not-so HD looking on new Hopper/Joey setup

[pepperlunch]

Hello. I just upgraded from a 722k to a Hopper/Joey. The picture quality does not seem to be in full HD. It's not as bad as macro blocking, but it is more like in between SD and HD. The DLP (Hopper) out in the family room does a better job of covering up the "fuzzies" around the faces and general low resolution but the LED (Joey) in the bedroom is much more noticeable.

I thought it might be the Joey so I moved the LED TV to the Hopper but there was no change.

I thought it might be the LED so I downloaded a TV show to a USB stick and played it on the LED. It was crystal clear like HD should be.

I also have an OTA USB adapter in my Hopper for my rooftop antenna . I DVR'd the one hour show. The Hopper showed the file was 7.5GB. However, that same show was 1.5GB that was recorded from the Dish channel. That makes me think that the compression is so low that it lowers the resolution.

Is the problem Dish is OVER-compressing the HD channels or is it possible I have bad equipment that is not decompressing correctly?

Thanks!

 

[KAB]

You should check your connections FROM the Hopper and resolution settings. Going HDMI to TV or AV Receiver? Your described PQ is not the norm, all all. So, there's something amiss on your end.

 

[pjsjeep]

I too wonder what DISH does, I have connected my CABLE coax (have internet) to my TV so I can get my Media General channel during blackout. When I watch the channel and all other digital channels on this I get TRUE 1080 crystal clear pic that I don't seem to get in my DISH channels. Why is it that cable can carry 1080i and dish can not???? I am about too install a roof antenna and I will get locals in 1080. I probably will not even watch any locals on dish then......

I am connected to HWS via HDMI

 

[pepperlunch]

You should check your connections FROM the Hopper and resolution settings. Going HDMI to TV or AV Receiver? Your described PQ is not the norm, all all. So, there's something amiss on your end.

I just checked and all the connections are good from the Hopper. All resolution settings are correct in the Hopper and Joeys. Hopper (over HDMI) to A/V receiver (over HDMI) to TV. I took the A/V out of the equation and went straight from the Hopper to the TV. I even swapped HDMI cables.

I noticed the technician used a tap under the house coming from the node. I doubt the quality would drop just by using a node/tap instead of just a node.

 

[KKlare]

Several points:

My H2000 and HWS experience compared to 622 and 722s is that the Hopper is noticeably sharper on my 55" DLP, dramatically so.
So I suspect you have a setting incorrect on the Hopper.

Make sure you match the Hopper resolution to your TV's. Press Yellow, Format TV, HDTV, 1080p/1080i and 16x9 unless you have a 720p set and likely even then. Also in the Format TV you may need to touch up the Screen Adjust, preferring a pixel-to-pixel match not squeezed. HDMI assumed.

In Yellow, Guide Settings, Format Guide, you may want Channel Preference as HD Channels to be less likely to pick the SD channel versions. Set EPG Banner Off while there to get 7 lines of programming instead of 6.

A place I visit often once a day is Yellow, Network Setup, Tests, View Counters, and page down past the temperatures to Fsck to check that I got the full nightly reboot, sometime free time after say 1:30AM.

While I'm thinking of updates Press Menu+Menu to see what Software Version you have. It should be S316 8/15/2013 or the newer one just coming.

The Dish signal takes a lot less bandwidth and disk space because it is MPEG-4 vs. Usually a factor of 2. MPEG-2. OTA will be slightly sharper if there are no sub-channels.

-Ken

 

[osu1991]

Dish has programming in both 720p and 1080i. For locals it depends on how Dish receives your locals. Is it a direct fiber link or does Dish pick them up with an antenna locally and then send it back to uplinked. If your locals on Dish are HD then Dish compresses and re-encodes them to MPEG 4 to save on satellite transponder space, unlike your local cable company Dish has to broadcast and carry locals nationwide, so balancing bandwidth and quality is a big deal.

It also depends on how many subchannels your locals are carrying,as the subchannels take away bandwidth from the main OTA channel. For my locals I have a couple that actually look better in Mpeg 4 through Dish than OTA because they are getting a Fiber feed directly from the local affiliate and not the bitstarved OTA broadcast.

 

[pepperlunch]

Several points:

My H2000 and HWS experience compared to 622 and 722s is that the Hopper is noticeably sharper on my 55" DLP, dramatically so.
So I suspect you have a setting incorrect on the Hopper.

Make sure you match the Hopper resolution to your TV's. Press Yellow, Format TV, HDTV, 1080p/1080i and 16x9 unless you have a 720p set and likely even then. Also in the Format TV you may need to touch up the Screen Adjust, preferring a pixel-to-pixel match not squeezed. HDMI assumed.

In Yellow, Guide Settings, Format Guide, you may want Channel Preference as HD Channels to be less likely to pick the SD channel versions. Set EPG Banner Off while there to get 7 lines of programming instead of 6.

A place I visit often once a day is Yellow, Network Setup, Tests, View Counters, and page down past the temperatures to Fsck to check that I got the full nightly reboot, sometime free time after say 1:30AM.

While I'm thinking of updates Press Menu+Menu to see what Software Version you have. It should be S316 8/15/2013 or the newer one just coming.

The Dish signal takes a lot less bandwidth and disk space because it is MPEG-4 vs. Usually a factor of 2. MPEG-2. OTA will be slightly sharper if there are no sub-channels.

-Ken

Resolution is matched. Screen Adjust is good. EPG is off. Nightly reboot happened. S401 is my software.

Check out this pic:



See those blocks? Those are noticeable when playing the show. It's worse when paused, like in the picture.

A technician actually just came out. I showed him how much better things look when playing off the USB vs what is on my DVR. He said his own TV does the same thing and thought it was normal!!! Two managers are coming out tomorrow...

 

[rusty813]

My picture quality for my hopper is pretty good, even those I am receiving low signal readings between 20s to low 40s, since I am using dish 1000.2 out in Hawaii. I would say check the HDMI cable that make with the receiver, which I am using is not that great. My is pretty loose connected to my Sony tv. Also another thing make sure you are using RG6 3.3 ghz cable, if using a older rg6 cable like what I did originally it my cause picture and signal loss issue, which I had problems on tuner 2.

 

[navychop]

Yes, the Hopper has more stringent coax requirements than the ViP series.

Sent from my iPhone using SatelliteGuys

 

[Jim S.]

Some of Dish's HD channels ARE compressed too much. They shouldn't look any different on your Hopper than on your old receiver, BUT, you can't compare at two different points in time because they use variable bit rates.

 

[Tampa8]

Although posting a pic is not always representative, I will say that does not look like HD.
By the way, how much space a recording takes is not a representation of the picture quality when comparing different codecs. Dish could use a different codec, the amount of space could increase, it would not mean the picture is necessarily better. Generally today's codecs are better than those used years ago for instance even if the compression is more.

There are many here who have checked carefully and often see no difference between OTA and over satellite from DISH. That's the truth, but it depends on the signal from your locals as that is not always the case. Most times I see virtually no difference, but every so often I do if I look close enough. If your picture is a reasonable representation of what you are seeing especially at a normal viewing distance, mine is never that bad on my VIP receivers.

 

[DustoMan]

Have you tried looking at your TV's video settings and disabling any artificial enhancements those companies tend to put on TVs to try to make the picture smoother. My parents had this big Phillips TV that had a setting that tried to make the picture appear smoother (I think it's called Frame Doubling), but it just made everything look over compressed and like everything was shot using cheap TV cameras. It was much better after I disabled that.

You've also tried swapping around Hoppers and Joeys and HDMI cables and they did the same thing.... but do you have another TV to try?

As others have said, the OTA adapter signal uses more disk space because of the difference between MPEG2/4, but I have one of those too and I can't tell the difference between an OTA signal and a DISH signal. And I'm really picky about how my picture looks.

 

[Scherrman]

It never hurts to put the TV and Hopper both to default settings and starting over.

 

[osu1991]

2 of my tv's revert to default settings anytime a new device is plugged into an hdmi plug. I have to remember which devices went where if I move stuff, because if I change the positions when reconnecting everything it will change one or more of them to defaults because it senses a new device was connected to that particular plug.

 

[costanzas_wallet]

IMHO, I've experienced better picture quality on other systems, but I really like the Hopper, PTAT and the Whole Home System in general, so Dish wins my $$ hands down.

That said, I use the "THX Calibration Tool" on my Pixar's Finding Nemo disk for picture calibration, which works very well ... I get it as good as I can get it, which is good enough on a 42' Vizio, but not as good as I've had it with other providers.

Again, IMHO, so YMMV.

 

[Jhon69]

Also when your in your guide the channel your watching should have a black transparent"HD" behind the channel number,if it doesn't your watching an SD channel.Good Luck!

 

[356B]

Did this issue ever get resolved?

 

[pepperlunch]

I forgot to let you guys know the update. A technician came out and looked at my picture. He said he could see the big pixel squares in the background in certain scenes but he thought it was normal for Dish since it was like that on his TV, as well. He said there was nothing he could do but have his manager come out another day. I stayed up all night looking for answers on the internet and noticed several other people had my issue since the S401 software. I read to drop the Hopper and Joey to 480i and reboot both. Then put them at 1080i/p and reboot both. That cleaned it up. I find it bizarre that the mode I was in, originally, was worse than 1080 but better than 480.

 

[Scherrman]

I forgot to let you guys know the update. A technician came out and looked at my picture. He said he could see the big pixel squares in the background in certain scenes but he thought it was normal for Dish since it was like that on his TV, as well. He said there was nothing he could do but have his manager come out another day. I stayed up all night looking for answers on the internet and noticed several other people had my issue since the S401 software. I read to drop the Hopper and Joey to 480i and reboot both. Then put them at 1080i/p and reboot both. That cleaned it up. I find it bizarre that the mode I was in, originally, was worse than 1080 but better than 480.

So that reset seemed to fix the issue? If that's the case that's great news and a good tip to know on here in case it happens again.