# What if you have NO interest in HD?



## Doug Higley (Dec 31, 2005)

Couldn't care less about the HD onslaught...zero...so how long will those not interetsed in a marginally better picture on a different TV get to stay staus quo??? I like my 625.

Thanks
Doug


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

Two or three years. With a 625 longer.


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## Link (Feb 2, 2004)

Doug Higley said:


> Couldn't care less about the HD onslaught...zero...so how long will those not interetsed in a marginally better picture on a different TV get to stay staus quo??? I like my 625.
> 
> Thanks
> Doug


I like my 721 and won't be happy when its no longer compatible in a few years because everything will be MPEG4.

Why is it exactly that the current receivers can't be upgraded from MPEG2 to MPEG4?? I assume its the hardward inside the receiver itself that is different??


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## Kevin Brown (Sep 4, 2005)

You won't have to switch ever if you don't want to. Similarly, I like my 522 and my analog CRT TV just fine, although I'm probably going to spring for an ED plasma really soon. For the size of TV I have/want, and my viewing distance, any benefit of HD over ED is small. Small enough that I don't want to pay for the difference. Even when the "old" analog channels go away, as far as us with cable or any kind of Dish, things will not change. Although all of them will continue to offer more HD channels, but as long as they want to charge us extra for them, I'll pass and stick with SD/ED.


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## navychop (Jul 13, 2005)

Sorry, Kev- there's another change, also. The 522/625 only recognize MPEG-2, not MPEG-4. The programming provided is being shifted over to MPEG-4 over an undetermined number of years. Even SD material is expected to eventually shift over, simply because bandwidth is scarce. Eventually, real time MPEG-4 encoding will improve enough to put 2 channels in the space of 1 MPEG-2 channel, or at least 3 MPEG-4 channels in the space of 2 MPEG-2 channels.

Link- yes, it takes new hardware. And for those of use with 721s, that STB does not recognize 8VSB either, which is also being phased in.


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

But at the moment real-time MPEG4 encoding has not caught up with MPEG2. It will be a while until MPEG4 encoders deliver an efficiency savings that would pay for the upgrade for new encoders for the 250+ national channels on the system, let alone the thousands of local TV feeds where MPEG4 will truly be most useful (because it will save space on the backhaul as well as on the uplink).

Perhaps in a year or two having a non-8PSK receiver would mean you would have to get a replacement. (The 311/522/625 and others are 8PSK and would survive). Perhaps in a year or less having an older receiver (pre-301/501/811/6000) would present a problem if E* starts using compression levels that old receivers won't handle.

I really do not expect MPEG4 to be the big thing that makes current receivers "obsolete" (other than HD, which needs all the efficiency it can get!).

The bandwidth isn't that scarce. E* has 50 TPs on D500 and up to 82 on D1000 (66 long term). E* has 72 permanent TPs on D500+61.5° for the east coast (even if they gave up the use of the STA and SkyAngel TPs). E* also has 32 TPs at 148° and 500MHz each at 121° and 105° FSS. All these orbital locations are hot and providing customers with service TODAY - not just future slots to buy satellites for. And that isn't counting the massive frequency reuse that a good spotbeam satellite like E10 (launching next month) will provide.

MPEG4 will be there for HD for now. I doubt anything SD will be in MPEG4 for several years - if only because of the cost of replacing thousands of encoders and millions of set-top boxes.


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## Mike D-CO5 (Mar 12, 2003)

James Long said:


> Two or three years. With a 625 longer.


 So are you saying that the 625 will last longer, because it will be upgradeble to mpeg4 in the future via software update? Or because they will upgrade the 625 receivers last , when they get around to mpeg 4 sd receiver upgrades?


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## James Long (Apr 17, 2003)

Mike D-CO5 said:


> So are you saying that the 625 will last longer, because it will be upgradeble to mpeg4 in the future via software update? Or because they will upgrade the 625 receivers last , when they get around to mpeg 4 sd receiver upgrades?


Post #6 might answer some of that.

The 625 is NOT software upgradeable to MPEG4, but it can handle 8PSK (and therefore Turbo 8PSK  ). It's not a matter of which receiver will upgrade last, but which ones have the most capabilities to 'go with the flow' of changes.


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## fwampler (Dec 2, 2005)

Kevin Brown said:


> You won't have to switch ever if you don't want to. Similarly, I like my 522 and my analog CRT TV just fine, although I'm probably going to spring for an ED plasma really soon. For the size of TV I have/want, and my viewing distance, any benefit of HD over ED is small. Small enough that I don't want to pay for the difference. Even when the "old" analog channels go away, as far as us with cable or any kind of Dish, things will not change. Although all of them will continue to offer more HD channels, but as long as they want to charge us extra for them, I'll pass and stick with SD/ED.


 I'll speak to the EDTV and 625. In a word I get an awesome picture. I have the Panasonic EDTV (2.5 yrs). It is the commercial version with all the great gamma and white balance adjustments. This combination is just great. The TV upgrades to progressive-scan quality and the clean digital signal from Dish makes that a really good combination. I've been around a lot of HD TV's and the difference is not worth mentioning (to me.) Anyhow, it is a great combination.


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## Bill R (Dec 20, 2002)

fwampler said:


> I'll speak to the EDTV and 625. In a word I get an awesome picture.


How anyone could think that a EDTV picture is "awesome" is beyond me. All you need to do is compare it to a HDTV picture and you will see what you are missing.

My wife wasn't "into" HDTV either until we got one. It seems that the more HD programs she watches, the more she complains about how bad SD channels look. She just asked me yesterday, "when are we going to get everything in HD?"

All I (or she) can say to people that say _"Couldn't care less about the HD onslaught"_ should take a look at some of the current HD stuff on the air (especially from PBS). Now that's awesome.


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## Doug Higley (Dec 31, 2005)

Bill R...I've seen plenty of HD...Maybe when they take that HD and go full 3-D then I'll pop. Untill then my current 32" TV (picture and sound), the 625 and the 500 dish delivers what my current set of eyes and ears see and hear as perfectly clear and sharp. A large 50"-60" HD set up via DVD might make a difference...but that's not making it in my apartment. I have too many folks ask if I had HD when they saw my TV and it's not even EDTV so I'm very comfortable the way things are and have no need to covet things beyond my range of sight and hearing and wallet.  

Others: Thanks for the answers!

Doug


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