SD Video Problems @ AMC

[1953]

July 4, 2007, Directv HD, AMC, Movie "Long Hot Summer",
Video is blurry and generally subpar for AMC. I changed HDMI cables, changed from HDMI through the AVR to direct from HR20 to TV yet no improvement. After resetting the HR20 still no improvement.

Could this just be a one off problem with that particular broadcast or.....?

All comments welcomed.
lp

[hasan]

July 4, 2007, Directv HD, AMC, Movie "Long Hot Summer",
Video is blurry and generally subpar for AMC. I changed HDMI cables, changed from HDMI through the AVR to direct from HR20 to TV yet no improvement. After resetting the HR20 still no improvement.

Could this just be a one off problem with that particular broadcast or.....?

All comments welcomed.
lp

SD quality is HIGHLY variable. Sometimes it is watchable, sometimes it is just awful. I tried watching a couple NASCAR events on SD and couldn't tolerate it. Football is awful in SD, period.

I"m sure sometimes AMC will be better than others....and I would never do a reset hoping for better SD quality...very unlikely to help.

The other thing to consider is garbage in = garbage out....only worse...if you have a screen > 42" inches, SD is only going to look marginally decent on a very few occasions. There just isn't enough bandwidth allocated to it, and the imperfections due to the compression being used are only amplified by the size of your screen.

Aside from news, I don't watch SD at all any more....it's just too painful.

[bwaldron]

Aside from news, I don't watch SD at all any more....it's just too painful.

I feel the same way -- especially SD as delivered by D* these days, and most especially sports. OTOH, a high-quality SD feed (e.g., analog BUD) can look pretty darned good, even on a large HD display w/ good scaling/deinterlacing.