30 year cable subscriber jumps to the 622!

[keve]

Hey Guys, After nearly 30 years as a cable guy I have been sucked into the HDTV satellite craze. I have been hooked up for about 6 weeks and have gone thru lots of joy and agony. The first shock came with the poor quality SD service. Way below my cable standards. This was soon fixed with a new S video cable for the SD to compliment the new component cables for the HD. The next shock was the still poor quality Locals signal. This was remedied with the installation of 2 directional antennas in the attic. I am now in HDHeaven. The only really nagging problem I have now other than the occasional OTA signal loss is a audio video sync issue with the local CBS station. In my case the audio drags behind the video. Rare from what I have read here. This only happens over the antenna and only on CBS. It is the same thru S video or component. An A\V receiver swap didnt help. I switched from rca cables to optical and still have this problem. A little joy in the optical purchase is that the Dolby Digital is now awesome. Could this be a bad 622, a wiring problem, a software issue or maybe a problem with my local. Love the DVR! This forum is great and has helped me solve all my other sat. issues. Thanks Kev

[mwgiii]

Get in touch with the station engineer at your CBS station. It sounds like a problem on their end.

[Eagles]

Hey Guys, After nearly 30 years as a cable guy I have been sucked into the HDTV satellite craze. I have been hooked up for about 6 weeks and have gone thru lots of joy and agony. The first shock came with the poor quality SD service. Way below my cable standards. This was soon fixed with a new S video cable for the SD to compliment the new component cables for the HD. The next shock was the still poor quality Locals signal. This was remedied with the installation of 2 directional antennas in the attic. I am now in HDHeaven. The only really nagging problem I have now other than the occasional OTA signal loss is a audio video sync issue with the local CBS station. In my case the audio drags behind the video. Rare from what I have read here. This only happens over the antenna and only on CBS. It is the same thru S video or component. An A\V receiver swap didnt help. I switched from rca cables to optical and still have this problem. A little joy in the optical purchase is that the Dolby Digital is now awesome. Could this be a bad 622, a wiring problem, a software issue or maybe a problem with my local. Love the DVR! This forum is great and has helped me solve all my other sat. issues. Thanks Kev


keve,
Welcome. Sounds like your enjoying your 622 for the most part. One question on your video hookups. Why would you use an s-video cable at all? I'm assuming your hooked up to an HDTV. Dump the s-video and watch all the programming thru the component cables. Much better SD & HD PQ, and no need to switch TV inputs when viewing. I have my 622 set to the "normal" format setting, 16 x 9 aspect ratio, 1080i and hooked to my TV via component cables. (Older model TV no HDMI available) With this setup my TV displays the SD content with cropped sides. I could choose another format setting on the 622 to fill the screen, but it kind of distorts the picture. Everybody seems to have fat heads. Naturally all the HD content fills the screen beautifully. Give it a shot. Maybe the SD content will look better.

[Hall]

One question on your video hookups. Why would you use an s-video cable at all? I'm assuming your hooked up to an HDTV. Dump the s-video and watch all the programming thru the component cables. Much better SD & HD PQ... He's not the 1st person to complain about the PQ of SD channels seen via component/DVI/HDMI connections. I've never tried it myself because if it is "better" looking I'm still not interested in switching inputs based on whether I'm watching an SD channel or HD channel.

[keve]

Thanks for the replys guys, I went back to the s video cable because in my case the SD quality is much better. I assume this depends on the display you are using. I think the component cable was sending to much info to my display. Lots of blur and pixel. Eagles what do you mean by "normal" format setting. I am using 16x9 and the 1080i setting. I dont have HDMI on my set. I have a 3 year old 42" Tosiba HDTV ready projection model with 1080i. If my audio /video sync problem is local would it not effect everyone in my area. I would think the station engineers would be on top of this. Im I wrong about that?

[Hall]

Audio/video sync issues can be very common on DVRs but I've only read a small number of complaints about it recently (on the 622). Because of that, it does suggest that it's a "local" problem, i.e. some odd quirk between a local station's equipment and the 622. Problem is, unless enough people complain, neither Dish nor the station can work on a fix. If you contact Dish, I'm not sure how your complaint will be escalated, if at all. If you contact the local station, they probably have direct connections to Dish people who can get something looked at.