[cornflakes]

I've got my VIP622 to record Law & Order SVU reruns on USA HD. Once in a while it would record one or two episodes that was not broadcasted in HD. It was recording the HD feed because the HD icon is there on the recording listing. But there are the black bars on the side, and also the USA logo on the corner of the screen just says USA, not USA HD.

This leads me to believe that the SD version got fed into the HD feed.

My question is, does anyone know if this is a Dish Network issue, or USA?

 

[jimborst]

Many times the channel will play a SD version of a show even though the HD version may be made. Sci-Fi sometimes plays the SD version of Enterprise even though it was in HD. So I would say it is a USA issue not Dish's, even more so since both Sci-Fi and USA are owned by NBC.

 

[garys]

USA is not the only channel doing this. Dish transmits what is supplied to them. I would really doubt Dish is supplying an sd signal on an HD channel just to mess with you.

 

[TBoneit]

And having the black bars on the side does not mean it isn't HD, It means the source was shot in 4:3 and not in 16:9 Aspect Ratio.

a 4:3 on a HD channel will look better than the same content on a SD channel.

If the black bars bother you zoom the picture until it fills the screen and the people look short & plump.

The wanting the screen filled is why some channels are variably stretching the video to fill the screen. Do a search on Stretch-O-Vision.

IMHO the result is somewhere between Retch, Yech and Puke quality.

 

[cornflakes]

Thanks for the responses, guys. It's not that the black bars bother me, I watch SD programming with the black bars (I never complained about the black bars, I was pointing out that there were black bars, further indicating that the show wasn't in HD because the other SVU reruns are all in widescreen HD).

Jimborst, I don't watch Scifi, but does Scifi's logo on the screen usually say Scifi HD like USA does? If so, during the SD shows, does the logo still say Scifi HD? Because on the SD episodes of L&O, the HD on the USA logo is not there.

 

[BattleZone]

At least half of all HD channels show SD content at least part of the time. In some cases, a series was not originally shot in HD and/or switched to HD at some point, so there are early SD episodes.

In other cases, the content has no HD transfer available.

In still others, one network may have an exclusive on the HD version of a show, while other stations can show it, but in SD only.

There are still lots of shows being produced in SD only, so it will be a long time before "everything" (i.e., nearly all modern programming) is HD.

 

[CorpITGuy]

I've noticed that a lot of my shows do as you described; the first season or two were shot in 4:3; more recent in 16:9.

 

[TBoneit]

Even worse, the 16:9 material is still shot to keep all the action in the 4:3 box. Do you hate seeing the station logo in that 4:3 box so they can use the 16:9 already with logo and just trim off the rest for the 4:3 broadcast?

I looked at Sci-Fi HD and I would have thought that if the have a Letterboxed SD source why don't they at least upscale it to fill the HD screen instead of having black bars on all 4 sides.

 

[CorpITGuy]

Even worse, the 16:9 material is still shot to keep all the action in the 4:3 box. Do you hate seeing the station logo in that 4:3 box so they can use the 16:9 already with logo and just trim off the rest for the 4:3 broadcast?

I have noticed that. It's annoying, but I do have an SD television in my bedroom. HD programming looks better on it than SD, but trimming from those HD stations sometimes makes them unusable. It's kind of a mixed bag. I suppose when more people have HD televisions and receivers the programming will move more and more towards 16:9 with tickers and logos correctly positioned.

 

[kal915]

Thanks for the responses, guys. It's not that the black bars bother me, I watch SD programming with the black bars (I never complained about the black bars, I was pointing out that there were black bars, further indicating that the show wasn't in HD because the other SVU reruns are all in widescreen HD).

Jimborst, I don't watch Scifi, but does Scifi's logo on the screen usually say Scifi HD like USA does? If so, during the SD shows, does the logo still say Scifi HD? Because on the SD episodes of L&O, the HD on the USA logo is not there.

If the show is SD on sci-fi it just says "Sci-Fi" with no HD. when there is an HD show it says "Sci-Fi HD"

 

[whatchel1]

There will be SD programs for ever. there is no way that all programming will be HD. The days of VOOM w nothing but HD on 24 X 7 will happen often. Of course they had to repeat a lot because of the lack of HD programming out there. As time goes by there will be less SD but it will not ever go away completely. In fact wide screen movies are only a few decades old.

 

[dishlover2]

Thanks for the responses, guys. It's not that the black bars bother me, I watch SD programming with the black bars (I never complained about the black bars, I was pointing out that there were black bars, further indicating that the show wasn't in HD because the other SVU reruns are all in widescreen HD).

Jimborst, I don't watch Scifi, but does Scifi's logo on the screen usually say Scifi HD like USA does? If so, during the SD shows, does the logo still say Scifi HD? Because on the SD episodes of L&O, the HD on the USA logo is not there.

usa and universal hd are owned by nbc anyway usa showing something sd on their hd channel is crazy

 

[Jim5506]

Now try punctuation!!