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Brrrrriiiiip, what and where

35K views 252 replies 99 participants last post by  hasan 
#1 ·
This can be very annoying while you're trying to watch a program. They can vary from every once and awhile to being every few seconds during a show.

Thanks to BattleScott here is a sample: http://www.dbstalk.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=18074&d=1239640597

And to Ken S :

What is happening is the DirecTV MPEG-4 encoder is "dumping" and having to reset as it is transcoding the MPEG-2 to MPEG-4 at the uplink center.

This seems to happen to HD locals more than national channels.
If your locals are doing this, you can tune into the OTA feed and sometimes see it there too, but other times not see it. This doesn't mean the station isn't the cause/source. Their feed may have corrupted bits that don't affect the playback of the MPEG-2 stream, but these cause the MPEG-4 encoder to reset.
Sometimes it is the DirecTV encoder, which I've seen when several local stations are all doing this at the same time.

So this is the "what and where" but what can you do about it?

If it's with a local station, I found the best [quickest] thing to do is to call/email the station engineering about it. If they're responsive [some are and some haven't been], they will look into their end and work with the Network Broadcast Center at DirecTV.

If they're not responsive or this is with a national channel, then you will need to contact DirecTV, but you can't get directly to the broadcast center.
This means the CSR can "log a report" which will get the the center, but these don't seem to be acted on until there are many reports [which I really can't blame them with all the channels they're working with]. If they "can see it at the time" then they'll work on it, but since this problem comes and goes, they can monitor the feed and not see it [since it isn't happening at the time].

The next step I took was to email ellen.filipiak@directv.com and explain the problem I was having and the steps I'd done. I would recommend not emailing first, but calling and having it get logged a few times. Let their system try to resolve it, before escalating it to this level.

It took me a few email replies and phone calls, but I did have someone interested in resolving "my problem". One of the first steps was to have a service call to make sure there wasn't anything in my system that might be causing it. There wasn't and I knew it, but they needed to start somewhere and know it wasn't on my end. They asked me to have some recordings so I could show them exactly what it was when the came. They looked all over my system, watched the recordings and then called the broadcast center. The engineer had them hand the phone to me and explained what the problem was.

"The problem" wasn't fixed overnight, but my locals have been much improved and between a few emails to station and the broadcast center engineers, have seen the improvements from both the stations and at the DirecTV uplink.
 
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#28 ·
Had an intermittent Brrrriiiiiiip on Fox News Channel HD Sunday evening. I had seen it before a couple of times - it was the first time that my wife noticed it. Was watching a previously recorded (earlier in the same evening) program.
 
#29 ·
Stuart Sweet said:
I've noticed that whenever there is a new Daily Show (as opposed to a rerun) there will be a significant Brrrrrip about 5 seconds before you see Jon Stewart.
I see this too, as well as more brrrrips later on in the show. But it happens predictably on every new recording of TDS.
 
#31 ·
BattleScott said:
Food Network very bad as of late.
Especially 3Ds and 30 Min Meals.

btw, is this thread being monitored by anyone at DirecTV or is this just like a brriiippp guestbook kind of thing?
One that they didn't expect and they are trying to keep it from becoming common knowledge.

I know that all too often I am getting little stutters and audio glitches on different channels on different shows. It's almost becoming a joke. I guess you are just suppose to ignore it and tell DirecTV thank you!:(
 
#32 ·
swans said:
One that they didn't expect and they are trying to keep it from becoming common knowledge.

I know that all too often I am getting little stutters and audio glitches on different channels on different shows. It's almost becoming a joke. I guess you are just suppose to ignore it and tell DirecTV thank you!:(
Friday they seemed to make some change in my local uplink. Brriippps have been replaced with slightly different audio problems and the video breakups have gotten much worse [more frequent], to the point of green screens.

You can either ignore it or let both the station & DirecTV know there is a problem. I've chose the latter and sent messages to everyone I can.
 
#33 ·
veryoldschool said:
Friday they seemed to make some change in my local uplink. Brriippps have been replaced with slightly different audio problems and the video breakups have gotten much worse [more frequent], to the point of green screens.

You can either ignore it or let both the station & DirecTV know there is a problem. I've chose the latter and sent messages to everyone I can.
I think DirecTV is hoping the majority of it's clients will choose to ignore it until they can figure it out and fix it at a reasonable cost.

I really do think they have a problem with their management of video via MP4. I don't know if it is compression, encoding/decoding, or the hardware, but I believe it is there. Just my opinion.:confused:
 
#34 ·
swans said:
I think DirecTV is hoping the majority of it's clients will choose to ignore it until they can figure it out and fix it at a reasonable cost.

I really do think they have a problem with their management of video via MP4. I don't know if it is compression, encoding/decoding, or the hardware, but I believe it is there. Just my opinion.:confused:
"The problem" is in the MPEG-4 encoding and how it doesn't handle bad MPEG-2 feeds.
Things that aren't "that bad" in the MPEG-2 [where you don't notice it] raise hell with the MPEG-4 encoders.

I don't know what DirecTV is "hoping", but I know they are responsive to my requests to get mine resolved.
I sent an email @ 7 AM, and had a return phone call by 10:30 AM today.
The broadcast center had a problem on Friday, claimed it was cleared by Friday night. DirecTV knew this wasn't the case if I still had the problem last night [and this morning] and is escalating it back to the broadcast center and has given me a "special number" to call back if it hasn't been resolved later today.
 
#35 ·
veryoldschool said:
"The problem" is in the MPEG-4 encoding and how it doesn't handle bad MPEG-2 feeds.
Things that aren't "that bad" in the MPEG-2 [where you don't notice it] raise hell with the MPEG-4 encoders.
I think this is the case, and explains problems I have experienced locally with the ABC affiliate (Seattle 4, KOMO). I was getting regular, consistent, audio and video breakups via mpeg4. I compared mpeg4 to mpeg2 HD (OTA), both via the tuners in an HR20 and via a digital converter box. No problem was observed ota.

My problem persisted, and got worse. Eventually it became very bad and when that happened it was also noticeable on both of the ota feeds. I am speculating the problem was at the source all the time, and only manifested itself initially via the mpeg4 re-coding.
 
#36 ·
I posted this in another thread on the "Brrrrriiiips", but has everyone who has experienced these glitches on their locals added a post in their respective DMA thread in the HD Locals Broadcast Issues forum? There's one thread for each DMA , and even though it says it's for HD Locals, I think if you clarify whether you are reporting for SD or HD, it will help document and track issues by market and then by stations within the markets.

Be sure to specify SD or HD, the station name and channel number, the time the issue occurred, the program you were watching, and add an explanation of the issue.

From comments made by the moderators, DIRECTV monitors that forum to spot-check problems, so you may as well report your Brrrriiippp problems there.

HD Locals Broadcast Issues forum
 
#37 ·
last night and right in the middle I got a 2-3 second stutter. It actually lost audio and had a black screen. I mean this is ridiculous. They want to be the top dog and they can't deliver the product! IT IS REALLY GETTING OLD!:mad:
 
#38 ·
swans said:
last night and right in the middle I got a 2-3 second stutter. It actually lost audio and had a black screen. I mean this is ridiculous. They want to be the top dog and they can't deliver the product! IT IS REALLY GETTING OLD!:mad:
National Geo has had problems for some time. What "we" don't know is if the source is the problem or the transcoding to MPEG-4.
 
#39 ·
veryoldschool said:
National Geo has had problems for some time. What "we" don't know is if the source is the problem or the transcoding to MPEG-4.
If the source is the problem, then DirecTV is the problem for not getting them to fix it!
 
#40 ·
swans said:
If the source is the problem, then DirecTV is the problem for not getting them to fix it!
Thats just a ridiculous statement. Maybe D* is putting pressure on them to get it fixed but they havent figured it out yet. Do you want D* to turn off the channel until it is corrected or would you rather be able to watch albeit with occasional flaws until they do it corrected?
 
#41 ·
CCarncross said:
Thats just a ridiculous statement. Maybe D* is putting pressure on them to get it fixed but they havent figured it out yet. Do you want D* to turn off the channel until it is corrected or would you rather be able to watch albeit with occasional flaws until they do it corrected?
The other night it was USA Network. Then it's TNT. The ridiculous part is that so many are willing to accept a FLAWED product!:nono:
 
#42 ·
swans said:
The other night it was USA Network. Then it's TNT. The ridiculous part is that so many are willing to accept a FLAWED product!:nono:
Then DO SOMETHING [other than just complaining here].
Give DirecTV your feedback. Let them know.
Change service providers, "something".
Be part of a solution. [I know I have, both to find the problem and post about what to do here.]
 
#43 ·
veryoldschool said:
National Geo has had problems for some time. What "we" don't know is if the source is the problem or the transcoding to MPEG-4.
I am wondering if it is the trasncoding, would more bandwidth would help? If they increase the bandwidth per channel then there would be more Forward Error Correction which would help reduce errors. As a side benefit there would be less compression. Just my two cents.
 
#44 ·
tvjay said:
I am wondering if it is the trasncoding, would more bandwidth would help? If they increase the bandwidth per channel then there would be more Forward Error Correction which would help reduce errors. As a side benefit there would be less compression. Just my two cents.
From talking with the engineers, this isn't it.
[poor explanation] The encoder "phase locks" on the MPEG-2 audio track to sync the video [as it changes from the larger MPEG-2 to MPEG-4]. As it starts to break lock, the brriip happens. If it can't stay locked, it has to dump and reset/restart the transcoding [on the fly].
"So" it's not the DirecTV bandwidth being too small, but "bad bits" [or missing bits] in the MPEG-2 feed that is the source [for the most part]. MPEG-2 doesn't seem to show these defects as it's error correction may be able to mask it.
 
#49 ·
seern said:
To me it seems that it has increased again over the last week or so. Noticed on CNN, Food, Discovery and History, both on watching live and from recordings.
Yep, I'm seeing it a lot more too, especially on my CBS local again.
 
#51 ·
It's everywhere now (0x034C), on many channels, much more frequently and with longer durations. Trick play (IR, Reverse) bring it out almost without fail on some channels.
 
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