# Is 720p uncompressed?



## Artwood (May 30, 2006)

I've heard that DirecTV compresses and downrezzes 1080i and also SD.

Do they also compress and downrezz 720p?

What channels that DirecTV offers do they compress the least?

What channels that DirecTV offers do they downrezz the least?

Which of their HD channels offer the most resolution?

Which of their SD channels offer the most resolution?


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## davring (Jan 13, 2007)

ALL video you can view on your set is compressed even Blue-Ray. Let me correct myself, Analog video tape is not compressed, I don't believe.


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## longrider (Apr 21, 2007)

Compression and downresolution are two totally separate issues. All HD is compressed, a raw HD stream is in the area of a GB, the in-plant distribution at a TV station is around 45MB and the ATSC broadcast standard is 19.2MB. It has been recently confirmed that the MPEG4 HD is not downrezzed, a full 1080x1920 was pulled from the stream. 720P has never been downrezzed, Ihave heard SD is taken to 480x480 but I dont know that for a fact.


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## mabellboi (Sep 16, 2007)




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## davring (Jan 13, 2007)

longrider said:


> Compression and downresolution are two totally separate issues. All HD is compressed, a raw HD stream is in the area of a GB, the in-plant distribution at a TV station is around 45MB and the ATSC broadcast standard is 19.2MB. It has been recently confirmed that the MPEG4 HD is not downrezzed, a full 1080x1920 was pulled from the stream. 720P has never been downrezzed, Ihave heard SD is taken to 480x480 but I dont know that for a fact.


That was good information on the data stream being a full 1920.


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## Artwood (May 30, 2006)

I don't care if every single medium in the history of the world is compressed--I'd like to know which channels on DirectTV are compressed the LEAST.

Is it possible for such a question to be answered? Are every one of the channels compressed exactly the same?

I don't care if every single SD channel in the history of television has been compressed I'd like to know exactly which SD channels on DirecTV are compressed the least.

Is it possible to answer such a question? Are ALL SD channels on DirecTV compressed exactly the same?

Which channels offered by DirecTV offer the most resolution? Do they all offer the same amount of resolution?

Can such a question be answered?

I guess what I'd really like to have is a chart of all DirecTV channels which would show the amount of resolution of each--the amount of compression for each--the bandwidth of each--and the bitrate of each.

That way I'd know which channels offered the most picture information.

Is it wrong to want such a thing?

Look--I could care less what DISH or cable or OTA or anything else offers I just want to know about DirecTV since that is my only viable option where I live.

Am I asking too much?


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## David MacLeod (Jan 29, 2008)

I may be wrong but I think most of the info you are looking for would need to come from the provider\broadcaster itself. if I'm wrong please correct me.


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## PoitNarf (Aug 19, 2006)

I'm pretty sure all MPEG4 HD channels are compressed at about an equal amount, as are all MPEG2 HD the same compression and all SD the same compression. MPEG2 HD (1080i anyway, I do not think 720p is downrezzed) and SD are downrezzed as well. MPEG4 HD is broadcast in the original resolution.

This is all based upon what I have learned here on these forums these past couple of years. Unfortunately I do not have any hard data to link to. Perhaps someone else has some actual numbers to present?


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## PoitNarf (Aug 19, 2006)

dmacleo said:


> I may be wrong but I think most of the info you are looking for would need to come from the provider\broadcaster itself. if I'm wrong please correct me.


Not really. DirecTV is provided with an original resolution video. Before they uplink it to the satellites, they perform their own compression and downrezzing.


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## Interceptor (Jul 20, 2007)

Artwood said:


> I don't care if every single medium in the history of the world is compressed--I'd like to know which channels on DirectTV are compressed the LEAST.
> Am I asking too much?


All I know is that my eyes have been "downrezzed" for about the past 15 years, so knowing all that technical info wouldn't make a hill of beans to me unless I needed the info for a research paper, or something. 

My point is, your eyes are going to make the biggest difference to you, and not a single person here is going to be able make the picture look any better by telling you it isn't compressed as much as some other medium.


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## Tom Robertson (Nov 15, 2005)

Artwood said:


> I don't care if every single medium in the history of the world is compressed--I'd like to know which channels on DirectTV are compressed the LEAST.
> 
> Is it possible for such a question to be answered? Are every one of the channels compressed exactly the same?
> 
> ...


Well...you are asking a whole lot. There are over 200 SD channels and about 80 HD channels. Every channel is multiplexed with the other channels on its transponder and the multiplexing changes on the fly, instant by instant.

Add to that the programming content at the moment dictates how much data is needed. An action sequence with explosions needs much, much more data than a static headshot of a talking head.

And "compression" is not the enemy. Overcompression is.

And then it all boils down to what do you see? On some of my TVs, I sit far enough back that I only see the larger effects. On others, I sit close enough to see every compression artifact, macro block, jitter, etc.

So... Yes, I think you ask for something that is rather senseless to answer unless someone takes many readings on all the channels throughout the week, aggregates all that data, and pronounces "these channels typically have the most data dedicated", which still doesn't tell you if they look good. 

Sorry, I'd like to say something simple like Channel 514 is always the best (and it might be, premiums that are MPEG4 often do look the best.) Another channel that often has great video is 255, MGM does a fantastic job of pre-compressing their programming which means they can get very tight compression with very high video quality. Compression on the fly, on the other hand, can't get as good a job done as dedicating a day to compressing a movie. (Yes, I do mean as much as a full day of HEAVY CPU usage.) 

Cheers,
Tom


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## Artwood (May 30, 2006)

Maybe here's a better question to ask: which channels on DirecTV most of the time seem to have less compression and more resolution?

I will agree that it seems like MGM movies always looks good--I didn't know the reason why.

It seems from the responses here that that the most likely candidates would be MPEG4 HD channels.

If this is so what is the best bet for less compression and more resolution--a 720p MPEG 4 HD channel or a 1080i MPEG4 HD channel?

And as a rule is there any difference between the compression and resolution of HD local channels on DirecTV versus other MPEG4 HD channels on DirecTV?

And lastly are all the SD channels compressed the same? If they are then SD is simply hopeless.

One of the reasons I ask these question is that I use to own DISH and before they compressed and downrezzed HD on the Monsters channel and the Food channel HD was incredible--you could make out every strand of a person's hair for example.

Those days are long gone for DISH and from what I've seen of DirecTV they seem long gone, too.

As a whole I think that DISH still offers more detail and resolution than DirecTV but in other parameters of Picture Quality such as color saturation and color fidelity--in those areas DirecTV looks better.

I hope that people never stop screaming to DirecTV and DISH and to to other providers about resolution--if they do we'll get 10 zillion stations that all look like compressed fuzzy crap.

Don't give me more HD--just give me a few channels of uncompressed undownrezzed HD--anyone who saw what HD used to look like knows what I'm talking about.

And for all the DirecTV boosters here I'm not trying to tear down DirecTV--DISH DEGRADES Picture quality just as much as DirecTV.

I'm just saying that if people who CARE about Picture Quality can't be honest about it here--where can they be honest about it?

I can hardly bear to watch most of the SD channels--they're that bad--and the HD channels aren't as good as they used to be which I mourn.

One last question: if I do change from component to HDMI is there any chance of seeing more DETAIL on any of the channels?


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## Tom Robertson (Nov 15, 2005)

Artwood said:


> Maybe here's a better question to ask: which channels on DirecTV most of the time seem to have less compression and more resolution?
> 
> I will agree that it seems like MGM movies always looks good--I didn't know the reason why.
> 
> ...


At this point I would guess that the 720p and 1080i channels are compressed about the same-ish. The big issue with all the 720p channels is that they are compressed on the fly.

As an example, MGM digitizes and compresses their library once, in advance. MPEG4 compression can be run against a video file multiple times. The first time or two, the compression programs can make notes as to which parts of the video stream don't need very much data to present the scene. Then in the next runs, the compression programs review the notes about the stream and grab some bits from the scenes are coming next that need more data and put them in the "group of pictures" of the scenes that don't need much data.

Obviously there is a limit as to how far ahead the bits are held, but you can end up with a very consistent stream rate that looks GREAT in all the scenes. (Which is one of the reasons MPEG4 is much harder to decode.)

Anyway, MGM compresses their files to an amazing degree without suffering at all in picture quality. (And uses massive amounts of CPU time to do this.)

So they don't re-compress on the fly, it already is as compressed as it can get and still looks good.

I expect all the premiums will start doing this and less compression on the fly for the same reasons. (Or they will "buy" their programming to arrive precompressed like this.) 

As for the SD channels, generally the premiums are slightly less bad . Beyond that so much also depends on how well your receiver and TV scale it up.

Regarding HDMI/Component normally they should look almost the same. Typically the only difference is in how well each input on the TV is calibrated. If both are calibrated well, they should both look astounding with a good stream. 

Hope this helps,
Tom


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## Artwood (May 30, 2006)

What is the difference between compressing 720p on the fly and not compressing 1080i on the fly?


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## Tom Robertson (Nov 15, 2005)

Let's back up a quarter step so I can clarify things a bit.

Until recently, everything was compressed on the fly on every channel delivered via satellite. Often they were delivered as an analogue signal to DIRECTV to digitize and compress but more and more of the "cable" channels are delivered as a compressed on the fly digital signal that DIRECTV further compresses on the fly.

Live events, most cable channels, local stations, etc. are still basically compressed on the fly, including all the few channels that broadcast in 720p. And Live events will always be compressed on the fly unless you want to introduce a 5 minute delay to optimize the compression.

Very recently, premium channels realized they don't have to compress on the fly. That they could pre-compress their library once, using the massive amounts of computer time as I've mentioned, and have a better quality picture at a reduced bitrate--saving money in the long run. Always nice when you can reduce your costs AND produce a better product.

So you've really only got two systems today: compress on the fly or the newer pre-compress. (The next innovation that is coming is a hybrid, where a local or cable channel could compress some things on the fly like live breaking news and pre-compress movies and commercials.) All the (few) 720p channels are still all compress on the fly, mostly for sports.

As has been also said, there is no uncompressed delivered anywhere except within the production studio itself. From there everything goes out compressed to the networks then to the cable and satellite systems.

Did this help?
Tom


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## inkahauts (Nov 13, 2006)

There is one other variable that needs to be considered... How the programs are shot as well. Programs shot with HD cameras may appear to have more resolution sometimes, even though their actual resolution is lower than film. People sometimes see film grain as lower quality picture. The quality of film transfer to digital format has a definite impact long before a signal gets to Directv. 

I'd say that anything MPEG-4 seems to be the leased over compressed, and I will assume that to be true with the SD MPEG-4 as well, even though I haven't seen anything from any of those channels (there are only a few LIL channels) From what I've seen, it seems that the premium channels are less over compressed than most of the other channels. 

As Tom mentioned, if they are receiving programing already compressed in MPEG-4 HD from some carriers, then that probably is some of the best quality signal, because broadcasters are more concerned about PQ than providers, in general. I am really looking forward to the additional HBO channels, because they are supposed to all be delivered to Directv in MPEG-4, so it will be interesting to see if they appear to be better in color and clarity than other channels.

I agree, we can never let up talking about how paramount PQ is. I have a feeling that over the next few years, we will see Directv move everyone to MPEG-4, and once that is done, they will switch all their channels to MPEG-4 (5 to 10 years) and then we will for the first time in a long time, see a real increase in PQ that isn't there simply because we've gone HD vs. SD.

You know, these same arguments can easily be had when talking about audio, especially in terms of CD's, and MP3s. Music is getting so over compressed it just doesn't sound as good as it used to because everyone is overcompressing everything into the same frequency range instead of giving music a dynamic range... I know thats a little off topic, but it really burns me when I know how much better everything we listen to could sound if mixers and engineers really wanted it to. I can't wait to hear the new Indiana Jones movie for this reason. George Lucas and Steven Spielberg never skimp on sound, which so many movies do.


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## cartrivision (Jul 25, 2007)

inkahauts said:


> As Tom mentioned, if they are receiving programing already compressed in MPEG-4 HD from some carriers, then that probably is some of the best quality signal, because broadcasters are more concerned about PQ than providers, in general. I am really looking forward to the additional HBO channels, because they are supposed to all be delivered to Directv in MPEG-4, so it will be interesting to see if they appear to be better in color and clarity than other channels.


All of the 4 current HD HBO/MAX channels that DirecTV carries are already available from HBO in the new MPEG4 version, so except for ch 501 (HBO-East) which DirecTV still broadcasts in MPEG2, what you see on the other 3 HBO/MAX channels is the new stuff that's all MPEG4 starting from HBO's feed through DirecTV's broadcast.


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## Artwood (May 30, 2006)

Now certainly DirecTV cannot be faulted if the original product that they receive is already compressed but does anyone know the answer to this question:

What would be the maximum amount of channels that DirecTV could carry if they added no additional compression to anything that they received?


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## veryoldschool (Dec 10, 2006)

Artwood said:


> Now certainly DirecTV cannot be faulted if the original product that they receive is already compressed but does anyone know the answer to this question:
> 
> What would be the maximum amount of channels that DirecTV could carry if they added no additional compression to anything that they received?


Not a simple question/answer.
First are you asking about the older MPEG-2 channels/SATs or the new MPEG-4 channels/SATs?
How are you counting channels? Does a west coast local count and an east coast local [being 2], or are you counting only national channels?
HD, SD, or?


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## Artwood (May 30, 2006)

i'm saying include all channels--MPEG 2 and MPEG 4--count them any way you want to count them--whatever way is larger.

What I'm trying to get a handle on is how many more channels does DirecTV NET by resorting to additional compressing?

Is what they NET more valuable to them than a smaller number of non compressed channels would be?

Exactly how many people out there CARE about the 250th through 300th most low rez channels?

And as more and more people buy HD sets won't the amount of people who CARE about those low rez and/or compressed channels drop even further?

Do people really want to buy HD sets to get NET(after compression) ED quality?


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## Tom Robertson (Nov 15, 2005)

Artwood said:


> Now certainly DirecTV cannot be faulted if the original product that they receive is already compressed but does anyone know the answer to this question:
> 
> What would be the maximum amount of channels that DirecTV could carry if they added no additional compression to anything that they received?


This project is way more effort than I'd like to get into. To be done correctly, you'd have to research each channel and their characteristic; find out how much bandwidth is used for: 1) guide data, firmware updates, transponder and channel maps, and transponder indexes; exactly how many spotbeams there are; etc.

I have projects that I find are far more interesting in mind. At this point, if this is something you really want answered, I suggest you might want to do the homework, as it's not as trivial as 32 transponders * Chan/transponders = Total number unfortunately.

Cheers,
Tom


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## Artwood (May 30, 2006)

How about just an informed speculative guess?

Would there be a 10% decrease in channels--20% decrease in channels--50% decrease in channels?

What I'm tring to quantify is just how many EXTRA channels do we gain at the expense of down rezzing and compression--both of SD channels and HD channels whether they be MPEG 2 or MPEG 4.

I think the real reason you don't see the answer to this question other than a nebulous reply of--oh people want more channels and the providers are simply giving them what they want--they have to compress and down rezz--is simple.

I believe that there are economic forces that are involved with the providers that are also involved with Blu-Ray Discs.

They know that if HD is not compressed or down rezzed that many will be quite content to watch movies on the premium channels and not BUY discs.

COMPRESSION and down rezzing have everything to do with MONEY--and more money can be made if there are three distinct levels--SD so bad that few will watch it so people will buy HD sets--but HD not good enough to threaten Blu-Ray sales!

With that model the maximum amount of money is made.

I guarantee you that Hollywood would much rather people BUY a Blu-Ray disc than see the same movie with great HD QUALITY non compressed and in a non downrezzed fashion on the premium channels.

I just lament the fact that the greater that HD sets IMPROVE in quality--the more that HD quality suffers from the satellite companies and the cable companies.

That doesn't make sense--it does make sense if the object is to eventually sell Blu-Ray discs.

The only way the tide gets reversed is if FIOS or others like FIOS are successful with a non down rezzed non compressed model.

You know what will happen next don't you--FIOS will be bought out in a few years so that the DIFFERENCE between HD as seen on satellite and HD as seen on a disc can be maintained!

I hope that I'm wrong.

Anyone want to bet right now if resolution will improve during the next 2 years on MPEG4 channels?

Anyone want to bet now if HD will ever look anything remotely like it did before the down rezz degradation scam commenced?

I say HD will never look as good.

Anyone here want to make the argument that HD will look better than it did before ADDITIONAL compression?

Wake me up when that happens!

And the problem is not just HD--I think it is absolutely pathetic that the cheapest SD set in the world hooked up with rabbitt ears will give you a much better picture OTA than SD on DISH, DirecTV, or the cable companies.

How is that progress?


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## Koz (Sep 16, 2006)

You postulate that HD on Directv is downrezzed to promote Blu Ray. This begs the question, how does Directv benefit?


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## BattleZone (Nov 13, 2007)

Artwood said:


> I hope that I'm wrong.
> 
> Anyone want to bet right now if resolution will improve during the next 2 years on MPEG4 channels?
> 
> ...


For the most part, I'd say you're mistaken.

DirecTV did a LOT of testing to see what kind of results they would get with various levels of MPEG4 compression before they concluded that they could fit 4-6 channels per MPEG4 transponder (high-motion content, such as most sports, which doesn't compress as well, gets more bandwidth and therefore fewer channels per transponder). The goal was to maintain a realistic level of quality, and most would agree that they've done that.

I seriously doubt that you'll see them down-rez or further compress their content to cram more channels per transponder. The limits and results are pretty well understood at this point.

Is it ever going to be as good as a Blu-Ray? Of course not; but that's because the technical limitations of satellite broadcasting, and the need to transmit more than a handful of channels, means that no broadcaster is going to have the bandwidth that you can get from a local source. It isn't a Hollywood conspiracy, but technical limitations.

Besides, being an installer/owner who has been in several thousand homes to deal with TV, I would estimate that far less than 1% of sat TV subscribers have *ANY* level of dedicated theater room or even have a system capable of proper Dolby Digital 5.1 reproduction. The vast, vast majority of people watch TV, and even DVD/Blu-Rays, pretty casually, often in a less-than-optimal viewing position and listening to the built-in TV speakers. Satellite HD is *plenty* good enough for the masses, even when cropped, down-rezzed, and on MPEG2. But most of them will still buy movies on disc for the convenience factor, as well as the "ownership" factor.

And enthusiests will always buy the best source available, and will spend the money and dedicate the space to get as close to the full theater experience as possible. But they are a tiny fraction of the subscriber base, so pleasing them, while important, isn't as vital to the providers as some would wish.


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## cartrivision (Jul 25, 2007)

Artwood said:


> How about just an informed speculative guess?
> 
> Would there be a 10% decrease in channels--20% decrease in channels--50% decrease in channels?
> 
> What I'm tring to quantify is just how many EXTRA channels do we gain at the expense of down rezzing and compression--both of SD channels and HD channels whether they be MPEG 2 or MPEG 4.


I hate to break it to you, but you are looking for something that you are never going to get. There are just too many variables, and much of the data as it applies specifically to DirecTV is not public information, so I doubt that anyone is going to take the time to try to gather enough data even to give you this "informed speculative guess" that you are now willing to accept. If it's important enough to you to find out in general what the various trade-offs are with different levels of compression and other data reduction techniques, you are probably going to have to do that research yourself.


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## cartrivision (Jul 25, 2007)

Koz said:


> You postulate that HD on Directv is downrezzed to promote Blu Ray. This begs the question, how does Directv benefit?


Good point, but then, nothing about this guy's original question or any of his follow-ups has shown that he even has even the most basic understanding of the concepts that he is trying to discuss&#8230;. and that's before we even get to some of his really illogical theories that he wants to apply the concepts to.

He strikes me as a community college student who came up with a really bad hypothesis in preparation for writing a research paper, who came here looking for data to support his flawed basis for his paper.


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## Koz (Sep 16, 2006)

I think the whole thing is a conspiracy of the Pentaverate.


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## Jeremy W (Jun 19, 2006)

longrider said:


> Ihave heard SD is taken to 480x480 but I dont know that for a fact.


You are correct, and I do know that for a fact.


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## Artwood (May 30, 2006)

I think there are many people that post at this forum who would be able to make an informed speculative guess and will not do so because they support the satellite industry--how pathetic!

Don't tell me that the know it alls and genuises who decry my lack of knowledge don't know the answers.

You know DirecTV would not go out of buisness if such truth were admitted--course it wouldn't be good PR that's for sure--and I'm sure for the industry plants here that is all that matters.

Exactly how may people are brave enough here to say that COMPRESSED HD really and truely does and forever will suck?

It doesn't take intelligence to SEE that--does it take intelligence to OBFUSCATE that truth?

Exactly how much INTELLIGENCE does it take to argue that 480X480 is great picture quality?

Exactly how much intelligence does it take to POSTULATE that the LOWEST COMMON DENOMINATOR of acceptable performance is something we should applaud and celebrate?

hip hip hooray--DirecTV makes money by performing minimally acceptable performance--let's be gald that Joe-Six pack doesn't mind--I mean who cares about QUALITY anyway--isn't all that really matters is whether the satellite preoviders make money or not--and as long as they do isn't anyone who questions that the problem around here? 

What I want to know is how does anyone ever get to that mindset?


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## Koz (Sep 16, 2006)

EDIT: I see you've updated your post while I responded. I don't have time right now to read your edit, so my comments may or may not make sense. Maybe I'll have a chance later.



Artwood said:


> I think there are many people that post at this forum who would be able to make an informed speculative guess and will not do so because they support the satellite industry--how pathetic!
> 
> Don't tell me that the know it alls and genuisses who decry my lack of knowledge don't know the answers.
> 
> You know DirecTV would not go out of buisness if such truth were admitted--course it wouldn't be good PR that's for sure--and I'm sure for the industry plants here that is all that matters.


While there are a number of Directv people who frequent and post here, the vast majority of posters here do not have any connection with Directv except as a customer and through this website. The tricky thing about getting the data you're looking for is getting the MPEG4 data onto a computer for analysis. This was done a while ago in great detail with MPEG2, but I haven't seen anything like this for MPEG4. Additionally, as was explained to you above, there is no set compression percentage for each channel. It gets adjusted constantly, on-the-fly, based on what's on the screen an how much data is necessary at that given time.



Artwood said:


> Exactly how may people are brave enough here to say that COMPRESSED HD really and truely does and forever will suck?


I'm sure 100% of people here would agree with you.



Artwood said:


> It doesn't take intelligence to SEE that--does it take intelligence to OBFUSCATE that truth?


I don't understand what you think is being hidden. The only people who would have the information you are looking for are Directv employees, and I'm sure this is competitive information they are not going to give out for fear of losing their jobs. I'm sure you can see their point of view on this issue. It would be like Colonel Sanders giving out his recipe for chicken.

Now I'm sure a lot of people around here would be interested in this data if you want to volunteer to purchase all the hardware, write some programs from scratch, do all the analysis, and write back in a few months when you are done. I'm not trying to joke, this is a major undertaking. But no one has done it yet, and that's why you aren't getting the answer you're looking for. No one's hiding anything. The data just doesn't exist outside of Directv.


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## cartrivision (Jul 25, 2007)

Artwood said:


> I think there are many people that post at this forum who would be able to make an informed speculative guess and will not do so because they support the satellite industry--how pathetic!
> 
> Don't tell me that the know it alls and genuises who decry my lack of knowledge don't know the answers.
> 
> ...


I guess that you are just too advanced for us. You might try the following web site since you have everyone here stumped:

www.mensa.org

Good luck with your research, and sorry that we couldn't help you. :wave:


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## Tom Robertson (Nov 15, 2005)

Artwood said:


> I think there are many people that post at this forum who would be able to make an informed speculative guess and will not do so because they support the satellite industry--how pathetic!
> 
> Don't tell me that the know it alls and genuises who decry my lack of knowledge don't know the answers.
> 
> ...


You're general tone does not encourage me to help you do your homework that you refuse to do. If you don't want to do it, asking someone else to, using this type of argument ain't gonna cut it for most people.

And to your specific comment, ALL hd is compressed. ALL. Every bit you ever see, unless you are directly watching right off the camera. So I will not say "COMPRESSED HD really and truly does and forever suck", that is not correct in the least. Every Blu-ray or HD-DVD disk, every OTA transmission, every premium channel as they uplink to DIRECTV or cable service. They ALL are compressed; there isn't enough bandwidth to send raw 1080i data from point to point. And it wouldn't fit on a Blu-ray disk.

So before you continue to insult my intelligence, please be sure of what you are seeking.

Regards,
Tom


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## dduitsman (Dec 8, 2007)

Artwood said:


> I think there are many people that post at this forum who would be able to make an informed speculative guess and will not do so because they support the satellite industry--how pathetic!
> 
> ...You know DirecTV would not go out of buisness if such truth were admitted--course it wouldn't be good PR that's for sure--and I'm sure for the industry plants here that is all that matters.


So we lack integrity.



Artwood said:


> Don't tell me that the know it alls and genuises who decry my lack of knowledge don't know the answers.


So we're closed and secretive.



Artwood said:


> Exactly how may people are brave enough here to say that COMPRESSED HD really and truely does and forever will suck?


So the "Enlightened" (like yourself) really know that compression is BAD - not a technical tool to effectively use bandwidth.



Artwood said:


> It doesn't take intelligence to SEE that--does it take intelligence to OBFUSCATE that truth?
> 
> Exactly how much INTELLIGENCE does it take to argue that 480X480 is great picture quality?
> 
> Exactly how much intelligence does it take to POSTULATE that the LOWEST COMMON DENOMINATOR of acceptable performance is something we should applaud and celebrate?


So we're dumb.

That is one *ugly* post Artwood. Wake up and smell what you're shovelling!

dd


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## cartrivision (Jul 25, 2007)

Koz said:


> Artwood said:
> 
> 
> > Exactly how may people are brave enough here to say that COMPRESSED HD really and truely does and forever will suck?
> ...


No we won't , so I would suggest not speaking for everyone else here. There are infinite variations in the possible methods and levels of compression, and a blanket statement like Atwood's statement above is absurd, nonsensical, and false on it's face.


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## veryoldschool (Dec 10, 2006)

This thread has been heading for a train wreck from the start. I think it's finally come.


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## Interceptor (Jul 20, 2007)

I agree, VOS. 


Artwood:
I cannot understand why this makes so much difference to you. Whether it's no compression or a lot of compression, it's just a bunch of numbers. If it doesn't look good to you, it doesn't matter how much or how little compression there is. Most of my channels look very good on my TV. Some better than others. If it looks horrible on your TV, maybe it's time to buy a better TV instead of trying to insult the guys on this board, or at least pick something else to do your thesis on.

This thread is dying a quick death.


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## Tom Robertson (Nov 15, 2005)

If I might comment about the thread itself, tho I'd rather talk about DBS; Artwood certainly has a right to his opinions and express them here so long as he follows the rules and basic politeness. 

While it doesn't appear this thread will serve much of a technical purpose, if there are members who wish to converse in this thread fair enough. Otherwise, it will just move on automatically. 

Cheers,
Tom


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## Artwood (May 30, 2006)

I wish one DUMB argument would cease here forever.

It goes something like this: since everything in the universe is COMPRESSED--categorizing ANY DirecTV COMPRESSION in a negative light is unfair.

Isn't that as DUMB as saying that since even NATURAL pollution exists on planet Earth in SOME AMOUNT then categorizing pollution by any particular entity in a negative light is also unfair?

Look--I can sympathize with anyone who believes that DirecTV degrades picture quality no more or no less than anyone else.

What I don't get is ANYONE who takes it personally when anyone QUESTIONS DirecTV's compression or lack thereof?

And while it is true that there are some DirecTV empoyees who may have inside knowledge of DirecTV's compression schemes and might be justly concerned about losing their jobs if they divulged them--

Just don't believe that it would be corporate espionage if such things were divulged or that recently retired people from DirecTV might actually posses such knowledge and are welcome to divulge it here.

In any case it's not like me a solitary poster will influence a company the size of DirecTV to change their use of compression to less compression.

Everytime however that a joe Six Pack who doesn't know about the existence of compression learns about it--who knows--maybe within the life of the universe there will actually be a LESSENING of Compression.

Some men see the COMPRESSED world of satellite and ask why?

I dream NON COMPRESSED dreams that are forbidden to be spoken of here and ask Why not?

Looks like the only thing practically I can do is purchase an HDMI cable and watch only MPEG 4 
HD.

Sorry if I offended some of you DirecTV fans--I'm a fan too--I watch it everyday--I just miss the LESS compressed days. Does anyone here miss them, too?


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## Jeremy W (Jun 19, 2006)

Artwood said:


> I wish one DUMB argument would cease here forever.
> 
> It goes something like this: since everything in the universe is COMPRESSED--categorizing ANY DirecTV COMPRESSION in a negative light is unfair.


Who is making that argument? I certainly haven't seen it in this thread. You're just coming up with straw men so that you have something to argue about.


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## Tom Robertson (Nov 15, 2005)

Artwood said:


> I wish one DUMB argument would cease here forever.
> 
> It goes something like this: since everything in the universe is COMPRESSED--categorizing ANY DirecTV COMPRESSION in a negative light is unfair.
> 
> ...


My point is I'm disturbed by your (ab)use of the term COMPRESSION. If what you are really hoping for is excellent picture quality by proper use of compression, I'm all over that.

Are some of the SD channels lacking for picture quality? Yes, I think so. 
Is it a big deal for me? Not really, I'm really happy with the HD channels and watching less SD.

Are some of the HD channels lacking for picture quality? That is a mixed answer for me. I do think the HR2x family of receivers do a better job of massaging the video outputs for the MPEG2 HD channels that are somewhat overcompressed and "hd-lite".

The MPEG4 hd channels are very good for the most part. Most of the issues I see, I feel are really at the origination side of things, not the DIRECTV side. And I am still willing to give everyone a PASS because MPEG4 as used by both the sources and DIRECTV is very new in this use. Everyone is still figuring out how to make things work and then how to make things look good.

And MGM and Smithsonian look great! Excellent preprocessing of the signal does work as shown by these two leaders. HBO is on the way; they look good most of the time.

So I guess I'm not as dissatisfied as you seem to be. Things are getting better; I'm happy about that. 

Cheers,
Tom


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## gregjones (Sep 20, 2007)

OK, I am going to assume that some of the statements have come from ignorance and not malice. I agree that the tone of the OP was questionable from the outset.

Correction 1:
Compression does not necessarily result in loss of picture quality. I know this seems counterintuitive, but it is correct. If you remove repetitive patterns from being retransmitted, you can get the same picture at the other end. MPEG4 specifically has a lower picture degradation for the same bandwidth savings. In other words the same segment can be (for example only) 22% less bandwidth in MPEG4 than MPEG2.

This means that the MPEG4 sample is MORE compressed. It does not have lower picture quality because the end product is the same.

If you approach this from the opposite end, an MPEG2 segment of X size would have 24% (again, example) less picture quality versus an MPEG4 segment of the same size. This means that they have equal compression (copmressed size/original size) but different picture quality (percentage of pixels from source that match after decompression).



Now, I assume the OP is trying to make a point along the lines of the following: Fewer channels with better quality would be a better package. This is an a la carte proponent belief. "If we were not carrying all of these insignificant channels, the good channels would look better." Those insignificant channels often absorb costs and subsidize content on more high-profile channels.

I would prefer the OP make his point and ask us to verify it instead of the shell game.


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## Tom Robertson (Nov 15, 2005)

gregjones, well said!

Another example, compressing files on a computer is lossless and we do that all the time. MPEG4 video compression can be completely lossless at a sufficient bitrate for the content. (A talking head with little movement needs very little data; a high action sporting scene needs a lot more.) 

Cheers,
Tom


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## Xzisted (Feb 12, 2007)

Artwood said:


> I don't care if every single medium in the history of the world is compressed--I'd like to know which channels on DirectTV are compressed the LEAST.
> 
> Is it possible for such a question to be answered? Are every one of the channels compressed exactly the same?
> 
> ...


Unfortunately, it fluctuates. Consider the fact that DirecTV currently has somewhere in the neighborhood of 100 HD channels. In order to create bandwidth for things such as HD March Madness and Baseball, you have to 'steal' bandwith from somewhere to 'create' bandwidth to distribute those. SD or HD this has always been the case. This is not to say that DirecTV does not keep some bandwidth in reserve in order to provide these services, but occasionally they DO run into situations where they may need to compress a channel or so a bit more than they normally would in order to create room where they need it.

I don't know the internals of DirecTV and how they go about selecting which channels get compressed. What I do know is that during MM this year, when it started there would be up to four games on at one time and they would not look that 'great'. A quick comparison between the 7xx channels for four games and when they were only running 1 on the 7xx channel supports the idea that they compressed a bit more when all four were on, but when only one game was on it got the least amount of compression they offered. Just to note that the first round Duke game was the last to start of the four that were on. The quality of the first 3/4 of the game was pretty marginal. However, when the other three games ended, the quality jumped QUITE noticeably.

Now to another part of your question. When DirecTV compresses a channel, they are not affecting its resolution. All the channels operate on their proper resolutions all the time. What they ARE changing would be the compression settings and bitrate. By increasing compression they are throwing out more info in the picture, which reduces picture QUALITY, but not resolution. It is however much more noticeable on a large screen.

Hope this helps.


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## Xzisted (Feb 12, 2007)

gregjones said:


> OK, I am going to assume that some of the statements have come from ignorance and not malice. I agree that the tone of the OP was questionable from the outset.
> 
> Correction 1:
> Compression does not necessarily result in loss of picture quality. I know this seems counterintuitive, but it is correct. If you remove repetitive patterns from being retransmitted, you can get the same picture at the other end. MPEG4 specifically has a lower picture degradation for the same bandwidth savings. In other words the same segment can be (for example only) 22% less bandwidth in MPEG4 than MPEG2.
> ...


To a large degree this is all correct. However this is assuming that a one size fits all approach will work for everything. I will say again that I do NOT know the specifics of how DirecTV is doing their compression, but I do ALOT of compression on my own and know the trade offs.

gregjones is correct in stating that you can achieve the same quality between MPEG2 and MPEG4. I would like to expand upon the issue a bit though. DirecTV I believe changes the tuning of their bandwidth in regards to content. For instance, if I were to compress two movies, lets say Transformers and A Few Good Men, with a CBR (constant bit rate) of say 1500 I would get two movies that occupy about the same space in megabytes, but would look INCREDIBLY different. The reason for this is that AFGM is a very static and stationary movie. Much of the background in the scenes is the same (courtroom, basketball court, apartment). So it compresses better at a lower bit rate because there is alot more repetition to be thrown out. However Transformers would look down right awful. The background is constantly changing and there is very little to no repetition from frame to frame. Obvious blocking and pixelation would occur as well.

Instead of that DirecTV probably uses a finely tuned VBR (variable bit rate) for their compression. Using VBR would cause two movies such as this to have wildly different file sizes even though the time length of each movie is roughly equal. However the quality of the movies could be very much the same in regards to picture quality. Using a VBR you can encode two very different movies like this and the more 'busy' movie with less frame repetition would have alot more b-frames but a much larger file size. But thats getting way further than i would like to into the compression.

So how does this affect DirecTV in regards to the bandwidth they allocate to their channels. Well, greatly and not that much. What it means is that, depending on content, DirecTV can change the available bandwidth for each channel ad hoc, and it probably wont affect the quality of that channel. For instance, if they took a look at the MAXIMUM amount of bandwidth used in any movie on HBO over 24 hours, they can lower the available bandwidth available to HBO to that maximum or just a little higher and you would never know, because it wouldnt affect the quality of any of the movies at all. They could then reallocate that bandwidth they saved as needed to somewhere else.

So in most instances you will never notice a loss in quality on any of their channels in regards to compression. Most often I find it is the SOURCE of the transmission that is the problem rather than DirecTV. A comparison of OTA channel 2 and DirecTV channel 2 (CBS here in LA) when I am noticing a sloppy picture tells me that, even though one is MPEG-2 (OTA) and one is MPEG-4 (DirecTV)

Sorry for the rambling but I just wanted to clear up some misconceptions about compression.


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## gregjones (Sep 20, 2007)

Xzisted said:


> To a large degree this is all correct. However this is assuming that a one size fits all approach will work for everything. I will say again that I do NOT know the specifics of how DirecTV is doing their compression, but I do ALOT of compression on my own and know the trade offs.
> 
> gregjones is correct in stating that you can achieve the same quality between MPEG2 and MPEG4. I would like to expand upon the issue a bit though. DirecTV I believe changes the tuning of their bandwidth in regards to content. For instance, if I were to compress two movies, lets say Transformers and A Few Good Men, with a CBR (constant bit rate) of say 1500 I would get two movies that occupy about the same space in megabytes, but would look INCREDIBLY different. The reason for this is that AFGM is a very static and stationary movie. Much of the background in the scenes is the same (courtroom, basketball court, apartment). So it compresses better at a lower bit rate because there is alot more repetition to be thrown out. However Transformers would look down right awful. The background is constantly changing and there is very little to no repetition from frame to frame. Obvious blocking and pixelation would occur as well.
> 
> ...


Replace the word segment in my previous post with "maximum bitrate" and it still holds true. They manage to a fixed maximum bitrate across the board. This results in individual channels working with a VBR method. The sum of the VBRs for all channels cannot exceed the maximum bitrate. With some channels getting priority, their VBR would be less impacted in the case of contention.


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## Artwood (May 30, 2006)

What MPEG 4 HD channels would be more likely to be compressed the most to where one could actually see a difference in picture quality?

I agree that Smithsonian and MGM movies look great.

If you had to pick two or three MPEG 4 HD channels that would look worse than any others which would they be?

Another question: usually do OTA locals look better than locals received on DirecTV or is that a question that will vary much by location?

My personal experience has been that DirecTV may look slightly less detailed thanDISH but DirecTV's overall Picture qulaity is much better in terms of color saturation and color fidelity.

What would account for this? Would it vary in different locations?

I just think DirecTV has better looking COLOR.

One other question: I can easily see that MPEG 2 HD channels seem to have more detail than HD 4 channels such as ESPN for example/

Should the difference indeed be noticeable?

I have a Panasonic plasma-- a 60u model.

most of the time i have all the video noise and other filters and other filters turned off but occasionally a channel will look better with them on.

I am able to run the sharpness control at maximum setting on most channels without the picture looking bad--that to me proves that DirecTV offers a mostly noiseless picture if not always the most detailed one.

Overall I would pick DirecTV over DISH--i just miss the days when Voom channels were not compressed on DISH.

Nowadays I think that maybe direcTV is doing compression better than DISH?

Does that make sense?


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## Xzisted (Feb 12, 2007)

Artwood said:


> What MPEG 4 HD channels would be more likely to be compressed the most to where one could actually see a difference in picture quality?
> 
> If you had to pick two or three MPEG 4 HD channels that would look worse than any others which would they be?


My experience has shown that add on packages are the first to get compressed more such as March Madness, NHL Center Ice. This is just my experience though.



> Another question: usually do OTA locals look better than locals received on DirecTV or is that a question that will vary much by location?


I find that they look identical for the most part. I have done side by side direct comparisons and the only thing I see is a minor delay on the DirecTV side. What I do see is that when there are artifacts on my OTA....I get artifacts on my DirecTV just seconds later (due to the delay)



> My personal experience has been that DirecTV may look slightly less detailed thanDISH but DirecTV's overall Picture qulaity is much better in terms of color saturation and color fidelity.
> 
> What would account for this? Would it vary in different locations?
> 
> I just think DirecTV has better looking COLOR.


Encoding and bitrate could both cause that effect.



> One other question: I can easily see that MPEG 2 HD channels seem to have more detail than HD 4 channels such as ESPN for example/
> 
> Should the difference indeed be noticeable?
> 
> ...


Strangely I find that sometimes, people mistake noise for detail. Terms like detail, clarity, etc. are often interchanged when they shouldn't be. Quite honestly I think people should refrain from using them unless they can do a DIRECT comparison to the source. That being said, in regards to ESPN MP2/MP4, the pictures look slightly different, but I cannot tell which is closer to the source, and therefore a better picture, without doing a side by side comparison. I can do this between my DVDs and compressed files I have created with mencoder to make sure I am getting the picture I want when I back them up. I spend alot of time doing each one to make sure I have exactly what I want.


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## Interceptor (Jul 20, 2007)

Artwood said:


> If you had to pick two or three MPEG 4 HD channels that would look worse than any others which would they be?
> 
> Another question: usually do OTA locals look better than locals received on DirecTV or is that a question that will vary much by location?


Since you and I are in the same area, I'll put it this way:

Example...
Golf on CBS-42 looks excellent. I couldn't detect a difference in the feed from DirecTV and OTA.
Golf on NBC-13 is horrible. Neither the DirecTV feed nor OTA were better.
These were just examples of previous shows where I noticed a huge difference.

OTOH, I find that the studio shots on NBC-13HD look great. Some of their "field" shots look terrible, even on the HD cameras. Can't explain that. 
I normally watch ABC33-40 for news, but checked out NBC-13 after they went HD for their local news. If you get a chance, take a look at one of their newscasts, and you'll see what I mean. The studio shots look great, but sometimes in the field the reporters are noticeably less detailed. Might be specific cameras, but I feel it's more of a field-to-studio link that may be short of bandwidth causing it.

Also, I can't remember which, one of the local stations is still uplinking their signal to DirecTV via OTA link versus a fiber optic one. Seems like I read that on one of the other boards.


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## Xzisted (Feb 12, 2007)

Interceptor said:


> Might be specific cameras, but I feel it's more of a field-to-studio link that may be short of bandwidth causing it.


That would be it. My girlfriend is a field producer and she said some of the uplinks cant provide enough bandwidth to transmit the full HD picture live. Recorded feeds are typically much better because they can take the time to upload the source video to the studio.


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## Tom Robertson (Nov 15, 2005)

One note to clarify right away. There isn't an MPEG4 ESPN or ESPN2. They are only in MPEG2 in all both locations. ESPNews is the only MPEG4 ESPN channel today.

At some point, the MPEG2 HD channels _will_ be mirrored as MPEG4, but they are not yet.

So the side by sides you are seeing are the exact same data stream.

Cheers,
Tom


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## Xzisted (Feb 12, 2007)

Tom Robertson said:


> One note to clarify right away. There isn't an MPEG4 ESPN or ESPN2. They are only in MPEG2 in all both locations. ESPNews is the only MPEG4 ESPN channel today.
> 
> At some point, the MPEG2 HD channels _will_ be mirrored as MPEG4, but they are not yet.
> 
> ...


I have never compared the ESPN HD's side by side. I have just flipped between the two. When you do that you cant really get a comparison, you can only go on what your mind sees. It may have seemed a bit different at the time. The only stuff i have DIRECTLY compared side by side are the OTA Local HD's and the DirecTV Locals, and I can't really see a difference except for the delay.


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## Tom Robertson (Nov 15, 2005)

Xzisted said:


> I have never compared the ESPN HD's side by side. I have just flipped between the two. When you do that you cant really get a comparison, you can only go on what your mind sees. It may have seemed a bit different at the time. The only stuff i have DIRECTLY compared side by side are the OTA Local HD's and the DirecTV Locals, and I can't really see a difference except for the delay.


My point is the two are the same data feed (and MPEG2), no matter if you tried side by side or flip back and forth. 

In theory I can do side by side, but I'd be comparing two uncalibrated inputs on my TV more than two channels.

Regarding OTA vs. via DIRECTV vs. cable, the last time I looked (18 months ago) I could tell a very small difference between OTA and DIRECTV on fast action Football. There was a tiny amount of sparkles on fast pans around the field via DIRECTV. (Even more, by another tiny amount, on cable.)

Last year I didn't do a full comparison again. My impression is that DIRECTV tuned and tweaked their encoders (which I happen to know they have been doing) and the differences are even smaller--if they exist at all. One of these days I'll try to find suitable content for another comparison.

Cheers,
Tom


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## Artwood (May 30, 2006)

I swear I see a difference between ESPN with the channel number in the 70s and ESPN on channel number 206.

Is that possible? Would anything account for that? The difference I see is slight.


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## Xzisted (Feb 12, 2007)

Tom Robertson said:


> My point is the two are the same data feed (and MPEG2), no matter if you tried side by side or flip back and forth.
> 
> In theory I can do side by side, but I'd be comparing two uncalibrated inputs on my TV more than two channels.
> 
> ...


Yeah, the side by side I did was watching the same exact episode of Jericho and freeze framing it on time stamp between my two HR20s on my two samsung 40" 1080p tv's side by side. I couldnt tell a difference at all. I had both TV's set to the same exact parameters.

As far as the ESPN's go, that speaks for itself. The same data is the same data, whether you are flipping between channel 70 something and 204. I could have been put off of the picture due to the flicker in the screen I get every time I change a channel.


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## Interceptor (Jul 20, 2007)

Artwood said:


> I swear I see a difference between ESPN with the channel number in the 70s and ESPN on channel number 206.
> 
> Is that possible? Would anything account for that? The difference I see is slight.


Tom's right. They can and do map channels virtually. That's why The 101 can be seen on 101, 334, and 800. They also do it with some of the "How to" channels they provide and even Game Lounge channels, if I'm not mistaken. Luckily, it only uses one stream.

So, to answer your question... Heck no, I don't see any reason you might be seeing a slightly different quality.


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## Jeremy W (Jun 19, 2006)

Artwood said:


> I swear I see a difference between ESPN with the channel number in the 70s and ESPN on channel number 206.
> 
> Is that possible? Would anything account for that? The difference I see is slight.


It's the human mind, seeing what it wants to see. They are bit for bit exactly the same, there is no difference.


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## Artwood (May 30, 2006)

Is it possible that the receiver does not exactly output to my set the exact same bits that it receives?

I'm not saying the streams are different--I'm asking if it is possible that the box might not output them exactly the same on the two different channels?

Would you bet your life that the receiver was functioning perfectly to do that?


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## Tom Robertson (Nov 15, 2005)

Artwood said:


> Is it possible that the receiver does not exactly output to my set the exact same bits that it receives?
> 
> I'm not saying the streams are different--I'm asking if it is possible that the box might not output them exactly the same on the two different channels?
> 
> Would you bet your life that the receiver was functioning perfectly to do that?


Somehow this doesn't seem to be a big enough issue to "bet my life" upon.


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## gregjones (Sep 20, 2007)

Artwood said:


> Is it possible that the receiver does not exactly output to my set the exact same bits that it receives?
> 
> I'm not saying the streams are different--I'm asking if it is possible that the box might not output them exactly the same on the two different channels?
> 
> Would you bet your life that the receiver was functioning perfectly to do that?


The only difference is the channel number itself. I cannot think of a way for the receiver to differentiate any quality between the two. Aside from the actual tuning to that channel, there is no difference between them.


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## Jeremy W (Jun 19, 2006)

Artwood said:


> I'm not saying the streams are different--I'm asking if it is possible that the box might not output them exactly the same on the two different channels?


No, it's impossible. Any screwy output by the receiver would be applied equally to both 73 and 206, because as far as the receiver is concerned they are the exact same channel. All of the channel numbers are just pointers to audio and video PIDs on a certain transponder, which is all the receiver cares about.


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## bhelton71 (Mar 8, 2007)

How many licks to get to the center of a Tootsie-Pop ?
Is 720p uncompressed ? 

Just to preface: This is just my opinion but I believe it is a very real possibility 720p is compressed.

Down at the hometown 720p station:

720P system:
1280 pixels x 720 lines
59.94 fields/s, 29.97 frames/s

Studio is 4:2:2 60fps
Transmission is 4:2:0 30fps


At the studio
720P 4:2:2, 10 bit 60 Hz	== 1.1 Gbps	

Convert to 8 bit
720P 4:2:2, 8 bit 60 Hz	== 883.85 Mbps	

Convert to 30Hz
720P 4:2:0, 8 bit 30 Hz	== 331.55 Mbps	

So the at the end of the step 1 - 331.55 Mbps


Well we have an artifacting problem already: 10-bit video yields 1023 levels - 8-bit video is a maximum 254 video levels so the conversion from 10-bit to 8-bit can be assumed to have already introduced rounding errors that will result in contour banding.

Now we know they don't send out 331.55 Mbps - but we will blissfully continue along anyway - how you would get that onto a satellite? 

Disclaimer:Not trying to be exacting here - the real sat gurus should feel more than free to correct as needed .

Kindof working backwards to get some sort of satellite capacity number: We believe the MPEG4 streams are around 8 Mbps and that approx 5 of those channels are on each transponder. So very conservatively I am guessing 40Mbps per TX. And I believe the number of CONUS transponders is around 75 so total = 3.0 Gbps using my guesstimates.

For perspective: we can theoretically fit 2 studio grade 720P channels on the entire satellite or 1 1080P (2.48 Gbps) studio grade signals. Not really sure if you can split a data stream over multiple transponders - sounds a bit complicated to me - but assuming you can - since we only have 331.55 Mbps video we get 9 whole channels of programming.


Then we come to the golden standard everyone throws around - ATSC: 
The maximum allowed bitrate (not practical - just allowed) of the MPEG-2 video stream is 19.4 Mbps. That is less than 6% of the 331.55 Mbps video bitrate and less than 2% of the original 1.1 Gbps. Thats all without any audio (and forget about 2nd language programs).

In conclusion thats why I think 720p is compressed. Always.

Now we can return to the regularly scheduled thread about compression already in progress...


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## Athlon646464 (Feb 23, 2007)

I've been reading this thread with great interest, and have been learning a great deal. Thank you, you tech gurus.....  

I'd like to offer a different view of the discussion, to come at it from my view (at least as it exists in my reality). :grin: 

My goal in getting D* was to get the best possible picture on the channels I watch (simple goal). I do, however, know that there are always going to be compromises. That's really the issue IMHO - how much of a compromise am I willing to allow.

The reason I put up with any compromise at all BTW, is that it is essentially out of my control, as there are only a few providers available at my address. Other than picket my current provider for better service there is not much I can do if they are still the best deal.

Here is how I answer the how much of a compromise question: when my perceived value of the service is less than what I am willing to pay for, I will go elsewhere.

So - in my mind, even though I get 100's of channels and only watch a small percentage of them - I understand that D* is obviously providing all of those other channels because they need to grow their subscriber base - again, in the end, something out of my control.

So, the real issue is how do I decide which channel to watch? If I want to watch NBC tonight, my choice is OTA , Charter's cable wire analog channel 7, Charter's cable wire HD channel 787, D*'s SD local 7, and D*'s HD local 7. 

The first step in the process is all about content, and the second step is all about quality vs price. I do not chose to watch NBC tonight because they provide the best picture my TV can show, I watch NBC tonight because they have on what I want to see - content nearly always is the deciding factor.

I then will do the smart thing and watch the source with the best PQ, unless it would be too damn expensive for me to watch that source. (In other words, if I could bribe someone in New York to let me into the studio to see the raw 'little compressed' version and it would cost me $10,000, I would not do that.) - I watch the D* feed, BTW-

I agree that we should not allow D* to over do it, and take away quality, but I do understand the compromises they and we have to make.

One thing I never do other than the first week of bringing home new equipment is to watch something by deciding on PQ over content - it's always content over PQ, and I'm willing to pay some for better PQ - but not too much.....

Hope I was clear with my point here. Thanks for allowing me to express my 2c.


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## gregjones (Sep 20, 2007)

To recap:

We have seen that DirecTV is not lowering the resolution of the HD MPEG4 feeds. They are always compressed at the source (all HD signals from the sources are) so the question of whether they are compressed is not applicable. The question has been asked if their resolution or picture quality is lower after MPEG4 compression. Nobody has been able to show any significant degradation in quality on the MPEG4 channels.

This is not the case for the handful of channels that are still MPEG2 (ESPNHD, ESPN2HD, Discovery Theater, HDNet, HDNet Movies, Universal HD, and probably a few others I forget). The quality on the MPEG2 channels is equivalent to most cable providers and Dish for the same channel.

Many believe these will be transitioned to MPEG4 (cloned or moved) after D11 is happily operating. On that timeline I will not speculate. If you want significant improvements on MPEG2 channels, push for the cloning or moving of these channels to MPEG4.


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## Artwood (May 30, 2006)

Does recompression or additional compression exist in the universe or is that an urban legend?


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## P Smith (Jul 25, 2002)

Sure exist; just try to answer to simple question: how stat mux working ? Or ask yourself: local stations taking 10..19 Mbps bandwidth, how to fit 4 or 5 of then into one sat mux with 30...40 Mbps cap?


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## hdtvfan0001 (Jul 28, 2004)

veryoldschool said:


> This thread has been heading for a train wreck from the start. I think it's finally come.





Interceptor said:


> I agree, VOS.
> 
> Artwood:
> I cannot understand why this makes so much difference to you. Whether it's no compression or a lot of compression, it's just a bunch of numbers. If it doesn't look good to you, it doesn't matter how much or how little compression there is. Most of my channels look very good on my TV. Some better than others. If it looks horrible on your TV, maybe it's time to buy a better TV instead of trying to insult the guys on this board, or at least pick something else to do your thesis on.
> ...


I agree with both of you.

Since I tend to be more of a "look at the big picture" kinda guy.... 

The science, technology, and process is interesting, and its impressive just how much a number of folks (especially Tom R. and gregjones) knows on the topic...

But in the end....does it matter how the HD image is produced on your screen?

What really matters is how good image is, not what kind of smoke and mirrors or voodoo is used to get it that way, at least thats my take on it all.

If the HD image is solid, stable, and with great quality, than I really don't care if they use 2 tin cans and string to make it all work, as long as they have enough duct tape around to assure it will stay that way. :lol:


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## P Smith (Jul 25, 2002)

That's right.

All our debates, starting from HD-Lite campaign, have one common major basis: artifacts. Especially macro-blocking.

You can accept softness, but not macro-blocking !


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## Artwood (May 30, 2006)

Is there anything that any Directv subscriber can do to influence Directv to sacrifice numer of channels offered to better picture quality?


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## curt8403 (Dec 27, 2007)

Artwood said:


> Is there anything that any Directv subscriber can do to influence Directv to sacrifice numer of channels offered to better picture quality?


just wait til D11 goes live.


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## gfrang (Aug 30, 2007)

Artwood said:


> Is there anything that any Directv subscriber can do to influence Directv to sacrifice numer of channels offered to better picture quality?


I really don't think so but you can call them and see what they tell you.


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## curt8403 (Dec 27, 2007)

gfrang said:


> I really don't think so but you can call them and see what they tell you.


something like, We are the leader in HD, and you want us to sacrifice some HD channels? Sorry Sir, but if you wait a few months, our signals will get better????


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## BattleZone (Nov 13, 2007)

Artwood said:


> Is there anything that any Directv subscriber can do to influence Directv to sacrifice numer of channels offered to better picture quality?


If you think so, you're dreaming. The vast majority want more HD channels, not less. And the vast majority are plenty satisfied with current HD picture quality. If you had any idea how many people have big HDTVs and pay for HD cable or sat boxes and HD service *but still use a 480i connection or have their resolution set at 480*, you'd be amazed. Yet they are plenty happy until you show them the difference.

DirecTV employs people whose job is specifically to optimize picture quality while maintaining the number of channels per transponder. Part of their job is to keep the encoders tuned, part is to investigate newer, potentially better encoders, and part to work with the networks to pre-compress their programming when possible.

Until you get about 20% of DirecTV's HD subscriber base to cancel, and give "low HD picture quality" as the reason, I wouldn't expect anything to change. Besides, DirecTV is already doing better than most of their competition (Dish's PQ is a little worse, and Comcast's in many areas is horrible despite fewer channels).

We'd all love to have Blu-Ray quality TV on every channel, but given the BILLIONS it costs to launch and maintain satellites, the very limited bandwidth, and the license limits from the FCC and others, DirecTV is going a reasonably good job, and knows it. They are in a leadership position, and are widely recognized as such in the industry. The chances of them changing things to please a handful of subscribers on a web forum? Zero.

If you were a stockholder, with your personal fortune tied up in the company, how would YOU use your limited bandwidth?


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## gfrang (Aug 30, 2007)

Ok its time to answer the OP's question if i am wrong please let me know,don't worry you won't hurt my feelings. Question is 720p uncompressed answer is no.


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## bobnielsen (Jun 29, 2006)

gfrang said:


> Ok its time to answer the OP's question if i am wrong please let me know,don't worry you won't hurt my feelings. Question is 720p uncompressed answer is no.


The question was answered in the first few posts. All MPEG-2 or MPEG-4 channels are compressed, be it OTA, cable or satellite.


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## Mertzen (Dec 8, 2006)

Artwood said:


> Is there anything that any Directv subscriber can do to influence Directv to sacrifice numer of channels offered to better picture quality?


Yup. Pay twice as much for the regular channels so they can boot off the shopping channels and use the bandwith to lower the compression. :hurah:


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## CCarncross (Jul 19, 2005)

Artwood, what are you trying to accomplish with this post?

Are you shopping for a new provider? You can go to many stores and see for yourself what service you think has the best PQ to your own eyes. It seems you are really bogged down in this whole stupid numbers game...


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## Artwood (May 30, 2006)

No I just remember what the premium channels looked like before compression.

I'm under no delusions--if you haven't seen the difference you'll be quite happy with what is offered.

My fear is that the compression will become more--slightly more--done very slowly--and as long as as all providers do it--you'll still hear the same people here defending it.


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## jdspencer (Nov 8, 2003)

Let's all step back and wait for DirecTV to get D11 on line before restarting this discussion. Okay?


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## gfrang (Aug 30, 2007)

Artwood said:


> No I just remember what the premium channels looked like before compression.
> 
> I'm under no delusions--if you haven't seen the difference you'll be quite happy with what is offered.
> 
> My fear is that the compression will become more--slightly more--done very slowly--and as long as as all providers do it--you'll still hear the same people here defending it.


Well what are you talking about analog? No analog is or can be compressed but everything digital that i know of is like sat, ota ,dvd,blu ray is, just a matter of how much and how much you want to pay for service.


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## Tom Robertson (Nov 15, 2005)

Artwood,
I suspect you have never seen an "uncompressed" video feed. They are almost never found outside of a studio. (And tricky to even find in a studio!)

If you are really saying "over compressed" video, that is something quite different.

Hopefully very soon you'll see some bright, crisp less compressed HD on some channels we've known and loved for many years now.

Cheers,
Tom


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## Artwood (May 30, 2006)

Tell me something: have any DirecTV subscribers who post here ever seen in the past channels that were less compressed than what they are now?

Do any of them miss when they were compressed less?

is it OK to miss them?


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## Tom Robertson (Nov 15, 2005)

Answering your questions:
Yes, absolutely.
Yes, absolutely.
Yes, absolutely.

(Note I think I got the order correct.) [Please understand, I am trying to have fun in supporting you; not making fun of you.]

I do remember when all the channels, SD and the one HD, were all very crisp and clear and how over time they became less so.

I also remember how the HR2x family has given me much better picture quality for all the channels. Better output processing?

I'm looking forward to the MPEG2 HD moving to MPEG4 very soon. The better encoders and decoders will return us to excellent PQ (in my opinion.)

Woohoo!

So, yes, I hear you and you are not alone in missing the original PQ. I hope you find the new HD PQ to be all that you hope for--and that your hopes are as high as mine. 

Cheers,
Tom


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## Artwood (May 30, 2006)

I will say this about DirecTV--for every channel that leaves me empty there are other channels that just blow me away.

There is a chance that picture quality over the long term will improve because even as dumb as Joe Six Pack is--even he/she will eventually see the difference that ever improving TVS are capable of providing.


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## Boston Fan (Feb 18, 2006)

Artwood said:


> Would you bet your life that the receiver was functioning perfectly to do that?


Well, not mine...But I'd bet yours!


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## Carl Spock (Sep 3, 2004)

Artwood said:


> There is a chance that picture quality over the long term will improve because even as dumb as Joe Six Pack is--even he/she will eventually see the difference that ever improving TVS are capable of providing.


Artwood, never mis-judge Joe Six Pack. For every clod who thinks his basic cable looks fantastic, there is another guy out there with a belt buckle the size of a dinner plate who can tell you more about video compression than you'd care to know.


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## Artwood (May 30, 2006)

Sometimes I wonder if there is a secret university that has a PhD program in video compression.

Part of the requirements of the program is being able to effectively communicate to the uninformed about how great video compression has been to the DBSTalk community!


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## Jeremy W (Jun 19, 2006)

Artwood said:


> Sometimes I wonder if there is a secret university that has a PhD program in video compression.
> 
> Part of the requirements of the program is being able to effectively communicate to the uninformed about how great video compression has been to the DBSTalk community!


Wow, you just can't get off it, can you?

Take a few seconds and just think about this: without video compression, HD wouldn't even exist for consumers. Everything would still be analog SD. Is that really a tradeoff you'd be willing to make, just so that you wouldn't have to deal with evil video compression?


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## veryoldschool (Dec 10, 2006)

Artwood said:


> Sometimes I wonder if there is a secret university that has a PhD program in video compression.
> 
> Part of the requirements of the program is being able to effectively communicate to the uninformed about how great video compression has been to the DBSTalk community!


It must have been posted here before but:
Uncompressed HD can be over 1 Gb/s, so how do you plan to have it delivered?


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## veryoldschool (Dec 10, 2006)

Jeremy W said:


> Take a few seconds and just think about this: without video compression, HD wouldn't even exist for consumers. Everything would still be analog SD. Is that really a tradeoff you'd be willing to make, just so that you wouldn't have to deal with evil video compression?


Having taken a few seconds: 
Analog HD would take 7 times the bandwidth of one NTSC channel. Since the overall bandwidth is fixed, it would mean only receiving 1/7 of the channels. :nono2:


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## Artwood (May 30, 2006)

Is it possible to distinguish between compression from the original source and additional compression that is ADDED?

Is it a sin to be against the addition?


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## Jeremy W (Jun 19, 2006)

Artwood said:


> Is it possible to distinguish between compression from the original source and additional compression that is ADDED?


So you're OK with compression, depending on who does it? How does that make any sense?


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## veryoldschool (Dec 10, 2006)

Artwood said:


> Is it possible to distinguish between compression from the original source and additional compression that is ADDED?
> Is it a sin to be against the addition?


The "sin" is too much compression, and it doesn't matter who or where it comes from.


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## Tom Robertson (Nov 15, 2005)

Artwood said:


> Is it possible to distinguish between compression from the original source and additional compression that is ADDED?
> 
> Is it a sin to be against the addition?


In my opinion these are the questions you should be asking. Lossless compression, where the picture can be totally restored without any loss whatsoever is good compression--it allows the signal to really be used.

Even lossless can be too much data for some applications, so everyone has to balance extra compression against usability.

So it is not a sin at all to rail against overcompression; whenever the eye detects artifacts or other picture quality problems. Not a sin at all.

At CES 2007, DIRECTV indicated their MPEG4 PQ stood up very well against the original sources. Alas I no longer recall the direct quote, but something to the effect the eye could not tell the difference.

On top of that, I'm fairly certain that DIRECTV has continued to improve picture quality. Or the original sources have. Or both. No matter, I'm pleased at how things look.

Where the MPEG2 HD channels overcompressed? Yup. Depending on the channel from a little to ... well... more than a little. 

Now, as of today, we get to see ALL the HD channels in MPEG4. I'm excited 

Anyway, Artwood, yes, feel free to express your viewpoint. Take a look at the MPEP4 HD channels. If they don't look right (and you've checked your system/TV/etc.), by all means raise the red flag.

Cheers,
Tom


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## Artwood (May 30, 2006)

The MPEG4 channels such as ESPN look ever so slightly better on MPEG4 than MPEG 2.

There is a greater improvement to my eyes from MPEG4 to MPEG 2 with the 1080i channels.

Are my eyes seeing what they're supposed to be seeing?

MGM HD looks fantastic and the other day one of the RSNs--I believe it was MASN looked unbelievable.


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## veryoldschool (Dec 10, 2006)

Artwood said:


> The MPEG4 channels such as ESPN look ever so slightly better on MPEG4 than MPEG 2.
> 
> There is a greater improvement to my eyes from MPEG4 to MPEG 2 with the 1080i channels.
> 
> ...


Could this be "garbage in / garbage out"? If MGM HD looks fantastic with MPEG-4, then "the quality goes in before..."
I would think, the only true comparison would be side by side MPEG-2 - MPEG-4, of the same program and the same time, which for me could only be done with Local HD via OTA and the DirecTV HD.
When I did this:
#1 was OTA
#2 was DirecTV [being vary close but "not the exact same"]
#3 Local cable [a distant third, where "green grass" seen ^ was brown]


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## gfrang (Aug 30, 2007)

gfrang


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## gfrang (Aug 30, 2007)

Artwood said:


> Sometimes I wonder if there is a secret university that has a PhD program in video compression.
> 
> Part of the requirements of the program is being able to effectively communicate to the uninformed about how great video compression has been to the DBSTalk community!


Wassamatta University in Frostbite Falls


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## veryoldschool (Dec 10, 2006)

gfrang said:


> Waasamatta University in Frostbite Falls


:lol:, Now that is old school.


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