Telus is now offering HDTV via internet on a hopped-up ADSL modem/service. (The salesman thought service was increased to around 8 mbit/sec, but was not positive about that.) The modem, in turn, is connected to a Scientific Atlanta model SA330 box, which supposedly has HDMI and component out.

I cannot imagine that there's enough bandwidth available via internet to give a decent image on the screen. I don't think even 8 mbit can cut it, but maybe I'm wrong on that.

Any Canadians using this service and, if so, what do you think of it?

I'm on it -- and was very surprised with the PQ. I have seen other service providers HD and TELUS is much better than some, not quite as good as the best. I had the TELUS SD service prior to my upgrade and the PQ was pretty bad (lots of macroblocking, which I was told was due to the Codec that TELUS is using) Yes the SA330 does output via HDMI...there were a few audio dropout issues to start but that has improved lately.

Essentially they provide 15mbit pipe to your house -- only get one HD box and one SD box no more than two boxes so you need to run coax out to your junction and sen to the rest of your house, and have a RF remote to watch on more than 2 TV's-- the left over bandwidth is used for your ADSL, and if you turn at least one box off -- you can gain some performance on your ADSL.

TELUS is now just starting to roll out the SA430 with PVR....personally I'm looking forward to that.

25 HD channels for like an extra $15 -- can't beat that.

Thanks for the information, Rich.

15 mbits/sec is certainly in the HDTV ballpark.

Presently, my wife and I veiw HDTV via Starchoice. That box connects via DVI/HDMI to a JVC RS1 that's projecting onto a 120" screen. We view from less than 1x screen diagonal. Most of the time, HDNET and Discovery HD look very good, even viewing that close. Obviously, we'd hate to buy an HDTV source that looked worse on the screen than the Starchoice.

If you don't mind my asking, what is your display, its size, resolution, and your normal viewing disatance?

You mentioned that you have compared Telus to other service providers. Have you had the opportunity to compare Telus to Starchoice (especially the two channels I mentioned above)?

Thanks again.

Yeah -- My Inlaws have *C and for many of the channels are very comparable -- TELUS does not have HDNET -- I know BOOURNS --- However I'd have to say that Discovery HD is the best looking HD channel on TELUS TV --- I cannot see much difference between *C and TELUS on that particular channel.

That being said -- If you were to poll all users that had both service providers and took all channels into consideration I'd say that the consensus would be that *C has overall better HD PQ. TELUS gets their feed from Bell so it can only be as good as what is being sent to them...and we all know that *C is better than Bell -- or at least that what I believe. Not sure if things will improve once BEV lauches their next SAT -- whenever that is going to be.

I have a Sammy 5271F 1080p LCD viewing from about 12 - 14 feet away normally. The SA 330 is set to output 1080i. If I get up close while watching HD (and I mean within 1.5 ft) I can see that the image isn't totallty crystal clear...but from my normal distance -- I am very impressed. The one downside to the hardware setting in the box is it does not include a 4:3 override like the Mot *C boxes do -- so all of your SD channels have the vertical black bars.

I'd guess that if you were viewing TELUS TV on a screen as large as yours you'd notice the imperfections alot more than I do on my 52'' LCD. Also my TV does a pretty good job of scaling -- and cleaning up the image if it needs to, plus I have it calibrated via DVE -- so it is better than it would look if you saw TELUS HD on display in a store with let's say; a Dell 720p LCD via component. :)

When you look at cost TELUS TV is at a better price point, taking into consideration that if you choose a Rate Protection Plan -- you don't pay for an HD box -- soon to be a HD w/ PVR.

One other exciting thing that TELUS is starting trials on is FTTH (Fiber to the home) I'm trying to get it but it is obviously limited to certain VERY new developments in CGY, VAN & EDM, with the dependancy of having to have the fibre already run to the ports in each neighbourhood --- I'm hearing the the min rate is 25mbit with no limitation on the number of boxes you can have, and of course a faster Internet pipe.

Rich, thanks for taking the time to educate me.:)

Telus is probably using H.264 MPEG-4 to deliver HD. This codec, given a proper encoder, allows bitrates to be shaved in half vs. MPEG-2 to deliver proper picture clarity. So, 8 Mbps H.264, at least for peaks (average bitrate ~7.5 Mbps) would be fine for 720p. 9 Mbps peak (8 Mbps average) would be better for 1080i.

As for SD, that would probably be MPEG-2 to save money, considering only one SD stream, but SD MPEG-2 doesn't need to pass 3-4 Mbps in peaks, and generally needs only 2-2.5 Mbps for good picture quality.