[Mixer]

I have seen Cable in my local town stretch the SD channels with far better results than the HR20 and I have read about line doublers in TVs that can do the same thing

Upgrades analog signals to near-HD: Wondering how ordinary programming will look on this TV? With the KDF-50E2000, even standard analog TV signals look great because of Sony's Digital Reality Creation® (DRC) multifunction technology. A robust line doubler, DRC upconverts ordinary video to an HD equivalent, producing up to four times the image resolution.

Is the HR20 currently attempting to make the PQ better by using this sort of technology? If not are there plans for it in the future.

 

[eengert]

I have seen Cable in my local town stretch the SD channels with far better results than the HR20 and I have read about line doublers in TVs that can do the same thing

Upgrades analog signals to near-HD: Wondering how ordinary programming will look on this TV? With the KDF-50E2000, even standard analog TV signals look great because of Sony's Digital Reality Creation® (DRC) multifunction technology. A robust line doubler, DRC upconverts ordinary video to an HD equivalent, producing up to four times the image resolution.

Is the HR20 currently attempting to make the PQ better by using this sort of technology? If not are there plans for it in the future.

HR20 doesn't do any upconversion (line doubling). All it does is stretch or zoom (crop) the image to fill a 16:9 screen. I highly doubt D* will ever include such technology in their receivers. Besides, in a few years (supposedly by 2009), there won't be any SD broadcasts. They won't all be HD either, but everything will at least me digital.

 

[Stuart Sweet]

If you read through this, there's an interesting, but highly technical white paper about the next-generation thinking on converting SD to HD:

http://biz.yahoo.com/bw/061114/20061114005747.html?.v=1

 

[cybrsurfer]

The motorola (former general instruments) digital boxes aren't true digital. They are compressed analog. Although it is difficult to tell the difference.

 

[harsh]

HR20 doesn't do any upconversion (line doubling). All it does is stretch or zoom (crop) the image to fill a 16:9 screen.

And just how do you think they accomplish this stretching and zooming? It is absolutely scan doubled (or line buffered, if you prefer).

I highly doubt D* will ever include such technology in their receivers.

All of the D* HD receivers have this capability.

Besides, in a few years (supposedly by 2009), there won't be any SD broadcasts. They won't all be HD either, but everything will at least me digital.

This is not accurate. There will likely be severely limited NTSC programming after that date. Don't confuse NTSC with SD. SD exists in both analog and digital domains. If the digital content isn't one of the handful of HD modes, it is SD. The magical date is February 17th, 2009.

 

[harsh]

The motorola (former general instruments) digital boxes aren't true digital. They are compressed analog. Although it is difficult to tell the difference.

Most cable systems use QAM, so it isn't limited to the GI boxes. Even OTA digital rides on an analog carrier. This is also why you need a modem if you have broadband service via DSL or cable.

 

[patsrule316]

VVV Oops, double post see the one below VVVV

 

[patsrule316]

HR20 doesn't do any upconversion (line doubling). All it does is stretch or zoom (crop) the image to fill a 16:9 screen. I highly doubt D* will ever include such technology in their receivers. Besides, in a few years (supposedly by 2009), there won't be any SD broadcasts. They won't all be HD either, but everything will at least me digital.

I think I am agreeing with the other person that disputed this, but maybe putting it in simpler terms...when we use the HR20 in 1080i pillarbox mode for an SD broadcast, the screen is still 4*3, but the picture quality is definitely better than on 480i pillar box. There has to be some form of upconverting going on there, doesn't there?

And as far as the 2009 no SD broadcasts, as was also said, 2009 means that the over-the-air broadcasts must be in digital format, which has nothing to do with SD or HD. There may still be SD broadcasts, just delivered with a digital medium.

 

[eengert]

I think I am agreeing with the other person that disputed this, but maybe putting it in simpler terms...when we use the HR20 in 1080i pillarbox mode for an SD broadcast, the screen is still 4*3, but the picture quality is definitely better than on 480i pillar box. There has to be some form of upconverting going on there, doesn't there?

And as far as the 2009 no SD broadcasts, as was also said, 2009 means that the over-the-air broadcasts must be in digital format, which has nothing to do with SD or HD. There may still be SD broadcasts, just delivered with a digital medium.

Sorry, I was certainly not thinking when I responded about the HR20's upres capabilities. Of course that's what it's doing when you have it output a 480i signal in 720p or 1080i.

My terminology on SD and Digital is a little fuzzy. I guess I meant to compare analog to digital.

 

[Mixer]

Thanks for the replies. I guess since it has been determined that the HR20 does have this technology the only question is can they do anything to imprvoe the way it does it. This is not a complaint, by any means, on how the SD PQ looks. More of a "give me hope that it could look even beter"

 

[glennb]

I leave my HR20 set to output 1080i all the time.

The SD PQ on my 46 inch wide screen looks pretty good to me as it is.

 

[spolaski]

I think I get a better picture on the SD channels if I let my TV do the upconverting rather than the HR20. It's hard to quantify, though as switching the resolutions takes awhile and I'm not 100% sure if I'm just not imagining a quality difference. FWIW I don't run in native mode as the resolution switching delay is kind of annoying to me and the PQ difference (if there is one) is minor.

I think you'd really need to have two identical TV's side by side with one being driven by an HR20 in native mode letting the TV upconvert the signal and another driven by an HR20 in 720p or 1080i mode to see if there's a noticeable difference in letting the HR20 upconvert vs. the TV. I have neither the resourses or inclination to conduct such an experiment.

The picture quality really seems to vary from channel to channel in my opinion. For instance the PQ sucks on some of the SD Sunday Ticket broadcasts and looks good on others. Whether that's an due to the feed from the networks or D* I've no idea. But I'd assume that since that since NFLST is one of their flagship offerings they'd devote adequate bandwidth for those channels.

If it is a bandwidth issue, maybe they can steal some bit rate from all the shopping channels.

 

[Dusty]

Thanks for the replies. I guess since it has been determined that the HR20 does have this technology the only question is can they do anything to imprvoe the way it does it. This is not a complaint, by any means, on how the SD PQ looks. More of a "give me hope that it could look even beter"

I think HR20 has a pretty simple up-convert. Some TV has more sophisticated signal processing. My Samsung 720p DLP displays SD much better than my Toshiba 1080i, so I have been favoring the Sammy for SD program recordings.

As for hoping for something look better, I am looking forward more to the 150 national HD prospect. In fact, I only need probably another 12 to be very happy. Once Golf/Versus HD is up and OTA is enabled, I probably will only watch SD very sparsely.