[James Long]

I was simply reiterating what was claimed in the announcement of the change with respect to their motivation for making the changes.

Our signal is excellent but we need to improve it? Sounds like the something Coke did decades ago when they introduced "New Coke".

People loved the Coke product but the company undermined their customers by changing to a new improved product which not only was not preferred by many customers (some customers hoarded the old formula so they could keep drinking it) but the message sent was "our product isn't good so we're going to change it". The improvement went over so well that Coke introduced "Classic Coke" to try to win back the customers they threw away. The "Classic Coke" still was not the original formula and the people they upset with the first change were further alienated.

 

[harsh]

Our signal is excellent but we need to improve it? Sounds like the something Coke did decades ago when they introduced "New Coke".

This isn't Coke trying to make their cola appeal to Pepsi users.

This is an acknowledgement that Ku typically offers better "reliability" than Ka and DIRECTV. Unless you live in places that suffer hurricane season or Tornado Alley, you may not fully appreciate it.

 

[James Long]

Got a link to a DirecTV source that actually states what you're claiming?

 

[harsh]

Got a link to a DirecTV source that actually states what you're claiming?

I do not.

It appears that this came from a memo circulated to dealers by DIRECTV (that Scott appears to have quoted verbatim).

 

[krel]

Since there phasing out SD hopefully they will get the HD feeds on there SD channels!!!

 

[harsh]

Since there phasing out SD hopefully they will get the HD feeds on there SD channels!!!

All of the SD channels that are being removed already have HD versions on Ka.

It won't help those with dome or multi-antenna setups but otherwise, the upgrade will insure that those with a Slimline antenna and AVC capable receivers won't lose channels.

 

[krel]

All of the SD channels that are being removed already have HD versions on Ka.

It won't help those with dome or multi-antenna setups but otherwise, the upgrade will insure that those with a Slimline antenna and AVC capable receivers won't lose channels.

i noticed some of the movie channels in the 500's are in SD. it would be nice if they upgraded those!!!

 

[harsh]

i noticed some of the movie channels in the 500's are in SD. it would be nice if they upgraded those!!!

Those are "premium" channels that most pay extra for (up to 560 anyway) so they're not probably not going anywhere until the conversion is more or less complete.

I would expect more of the fringe SD channels with Ka counterparts to be replaced by popular HD channels until DIRECTV finally gets serious about their MPEG2 jettison.

If they push too hard, customers may walk or DIRECTV may run out of equipment.

 

[JoeTheDragon]

Those are "premium" channels that most pay extra for (up to 560 anyway) so they're not probably not going anywhere until the conversion is more or less complete.

I would expect more of the fringe SD channels with Ka counterparts to be replaced by popular HD channels until DIRECTV finally gets serious about their MPEG2 jettison.

If they push too hard, customers may walk or DIRECTV may run out of equipment.

well they may drop some of the MPEG 2 premium feeds sooner.

 

[harsh]

well they may drop some of the MPEG 2 premium feeds sooner.

Anything is possible but if they don't have the hardware available, they surely need to tread carefully.

 

[P Smith]

MPEG2

MPEG-2 could include H.262 video compression scheme of SD or HD.

You are too "young" speaker, who don't know how dish was a pioneer in HD using full blown bandwidth for HD using MPEG-2 !

 

[harsh]

MPEG-2 is a transport container, what could include H.262 and H.264 video compression scheme of SD or HD.

MPEG-2 is NOT a transport container. MPEG Transport Stream (TS) and MPEG Program Stream (PS) are the MPEG transport containers.

The inner workings of the compressions schemes and transport containers are a useless distraction in this context. What's important is that DIRECTV is promising to do away with MPEG-2 in whatever container it comes in.

 

[P Smith]

OK, whatever wording DTV is using, MPEG-2 can/did carry HD or SD compressed by H.262 algo.
As to transport level ... current DSS transponders broadcast TS as packets 131 bytes (include four bytes with SYNC byte, SCID, etc.) with video compression MPEG-1 or "1.5". Those transponders reside in Ku range.
Ka sats tpns using DVB-S transport with packets of 188 bytes. Video PIDs usually use H.264 or H.265 for UHD video. DTV named the broadcast format as A3.

Now try to find what is the acronym [A3] means!

 

[harsh]

As to transport level ... current DSS transponders broadcast TS as packets 131 bytes (include four bytes with SYNC byte, SCID, etc.) with video compression MPEG-1 or "1.5". Those transponders reside in Ku range.
Ka sats tpns using DVB-S transport with packets of 188 bytes. Video PIDs usually use H.264 or H.265 for UHD video. DTV named the broadcast format as A3.

Now try to find what is the acronym [A3] means!

As I said, all of this underlying technology mansplaining is unhelpful (especially when its wrong) in the context of this thread.

The only DIRECTV coined terminology is "A3" and that's their secret recipe code word for AVC. AVC already has three or four official names as it is.

 

[P Smith]

Wrong answer.

 

[slice1900]

OK, whatever wording DTV is using, MPEG-2 can/did carry HD or SD compressed by H.262 algo.

h.262 is another name for MPEG2, just like h.264 is another name for MPEG4. MPEG2 streams cannot contain h.264 compressed video only h.262. MPEG2 is not a transport container as you falsely claimed.

 

[P Smith]

MPEG2 streams cannot contain h.264 compressed video only h.262. MPEG2 is not a transport container

Corrected.