Comcast Puts the Screws To HDTV 317
Todd Spangler writes "Comcast, like every video distributor, compresses its digital video signals. But to fit in more HDTV channels, Comcast is squeezing some signals more than others. The cable operator claims it is using improved compression techniques, so that most subscribers won't see any drop-off in picture quality. But A/V buff Ken Fowler claims the differences between some of Comcast's more highly compressed channels and Verizon's FiOS TV are indeed noticeable. He's posted his comparative test results on AVSForum.com — and the results are not pretty."
The Comcast guy whas at my house yesterday! (Score:2, Interesting)
But my dad said we were thinking about canceling our Comcast cable and getting FiOS, then the Comcast guy, noticing our spiffy new HDTV, starting going on and on about how we would have like 50 new "HD" channels by the end of the year, all at MUCH better quality.
Yea right! What a LIE that Comcast guy was saying! I told him we will think about getting Comcast phone service when BitTorrent works on our Internet like
First post w00t
Re:Who has what? (Score:5, Interesting)
Play 30 second commercials with dancing 7-foot tall VRAD cabinets. I guess they're supposed to be huge and in everyone's front yard. Obviously.
Why bother to have better services when you can just slander your competition?
Not suprising at all (Score:5, Interesting)
Here's the thing: Coax cable networks, even hybrid fiber/coax cable networks, just don't have the bandwidth to handle very many HD channels without compressing the hell out of them. They just don't. It's not going to improve. The ONLY thing they can do is either drastically reduce the number of digital and HD channels they offer their subscribers, or bite the bullet and start massively upgrading their network. Basically, they need to run fiber to every home. Which they aren't going to do.
This is why I laugh at people who buy HDTVs and expect some kind of massive improvement. In most of the country, the infrastructure just isn't there to give people very many full-res HD channels over cable. Digital satellite has many of the same issues. There just isn't enough bandwidth.
What about OTA, you say? Yeah, OTA broadcasts only have to be *digital*, not HD.
Comcast sucks balls & hates netflix (Score:4, Interesting)
I don't have the wherewithall to prove it, but I am pretty sure that they are throttling netflix watch-it-now services. When netflix first released that service my downloads were speedy and ran great. Now that netflix is starting to offer some real titles comcast is throttling them, I'm sure of it. Case in point, I've been very sick this week and in bed a lot. I've turned to netflix for entertainment. I can watch my first episode with no problem, 2nd, a few minutes of buffer but no big deal. Now that I have been using it for a day or two it can take 20 minutes to start a show with several buffer sessions in the middle.
Contrast this with the fact that I can take my laptop to school on a SLOWER connection and get uninterrupted downloads. Their legalized monopoly they have is complete bullshit. If somebody offered another service in my area you can bet I would be there tomorrow. I despise writing that check every month to those fuckers. I hope they get what's coming to them in the form of a class action law suit to the tune of billions.
If they really want more bandwidth.... (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Not suprising at all (Score:5, Interesting)
Ridiculous.
Re:Screws to HDTV? Not exactly (Score:4, Interesting)
I see this all the time. (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Screws to HDTV? Not exactly (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Screws to HDTV? Not exactly (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Who has what? (Score:5, Interesting)
Lucky!
We just get the turtles in the lawn, turtle dinner parties, turtle this, turtle that.
Oh, and the fake new reports, and the guy squirting silver stuff on his shoes to run faster and jump higher.
But it all amounts to "slander your competition" except perhaps the vats of silver stuff.
Re:Screws to HDTV? Not exactly (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Who has what? (Score:2, Interesting)
Last year, Rogers wasn't so bad, but this year I've noticed a huge difference in one thing: hockey. Local Senators games look much worse than they used to. Granted, some people don't seem to notice, but when you can't read the numbers on the players' sleeves, and the sticks are almost compressed out of existence when held diagonally, it kind of jumps out at me.
Being a Canadian, hockey is very important to me. Luckily, come playoff time (in a couple of weeks) CBC has exclusive rights to all the games. Goodbye, Rogers!
Actually, I just did a side-by-side of The Nature of Things OTA vs. QAM (nice panning shot of the Rockies from a plane, would need a damn good bitrate to make it look good), and the OTA was obviously superior, especially during the pan. They simply can't keep up with OTA's bitrate.
Now, if only I got more than one channel OTA...
Re:Perhaps we don't really need HDTV? (Score:5, Interesting)
Do they? Not if someone had to compare screen caps to prove it.
in the compressed images, you can see the artifacts.
Artifacts in screen captures don't necessarily mean noticeable artifacts in moving video. Screen captures in NTSC look like crap, far far worse than you "really" see when watching TV, thanks to the persistence of vision.
This point, by the way, was also in TFA.
FIOS testimonial (Score:5, Interesting)
As a former Comcast customer, what can I tell you but keep checking.
When FIOS reached my block, I called Verizon the next day. The install went smoothly and all the contacts I've had with Verizon have been great.
I'm done with those thieves at Comcast.
Internet is unbelievable, I shelled out extra money for higher speed. Downloading a distro used to be an overnight undertaking. Now it's more like 20 minutes.
I got a bunch of new phone features I don't need and the TV signal quality is great.
Best part is I'm paying a little less than I used to pay Comcast for TV and internet but
I'm getting TV, Internet, phone and long distance with the price locked in for 2 years.
I'm still waiting for my free 19inch LCD TV from Verizon, but to make up for the delay they sent me a $20 gift certificate.
Re:Not suprising at all (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Should redefine "HD" (Score:3, Interesting)
Maybe we could have a few classifications:
HD Bronze - Barely passes some maximum average quantizer check
HD Silver - The channel is running at a maximum average quantizer that will guarantee high quality video
HD Gold - The channel is running at a maximum average quantizer suitable for premium content
HD Platinum - Nose to screen archival quality material
It's not HD if the quantization is so great that taking a standard def source and upsampling it would produce similar results, which is what some of those Comcast screenshots look like.
I'll personally be sad when analog eventually goes away, purely because of the tricks that are being played with compression for digital broadcast.
Re:Not suprising at all (Score:3, Interesting)
Now this is not in response to the parent but to the topic in general... Cable could offer far more picture quality by simply eliminating their analog lineup and using the bandwidth for digital. Using 256QAM modulation they can fit something like 12 digital standard def or 2 high def channels in the bandwidth that one analog channel used to take up, with excellent quality. Using MPEG-4 instead of MPEG-2 would further increase the number of channels that could be provided with acceptable quality due to more efficient coding.
I've noticed compression artifacts... (Score:3, Interesting)
When the installer came for this new house, I mentioned that I was only getting digital for the purposes of HDTV, and that otherwise I liked analog better. It was rather entertaining listening to him explain that digital only needs ONE bandwidth, while analog needs FOUR bandwidths.
None of this is nearly as annoying as their execrable channel guide, which dedicates a third of the screne to some random bullshit preview and a third to advertising. And often takes ~10 seconds to flip to the next screen. And if you want to search by name... my god. To get to the middle of the alphabet, it's ~20 key presses (they make you go through the numerals if you try to go backwards). It's one of the worst interfaces I've ever seen-- and I have seen some shit.
But never mind all that; I've seen MythTV in action and I will soon be cured.
The FCC should set quality standards... (Score:4, Interesting)
Let the marketplace decide, but make sure that consumers know what they are actually buying.
Re:Not suprising at all (Score:5, Interesting)
Speaking as someone who has lived in NYC for the past nine years and lived in five different apartments so far: You would not believe how poorly patched together New York City is unless you are reading this from a former soviet-block country. From the subway to apartment repairs to the roads to phone and cable infrastructure, NYC is a collection of barely good enough, cheapest, fastest repairs and hacks. NYC hasn't been able to even put in a new subway line since 1919 [wikipedia.org] and you think we should be able to roll out fiber to any but the most expensive apartments? In Stockholm you may be able to convince landlords to actually do things like put in new pipes or electric wiring and to add fiber while they are at it. Here in Manhattan, my water comes out of the faucet rust brown and I only have electrical outlets on two walls of my apartment. Landlords do the least amount they can legally get away with, as there is always someone who will step in a rent the apartment as is. (The vacancy rate here is below 1%) I would expect fiber to be run to most of the surrounding commuter towns well before it becomes common in households actually in the city. Seriously the infrastructure here is FUBAR
analog TV = eliminates this compression crap (Score:2, Interesting)
With digital there are all kinds of horrible things the broadcasters can do to the signals - compression is just one of them.
Free-to-air. (Score:3, Interesting)
The highest quality HD I've seen to date has come via over-the-air signals; the good old antenna. My father set it up last year but continued to subscribe to cable. Earlier this year they raised rates, yet again, he got pissed and canceled. He occasionally wishes he still had a few of those channels he had with cable, but otherwise he doesn't miss it at all. More recently, he's been considering free-to-air satellite to augment what he gets now.
As for the reception, it's all digital so it's flawless. Even standard-definition is superior to cable, but HD is on a whole other level. It's a pity this doesn't get more attention. Some people actually believe over-the-air broadcasting is ending with the switch to digital; even at least one high-profile blog has perpetuated this notion.
If people wanted to screw the cable companies they'd just dump them. But people have a hard time letting go of all the programming they get. After a week, however, most wouldn't miss it. The majority of television programming is drivel anyway and most shows nowadays wind up on DVD or online further reducing the need for cable, satellite or anything else.
Of course if everyone left then these providers really wouldn't have the money to set up a proper network. But then, this is one of the very few times where I'm inclined to think that like the highway system a high speed communications network might be their responsibility. At least until I'd learn they're spending 5 times more than they should, taking 3 times longer than projected and making a mess of it.
Re:Who has what? (Score:3, Interesting)
They'd better be careful about that analogy. Somebody's liable to do a commercial about the tortoise and the hare. Portray Comcast as the hare, download caps and Bittorrent filtering as the hare falling asleep while the tortoise wins the race.