV9 originally they will not be helped by WMV9. If VOOM takes their MPEG-2 compressed pic, decompresses, then re-compresses using WMV9 to take less bandwidth, there will be some picture degradation. Just have to hope that it is unnoticeable.

 

[Westbender]

"already been compressed ... and compress it more with WMV9"?

They're going to replace their existing codec with wm9, not just add another layer of compression on top of the existing one. Wm9 does a much better job at encoding/compressing data without as much loss in quality. In essence, better quality than mpeg-2 at the same bitrate. That's the whole point of these new codecs!


"remember HDTV is already really compressed"?

How do you get that? HDTV signals are only compressed for transport. They don't start out that way! It works the same way as zipping files on your computer. The original file is not compressed. You compress it to transport it (email), then you decompress it on the receiving end to use it. You wouldn't compress it twice.

 

[Westbender]

Here's a link to some info that probably explains it better than I do:

http://www.voom.com/newsletter/may_resource1.jsp?id=2

 

[Westbender]

After further review, it looks like mike123abc is right. My apologies. I assumed VOOM would have a "high-bandwidth link" with the broadcasters. The broadcast company feeds are indeed encoded, sent and then decoded by VOOM. VOOM then re-encodes before sending it on it's way to us. Probably at a lower bit-rate than the original feed. A straight pass-thru eliminating the extra encode/decode cycle would probably make a difference. Maybe that's what we'll get someday in the future. Too bad! There's already some PQ loss before VOOM even sends it to us. What a shame. Kind of like making a copy of a copy.

I'm researching to see if I can find out what the feed bit-rates are from each of the broadcasters. Anyone know these stats or a good source to find them? Has anyone heard whether the feeds will migrate to the newer codecs anytime soon?

I have a question posted for Wilt on the Yahoo forum regarding this very subject. It'll be interesting to hear his take on the difference between the bit-rate on the feed vs. what we get.