# Is the DISH 942 MPEG4 compatible? DISH says yes...



## frogfrog (Oct 13, 2005)

I'm thinking about moving to Dish HD and I've made 2 separate phone calls to Dish to see if the 942 is MPEG4 ready. Both times the sales rep checks with a supervisor and says that it is. They claim it will be a simple overnight download. 

Question: is this possible? I haven't found any literature to support their claims.

(side question-is VOOM worth it? what shows does it have)

Thanks.


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## Mikey (Oct 26, 2004)

frogfrog said:


> I'm thinking about moving to Dish HD and I've made 2 separate phone calls to Dish to see if the 942 is MPEG4 ready. Both times the sales rep checks with a supervisor and says that it is. They claim it will be a simple overnight download.
> 
> Question: is this possible? I haven't found any literature to support their claims.
> ...


No, the 942 doesn't have the MPEG-4 decoder chip.

And welcome. :welcome:


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## LtMunst (Aug 24, 2005)

frogfrog said:


> I'm thinking about moving to Dish HD and I've made 2 separate phone calls to Dish to see if the 942 is MPEG4 ready. Both times the sales rep checks with a supervisor and says that it is. They claim it will be a simple overnight download.
> 
> Question: is this possible? I haven't found any literature to support their claims.
> 
> ...


Tell the sales rep to put it in writing about the 942 being MPEG4 ready. (It is NOT)
As far as VOOM goes, I cannot imagine life without MonstersHD.


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## dave1234 (Oct 9, 2005)

Does anybody have written proof from Dish that the 942 DOES NOT support MPEG 4 with updated S/W?


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## Moridin (Mar 22, 2005)

dave1234 said:


> Does anybody have written proof from Dish that the 942 DOES NOT support MPEG 4 with updated S/W?


I doubt it, but since the 942 performs decoding MPEG-2 via _hardware_ (an ASIC dedicated to purely MPEG-2 decoding, in fact), it is indeed safe to say that a software update will not magically enable the 942 to be able to decode MPEG-4. You can play the absence of evidence is not evidence of absence game if you like, but you'll lose, I'm afraid.


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## frogfrog (Oct 13, 2005)

Hmmm. This may be something the reps shouldn't be telling people...

One even said, "There is nothing in writing as of yet. Even though it says MPEG2, it is actually MPEG4 compatible."

My point: it wasn't as if he was guessing. He seemed knowledgable on the subject.

*Is it dumb to sign up now, then???? I'm getting impatient and want the HD...*


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## olgeezer (Dec 5, 2003)

And the executives and techs at dish have said that the 942 wasn't MPEG4 capable. I think they recently announced the first Dish MPEG4 receivers at a trade show. Not a release date or program available date, just the working prototypes.


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## olgeezer (Dec 5, 2003)

From a dealer website in North Carolina:

"We will offer the DISH 411, DISH 422 and DISH Player DVR 962, DISH Network's planned MP4 HDTV Receivers, when they become available"


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## frogfrog (Oct 13, 2005)

Well, in "reliance" on their word, I'm going with the 942 and then piss and moan when I find out they told me wrong. wish me luck.


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## Mikey (Oct 26, 2004)

frogfrog said:


> Well, in "reliance" on their word, I'm going with the 942 and then piss and moan when I find out they told me wrong. wish me luck.


I hope you got that statement in writing. Don't say we didn't warn you.


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## olgeezer (Dec 5, 2003)

You'll love it


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## frogfrog (Oct 13, 2005)

Mikey- I'm fully aware that I'll probably be bent over on this deal. Blame my impatience.


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## Mikey (Oct 26, 2004)

frogfrog said:


> Mikey- I'm fully aware that I'll probably be bent over on this deal. Blame my impatience.


Like the geezer says, you'll love it. You can use it forever to record OTA HD.


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## frogfrog (Oct 13, 2005)

Here's how clueless I am. What is "OTA"?


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## Bichon (Jun 5, 2003)

OTA = over the air (in other words, local broadcast received with an antenna, not from the satellite).

Like the other posters have said, the 942 is not upgradable to MPEG4. It has been discussed on the "tech forums" with their engineers, which air quarterly on channel 101.


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## elbyj (Jan 9, 2003)

Check the front panel of the 942 -- It clearly says "MPEG 2". I wish it would say "MPEG 2/4", but it doesn't.


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## dave1234 (Oct 9, 2005)

OK Just the facts...

The 942 does not and will not support MPEG4. Here's the chip sets used in the 942.

All Broadcom...

BCM7038 graphics controller etc.

BCM3520 NTSC, ATSC tuner chip.

and the one relevant to this thread:
BCM4500 One each for each satellite feed. This outputs a MPEG2 stream  

You guys made me look it up.......  (not to mention removing the cover from my brand new 942)

Broadcom's web site has the details for those interested.

NO ASICS in this design...


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## Bichon (Jun 5, 2003)

dave1234 said:


> (not to mention removing the cover from my brand new 942)


While you had it apart, did you happen to notice what brand/model of hard drive is used?


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## dave1234 (Oct 9, 2005)

And here's my WAG at what Dish may offer.

The 942 is on one door. MPEG2 is written on another door. 

Dish could offer to upgrade the 942 to a 962 by replacing the main board, then swap doors... Anyone get a look at the 962? Is it the same as the 942 mechanically?


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## dave1234 (Oct 9, 2005)

Didn't disturb the hard disk drive or even look at the connector... It was a 3.5" drive however.


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## jsanders (Jan 21, 2004)

dave1234 said:


> and the one relevant to this thread:
> BCM4500 One each for each satellite feed. This outputs a MPEG2 stream
> 
> You guys made me look it up.......  (not to mention removing the cover from my brand new 942)


I looked up that BCM4500 here:
http://www.broadcom.com/products/Satellite/HDTV-SDTV-Video,-Graphics-&-Receiver-Chips/BCM4500

I think that isn't quite what we are talking about. This doesn't say it *decodes* MPEG-2, it just says it outputs MPEG-2, and demodulates the E* 8PSK signal.

Not sure why they say it that way, seems that it should demodulate any bit stream, MPEG-2 or MPEG-4, as far as this chip is concerned, I don't think there is a difference. Bits are bits, unless it has to do with the forward error correction somehow. There is nothing on the product page about MPEG-4, maybe they just haven't tested it.

The chip that does MPEG-2, on the Broadcom website is teh BCM7020, that one decodes MPEG-2. The website says, "supports the requirements [...] that require high-definition or standard-definition decoding of MPEG-2 streams"
http://www.broadcom.com/products/Satellite/HDTV-SDTV-Video,-Graphics-&-Receiver-Chips/BCM7020

When you opened up your 942, did you see that chip? The BCM7020 is the one that would need to be replaced and/or augmented. I didn't see anything listed that has anything to do with MPEG-4. Still on the bleeding edge maybe.



dave1234 said:


> NO ASICS in this design...


ASIC = Application Specific Integrated Circuit

The things you mentioned aren't in-house designs, but they are application specific circuits.


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## dave1234 (Oct 9, 2005)

I believe the BCM7038 probably incorporates the MPEG decoder, it's the big chip on the board with memory attached.... There wasn't a 7020 on the board. The block diagram for the 7038 shows 2 mpeg streams in, DVI/component video out, as well as a 1394 mpeg I/O capability. Its located here: http://www.broadcom.com/collateral/pb/7038-PB01-R.pdf


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## CCarncross (Jul 19, 2005)

There are no mpeg4 receivers out and being installed yet...When the long and arduous swap-over to mpeg4 begins, this forum will obviously one of the 1st places you will see it posted. So wait for it...geez its like 3 year olds "Are we there yet, are we there yet, are we there yet?"


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## tweaver999 (Jul 9, 2004)

I believe the BCM 4500 has upgradeable firmware from what I see on the web site... it seems to me that mpegx is just a compression algorithm , would it not be possible to update to output mepg4.... of course that would require some heavy duty software development and I am not sure the E* teams are up to it... anybody know if that is possible.... the speed of the chip might be a problem... but the the hardware of the output port should be ok... correct???


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## dave1234 (Oct 9, 2005)

The broadcom mpeg4 decoder chip is located here:
http://www.broadcom.com/collateral/pb/7411-PB04-R.pdf

It states it seamlessly integrates with the BCM7038.

To Ccarncross: I can't help it, I was born an engineer.


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## P Smith (Jul 25, 2002)

dave1234, did you see there any expansion slot in 942 for do the "seamlessly integrates with the BCM7038" ?

Regarding BCM4500, the chip do perfectly the MPEG-2/MPEG-4 output for any type of modulation what Dish using and testing. Actually, the chip doesn't do any MPEG decompressing, just read Broadcom description and check diagrams.
7038 is the show-stopper .


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## Jeff McClellan (Apr 22, 2002)

:lol: I still say that there is a way and it will be MPEG-4 compatible.


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## the_bear (Oct 18, 2004)

I’ll take [email protected] over [email protected] any day.


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## Bichon (Jun 5, 2003)

the_bear said:


> I'll take [email protected] over [email protected] any day.


Suspect you won't be seeing that much longer. The Dish channels are already stat-muxed a good bit lower than that, and full bitrate on OTA locals is getting to be more and more rare. I hear CBS is planning to start multicasting an entertainment channel soon, NBC already has a weather channel, and ABC has both a news channel and a weather channel.


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## M Sparks (Sep 28, 2005)

the_bear said:


> I'll take [email protected] over [email protected] any day.


Oh, so you've compared them side by side? 

As already pointed out, 19mbs MPEG2 is pretty rare anyways. But you're comparing apples to oranges (to flog an old cliche). The whole point of MPEG4 is that the bitrate can be lowered without losing quality.

I am a low budget video producer. An hour of DVD MPEG2 video at the maximum safe bitrate (9mbs) pretty much uses up an entire single layer DVD- about 4.3GB. The same hour of video with DV compression takes up 13GB on my hard drive. But the difference is very hard to see with the naked eye. Now, as you drop the bitrate on the DVD video, the differences become much more obvious.

But most hollywood DVD movies are WAY less than 9mbs. They still look great, because they have better compression schemes than I have access to.

From what I understand, MPEG-4 can operate at about half the bitrate as MPEG-2 with the same results. So yes, if you can find an MPEG-2 source at 19mbs, it should be slightly better than an MPEG-4 source at 8mbs.

Personally, I'd rather have 20 spectacular HD channels than 10 slightly-better-than-spectacular HD channels.


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## the_bear (Oct 18, 2004)

I have not done any scientific test so take comments as subjective IMHO. The mpeg2 double mpeg4 rule is just a rule of thumb. [email protected] looks way better than [email protected], but [email protected] does not look as good as [email protected] When I do home movies, I occasionally print 4x6s from a frames of miniDV video. These 4x6s do look better when than when printing from a mpeg2 DVD. Mpeg4 especially variable bit rate, makes sense as a delivery mechanism, but not an archival format. There is just too much loss. When, I post family videos on the web, I usually use VC1 (MS hacked version of mpeg4), but I save the miniDV video as an archive.

Anyway, the point I am trying to make is for those people that can get all stations OTA, there is no need to buy Dish’s HD LIL service. The picture and sound from Dish HD LIL, will likely be a lower quality than what is available OTA.


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## Antknee (Oct 13, 2005)

Dish told me too that the 942 was MPEG4 when I signed up recently


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## voripteth (Oct 25, 2005)

As a brand new owner of a 942 I have spoken with no less than 4 different Dish reps and every one of them has sworn that the 942 will be able to handle MPeg4 with just a software update. I even asked them to check with their supervisor because I had read that the 942 could not do MPeg4 without a hardware change. They came back after a few moments and said the 942 could do MPeg4.

If the 942 doesn't do MPeg4, it isn't the case of an ignorant rep but a corporate directive to lie to customers. Do you think Dish is doing this?


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## dave1234 (Oct 9, 2005)

As one who has worked in a large corporate environment I would say it's likely ineptitude, not corporate directive. That ineptitude could likely be very high up in the CSR or marketing department. The bottom line: The 942 WILL NOT decode Mpeg4, the internal chip will not do it without an add on chip. No S/W upgrade available.


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

tweaver999 said:


> I believe the BCM 4500 has upgradeable firmware from what I see on the web site... it seems to me that mpegx is just a compression algorithm , would it not be possible to update to output mepg4....


What you're suggesting is similar to the idea that an automotive engine control unit swap in your favorite motor vehicle is all that is required to switch from burning gasoline to biodiesel.

Perhaps a more relevant comparison would be modern personal computer display adapters. There is a reason that the display adapter generally costs more than the motherboard, RAM and CPU put together. There is dedicated hardware to "accelerate" key functions and make the whole experience smoother and more realistic without significant impact on the CPU.

MPEG2 typically utilizes hardware decoding in television applications and given that MPEG4 gives up to double the compression using much more intensive (but not necessarily more sophisticated) compression algorithms, it makes sense that it takes more to decode; even if just more memory. Piling special software on top of a decoder chip that can't interpret the input is not going to work just like pouring biodiesel into your car isn't going to work. The engine cannot do its magic on a media that it doesn't support.

For all of the rhetoric, it will likely be years before anyone *needs* MPEG4 and much of that will be local market HD. Voom and other broad distribution content will probably remain as it is today until all but a negligible percentage of the customer base has converted to MPEG4 receivers.


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## Mickey (Oct 26, 2005)

Hi, just thought I would chime in and say a CSR told me that the 942 would work with MPEG 4 also. I pressed the issue trying to make sure she knew what she was talking about, but "Leslie" assured me it would work fine. I'm still on the fence about getting one.......and no, I don't believe Leslie as far as I can throw her. :eek2:


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## lakebum431 (Jun 30, 2005)

The overwhelming consensus seems to be that there is no way the 942 will work with MPEG4. If this is the case, it is really bad that the CSRs are telling people that they are. There are going to be a ton of very upset people if this is the case. I am leasing a 942 and if there is not a free/cheap upgrade to the MPEG4 equivalent, then I will be leaving for D*. This is the main reason that I did not agree to a contract when I signed up for E* 3 months ago.


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## Jeff McClellan (Apr 22, 2002)

I have to jump in and say, I have been with E for years and have a 942. I fully expect them to make a reasonable offer for a upgrade when the time comes to go to mpeg-4. Do any of us really thing they wouldn't. That would be like pulling the shoe off a horse at full gallop. Play it out to the end. You will always have a choice. Give them a chance before you just figure it will never happen. Customers still equal money from where I come from.


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## voripteth (Oct 25, 2005)

I just sent the following email to the Dish folks.

"I just ordered a 942 DVR on the condition that it will support MPeg4. Can you please send me a written statement confirming that the 942 will support MPeg4 through a software update?

If by some chance the 942 doesn't turn out to support MPeg4, will Dish provide a free upgrade to a unit that does?

Looking forward to being a happy Dish customer..."

If you too have been told by Dish that the 942 will support MPeg4, send in an e-mail. Perhaps if they hear from enough people they will do something!


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## Mickey (Oct 26, 2005)

If I could get a lease deal on a 942, I would go for it in a second, but I understand they will only lease a 942 to a new customer (great CS E*). I have read in a few places that if you beg the right people at E*, you might get the lease deal. Can someone tell me whose shoes I have to shine to get the lease deal? :nono2:


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## lakebum431 (Jun 30, 2005)

I have every intention of staying with Dish, and I plan to stick it out. I'm just saying that if they refused to do a low cost upgrade it would be a deal breaker for me.


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## Bichon (Jun 5, 2003)

Jeff McClellan said:


> I have been with E for years and have a 942. I fully expect them to make a reasonable offer for a upgrade when the time comes to go to mpeg-4. Do any of us really thing they wouldn't.


My experience with E suggests that when the MPEG4 receiver first comes out, it will be in short supply and command a premium price. As they catch up with demand, there may be discounts offered in conjunction with a commitment to purchase the MPEG4 services. But I'll bet you don't see the really attractive (e.g. free or negligible cost) offers until they're ready to convert existing services from MPEG2 to MPEG4.


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## voripteth (Oct 25, 2005)

I got this message from Heather Turner at Dish Tech support:
"The model 942 does not have the ability to decode MPEG4 technology. We have not released anything that says that there will be a cost or that there won’t be a cost to upgrade that receiver to MPEG4. I do sincerely apologize for this inconvenience and the misinformation. I am currently looking into this and will make sure that the word gets out that this is not something that should be told to our customers because at this time, we do not know. 


Thanks, 
Heather
Technical E-mail Support
Dish Network"


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## Mikey (Oct 26, 2004)

voripteth said:


> I got this message from Heather Turner at Dish Tech support:
> "The model 942 does not have the ability to decode MPEG4 technology....


I'm shocked to find that the 942 won't decode MPEG-4, shocked I tell you!


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## voripteth (Oct 25, 2005)

I had my hopes especially after being told by FOUR Dish sales reps that it could do MPeg4.  

In the end it probably isn't that big a thing as long as they offer a low cost upgrade. I'm actually rather pleased that SD on my 60" SXRD doesn't look all that bad. Certainly not stunning like HD but at least I can live with it.


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

the_bear said:


> I have not done any scientific test so take comments as subjective IMHO
> 
> When I do home movies, I occasionally print 4x6s from a frames of miniDV video. These 4x6s do look better when than when printing from a mpeg2 DVD


If you're going to make stills from moving source material, you should use software to average fields. Many authoring packages have a function that will make a reasonable still out of a section of video; presumably for cover art. The software processes the moving image in much the same way as your eye does.


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## MacGuy (Nov 16, 2005)

And in answer to your other question, yes, VOOM is worth it.

VOOM is the best content anyone has to offer and is the reason I am back with Dish.


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