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On which channels do you have audio dropouts?

195K views 933 replies 267 participants last post by  Rich 
#1 ·
Seems like a good time to get a list of which HD MPEG-4 channels are still giving problems.

So, it's fairly well known that there are problems with the SAT feed that gives us audio dropouts on all MPEG-4 receivers with Dolby 5.1.
These dropouts have nothing to do with the hardware on our end, regardless of what DirecTV customer service may try to tell you.

If you have more than a random dropout every so often, then please post what channel is doing this and maybe the time/program you were watching, along with how many there were.

Things that will affect how bad these may be are whether you have Dolby set, and whether you're using your TV speakers, or running through an Audio Video Receiver. Some AVRs react much worse to these errors in the SAT feed than other AVRs, but the true source of the problem looks to be from the MPEG-2 to MPEG-4 conversion process on the uplink.

The goal here is to gather useful data to point DirecTV to where they need to focus, much like rubbing a dog's nose in something to get his attention.

Please leave the rants,*****ing, etc. to one of the other threads, as "we know" it is frustrating but posting it here will only get in the way of "mining the data" and could become counter productive to the goal of this thread.

DirecTV has asked us to post which Audio Video Receiver we're using, as this affects the frequency and duration of the dropouts
 
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#603 ·
Doug Brott said:
DIRECTV spent a lot of effort on this issue. It's not completely gone because the root of the problem is the source material from the content providers. DIRECTV has done a great job of mitigating the problems so that it is now much less noticeable when it does happen.

Also, in theory, the providers should be getting there act together a bit more now as this problem is not unique to DIRECTV ..
What exactly was great about taking 15 months to make it better?
 
#606 ·
The audio problems (lip sync, brrrps and dropouts) appeared when DirecTV started transcoding from MPEG-2 to MPEG-4.

The DirecTV transcoding system takes MPEG-2 content that any el cheapo HDTV or AVR can handle with no problem and converts it to MPEG-4 content with audio problems.

Blaming the audio problems on content providers is convenient, but it is far from the "whole truth".
 
#612 ·
betterdan said:
I still continue to get audio drops. They are much shorter in duration now with the new receiver but still there. Happening quite a bit more the last couple of days.
Doesn't seem like Directv has solved anything... except shrinking my bank account a little each month.
Since last Wednesday I've noticed a bump up in the frequency of the audio dropouts. I checked my setup and notice a software upgrade occured the night before. Coincidental???

All I know is it's been well over a year and still counting for me!!!
 
#616 ·
I had a period of time in Nov/Dec where I'd loose center channel on most channels. If I switched to normal stereo or 5 channel I was fine - but of course that stinks not getting true 5.1 with a center channel. I've not had any problems here in the past two weeks - hoping this continues......
 
#618 ·
integra dhc 80.2 clicks
There has been a lot of buzz about clicks with Onkyo/Integra products with Direct TV. It seems that there is a break in the DTV stream that causes a relay to click in the AVR. While the clicking issue can be fixed for Comcast and Fios broadcasts just by choosing the right listening mode in the AVR, it does not get fixed for Direct TV because there seems to be an actual break in the audio stream as commercials change. For example this was very pronounced last night in ESPN.

Can this issue be addressed in firmware for the Direct TV receivers- i.e. buffering the sound for 1-2 seconds when there is a break so that the AVR does not think the stream has changed?

Joel
 
#620 ·
Just when I thought it was all over...... Last night while watching the recorded version of "Californication" I had 3 dropouts on Sho HD 545 in this 30 minute show.

Something is not right with Sho HD 545 and D*, one or the other or both, may be to blame!! Who knows!! All I can say is that I don't experience this on any other Sho HD channel.

THIS SUCKS!!!!!

Hidef2010
 
#622 ·
hidef2010 said:
Just when I thought it was all over...... Last night while watching the recorded version of "Californication" I had 3 dropouts on Sho HD 545 in this 30 minute show.

Something is not right with Sho HD 545 and D*, one or the other or both, may be to blame...
I recorded SHOeHD's first showing of Californication on Sun 1/9 (I believe at 8pm CT) and just got around to watching it yesterday. I had your post in mind, and was looking for glitches. To my surprise, there were none at all!

To me this indicates there may be a problem with your equipment or your setup.
 
#623 ·
Syzygy said:
I recorded SHOeHD's first showing of Californication on Sun 1/9 (I believe at 8pm CT) and just got around to watching it yesterday. I had your post in mind, and was looking for glitches. To my surprise, there were none at all!

To me this indicates there may be a problem with your equipment or your setup.
This kind of supports what I was thinking too. I'd watched it before reading that post, and when I did, I couldn't remember having them either.
 
#624 ·
Thanks Syzygy & VOS, I am baffled here, for its been a while since I have had an audio drop-out. In fact, this is the only channel that has given me a problem. Everything else I record on other channels are fine (HD/SD). I'll try and rule out the PVR by watching it live this Sunday to see if this occurs. ie (watch live -no recording).
Wait a minute, I just remembered that I also recorded the new show called "Episodes" & "Shameless" which followed "Californication". I watched "episodes last night and there WERE NO AUDIO DROPOUTS. I 'll watch "Shameless" tonight and post back.

Any thoughths???

Hidef2010
 
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