That's because U-verse has many times more bandwidth available to pipe to your house.
Enjoy :) On Saturday, April 11, 2009, mark.dodge <mark.do...@earthlink.net> wrote: > I do not know where to get any figures to give a size or fps figures but all > I know is that after switching from Direct TV to UVerse400 I have seen a > significant improvement in the quality of the picture and very little > pixelization in all HD channels. I had very frequent, daily problems with > dropped signal, loss of audio, freezing and very bad pixelization on all of > the broadcast stations along with Discovery Showtime and HBO and skipping > sound on ESPN2 just to name a few. I do not get it but once or twice a week > on UVerse. I am very happy with the switch and I had been with D-TV for > close to 6 years. > > -----Original Message----- > From: hardware-boun...@hardwaregroup.com > [mailto:hardware-boun...@hardwaregroup.com] On Behalf Of Brian Weeden > Sent: Wednesday, April 08, 2009 07:39 > To: hardware@hardwaregroup.com > Subject: Re: [H] HDTV Math > > If you looked at satellite HD broadcasts I would suspect you would find even > worse bitrates among several of the HD stations. > > It all comes down to bandwidth - the cable satellite operators have limited > bandwidth and are trying to cram as many stations in as possible, and in > many case this means highly compressing some stations. Usually they try to > make sure that HD signals where it is most likely to be noticed (Discovery > HD, PPV movies and live sports) get the best signal while other pseudo HD > channels like History or HGTV will get re-compressed like crazy. > > --------------------------- > Brian Weeden > Technical Consultant > Secure World Foundation <http://www.secureworldfoundation.org> > +1 (514) 466-2756 Canada > +1 (202) 683-8534 US > > > On Wed, Apr 8, 2009 at 1:35 AM, James Maki <jwm_maill...@comcast.net> wrote: > >> I discovered something this week and am trying to understand its >> ramifications. I noticed lots of pixelation and motion blur the last two >> weeks of Heroes. NBC broadcasts at 1080i for HDTV. I checked the > statistics >> for the show I recorded via HD Homerun tuners using Comcast cable, and NBC >> is averaging about 4.8 GB per hour for a 1080i show. I thought is a bit > low >> but was even more surprised when I checked out shows on the other > broadcast >> networks. >> >> ABC 720p/60fps 6.3 GB >> NBC 1080i/29.97fps 4.8 GB >> CBS 1080i/29.97fps 5.6 GB >> PBS 720p/60fps 5.4 GB >> CW 1080i/29.97fps 7.9 GB >> FOX 720p/60fps 7.3 GB >> >> I find it strange that NBC has the lowest total file size but is >> broadcasting at 1080i, so I assuming (and I know the drawback of that!) it >> is compressed more than the other channels and am again assuming that is >> why >> I am seeing the picture degradation. Calling Comcast is a joke, so I > wanted >> to do the math to calculate the 'bits-per-second" for each case, but am > not >> exactly sure if I am doing this correctly. It would seem that 4.8 GB/hr >> would calculate as: >> >> 4.8 GB/hr * 1 hr/60 min * 1 min/60 sec * 1024 MB/GB * 8 Mb/MB = 10.9 Mbps. >> >> One online source indicated that for quality 1080i you should have at > least >> 15 Mbps. >> >> For the FOX network, the calculation would give 16.6 Mbps, far better than >> the 12 Mbps my online source gave for quality 720p broadcasts. >> >> I can't understand why the 720p broadcast is actually providing better >> throughput than the 1080i. It seems backwards (which is why I am wondering >> if my math is correct). I am not sure how to factor in the fps figures, if >> at all. >> >> If you can add some insight, it would be appreciated. >> >> Thanks, >> >> Jim Maki >> jwm_maill...@comcast.net >> >> > >
