I've compared Directv and Charter HD to terrestrial TV and both appear to be compressed compared to the original ATSC signal. Satellite being the worse of the two.

On some of the Directv channels they actually change the aspect ratio to save bandwidth.

These companies evidently don't care about the quality of their picture. I guess because most people don't see the difference.

It is known that cable and satellite compress the HD to save bandwidth etc. Good for them. I fault the FCC for screwing up the entire HDTV spec. They should have picked one resolution and mandate a specific bite rate and encoder format. None of this Full HD, true HD, and HD ready crap. Oh wait, this could cost the FCC's customer, aka big business, more money. Ok, I stand corrected.

I find it strange that Sharp and Sony, etc have not lobbied the FCC for this quality standard. All too often I have to explain to some people that HDTV can look better than what FOX puts out. Many think HD itself or their TV was a gimmick.

This isn't news. DirecTV has been screwing their customers for years--with a friendly smile...If it weren't for NFL sunday Ticket, I wouldnt use the crummy service. Cable companies should rally and get that contract. Whats even more pathetic??? NFL games for the most part are broadcast in HD in their local markets. After purchasing NFL sunday Ticket for $250, you find you get your games DOWNGRADED to Non-HD. You must pay $99 EXTRA for the SUPERFAN package to get "SOME", not all, upgraded to HD. Shicksters.

Why would anyone want to watch reruns of Law and Order in HD over an NFL game anyway????? Aren't they supposed to launch new satellites this winter to provide the extra bandwidth?

Enough said.

I can understand where DirecTV is coming from.
Broadcast 1 program or broadcast many programs using the same amount of bandwidth. It doesn't take a NASA engineer to figure out what is going to make more money.

I don't buy games or movie downloads plus the DVDs provide an excellent off harddrive storage incase of HD failure.

Down with downloads!

Has anyone ever even watched TNT HD the quality is terrible the shouldn't be able to call their channel TNT HD because most of the time all they do is stretch out SD Images to a 16:9 ratio so it looks even worse.

...not for bandwidth. But for more channels. They'll probably always compress as much as they possibly can just so they can say they offer more channels.

The picture on standard definition DirecTV and Dish has always sucked. No dynamic range. Dark looking and lack of detail.

This is a perfect opportunity for Verizon FIOS to offer better programming with their new, state of the art system. I hope they're building their system with HD in mind.

Eric,

I know TNT used to do this with movies they show, but I haven't noticed them doing it on the channel for over a year now. Whenever they show movies these days they are in true 16:9 ratio with no stretching and they look great.

I notice the same problem on sunday, they bump the chinese channels for most of the days so they could do that. I will file a complaint if they happen again next sunday.

Before cable and SatTV can offer true HiDef TV. It just requires more bandwidth then either currently have. Maybe by 2015 is my best guess.

I wish they would use a more efficient form of compression, such as H.264, because a lot of channels are still broadcast in MPEG2. If they used H.264 they could up the quality of the video while still maintaining the same bandwidth.

Actually, the new H20/21 and HR20/21 receivers are al fully h.264 (commonly referred to as MPEG-4) compliant and ready for the new satellite to begin broadcasting in a couple weeks. That’s also assuming you also have a 5 LNB dish and the B-Band converters DTV keeps reminding you that you must have installed. MPEG-4 uses half the bit rate of MPEG-2 (h.262) so they will be able to essentially double the amount of HD content utilizing the same amount of bandwidth. So it should all be good news in a few weeks when we get to start seeing programming from the new satellite “DirecTV10,” which will broadcast only HD content exclusively in MPEG-4 format.

Not good news if you still have some HR-10 receivers. They are only capable of MPEG-2 and won’t be able to decode the new satellite’s broadcasts. However I have seen on some sites that there may be some patches available.

I am in Southern Cal and the standard definiton feeds here from DirecTV seem great in my opinion. They are in no way as good as high def but are every bit as good as my neighbors digital cable feed.

Have to say I disagree with the comment above about HD being overrated, and I beleive that as the cost of large HD TV sets continues to tumble, that more and more people will come to reject watching longer formats ( TV shows & Movies rather that YouTube sketches) in Standard Defintion.
I selected my bandwidth provider (FiOS) over competitors for 2 factors, the speed of their service and the number of HD TV channels they carry. I probably spend 75% of my TV time watching HD channels and only 25% on the SD channels, when the lack of good content on the HD channels drives me to them.

said that HD is not being done right by the broadcasters. When your local stations offer a better quality image than cable, you know there is trouble.

All I can say is that I will either move to a Verizon FIOS area or pray they come to me. The sooner we get all the bandwidth Fiber Optic provides to everyone, the sooner everyone can see high-def porn (and you know thats what at least a quarter of people really want).

Not sure how much bandwidth it would free up to drop 50-60 crappy SD channels, but there sure are some real doozies that need to go.