Excessive picture issues with Showtime

I watched a recording of the Affair, recorded Sunday evening at 9pm on Showtime, Ch 545. During the playback, there were excessive numbers (15-20) of brief picture breakups (pixelation, sound dropped). I typically don’t see as many issues as I saw last night.

I went through the typical checks to make sure the issues were not caused by my local setup. I ran the System test (no errors), re-ran Sat Setup (no errors), checked signal strength (all readings 85% or higher). I had a new dish, a new HR54-700, and all new coax cabling installed approximately a year ago. I am running 0x1088 SW. So, it would seem to me that whatever is causing the picture breakups is external to my setup.

Anyone else seeing excessive PQ issues, especially on Showtime?

 

I just finished watching the seasons finale of Westworld, which was recorded at the same time yesterday as the Affair. The HBO program had not a single flaw, which leads me to believe that the problems reported in my previous post were specific to the Showtime channel. Can anyone share a theory of what is going on here?

 

I agree. But the purpose of my last post was to provide evidence that whatever is causing the issues must be external from my setup. Naturally, I would like to avoid issues that make watching a recorded program difficult, and was looking for confirmation that I am not the only one seeing the problems.

 

Thanks for the feedback. By “same recording”, just to confirm, do you mean the same time, 8pm CDT, and channel 545?

 

I just watched a recording of “I am dying up here”, recorded following the Affair, also on Ch 545. It had quite a bit of picture break-up as well. I am going to try recording on Show West next Sunday to see if there are fewer PQ issues.

 

I checked the latest satellite/transponder list, and the previous two programs I mentioned as having excessive picture breakup are both on satellite 99CA. A program I watched later in the week on Freeform (the Bold Type) had particularly bad picture breakup issues, and it is also on satellite 99CA.

99CA actually has quite a few important (IMO) channels, like Starz, Cinemax, AMC, TBS, and USA. Based on my experiences, it looks like 99CA might have been experiencing an issue for several days last week. However, I watched both the Affair and I am Dying Up Here this evening, and the picture quality was perfect. Whatever was happening last week seems to have been resolved now, much to my relief.

 

You may be correct, although my reverse LNB was just installed less than a year ago. I’ll continue to monitor the PQ. I have a service contract, so it wouldn’t cost me anything to have a technician check the LNB out.