# PQ with SD signals



## Antknee (Oct 13, 2005)

Hi I have a 942 and a 50" Samsung plasma. I just hooked it up and HD looks great, but SD looks terrible, probably even worse than my old TV. The picture looks blockyand very soft.
Any ideas?
THanks


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## zephyr (Jun 25, 2005)

Is the SD over the air or satellite local channels or satellite SD channels?

Satellite locals will look very soft and blocky in our market (we live in GR), because the image is over-compressed (trying to fit too many channels on too little satellite bandwidth). The result is less detail an increased contouring (areas of solid tones look like contour maps, rather than smooth gradation of small tone differences). Satellite SD also suffers this on some channels, but less than digital cable.

At 50" the picture is blown up pretty large, so every imperfection is also large.

Once you've seen HD, everything else looks blocky and soft, even if it's doing as good as it can.


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## Jeff McClellan (Apr 22, 2002)

I have a Sony 50 inch, and after doing some tweaks with DVE it looks tons better. That is where I would start.


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## Antknee (Oct 13, 2005)

These are local channels over satellite. Could it also have something to do with live events? I have really noticed the poor quality on football games. Where as shows like the Simpsons, etc look better.
I am ordering DVE, can't find it at a store aroung here. 
Thanks


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## Jeff McClellan (Apr 22, 2002)

Alot of times the games dont look great. Give it some time, tweak it and you will get it to where you want it.


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## zephyr (Jun 25, 2005)

The ABC (13.1 and 41.1) football games that are in SD are painfully bad compared to HD. I agree with the advice to tweak based on DVE, but recognize that the college games will not look anything like Monday Night Football in HD.

Satellite SD for local channels is only viewable to me if you have to have the digital OTA tuner tied up doing something else.


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## Stewart Vernon (Jan 7, 2005)

I don't know what your previous TV was... but you'll also see the difference magnified on the larger set. I have a 32" TV and a 65" HDTV... and channels like the locals in SD on satellite that look bad in my main room, look fine on my 32" TV.


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## alsays (Aug 12, 2005)

sorry still pretty new to this.

Also been having the same problem and a techie guru friend said that the 942 records SD channels at the lowest quality level using the least amount of disk space where as Tivo (which I had previously) & Replay TV have options to use more hard drive space giving you a better quality picture... thus my Tivo which had 80 hrs of SD recording space available at it's lowest quality would only allow me to record 20 hrs of programming at it's highest quality which is what I would do but the picture was alot better than what I'm getting right now with either 942 or 655. When the 942 records in HD you only get 20+ hours of recording time because it takes much more hard drive space to get the detail but your not getting that option with the SD recording. I really think that Dish needs to fix that problem and give us that option. Though it's nice having 100+ hours of recording space...I'd rather have less and a much better picture.


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## LtMunst (Aug 24, 2005)

alsays said:


> sorry still pretty new to this.
> 
> Also been having the same problem and a techie guru friend said that the 942 records SD channels at the lowest quality level using the least amount of disk space where as Tivo (which I had previously) & Replay TV have options to use more hard drive space giving you a better quality picture... thus my Tivo which had 80 hrs of SD recording space available at it's lowest quality would only allow me to record 20 hrs of programming at it's highest quality which is what I would do but the picture was alot better than what I'm getting right now with either 942 or 655. When the 942 records in HD you only get 20+ hours of recording time because it takes much more hard drive space to get the detail but your not getting that option with the SD recording. I really think that Dish needs to fix that problem and give us that option. Though it's nice having 100+ hours of recording space...I'd rather have less and a much better picture.


The 942 does not process the incoming stream. It records to the hardrive exactly as it is received from the Satellite. There is nothing to be done on the receiver end to change the SD compression.


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## Antknee (Oct 13, 2005)

DVE is Digital Video Essentials. It is a DVD that will guide you calibrating your TV/Audio systems. 
There is a nice tutorial on using it here:
http://www.ramelectronics.net/html/Video-calibration.html


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## alsays (Aug 12, 2005)

LtMunst said:


> The 942 does not process the incoming stream. It records to the hardrive exactly as it is received from the Satellite. There is nothing to be done on the receiver end to change the SD compression.


 Every hard drive recording device I've seen whether it's Direct's Tivo, stand alone Tivo's, replay tv, and various DVD recorders that also utilize hard drive recording all have quality level settings. This is why HD recordings on the 942 are so clear they use a significant amount of the hard drive space. The SD picture that being reproduced on the 942 is not exactly as it's received by the satellite...The picture quality that you get from a non-dvr dish receiver is significantly better than the picture quality you get using dish dvr's. The less disc space you use the lower the quality.


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## the_bear (Oct 18, 2004)

The 942 records the digital stream without modification.

Watching SD from your stations HD OTA feed is the way to go. Your local station probably payed $10K on an SD to HD scaler. You may was well take advantage of it.


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## lakebum431 (Jun 30, 2005)

alsays said:


> The picture quality that you get from a non-dvr dish receiver is significantly better than the picture quality you get using dish dvr's.


Where do you get this information? Just because a signal is recorded doesn't automatically make it worse than if it was live through a non-dvr box. Do you have facts to back this up or are you just shooting your mouth off?


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## Orange Man (Oct 9, 2003)

I don't have either a plasma or the 942 but I do have "Video Essentials" and anyone with a large TV this should be a mandatory item. It is worth every penny. I cna't say how it works with plasma's , DLP's or LCD's since I've used it with our Mits RPTV.

I think I know what you mean by the "blochy washed" look. I get it no matter if it's on our 36" Sony crt (4900) or the Mits (811). Locals just s*#K except HD. Trust me get the "Video Essentials" and you'll enjoy HT even more.


Kenny J.


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## SteveinDanville (Jun 26, 2002)

alsays said:


> Every hard drive recording device I've seen whether it's Direct's Tivo, stand alone Tivo's, replay tv, and various DVD recorders that also utilize hard drive recording all have quality level settings. This is why HD recordings on the 942 are so clear they use a significant amount of the hard drive space. The SD picture that being reproduced on the 942 is not exactly as it's received by the satellite...The picture quality that you get from a non-dvr dish receiver is significantly better than the picture quality you get using dish dvr's. The less disc space you use the lower the quality.


There is a huge difference between what a stand-alone TiVo or ReplayTV does to the digital signal as opposed to what a satellite/HDD combo unit does. The signal is passed straight through, like an open window, on the sat/HDD unit; what was transmitted is EXACTLY what you get, with no generational loss. The compression happens at either the uplink site, as in local channels, or at Dish when they uplink the compressed image. I may be wrong in my terminology or "science", but the general gist of what I'm saying is true. You are correct in seeing the worst picture possible with local channel satellite images; mine are almost unwatchable.


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