St. Louis, MO - HDTV *OLD* [Text View] - Page 29

kjohnson

08-10-05, 07:40 PM

kj,

I don't know if KETC is able to do what you've suggested they're doing, but it really doesn't matter -- two subchannels (or the bandwidth dedicated to those subchannels) was already wrecking the HD channel's PQ. If they're now allocating the bandwidth of the two previous subchannels to three subchannels, that's commendable but does nothing to address the fact that the HD channel is underserved, bitwise.

There's a finite amount of bandwidth, and while an HD program typically won't take up all of that bandwidth all of the time, when there's lots of motion, or when a field/frame of video changes completely, HD needs near-full bandwidth to maintain picture integrity.

Theoretically, you could run two HD channels in the available over-the-air broadcast bandwidth, but they would be HD in name only, as you'd likely be reducing PQ of each one to sub-DVD levels.

Yes, 720p takes up less bandwidth than 1080i, because progressive video compresses much more efficiently than interlaced. The PBS HD channel originates nationally (or at least it used to) as 1080i, and many of the locals are converting to 720p, presumably to maximize the multicast potential. When KETC first began broadcasting in HD here, 1080i was used for the national HD PBS loop; once they began multicasting, the HD channel was converted to 720p.

Thanks for the clarification, Doug. So what exactly is the attraction to 1080i? I personally prefer the way that KDNL and KTVI look on HD programs...It's great. I haven't exactly been blown away by KSDK or KMOV's HD signal...Not bad, but not outstanding (to me). Can you really tell the difference?

This is going to sound like the dumbest thing you've ever heard. I just use OTA HDTV, so the cable/satellite terms are a bit confusing. What the heck is a MOXI box? The obvious stuff I get, you know, DVR, I got that. But this MOXI thing has had my head spinning for a while.

As for DD 5.1 on 30-1, I echo everybody's curiousity on whether KNDL will air in DD 5.1 this fall. I hope it will be implemented without the problems KPLR contiues to have.

And I have a couple of questions...Are there any HDTV DVR's on the market that don't cost and both arms and both legs, and work well with OTA signals in St. Louis? And my second question is...What can I do to improve reception the HD stations with an inside antenna setup? It isn't practical to put a antenna on the roof, as I live in an apartment (rare among the group posting here). I want stop having to rotate the antenna like a top everytime the atmosphere changes. I'm using a Zenith Silver Sensor antenna, and I like to know what I can do to make it work better, or are there any better indoor antennas amplified (or not) that work in an apartment situation?

Jhamps10

08-10-05, 07:54 PM

Can anyone fill me in on the price for charter cable digital service?

Scott Tucker

08-10-05, 08:14 PM

Both my Zenith HD-SAT520 Directv receivers won't turn on. One is in the basement and the other upstairs. My wife said the power shut off momentarily, but all other stuff in the house is fine. I also had a Directv Tivo box hooked to the same dish, but it works fine. Anyone have a clue what I should expect? Are they toast? Can they be reset? Tried unplugging and plugging them back in to no avail. HELP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Scott

Not sure how I did it but they are both fixed. Whew! Thought I was gonna cry.

Scott

redwine

08-10-05, 11:10 PM

Charter Names Former AOL Executive as New CEO

Does this mean Charter will start mailing those annoying CDs every week like AOL does? :D

djsmokyc

08-11-05, 08:02 AM

And my second question is...What can I do to improve reception the HD stations with an inside antenna setup? It isn't practical to put a antenna on the roof, as I live in an apartment (rare among the group posting here). I want stop having to rotate the antenna like a top everytime the atmosphere changes. I'm using a Zenith Silver Sensor antenna, and I like to know what I can do to make it work better, or are there any better indoor antennas amplified (or not) that work in an apartment situation?

I also live in an apartment. I used to live in Maryland Heights, but I'm now in Dogtown. I've been able to get decently reliable OTA reception (except for PBS).

I used to have a Terk TV5 (bought at CC) and recently bought a Silver Sensor hoping to improve my signal stability. I actually got the same or better results with the TV5. The TV5 has a built in amplifier, but I got better results with it turned to its lowest setting or off completely.

Depending on where you live and which direction the towers are, different types of antennas will work better. I assume you've checked antennaweb.org to figure out the best way to point your Silver Sensor. It is a very directional antenna, so if you have towers in multiple directions, you might want to try something else.

In my Maryland Heights apartment, I got better reception by moving the antenna five feet from the top of the TV to a table near my patio door. I was suprised that small of a change helped. I've also had success moving the antenna away from my receivers. Maybe some electronic interference.

Hope this helps.

GlendaleHDTV

08-11-05, 09:00 AM

Can anyone fill me in on the price for charter cable digital service?

Go back a couple of pages in this thread (or use the search feature) and Doug (DroptheRemote) has a complete rundown on Charter's pricing.

PWSHER

08-11-05, 09:25 AM

wmschultz

08-11-05, 11:06 AM

There is a really interesting article in today's Post about a guy in Wildwood who is building HDTV OTA antenna's geared to St. Louis and other areas. I wasn't sure if I could link to it or not. It is in the business section under "Software guy" builds HDTV antennas out of frustration. His website is www.antennasdirect.com. I have absolutely no affiliation or endorse this or have any antennas my self just thought youse guys should know.
Wayne

I thought they were a sponsor on here. I bought my Antenna from them a while ago and it is awesome. The one he is holding in the picture is the DB4. I bought the DB8 and it is great. The only channel I don't get is 46 and I really don't care about that. I have even called and talked to them about what I could do to improve my signal strength and they gave me recommendations. I was quite disappointed to find out I paid shipping after I called them later and found they were in Wildwood.

dominicr

08-11-05, 11:43 AM

You can read the article about Richard here. I have spoken to him many times and use one of his antennas. I wish him well. A Best Buy employee told me to check him out when I was about to purchase one of their crappy antennas. Charter made me frustrated with a poor picture. Now I'm OTA only and get great reception.

http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/business/stories.nsf/story/B7AA4F9DFD68ECCF8625705A00324406?OpenDocument&highlight=2%2C%22hdtv%22+AND+%22wildwood%22

P.S. with all the antennas I see around West County, there are plenty of potential customers out there.

Anyone notice the 4th PBS channel? I hope it doesn't kill the HDTV portion of they have.

djearl81

08-11-05, 04:01 PM

I thought they were a sponsor on here. I bought my Antenna from them a while ago and it is awesome. The one he is holding in the picture is the DB4. I bought the DB8 and it is great. The only channel I don't get is 46 and I really don't care about that. I have even called and talked to them about what I could do to improve my signal strength and they gave me recommendations. I was quite disappointed to find out I paid shipping after I called them later and found they were in Wildwood.

I use the DB2 in my attic in Swansea, IL. I get all the channels very well.

kjohnson

08-11-05, 07:25 PM

I also live in an apartment. I used to live in Maryland Heights, but I'm now in Dogtown. I've been able to get decently reliable OTA reception (except for PBS).

I used to have a Terk TV5 (bought at CC) and recently bought a Silver Sensor hoping to improve my signal stability. I actually got the same or better results with the TV5. The TV5 has a built in amplifier, but I got better results with it turned to its lowest setting or off completely.

Depending on where you live and which direction the towers are, different types of antennas will work better. I assume you've checked antennaweb.org to figure out the best way to point your Silver Sensor. It is a very directional antenna, so if you have towers in multiple directions, you might want to try something else.

In my Maryland Heights apartment, I got better reception by moving the antenna five feet from the top of the TV to a table near my patio door. I was suprised that small of a change helped. I've also had success moving the antenna away from my receivers. Maybe some electronic interference.

Hope this helps.

Ahh...I've been using a spare (metal) bookcase. You're going to laugh. I live on the second floor (in an apartment about a couple of blocks ne of the Botanical Gardens), and I have the silver sensor on a metal bookcase on top of a table and facing the the ceiling. Works most of the time, but will refuse to show 4 or 5 in one direction, 11 or 30 in another, and in still another 46 or 2. Very frustrating. Thanks for the response. I've been looking into a new antenna, and I will go back to antennaweb.org to see if I've got this thing set up right. Seeing as it looks like it might rain, I'll be having multipath issues again, and tonight is PBS night! :)

abcward

08-12-05, 09:11 AM

Does anyone know if the preseason Rams-Bears game tonight on Fox is in HD?

DroptheRemote

08-12-05, 09:13 AM

DirecTV to Cease TiVo Marketing in October

The following story was featured in today's TVPredictions.com newsletter.
__________________________________________________

TiVo shares slid 6 percent on Thursday after DirecTV announced it will stop marketing TiVo’s digital video recorders in about two months.

The satellite TV provider, which has more than 14.6 million customers, plans to substitute its own digital video recorder in a set-top box that allows viewers to record, pause, and rewind live TV, CEO Chase Carey said Wednesday at the Reuters Telecommunications, Cable, and Satellite Summit.

In the past year, Mr. Carey has made statements saying that DirecTV will stop marketing TiVo’s DVR once the company comes out with its own product. This could be a blow to TiVo as about two-thirds of the Alviso, California-based company’s 3.3 million customers come from DirecTV. TiVo’s current contract with DirecTV expires in 2007.

U.K.-based NDS, an interactive software development company, will be providing DirecTV with its own proprietary set-top box to market to its customers, one of the reasons why TiVo is scrambling to get contracts with other cable companies.

‘TiVo is the middleman being squeezed out of the time-shifting industry.’

Last March, TiVo signed up with Comcast, the largest cable TV provider in the United States, for a customized version of its service that will be available to Comcast customers starting mid- to late-2006. However, the deal was not exclusive and TiVo will be competing with other services.

The company’s stock price has been susceptible to announcements in the news media about its partnerships, and the shares fell $0.37 to $5.62 in recent trading.

DirecTV’s decision doesn’t mean that DirecTV’s customers will go away all at once. Existing customers will still use TiVo’s DVR.
__________________________________________________

For the complete story, click here. (http://www.redherring.com/Article.aspx?a=13136&hed=DirecTV+Scuttles+TiVo+DVRs)

mjohnson71

08-12-05, 10:07 AM

Does anyone know if the preseason Rams-Bears game tonight on Fox is in HD?

It's a local KTVI production with Jay Randolph Sr. and Jackie Slater in the booth. As are the Aug 21 Rams/Chargers game and the Sept 2 Rams/Chiefs game. I would bet the farm on those not being HD.

The Rams/Lions pre-season game on Aug 29 is a ABC production so that one should be HD.

abcward

08-12-05, 11:24 AM

Here is the report from Eklund's Hockey site:

From a good source, "Looks like tomorrow is the day and OLN is the probably the winner."

Word is that ESPN will not match the offer for the NHL put forth by Comcast, and the OLN Network will be the new home to the NHL.

More to come for sure. Another source, very familiar with Comcast, says that he expects, "comcast do do a great job and give the sport the respect if deserves moving forward."

I will have more on this as it develops.

My question is will OLN get us any HD? There have been rumors but nothing concrete. It has also been confirmed multiple times that HDNet will be broadcasting 2-3 games per week as well.

dominicr

08-12-05, 11:30 AM

Bummer, I've set aside couch time and made a financial investment in beer. I was hoping for HD for tonights game.

djearl81

08-12-05, 11:32 AM

It's a local KTVI production with Jay Randolph Sr. and Jackie Slater in the booth. As are the Aug 21 Rams/Chargers game and the Sept 2 Rams/Chiefs game. I would bet the farm on those not being HD.

The Rams/Lions pre-season game on Aug 29 is a ABC production so that one should be HD.

You guys were thinking exactly the same thing I was. I guess the HD football cure won't come for another few weeks. But when it does, it will come with a bang.

The new revamped Oakland Raiders vs. the different defensive look of the Superbowl Chamipon New England Patriots on September 8th on ABC. Woohooo....a night game OTA to start the season...Should be a phenomenal picture. I can't wait. Who's got my nachos and Beer?

(Sorry...it's friday)

abcward

08-12-05, 12:27 PM

kjohnson

08-12-05, 01:49 PM

Why am I not surprised that the game won't be in HD? Seems to me, only about 5 stations in the entire country have HD-cameras, so I'm not surprised that KTVI doesn't wan't to be first in HD (news or otherwise). You want HD tonight? In 720p, we've got ABC primetime. In upconverted 480i, we've got the Rams game. So very sad. They are after all, a FOX O&O. They could borrow the HD equipment for these games. I'm certain if KDNL was to mount something like this, they wouldn't have hesitated to ask ABC for equipment. So, the big question. FOX NFL graphics, or clunky KTVI ones?

I guess we should expect that ABC not do MNF on the cheap this season. I expect to see they wonderful 720p feed that we were spoiled with last season.

kjohnson

08-12-05, 01:54 PM

WinstonSmith

08-12-05, 02:50 PM

Locally produced football is just sickening to watch.

I can't watch it. It makes my physicall ill.

Scott Tucker

08-12-05, 11:26 PM

There is some Football already in HD. Last night's Packers/Chargers snoozer was in HD on ESPN. Beautiful picture too.

I will officially be happy when every single major sport is broadcast in HD every single game. :)

Finally got to see San Diego in HD. That rarely happens. Picture looked very good. Chargers kicker looked very bad missing 3 consecutive field goals. Wouldn't surprise me if the Boltz get a new kicker.

Yeah, the Rams game tonight wasn't even watchable for me. I hate local broadcasts.

Scott

redwine

08-13-05, 12:27 AM

Tom Grooms

08-13-05, 01:12 AM

:rolleyes:

WinstonSmith

08-13-05, 02:17 AM

Joseph Clark

08-13-05, 02:43 AM

Some of you may remember that I'm considering building my own HTPC for the purpose of essentially creating my own HD PVR.

The fiance and I were out shopping tonight and I ran across this Gateway PC w/ Media Center on it. (http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1759,1824723,00.asp). Its $1000.

Since my "extra" computer isn't going to be powerful enough to run what I want/need for an HD PVR, I'm also considering building one. I suppose you're going to say its better to build one, but is that cheaper?

I've been looking at this Shuttle barebones system from newegg.com. (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16856101467) Would that be a good place to start?

Again, the sole purpose of this would be to create an HD PVR, while playing MVP Baseball on my 55in HDTV monitor would also be nice as would playing my mp3s through the HTPC, the main idea is to be able to record and pause and rewind live OTA HD television.

I'd steer clear of a Shuttle, simply because it's so small. You may decide you want to add an extra hard drive or two or three and the small form factor PCs just don't give you much room for expansion.

Can't speak to the Media Center PCs, but there's been a lot written about them in the HTPC area. I'd check there for compatibility issues with regular Media Center capture cards and the HD card you're considering.

As to the cost of buying a PC vs building one yourself, you can almost always find a PC from a major vendor for less than you will spend buying the parts and OS separately, and you'll have their support in case something goes wrong. If you go that route, just make sure the PC has enough expansion room for a card and an extra hard drive, as well as a power supply that can handle the load. (That's the reason I built my own HTPC's - the vendors didn't have the configurations I wanted (e.g. lots of expansion room and a beefy power supply but without things like USB card readers and floppy drives).

Although I've had a lot of success building my own, it can be a nightmare if something goes wrong. Being able to take that box back to Best Buy if it's not right is a big incentive to buy a major brand locally. And there are good deals if you look around and are patient.

I looked at the Gateway you referenced and I think you ought to be able to get more for your money at $950.

Tom Grooms

08-13-05, 02:23 PM

Why is KMOV channel 4 all jacked up? HD broadcast? Yeah right. :(

Good Job!

WinstonSmith

08-13-05, 02:43 PM

jedi35

08-13-05, 07:45 PM

Joseph Clark

08-14-05, 12:53 AM

Joe, you confirmed my suspicions about the Gateway, plus the fiance didn't like its look all that much =]

After doing a little bit of research online this morning, I almost went and bought this eMachines MCE PC for $600. (http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1759,1840845,00.asp) There are some issues w/ this one to get it under the $1000 price tag. For example:

-- I'd have to purchase a TV tuner. This one does not come w/ a TV tuner, though it does have Windows MCE on it. I would also have to purchase a wireless PCI card. In addition, I would have to upgrade the video card at some point so that I could play MVP Baseball on it.

-- But, it does have some nice features for hte price. Number one, its upgradable, whereas some of them are not. It has two PCI openings and and a PCIe opening. I could upgrade the video card, add teh HDTV tuner card and a wireless PCI card w/o any trouble.

-- It also comes w/ 1GB of RAM, the AMD 64 processor, a 200GB hard drive and none of the SATA slots are in use. Plenty of room to upgrade space.

With the Fusion HDTV card or hte myHD card I could use its software or I could use MCE. All I want is to be able to record HD and play some mp3s and maybe a game or two.

This system looks like a great start at a great price, which I can then upgrade to fit our needs. If I'm way off, someone talk me out of it.

eMachines used to be junk, but their quality improved so dramatically, they actually started winning face offs with the better brands in magazines. Gateway bought them fairly recently and they are definitely worth considering. I opened one at Best Buy a few months ago and the only problem I saw was the two PCI slots (this one didn't have PCIe) and limited expansion (I put lots of drives in my systems). I'd say it's not a bad choice, but I'd definitely add that extra hard drive asap. A 250gig drive shouldn't cost you more than $100 (maybe less), if you shop around.

If you're not too afraid to go the on-line route, Tiger Direct has some great deals that would give you a similar configuration but save maybe $150 or $200. If you do a search, you'll probably find a lot of people who have bad experiences with them, but I've built three systems with parts from them, upgraded lots of times and got a Compaq for a friend, which he has been using for a few months now - recording HDTV with MyHD.

Joseph Clark

08-14-05, 01:20 AM

HD-dvd has arrived!!

Well, in a way. A fellow board member(he'll reveal his name if he wants too) came over last night to check out my DISH 942 DVR, and brought a stack of dvds with him. Among them were a few broadcasts of CSI and The Inside that he'd recorded using his hdtv OTA capture card. After running them through some programs that he used to process the video and get them dvd compliant, the results looked about as good to me as what I remember from the original broadcast!! So dude, I'm giving you your kudos publically. He can tell you better than I can about the software needed for this, but you'd all be surprised to know exactly how good an hd broadcast can look recorded onto regular dvd, complete with awesome 5.1 sound. He accomplished all this on his home built htpc. Way cool...

Also of note are some SD shows off D* that he was able to convert to widescreen format, and they wound up looking pretty darn good too...almost as if they'd come from hd broadcasts.

DVDs from HD sources can look great because the original sources are so good - much better than DVDs made from typical SD video cameras. Just so you are aware, though, HD-DVD is here for real, but the catch is that you have to play it from a computer. See the posts above.

Most people have read the news about BluRay and HD-DVD, but what a lot of people don't realize is that you already can record true HD programs from broadcast and/or satellite and archive those programs to standard DVDs in full HD quality. You can then play them back and they will be not just great looking SD but identical to the original broadcasts.

The beautiful thing is that you don't even have to be a computer guru to do it. It's really pretty easy. I have a couple of years of Everybody Loves Raymond and all four years of Smallville, most of which are already on DVD - and the rest will be, too, when I get finished editing out the commercials. (OK, the comments on my taste in TV shows can begin.) Unedited half hour shows will fit on a single layer DVD (not DVD compliant video, but full HD quality). Edited hour long shows will fit on a double layer disk (or they can be split across 2 DVDs). If you're a real fan of a show, it's a way to get an entire season in HD on DVDs that you'd be crazy to pay more than 40 cents a piece for (well, the double layer disks are still high, but they're coming down, too).

Scott Tucker

08-14-05, 08:48 AM

Why is KMOV channel 4 all jacked up? HD broadcast? Yeah right. :(

Good Job!

Are you referring to the PGA Championship telecast? Looked good, but not real good. Looked like they were upconverting a bad signal or something. At least their attempting to show HD golf.

Scott

Scott Tucker

08-14-05, 08:51 AM

Who sells the Zenith silver sensor locally? And, will it work off of Ladue rd. about a mile west of 270 in Creve Couer?

Scott

abcward

08-14-05, 09:15 AM

Tom Grooms

08-14-05, 10:17 AM

Are you referring to the PGA Championship telecast? Looked good, but not real good. Looked like they were upconverting a bad signal or something. At least their attempting to show HD golf.

ScottAll I saw was a crappy 4x3 broadcast OTA :mad:

Scott Tucker

08-14-05, 10:17 AM

Scott Tucker

08-14-05, 10:20 AM

All I saw was a crappy 4x3 broadcast OTA :mad:

You must have been watching from work. Those guys at Ultimate never know how to get HD working. :p

Neuner

08-14-05, 12:53 PM

I have seen some 'barebones' systems offered by newegg.com, but I am a little intimidated in knowing exactly what the system should have in it.

I have a HTPC based system and love it.

What you need varies on what you want it to do with it. The HTPC forum is where you can find all of your answers, but it can be a little intimidating at first. The best thing is to read as much as you can & don't be afraid to ask a stupid question, there have been plenty already asked.

I don't think you can go with a barebone system, the expansion capabilities aren't great enough.

Joseph Clark

08-14-05, 12:57 PM

I too have had interest in building my own HTPC, especially to use as another HD DVR. I have seen some 'barebones' systems offered by newegg.com, but I am a little intimidated in knowing exactly what the system should have in it.

Can someone give me some advice on what exactly a good MediaCenter PC should have in it? HD Space? Memory? PVR software? Tuner card? etc.

Any advice is appreciated

I have 4 HTPCs and, as Scott says, I started in the HTPC area for the info I needed to get the Home Theater part of a HTPC going. I've shopped at Newegg a lot, too. Depends on what you want to do with it as to how much you'll need: record from satellite or broadcast, or both; play the latest 3D games on your HDTV or projector; play high def Windows Media Video files; play MP3s; etc.

Glad to help if I can.

Jym

08-14-05, 01:04 PM

Will the baseball game be on ESPN HD tonight? Or will it be blacked out? I have Charter.

Thanks!

-Jym-

abcward

08-14-05, 02:58 PM

Jym,

The ESPN Sunday night games are never blacked out. This is because they have exclusive rights to that Sunday night game. And I believe they are always in HD too....

abcward

08-14-05, 03:03 PM

I have 4 HTPCs and, as Scott says, I started in the HTPC area for the info I needed to get the Home Theater part of a HTPC going. I've shopped at Newegg a lot, too. Depends on what you want to do with it as to how much you'll need: record from satellite or broadcast, or both; play the latest 3D games on your HDTV or projector; play high def Windows Media Video files; play MP3s; etc.

Glad to help if I can.

Thanks for the input guys - I will head over the HTPC area and start doing some homework.

Personally I want an HTPC to take full use of my plasma. It has the appropriate inputs that aren't being used. I would like it to be a PVR, play HD mpegs and mp3s, and to allow me to use a DVDROM drive for movies which allows me to play all DVDs regardless of region. I'm not much of a PC Gamer, so that isn't all that important to me.

Joseph Clark

08-14-05, 05:17 PM

Thanks for the input guys - I will head over the HTPC area and start doing some homework.

Personally I want an HTPC to take full use of my plasma. It has the appropriate inputs that aren't being used. I would like it to be a PVR, play HD mpegs and mp3s, and to allow me to use a DVDROM drive for movies which allows me to play all DVDs regardless of region. I'm not much of a PC Gamer, so that isn't all that important to me.

HD PVR - a MyHD or similar card will give you the ability to record OTA local broadcasts and, with a DVD burner, archive those as DVD data disks for playback later by the MyHD. You don't need a very powerful computer for this; I had one running on an ancient PII 450mhz. Custom modifications are available for several HD satellite receivers that will give you the ability to record HD from DirectTV or Dish Network. I use the R5000 mod for a Dish 6000 receiver to capture HBO, Showtime, etc. You'll need a beefy P4 or Athlon for this (2.8ghz or more is best).

Play HD MPEGs and WMV HD files (Microsoft codec) - you'll need a fairly powerful PC to do this, say at least a 2.6ghz or better CPU and a decent video card (I use Radeons - a 9800XT and a couple of 9600XTs); some get by with less but your results will probably suffer with some files (Microsoft recommends 3ghz CPUs for 1080i playback of its HD codec).

Play all DVDs regardless of region code - you'll need something like AnyDVD. Google it.

MP3s can be handled by just about any old PC. You should be aware that you'll need a separate digital audio cable for most HD capture cards. The PCs audio out is independent of most (but not all) of the HD capture cards' multichannel audio output.

Robert Simandl

08-14-05, 06:01 PM

FusionHDTV is the HD card in my HTPC. It does a great job of capturing OTA HD broadcasts. It gets better reception of channel 46-1 than the HD Tivo sitting next to it on my shelf. Needs a separate audio connection to the sound card only for capturing SD through the S-video input (which I never do so I never connected it). Unlike the MyHD, it sends the signal to your TV through your video card, so it requires a higher end video card and CPU than the MyHD does (2.2gHz at least). And its multichannel audio output is through the PC's sound card. But it costs $100 less than the MyHD.

It comes with a remote control that was pretty easy to adapt to other programs on the PC, specifically the "Media Portal" HTPC front end program.

Contrary to a recommendation or two here, my HTPC started from a Shuttle XPC barebone. Admittedly there's not much room for expansion in the HTPC itself, but I have a 400gb hard drive in there in the first place. And through the LAN connection I can offload recorded shows to the server in the other room (with almost a TERAbyte of storage space), and stream them back in real time to the HTPC whenever I want to watch them. Or I can offload them to my video editing station for conversion to 720x480 mpegs that make fabulous DVD's playable in any player. Jedi attested to the quality above.

For region-free DVD's I use DVDidlePro. I think it's at http://www.dvdidle.com

Before you go paying for SageTV, Snapstream, BeyondTV, or any of those commercial HTPC front end programs, check out Media Portal at http://mediaportal.sourceforge.net It's freeware and works great with the FusionHDTV card's remote control.

Tom Grooms

08-14-05, 07:54 PM

You must have been watching from work. Those guys at Ultimate never know how to get HD working. :p LMAO, The new box for OTA was set to 4x3/480i. A couple minutes in the smoke & mirrors room and its all cleared up.;)

Scott Tucker

08-15-05, 12:04 AM

LMAO, The new box for OTA was set to 4x3/480i. A couple minutes in the smoke & mirrors room and its all cleared up.;)

I was in your store today, and never could figure out how or where to see the golf in HD. I ended up watching on the Plasma where your D* display is.

I bought two Sirius systmes today and had them both installed in our cars. Ray the car guy is a good guy.

One of the home AV guys pissed me off though. He got upset that I was changing the channels on the plasmas near the big screen room. I almost asked him to chill and get me a bottle of water, but my wife made me bite my lip.

What did you guys do with all the remotes in that store? It's virtually impossible to play with stuff in there.

Glad you figured out the new OTA box. :)

Joseph Clark

08-15-05, 12:09 AM

Contrary to a recommendation or two here, my HTPC started from a Shuttle XPC barebone. Admittedly there's not much room for expansion in the HTPC itself, but I have a 400gb hard drive in there in the first place. And through the LAN connection I can offload recorded shows to the server in the other room (with almost a TERAbyte of storage space), and stream them back in real time to the HTPC whenever I want to watch them. Or I can offload them to my video editing station for conversion to 720x480 mpegs that make fabulous DVD's playable in any player.

The Shuttle is also quiet and easy to integrate into a home entertainment system because of its small size. I guess I'm just claustrophobic, and I have a tendency to want to stuff too much into a computer case.

Just out of curiosity, what's your video editing program of choice?

Robert Simandl

08-15-05, 07:25 AM

duihlein

08-15-05, 07:50 AM

I also use VideoRedo to edit files captured from my HiPix, though I haven't used it much since I got my Dish DVR-921.

I purchased a DB4 antenna from Antennas Direct (picked it up at his house on Friday). At first I tried putting it in the attic like my old RatShack beast, but I was still having problems with Ch11's signal bouncing from 0-100. So, I finally bought myself a roof mount kit and propped it up there with a 5ft mast. I don't think I would have wanted to do that with my old one (big yagi style), but the DB4 was very easy to get up there and mount.

Now all channels lock at 125 (except 46 which hovers about 80, but stays locked)

The bad part was I noticed my gutters needed cleaning...

So now I'm all set for some HD-NFL and the upcomming primetime season!!!

Dave

Joseph Clark

08-15-05, 10:49 AM

After four years of using Womble mpeg2vcr for mpegs from my ReplayTV, I've recently switched to VideoRedo for both ReplayTV mpegs and .tp streams from the FusionHDTV card.

VideoRedo does a MUCH better job of handling the funkiness of Replay mpegs (lots of garbage in the headers which causes sync loss in some shows after editing).

Channel 46-1 also has some weirdness in its stream that can cause sync loss when editing with Womble. Editing that same .tp stream with VideoRedo gives perfect sync from beginning to end.

I just recently got VideoRedo but haven't had a chance to work with it that much yet. I used to use HDTVtoMPEG2, but it didn't have frame accurate editing, so edit points were rough. VideoRedo makes for much smoother transitions. It's navigation is easier, too.

redwine

08-15-05, 11:21 PM

Scott Tucker

08-15-05, 11:58 PM

Well, it has been a few months now and I am still looking for a HD LCD set over 30" for my bedroom. The prices have been coming down and now the Hisense 32" is under $1000. What are the opinions out there about a set made totally in China (including the chip which is what the company is railing about in p.r. releases). Should I go for it or will the price drop even further before Christmas?

Curious, why an LCD? I've seen HDTV CRT sets in that size range for 1/2 that price around town. Do you have a size restriction? Need to wall mount? Just wondering. I would be skeptical simply because I've never even heard of the brand. I'm not saying it isn't the best thing since sliced bread. Maybe it is, but is any LCD at any price the right display for you?

Scott

hanjke

08-16-05, 12:35 PM

Does this mean Charter will start mailing those annoying CDs every week like AOL does? :D

At least in the old days AOL mailed me free floppies that were re-writeable. Those CDs can only be used as coasters.
:-)

RaceTripper

08-16-05, 12:40 PM

At least in the old days AOL mailed me free floppies that were re-writeable. Those CDs can only be used as coasters.
:-)

Or pizza cutters, until they melt.

STL

08-16-05, 01:00 PM

I have a couple questions for you guys:
1) Is anyone getting anything on channel 5.2? They keep advertising it (on TV and the web), but I've yet to see anything on it. I've only tried for the past week or so.
2) Is anyone really getting surround sound with NBC's NASCAR broadcasts? Each week they do a promo billing the broadcast as Sony HD Audio, but my Sony ES rec'r is only decoding it as three channel audio (L+C+R -- no rears).

Joseph Clark

08-16-05, 01:05 PM

mjohnson71

08-16-05, 01:05 PM

It's three weeks after when stage 2 of the digital conversion on Charter was supposed to occur. Any new news?

STL

08-16-05, 01:12 PM

Actually I have rescanned. I do get channel 5.2 but nothing is ever on the channel when I tune to it. BTW, I have a HD TiVo if that matters.

Joseph Clark

08-16-05, 01:47 PM

Actually I have rescanned. I do get channel 5.2 but nothing is ever on the channel when I tune to it. BTW, I have a HD TiVo if that matters.

Haven't used it much, but it's been there for the last weeks every time I checked and it's there right now. The signal is going out.

STL

08-16-05, 02:14 PM

Thanks for the info; that's what I needed to know. Time to figure out why mine isn't working...

Now I just need NASCAR viewers here to chime in on my other question! :)

mikesweeney

08-16-05, 02:23 PM

I think I know the answer to this question I'm about to pose, but I thought I'd still bring it before the braintrust here. I'm about to buy a house and the previous owner has left behind a large antenna in the attic.

now, as long as I have a TV with HD built in and something that will convert the 70 ohm connector to a standard BNC connection, I should be able to pull down OTA HD, correct?

STL

08-16-05, 02:31 PM

As long as the antenna is capable of pulling in a UHF signal you are correct. I suspect this large antenna is a yagi and that it does both VHF and UHF. That being said, when I changed to a quad bowtie antenna (from a large yagi) for UHF reception my HD signal numbers went higher and became more stable. From what I've heard, these bowtie type antennas are better at rejecting multipath that is common when having an antenna in the attic.

wmschultz

08-16-05, 04:32 PM

I have a couple questions for you guys:

2) Is anyone really getting surround sound with NBC's NASCAR broadcasts? Each week they do a promo billing the broadcast as Sony HD Audio, but my Sony ES rec'r is only decoding it as three channel audio (L+C+R -- no rears).

I hear stuff in my rears, but it isn't true 5.1, as a matter of fact, I don't know if KSDK passes through DD.

I usually turn down the center channel cuz I can't stand listening to BENNY or The other head, but they still come out of my fronts.

Scott Tucker

08-16-05, 07:56 PM

Actually I have rescanned. I do get channel 5.2 but nothing is ever on the channel when I tune to it. BTW, I have a HD TiVo if that matters.

I get 5.2 just fine. Found myself actually watching it lately with all the storms.

Scott

DroptheRemote

08-16-05, 08:20 PM

When is a Performance Bonus Not About Performance?

When I first saw this, I didn't think it was that big a deal, but it seems to be generating a lot of coverage in various places, including the lead story in today's Evening Bridge market close.

Maybe it was just a slow news day.

But here's something to ponder the next time you're wating for your Charter installer to show up: The boss's "bonus" is guaranteed at a cool $1.2 mil, whether he arrives or not.

__________________________________________________

New Charter CEO Neil Smit will receive a base salary of $1.2 million per year for the first three years of his employment, slated to begin on Aug. 22, the company said in a SEC filing.

Smit will then receive $1.4 million per year and is eligible for a performance-based bonus of 125 to 200 percent of his salary.

Smit's minimum annual bonus is $1.2 million.
__________________________________________________

Robert Simandl

08-16-05, 09:55 PM

Hey Doug,

In 1998, the CEO of Venture Stores, Inc, got a "performance bonus" of $5 million... as the company was liquidating.

redwine

08-16-05, 10:38 PM

DroptheRemote

08-16-05, 10:49 PM

Robert,

I'm not saying that Charter is alone in being screwed up on executive compensation.

However, at the moment it's not part of the new CEO's charter to liquidate the company -- though that may well be in the cards at some point.

This new guy is supposed to turn around a company that is in extermely difficult straits, and I just don't see how a board of directors envisions that happening when any performance at all would pay the CEO (and presumably the balance of his executive team) half their incentive pay -- entirely without regard to the company's results.

I don't think you need to be Einstein to see the utter stupidity in this sort of plan. You might as well at least be forthright and call it $2.4 million in salary and $1.2 million in incentive comp, because that is the bottom line.

But maybe this is the sort of incentive plan that it takes to get hot executive with a sexy track record. Still, I can't help but thinking you'd have a lot better shot at actually changing this particular business by bringing up the second string and giving them the same incentive plan -- but with the whole shebang at risk if hard and fast minimum objectives weren't achieved.

But hey, there is good news...I saved money on my car insurance. ;)

redwine

08-16-05, 11:02 PM

Curious, why an LCD? I've seen HDTV CRT sets in that size range for 1/2 that price around town. Do you have a size restriction? Need to wall mount? Just wondering. I would be skeptical simply because I've never even heard of the brand. I'm not saying it isn't the best thing since sliced bread. Maybe it is, but is any LCD at any price the right display for you?

Scott

Scott,

The namebrand HD CRT sets at 32"-34" AND WIDESCREEN are close to the same price or much more than $999 for the Hisense LCD. The best deals (about 1/2 price) are HD CRT sets that are the same size but only a 4:3 ratio - but why? The LCD sets seem more sexy. The CRT sets are very bulky and very heavy at that size and I would have to lug it upstairs. I do think the quality is great and will probably buy a CRT widescreen when the price goes down unless I am convinced otherwise.

I have been waiting for the same quality LCD at a comparable price and size for about a year. Prices have been dropping for name brands (Sharp etc.). I have been hearing about the LCD wars among the manufacturers. I just was wondering about the opinions of my fellow AVS-STL forum members.

redwine

08-16-05, 11:10 PM

Robert,

I'm not saying that Charter is alone in being screwed up on executive compensation.

However, at the moment it's not part of the new CEO's charter to liquidate the company -- though that may well be in the cards at some point.

;)

Doug,

I think Paul Allen just wants another polo partner. :) Doesn't he still basically control this company and can afford to run it into the ground?

I still think the company is being positioned to be bought out --- but by who is the problem? AOL?

Scott Tucker

08-17-05, 12:25 AM

Scott,

The namebrand HD CRT sets at 32"-34" AND WIDESCREEN are close to the same price or much more than $999 for the Hisense LCD. The best deals (about 1/2 price) are HD CRT sets that are the same size but only a 4:3 ratio - but why? The LCD sets seem more sexy. The CRT sets are very bulky and very heavy at that size and I would have to lug it upstairs. I do think the quality is great and will probably buy a CRT widescreen when the price goes down unless I am convinced otherwise.

I have been waiting for the same quality LCD at a comparable price and size for about a year. Prices have been dropping for name brands (Sharp etc.). I have been hearing about the LCD wars among the manufacturers. I just was wondering about the opinions of my fellow AVS-STL forum members.

Thanks for helping me understand your reasons. Yeah, the LCD's are sexy.

I may be wrong, but when I was in UE the other day getting Sirius radio's installed, I thought I saw a 30" Samsung CRT widescreen for around $500. I think it was a demo on clearance.

Scott

abcward

08-17-05, 09:36 AM

The pay gap is widening between executives and average workers. There was a good write up in the Sunday Post on all this. I especially enjoy the trend of outsourcing "average" workers to foreign countries. It started in manufacturing and we were told to get trained on those computer jobs. Well now the computer jobs are now outsourced to India and China (countries with virtually free higher education) at about 1/6 the pay.

All these decisions are made by the same executives whose pay goes up extraordinary amounts. Somehow I think Walmart is behind most of this. If we all have mediocre pay the only place we can afford to shop at will be Walmart and most of the goods they sell are made in China!

This subject is something that strikes close to home for me. I was one of the many IT professionals that paid the price for being in the wrong field at the wrong time. I've been downsized twice by HUGE companies...all for the sake of saving a buck. And way back, I was urged by my father to study computer science because it was THE field to go into. [These days I am already preaching to my young children to do what you enjoy, not what someone else tells you to do.]

I am torn on the hiring of Charter's new CEO and his pay. I am a current Charter sub, partially for its price, partially for the convenience. I can see some of Charter's good points, but I can also be one of Charter's biggest critics. Bottom line: something needs to be done to fix this company. Maybe the huge salary was the only way to lure a talented person who can handle this mess. Or maybe its just another thoughtless move by a clueless company.

Personally, I would welcome Charter being swallowed up by another Cable Co. Comcast or TWC?

DroptheRemote

08-17-05, 10:16 AM

abc,

FWIW, there was a news item earlier this week that reported that Carl Icahn, who has recently been a major buyer of Time-Warner stock, has joined with other major investors and urged the company's management to sell Time-Warner Cable.

http://www.nynewsday.com/business/sns-ap-icahn-time-warner,0,4207244.story?coll=nyc-business-headlines

No idea if this will come to pass, but in the short term at least, it probably means that TWC won't be looking for other acquisitions beyond its plan to absorb Adelphia in a deal with Comcast.

abcward

08-17-05, 10:27 AM

Someone earlier mentioned AOL as a potential buyer...is that something feasible?

Bruce

wallyj

08-17-05, 10:34 AM

...That being said, when I changed to a quad bowtie antenna (from a large yagi) for UHF reception my HD signal numbers went higher and became more stable...

Thanks STL,

Any suggestions/endorsements on a quad bowtie. I live in St. Charles off Harvester Rd and need to pull the trigger soon as my HT is about two weeks from completion. I’ve got the cable pulled to the attic just waiting to be hooked up!

Am I reading the maps (posted by DroptheRemote) correctly that I need to point my antenna to the South East from St. Chuck?

STL

08-17-05, 12:25 PM

FYI, I finally got channel 5-2 (and 9-4 also) to correctly tune in. My HD TiVo wouldn't really find these new stations until after I ended up 1) clearing out existing OTA channels, 2) re-defined my local network area, and 3) then commaned it to search for new channels. You would think that just the last step is needed, but several attempts doing just that didn't work for me.

STL

08-17-05, 12:36 PM

wallyj,
You should be able to find a quad bowtie for about $25. I actually like in St. Peters myself (a few miles south of Mid Rivers mall) so the antenna should work well for you. A friend of mine further south off O'Fallon Rd. also said going to a quad bowtie was a big improvement for him.

BTW, you'll have to fine tune the pointing of your antenna by trail and error, but those maps give you a good place to start. Ironically to get the best reception for each, the direction that I point my UHF quad bowtie and my VHF-only yagi (after I removed the UHF elements so I could combine their signals on one cable) differ by at least 15 degrees!

jedi35

08-17-05, 03:41 PM

Doug,
Now that I'm back from Michigan, I've noticed an upgrade to the DISH 942 PVR's software. Previously, when users punched up the program timer record feature, the default was set at one minute before, and 3 minutes after the program's end. These could be changed by getting into the options menu, but it just added the extra hassle of buttons to be pressed, not to mention more time. The default itself cold not be changed, so one had to do this for every recorded program. Now, I see there is an option for changing the default. Pretty cool.

Also, I could be wrong about this, but there seems to be a new option for setting the maximum number of events for each timer, which allows for the oldest unprotected events to be removed after a set number of recordings.

For now, I'm saying goodbye to my Charter services. I hate to see the boxes go, especially since it'll be hard to get another 6200 hd box with firewire if I decide to start things up again. I certainly enjoyed the high speed cable, and wanted to have a look at the new all-digital network as it develops, along with the coming HD channels. It's just too exspensive for me right now, and not much money is coming in. I still have my DISH services. In fact, DISH is coming out tomorrow to install a free second dish so that I can get all my locals. While it's not such a big deal that I'll now get analog UPN, seeing the other satellite location at 61.5 lines me up for more HD channels with the addition of the VOOM pak. 10 more HD channels will grace my screen tomorrow.

Joe,
Yep, I was aware that hd is already being recorded onto current dvds. I guess I'm not thrilled about using 2 discs for a one hour show, or buying the exspensive double-sided discs. What Bob is doing looks just like HD quality, gives you 5.1 sound, and 2 hours on a standard dvd. Way cool...

djearl81

08-17-05, 03:44 PM

WallyJ,
I use the DB2 dual bow tie antenna in IL. If you looking for a quad bowtie antenna, I'd look into Antennas Direct - http://www.antennasdirect.com/ . I get better reception with my DB2 in my attic than I did with many other antennas on my roof. Plus, it's a local company.

Good luck...Gotta get all that HD stuff working by the start of football season.

wallyj

08-17-05, 03:50 PM

...point my UHF quad bowtie and my VHF-only yagi...

You have both a UHF and VHF antenna? Am I missing something, thought you just needed a UHF for OTA High-Def reception. Antenas Direct has the DB4 for $59 and I see the Channel Master for $38 plus shipping. Didn't find anything around $25, any hints?

djearl81

08-17-05, 03:55 PM

All.

My Dad and I are going to install his new plasma tommorow evening. We've been working on the remodel for about a month now tearing everything apart, building new cabinets and sofits, putting up bead board, molding, painting, and running audio/video cables, painting...you get the idea. Anyway, everything is finished except for the carpet, hanging the TV, and moving the new furniture into the room. I'm hoping to post some pictures when it's all finished...I'm proud of this one.

Long story short...
Has anyone here ever installed a plasma? If so, are there any tips or pitfalls to look out for?

wallyj

08-17-05, 03:55 PM

WallyJ,
Good luck...Gotta get all that HD stuff working by the start of football season.

Thanks djearl81,

Yup football season is a consideration, but not as much as getting up and running by the October 2 NASCAR race at Talladega :D

STL

08-17-05, 05:12 PM

You have both a UHF and VHF antenna? Am I missing something, thought you just needed a UHF for OTA High-Def reception. Yes I have two antennas, but the VHF one has absolutely nothing to do with high-def reception. Not all the TVs in my house have OTA digital tuners and since I refuse to pay a DirecTV for local changes I can get for free, I left the old antenna up there (and just took off the UHF elements). All that being said, I rarely (if ever) watch analog OTA TV. That's mostly because I have a TiVo I never watch anything "live" -- that and my HD TiVo can tune the OTA digital signals then output an analog signal (for my old TVs). My setup isn't typical since I only have one SAT rec'r (the HD TiVo) that runs all four TVs in my home. I even designed and built a custom IR repeater (for about $40) so I can control the TiVo from each room. How's that for telling you more than you want to know!?! LOL

Antenas Direct has the DB4 for $59 and I see the Channel Master for $38 plus shipping. Didn't find anything around $25, any hints?This is what one friend ordered:
http://www.acehardware.com/product/index.jsp?productId=1291860&cp=1259088&parentPage=family
Problem is it shows as being currently out of stock. IMO, $38 (let alone $59) is too much for a quad bowtie -- you can get a 8-bay bowtie locally for less than that! I'll ask where my other friend got his 4-bay (aka quad) bowtie and let you know. BTW, I got my Channel Master quad bowtie for like $17 from a friend of a friend who sells satellite equipment wholesale.

STL

08-17-05, 05:24 PM

Joe,
Yep, I was aware that hd is already being recorded onto current dvds. I guess I'm not thrilled about using 2 discs for a one hour show, or buying the exspensive double-sided discs. What Bob is doing looks just like HD quality, gives you 5.1 sound, and 2 hours on a standard dvd. Way cool...Are you saying one can get a true 1080i (or 720p) signal on a DVD that a regular DVD player will read? :eek: I haven't heard of that!! I do know you can take HD material and convert it to the standard DVD format (essentially converting it to 480i or maybe even 480p) and keep the widescreen aspect as well as the 5.1 audio -- but that's no longer a HD picture!

DroptheRemote

08-17-05, 05:36 PM

STL,

I ran into something similar when I recently tried to scan for additional channels on my HD TiVo. In the end, I decided I didn't really want to see 5-2 or 9-4 THAT badly and left well enough alone.

wallyj,

I don't have the maps in front of me, but that sounds right from your location, though I'd think it's probably somewhere between due east and southeast. But the maps should be very accurate, at least in terms of where the towers have been placed on them. These were recently redone and doublechecked against the FCC filings database.

DroptheRemote

08-17-05, 05:44 PM

djear81,

As you probably appreciate, plasma panels are relatively fragile, especially in comparison with other display technologies. The main thing you want to watch is that the frame is supporting the panel, rather than all of the weight coming down on the panel itself (avoid turning it face down).

For a while some retailers were requiring that the installation be done by their staff, or else they might not honor the warranty. I don't know if this is still happening, but it sounds overly cautious and the instructions ought to be clearly enough written to handle this without paying an additional fee to have it done.

stoesser

08-17-05, 05:49 PM

Hello all,

Just moved back to St. Louis after a few years in Tampa. Got some questions. Thanks in advance.

1) My father in law lives WAY out in Wright City (exit 200 off of 70) in a brand new subdivision where he cannot as yet get cable. So, he signed up for DirecTV and has the HD package for his new Sony HD television. Local HD channels are the issue. I called DirecTV today and had them submit the waivers for me. Think we'll get approval?

2) I'll be living in Creve Coeur (Olive and Fernview). Anybody in this area have luck with an indoor Radioshack antenna for HD locals? I used this type of antenna in Tampa and was able to get most all the HD locals.

3) Off topic - who has the best high speed internet option in St. Louis? Charter or SBC?

4) I need a job in tech as a datacom sales engineer - anybody hiring?

Bill

DroptheRemote

08-17-05, 05:52 PM

wallyj,

When the transition to digital becomes an actual finality, some local broadcasters may choose to move their digital broadcasts back to their longtime frequency, and for several of them this might mean a move back to the VHF band (KTVI, KMOV, KSDK, KETC, KPLR).

The most likely candidate for such a move in the market here is KMOV, which currently does its digital broadcasting on channel 56. Because the FCC is planning to clear out all TV broadcasting from channels 51 and above, I think the chances of KMOV moving back to 4 for their digital broadcasts is more likely than them staking out another UHF frequency.

The rationale behind freeing up the frequencies beyond 50 is that it will allow more contiguous and useful bandwidth to be available when it comes time to auction off these frequencies.

I don't believe anything has been finalized, but 2009 is looking like a likely date for the end of analog broadcasting.

DroptheRemote

08-17-05, 06:04 PM

bill,

Wright City is 52 miles from downtown, so it's probably something like 45 miles from the main cluster of towers. I think this is probably going to result in hit-and-miss reception. The problem with waivers is local broadcasters are loathe to sign off on them and as a result I expect the chances of getting all of the St. Louis stations to provide waivers is small.

Hopefully I'm wrong.

On the RatSchack antenna, it's hard to say. In some cities, all of the stations are "co-located" on a single tower which makes it more straightforward to get reliable reception with an indoor antenna. However, here most of the stations have their own towers, with only two of the stations co-located. Generally, the Zenith Silver Sensor gets the best marks for reliability, but I think there's been some recent favorable reports here on the RS model. Bottom line is, you won't really know until you try it.

Charter has the best coverage due to the fact that anywhere there's cable they can reliably deliver Charter Pipeline Internet service. With DSL, you need to be within a certain number of feet away from the Central Office. A good forum neighbor here recently checked this out for me and found that I'm 32,000 feet away from the CO. I think that's something like 25,000 feet too remote.

Finding this out makes me thankful that I'm well within range of "running water" and "e-lec-tricity"... :)

aspec2

08-17-05, 06:35 PM

Just spent a couple of weeks in Texas at the oldest's house. They have Directv. On returning to my Charter cable on Sunday, I must say that "D" programming is so compressed, the SD is hardly watchable. My son-in-law has a sports game room. He has 4 sets in this room. One Toshiba 61' that is tweaked (the best SD set I have ever seen) 2, 24 inch sets mounted on the wall and one 24" on a stand. All are connected to Direct TV boxes. The Toshiba also gets OTA HD. We were able to do a lot of A/B comparisons with D and OTA. I have watched a lot of sports in this room and must say that I am going to keep Charter and stop thinking about Sunday ticket.

I have found to avoid problems with Charter service, you meet the man at the door, take the box from his hands, install it and then have him make the call. When calling for HD problems, don't call the regular CSR's. Call Charter Digital. If you do call the regular number, have them connect you to Charter Digital.

Walt

wallyj

08-17-05, 11:03 PM

Hello all,

3) Off topic - who has the best high speed internet option in St. Louis? Charter or SBC?

Looks like others have had alright service from Charter, but we had nothing but problems. Mostly billing issues. We went from Charter Cable, Pipeline (internet), and TV to, as of two weeks ago, NOTHING!! It was hellish. I don't like our SBC/Yahoo DSL as much as Pipeline, I'm thrilled I don't have to deal with Charter every month or so.

wallyj

08-17-05, 11:05 PM

wallyj,
I don't believe anything has been finalized, but 2009 is looking like a likely date for the end of analog broadcasting.

Are you saying we might need a VHF too in the future?

skippy_rq

08-17-05, 11:36 PM

3) Off topic - who has the best high speed internet option in St. Louis? Charter or SBC?

Bill

Bill,

As a SBC employee (one who actually uses Charter's pipeline service) I will say that for the money, SBC is the better option right now. Charter will offer the 3mb service for 29.99 if you auto pay and sign up for a year contract, otherwise they are 39.99. SBC offers 1.5mb service for 14.95 and 3mb for 24.95 with a one year contract. I offered my services to the forum if you or others want me to check and run a prequal to see if you are able to get service and at what speed.

You are probably wondering why I have Charter instead of SBC. I live in O'Fallon, MO area and SBC does not service this area. :( I pay $49.99 for 5mb with Charter. Send me a PM with your phone number and address and I will check availability for you.

Rich

redwine

08-18-05, 12:08 AM

Bill,

As a SBC employee (one who actually uses Charter's pipeline service) I will say that for the money, SBC is the better option right now. Charter will offer the 3mb service for 29.99 if you auto pay and sign up for a year contract, otherwise they are 39.99. SBC offers 1.5mb service for 14.95 and 3mb for 24.95 with a one year contract. I offered my services to the forum if you or others want me to check and run a prequal to see if you are able to get service and at what speed.

You are probably wondering why I have Charter instead of SBC. I live in O'Fallon, MO area and SBC does not service this area. :( I pay $49.99 for 5mb with Charter. Send me a PM with your phone number and address and I will check availability for you.

Rich

Rich, do you know anything about CenturyTel DSL offerings? I also cannot get SBC and use Charter pipeline but CenturyTel is the phone service here.

Mike

redwine

08-18-05, 12:22 AM

This subject is something that strikes close to home for me. I was one of the many IT professionals that paid the price for being in the wrong field at the wrong time. I've been downsized twice by HUGE companies...all for the sake of saving a buck. And way back, I was urged by my father to study computer science because it was THE field to go into. [These days I am already preaching to my young children to do what you enjoy, not what someone else tells you to do.]

Abc...same for me....and I also tell my children to find something they can enjoy and be inspired by for a career. I believe the money takes care of itself if you are doing something you really love for a career. This was not preached in the 70s when I went to college.

Jhamps10

08-18-05, 12:35 AM

MSloss

08-18-05, 06:59 AM

Rich, do you know anything about CenturyTel DSL offerings? I also cannot get SBC and use Charter pipeline but CenturyTel is the phone service here.

Mike

Redwine,

I have used Centurytel DSL since I moved out here last year. I had initial problems with a defective modem, but no problems since getting a replacement. I have the 768K service and pay about $80 for metro phone and DSL.

Weren't you finishing your basement for a home theater? How did it turn out?

Add me to the club of IT guys having been laid off (twice). I am back working now on a federal contract, but have had no luck in "permananent" placement for the last 3 years.

Mike

ferl

08-18-05, 07:18 AM

Going Back to the internet for a second. Does anyone know if SBC will work in the I-70 Cave Springs interchange area, or will I have to deal with Charter. I am moving there soon, like within the next couple of weeks, and was just checking.

A good place for information about telco or cable broadband is HTTP://www.dslreports.com

http://www.dslreports.com/forums/all

Kurt K

08-18-05, 07:50 AM

Bill,

As a SBC employee (one who actually uses Charter's pipeline service) I will say that for the money, SBC is the better option right now. Charter will offer the 3mb service for 29.99 if you auto pay and sign up for a year contract, otherwise they are 39.99. SBC offers 1.5mb service for 14.95 and 3mb for 24.95 with a one year contract. I offered my services to the forum if you or others want me to check and run a prequal to see if you are able to get service and at what speed.

You are probably wondering why I have Charter instead of SBC. I live in O'Fallon, MO area and SBC does not service this area. :( I pay $49.99 for 5mb with Charter. Send me a PM with your phone number and address and I will check availability for you.

RichYou forgot to tack on an additional $10/month if you don't subscribe to any additional Charter services. With that said, I'm in the process of making the switch from Charter to SBC DSL (thanks Rich). Even if the top tier DSL is a little slower than Cable, I'll be happy with cutting my internet bill in half. I am supposed to be activated on 8/22 and can report back with a comparison in a while.

abcward

08-18-05, 08:08 AM

http://sports.espn.go.com/nhl/news/story?id=2137098

OLN will now be the home of the NHL. I'm not sure how I feel about this one. ESPN is much more established, reaches more homes and already has HD. However OLN will make the NHL their number one priority and Comcast seems pretty aggressive when it comes to sports.

Reports are that OLN-HD will be up in October. Now, how soon before D*, E* and Charter add that channel?

Also, HDNet has already gone on the record that they will be broadcasting 2-3 games per week.

Game On!

Dave_STLMO

08-18-05, 08:33 AM

Charter has the best coverage due to the fact that anywhere there's cable they can reliably deliver Charter Pipeline Internet service. With DSL, you need to be within a certain number of feet away from the Central Office. A good forum neighbor here recently checked this out for me and found that I'm 32,000 feet away from the CO. I think that's something like 25,000 feet too remote.

2) I'll be living in Creve Coeur (Olive and Fernview).

Actually Bill, The Fernwood entrance is about 500 cable feet from the Creve Coeur West central Office. You shold be in great shape in that regard.

Best
Dave

STL

08-18-05, 09:44 AM

wallyj

08-18-05, 10:02 AM

wallyj,
My friend got this quad bowtie locally for about $20 from:
Skywalker Communications
9390 Veterans Memorial Parkway
O'Fallon, MO 63366
Phone: 636-272-8025
I've also purchased stuff from them and was happy with the transaction.

Thanks STL. Is that a retail location? If so, looks like I'll be making the trek to O'Fallon this week-end.

STL

08-18-05, 10:42 AM

The are not really retail but they do sell to the general public. I think you have to give them a call first and place your order, but then you can drop by and pick it up to avoid any needless shipping charges. If they don't work out let me know....I might be able to find you another place to buy it. I'm sure those Antenna's Direct units are fine and all, but they aren't any better to justify the fact they're about 3x the price.

DroptheRemote

08-18-05, 10:51 AM

J.D. Power Unveils 2005 Cable/DBS Customer Survey

The following story is from today's SkyREPORT newsletter.

As the story notes, DirecTV and DISH were near the top level of customer satisfaction. While I wasn't able to find an actual score for Charter, it appears that they were ranked at the bottom ("the rest") in all of the survey categories -- performance/reliability; cost of service, billing; image; offerings/promotion; and customer service.

A link is included below that summarizes the J.D. Power survey and category scoring breakdowns.
___________________________________________________

According to J.D. Power and Associates' 2005 Residential Cable/Satellite TV Satisfaction Study released Thursday, a cable overbuilder has topped the small dish competition in terms of customer satisfaction for the first time since 2001. WOW now holds the top position in J.D. Power's customer satisfaction rankings, a release from the research company said.

WOW, which operates in Michigan, Illinois and Ohio, ranked highest among 14 of the nation's largest cable/satellite companies with an index score of 717 (on a 1,000-point scale), J.D. Power said. DirecTV was one point behind, taking a close second. EchoStar's DISH Network fell to fourth place with a 708 score. Cox Communications placed third with a 711 score.

Last year, DISH Network won the J.D. Power prize for customer satisfaction, with DirecTV close behind in the rankings.

The nation's biggest satellite TV service was happy with the results. "We are pleased that DirecTV ranked highest among satellite TV providers and we are also pleased that we continue to have a higher customer satisfaction rating than all of the major pay TV providers," said DirecTV spokesperson Bob Marsocci.

The industry average for this year's survey was 667. Comcast, the nation's biggest cable operator, was well below that number, with a score of 631.
___________________________________________________

Survey Summary at J.D. Power web site (http://www.jdpower.com/cc/telecom/ratings/cable_satellite/index.jsp)

For more satellite television news, click here. (http://www.skyreport.com)

DroptheRemote

08-18-05, 10:55 AM

wallyj,

SkyWalker is actually a wholesaler that primarily sells direct to installers. However, they do typically sell to walk-in customers, but normally at above wholesale price levels.

skippy_rq

08-18-05, 11:43 AM

Rich, do you know anything about CenturyTel DSL offerings? I also cannot get SBC and use Charter pipeline but CenturyTel is the phone service here.

Mike

CenturyTel is the worst choice you could make. But for some it is the only one. I had CenturyTel before Charter since Charter hadn't built out my subdivision at that time. CenturyTel advertises certain speeds that are a joke to ever obtain. They had 1.5m service for 46.99 and I never saw anything over 700k. I would complain and nothing ever would happen. Then they offered 3m service for 59.99 and I figured ok I will try that since the first 3 months were 19.99 on any speed package. I never got speeds above 2m. Once my 3 months of the 19.99 were up I cancelled and at that time Charter was finally in my area. I didn't have to pay the ETF of $150 with CenturyTel since I used a DSL modem I previously owned. But they tried to charge me the fee until I told them to check the notes on the acct and prove that I received a modem from them. They eventually waived it and said they were sorry.
My question for you is why do you still have phone service with CenturyTel? Charter offers phone service at a better price and you can keep your number. If you have a metro line, Charter is $39.99 with like 5 options on the phone. If you don't have a metro line then they offer 18.99 w/ the 5 options or 9.99 with no options. You can PM me for further ?s if you want. I was out on disability for the first half of the year and called to find pricing on everyone! Also, in that quest, I found a wireless ISP in the O'Fallon, MO area that offers pretty good pricing and speeds. Charter still beat them though. :)

Where at out here do you live? I am off Fallon Parkway.

Rich

hanjke

08-18-05, 11:44 AM

Rich, do you know anything about CenturyTel DSL offerings? I also cannot get SBC and use Charter pipeline but CenturyTel is the phone service here.

Mike

When we moved to St Louis, we looked into DSL vs Cable for internet connection. I called CenturyTel, but was informed I would need to transfer my local phone carrier to them in order to receive DSL. Not sure if this is still their policy, but it was in April of '04.

-Hanjke

skippy_rq

08-18-05, 11:46 AM

You forgot to tack on an additional $10/month if you don't subscribe to any additional Charter services. With that said, I'm in the process of making the switch from Charter to SBC DSL (thanks Rich). Even if the top tier DSL is a little slower than Cable, I'll be happy with cutting my internet bill in half. I am supposed to be activated on 8/22 and can report back with a comparison in a while.

When I first switched to Charter for just internet they didn't charge me the $10 extra fee since I agreed to autopay and commit to a year. Which I thought was odd and even questioned it. 2 months later I switched my TV to them so I never saw the fee. But you are right, there should be one. :) Let me know about the DSL.

Rich

skippy_rq

08-18-05, 11:47 AM

Going Back to the internet for a second. Does anyone know if SBC will work in the I-70 Cave Springs interchange area, or will I have to deal with Charter. I am moving there soon, like within the next couple of weeks, and was just checking.

Yes, that is SBC service territory. I will be glad to check the availability for you. PM me.

Rich

John Kotches

08-18-05, 11:57 AM

I have 6 Mbits/sec DSL service which runs me 47.47 month with taxes. Since I work from home the bandwidth is something I can use.

Cheers,

wallyj

08-18-05, 12:19 PM

One difference between our old Charter Pipeline and current SBC/Yahoo DSL is that you have to physically (click) log into DSL. When you start your browser, the one provided or your choice, you get a dialog box that requires a log-in name and password. When you click to log-in it goes through a short sequence, similar to old school dial-up. You can also log-out. With Pipeline, we were automatically connected at computer start up. Not a big deal, but definitely different.

STL

08-18-05, 12:25 PM

SkyWalker is actually a wholesaler that primarily sells direct to installers. However, they do typically sell to walk-in customers, but normally at above wholesale price levels.Did you also know they have a website? It is:
http://www.a1components.com/
The website doesn't give you the option to pick stuff up -- I found that out by calling them. In my experience, even their above wholesale prices are very good.

Mr_Bester

08-18-05, 01:08 PM

skippy_rq

08-18-05, 01:56 PM

You can avoid that with an inexpensive router. This would also help you share the internet to more than one computer.
Dug

The speedstream modems that SBC is sending out now do all the logging in for you. The whole logging in with a click thing isn't as prevelant any more.

STL

08-18-05, 01:59 PM

My question for you is why do you still have phone service with CenturyTel? Charter offers phone service...Forget both of those and get Vonage. You can get it for $25/mo with unlimited calling and free LD -- or do what I did and get 500 minutes a month (and still free LD) package for just $15/mo.

DroptheRemote

08-18-05, 02:05 PM

Scott Tucker

08-18-05, 02:08 PM

Rich, do you know anything about CenturyTel DSL offerings? I also cannot get SBC and use Charter pipeline but CenturyTel is the phone service here.

Mike

I use Centurytel for DSL. They used to be fairly slow, but recently very consistent speeds around 700 kbps or what ever you call them.

Scott

GlendaleHDTV

08-18-05, 03:19 PM

Can somebody here let me know what the current state of play is on Charter's HD-capable receivers in terms of Firewire and DVI connectivity?

I was reading some discussion of the Sony CableCard DVRs on the HDTV Tips List this morning, and one of the more knowledgable guys noted that cable providers have been required by the FCC to provide Firewire connectivity since April 2004 and DVI/HDMI as of July 2005.

Is Charter meeting that requirement on all their boxes? The last thing I saw here, the MOXI DVI was still inactive. I actually checked the Charter MOXI manual and the diagrams of the connection panel show neither DVI or Firewire...

The non-PVR Moto 5100 that Charter uses (when they have them in stock) has DVI active and working. It is still inactive on the Moxi. Not sure what the FCC law mandates, but I was under the impression that Charter just has to be able to provide a box that has DVI active (i.e. if someone demands DVI, they just give them the Moto box instead of Moxi). It seems like they've met this requirement.

wallyj

08-18-05, 03:24 PM

You can avoid that with an inexpensive router. This would also help you share the internet to more than one computer.

The speedstream modems that SBC is sending out now do all the logging in for you. The whole logging in with a click thing isn't as prevelant any more.

We’ve got a wireless router hooked up and have only had the service under a month. Not sure what kind of modem we have.

I actually like having to log-in. We have a 14 year old son, and it’s very easy to click and log-out preventing him from viewing sites that are, shall we say, questionable.

Jhamps10

08-18-05, 04:38 PM

The speedstream modems that SBC is sending out now do all the logging in for you. The whole logging in with a click thing isn't as prevelant any more.

Does SBC provide the modem like Verizon DSL does, or do you have to pay for it.

Jym

08-18-05, 05:14 PM

ESPN Web site does not list the Cardinal game as ESPN HD tonight. Is this true? No HD?

-Jym-

abcward

08-18-05, 05:30 PM

ESPN Web site does not list the Cardinal game as ESPN HD tonight. Is this true? No HD?

-Jym-

Not sure on the HD, but the ESPN broadcast will be blacked out here in St. Louis. The game is on FSMW locally.

skippy_rq

08-18-05, 05:40 PM

Does SBC provide the modem like Verizon DSL does, or do you have to pay for it.

Free after rebates. See your PM.

STL

08-18-05, 05:47 PM

ESPN Web site does not list the Cardinal game as ESPN HD tonight. Is this true? No HD?That's the problem with ESPN-HD -- most of what they broadcast is not HD but rather just upconverted SD.

redwine

08-18-05, 07:02 PM

My question for you is why do you still have phone service with CenturyTel? Charter offers phone service at a better price and you can keep your number. If you have a metro line, Charter is $39.99 with like 5 options on the phone. If you don't have a metro line then they offer 18.99 w/ the 5 options or 9.99 with no options. You can PM me for further ?s if you want. I was out on disability for the first half of the year and called to find pricing on everyone! Also, in that quest, I found a wireless ISP in the O'Fallon, MO area that offers pretty good pricing and speeds. Charter still beat them though. :)

Where at out here do you live? I am off Fallon Parkway.

Rich

Rich, I currently use Charter for my phone service but just today was threatened with a cutoff notice for non-payment. This has been the third incident of this sort. I paid the bill, via U.S. Bank e-pay but Charter keeps crediting the payment to my cable/pipeline account - which gets overpaid! They cannot combine the charges on one account. Their backoffice processing is just plain stupid. They accept e-payments for cable/pipeline accounts but not the telephone accounts. Basically the morons who open the envelope and read the check can't figure out the account number.

For this reason I would like to switch just my phone service to CenturyTel and keep the same number. The wires are already connected to my house. I have not researched this yet but I am sick of being threatened by a phone cutoff.

BTW..I live right off highway N near Winghaven Blvd.

redwine

08-18-05, 07:10 PM

Redwine,

Weren't you finishing your basement for a home theater? How did it turn out?

Add me to the club of IT guys having been laid off (twice). I am back working now on a federal contract, but have had no luck in "permananent" placement for the last 3 years.

Mike

Mike, no home theater in my basement..must be someone else around here you are thinking of...I might consider when my teenage kids move out :D

Have you tried Mastercard for a "permanent" placement? They are close by.

Robert Simandl

08-18-05, 07:51 PM

My basement will be a home theater at some point. But it's more a long-term goal than a short term one.... as in a few years from now after I pay off the credit cards.

wallyj

08-18-05, 08:41 PM

but Charter keeps crediting the payment to my cable/pipeline account - which gets overpaid!

OMG Redwine!!!
Your post made my day. I thought all this time it was us. That is the exact problem we had over, and over, and over. Worse was that we had phone, Pipeline, and TV with Cable and every month or two they would shut one off for "non-payment". When we would contact them they would notice we were short on cable for, lets say, $75, but LOOK! you have a credit of $75 on your phone account. When asked if we could consolidate bills, some agents would say no, and some would say yes. For the ones that said yes, we could hear them entering something on a keyboard over the phone! Next time something was cut-off when we told the customer service agent that our bill was consolidated they would say, "You can't do that." What do you mean we can't to that, I HEARD THE GUY DO IT!

Anyway, *bulging vein on forehead fades* we are totally D-I-V-O-R-C-E-D from Charter, and couldn’t be happier. We now have SBC for phone/DSL and Dish for TV.

wallyj

08-18-05, 08:43 PM

Should have my basement HT up and running in two weeks. In fact, I should be downstairs now touching up the baseboard paint and giving the doors one last coat. Oh well, it’s Thursday night.

DroptheRemote

08-18-05, 10:48 PM

ESPN2 HD to be provided on DirecTV beginning Sep 8

Not sure how I overlooked this earlier -- I guess I'd given up that it would ever happen:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=568709

Apologies if this is old news, but I don't recall any discussion here...

MSloss

08-18-05, 11:15 PM

Mike, no home theater in my basement..must be someone else around here you are thinking of...I might consider when my teenage kids move out :D

Have you tried Mastercard for a "permanent" placement? They are close by.

Redwine, I had to go back and do some searching, but it another nearby member that I was confusing with you -- Toeside. Maybe he can give us an update if he is still following this thread.

Yes, I tried Mastercard both directly and through agencies, but they are a tough place to get into. I have stopped looking for anything else, since I am doing OK for now.

Mike

Robert Simandl

08-18-05, 11:17 PM

<sarcasm>

Great. I guess HD Lite is about to get lighter.

</sarcasm>

duihlein

08-19-05, 06:16 AM

OMG Redwine!!!
Your post made my day. I thought all this time it was us. That is the exact problem we had over, and over, and over. Worse was that we had phone, Pipeline, and TV with Cable and every month or two they would shut one off for "non-payment". When we would contact them they would notice we were short on cable for, lets say, $75, but LOOK! you have a credit of $75 on your phone account. When asked if we could consolidate bills, some agents would say no, and some would say yes. For the ones that said yes, we could hear them entering something on a keyboard over the phone! Next time something was cut-off when we told the customer service agent that our bill was consolidated they would say, "You can't do that." What do you mean we can't to that, I HEARD THE GUY DO IT!

Anyway, *bulging vein on forehead fades* we are totally D-I-V-O-R-C-E-D from Charter, and couldn’t be happier. We now have SBC for phone/DSL and Dish for TV.

I had the same experience here. My phone was disconnected and when I called they said they could not consolidate (FCC rules) and said I must pay a $60 reconnection fee, and they could not waive it. At that point I said fine, I'm calling SBC. I called SBC (who provided DSL to me 2 years ago) and they said I was too far away for DSL. I then explained I had DSL before, but they said since they upgraded to higher speeds their distances were scaled back, so now I'm in a "Red Zone"

Needless to say I called Charter back, ready to eat crow and the Rep I got took care of the re-activation. Now I really need to set up auto-pay to get my internet price dropped.

Dave

skippy_rq

08-19-05, 02:16 PM

duihlein

08-19-05, 04:56 PM

Thanks Skippy_rq,
I sent you a PM with my address.

On a side not, I am now oficially unemployed as I await to start my new job on Monday. My old firm is now looking for a top notch Microsoft guy (or gal) and an EMC storage engineer.

If anyone is interested or knows someone who is please PM me.

Thanks
Dave

StockInv

08-19-05, 06:25 PM

jedi35

08-19-05, 06:30 PM

Doug,
I have an inactive Motorola 6200 box that I still need to return to Charter. It provided not only an active dvi port, but also an active firewire connection. I hate to see it go, but Charter's high prices have closed me down.

STL,
My statements a couple of pages back about HD quality on regular dvds have to do with how good the dvds look, not their actual resolution. Bob did such a good job making these, that they look just like the original hd broadcasts, even though they are at 480p. Thus, it seems that HD-dvd has arrived since I also get the 5.1 sound and 2 hour length.

Well, my 2nd dish install for my DISH system went pretty badly. The tech didn't appear to be very good, and he left even though I wasn't getting a usuable signal yet. Het blamed it on water getting into the LNB or the switch, and told me to wait a couple of hours for things to dry our, and try it again. I did eventually get a picture later last night, but only one tuner input on my 942 PVR was active. I could surf to any of the 3 sats I now have access to, including the 61.5 location that has the Voom 10 channels(which I added), but I couldn't record one channel and watch another like I could before.

After several calls to DISH tech support, I have been scheduled for a service call, but it won't happen until Monday. My installer promised to call me back this morning to see about coming back out to fix things, but he didn't call.

Along with the Voom channels I now have, I have just noticed a new HD demo channel that seems pretty cool. However, at night I only saw aquarium shots with music. That gets old quickly. This channel is located between ESPN HD and HBO HD, so I guess it's part of the HD pak.

redwine

08-19-05, 07:01 PM

Redwine,
That is a pain on the Charter seperate account billing. I straightened all that up by signing up on Charter's page for e-bill. I used to go through my bank but since using Charter's site, I have not had a problem. They list the seperate accounts and let you pay on each one.

Skip, I thought about doing this but just don't like the idea of Charter originating the authorization to extract funds from my checking account. I work in this business and don't yet trust transactions not instigated by the account holder -- especially companies with employess who can't read account numbers on checks. :eek:

I think I can add a "memo" note on the e-instigated and mailed checks that my bank issues and will in the future mention "THIS IS FOR PHONE SERVICE--PLEASE DOUBLE CHECK ACCOUNT NUMBER".

I still don't understand why Charter accepts e-payments from my bank for the cable/internet bill but can't do it for the phone bill.

I am also giving CenturyTel a call.

Jhamps10

08-19-05, 08:44 PM

After the storm on Saturday, I had no cable or internet service. What follows is a summary of my telephone call to Charter. Please fasten your seatbelt.

Me: Hi, I'm calling to find out what time you'll be here. I had an appointment for today and you said someone would be here between 8 and 12.
Charter: You don't have an appointment for today.
Me: WHAT? I called Monday (August 15th) and you told me someone would be here on Wednesday (August 17th) between 8 and 12. I took off work this morning and have been waiting for over three hours.
Charter: No, you don't have an appointment for today. You had one for Monday. (August 15th).
Me: MONDAY! How could I have an appointment for Monday when I called you on Monday?
Charter: Yes, you had an appointment for Monday.
Me: Well, how come no one showed up on Monday?
Charter: That's because we cancelled it.
Me: WHAT! You're telling me that you cancelled an appointment that I didn't even make?
Charter: It appears that we'll be out on the 24th.
Me: WHAT! I've been without cable and internet since the storm on Saturday and you're telling me I have to wait another week for service?
Charter: Sir, you don't have to be home then. It's a general outage and it's on our end. You don't have to be home.
Me: THEN WHY THE HELL DID YOU SCHEDULE ME AN APPOINTMENT FOR TODAY? AND WHY ARE YOU SCHEDULING ME AN APPOINTMENT FOR THE 24th? I'VE MISSED WORK AND HAVE BEEN WAITING FOR YOU ALL MORNING! GET ME A SUPERVISOR!

After another 10 minutes on hold the same agent comes back to the phone.

Sir: The problem is on our end. We're working on it.
Me: THE PROBLEM IS THAT YOU HAVE NO IDEA WHAT YOU'RE DOING. IF THE PROBLEM IS ON YOUR END, THEN WHY WOULD YOU SCHEDULE AN APPOINTMENT AND HAVE ME WAIT FOR YOU ALL MORNING? (I figure if I continually repeat myself, they might get it. Nah!)
GET ME A SUPERVISOR!

Five minutes later a supervisor comes on and tells me the problem is on their end. That was certainly news to me. I told him about their lack of communication. I'm sure he's never heard that before. He offered me $20 to make me feel better. I told him to bring it over tomorrow between 8 and 12 and to wait for me to come out of the house. Then I told him what I thought about their service. It's not printable.

Epilogue: Within an hour and a half my wife calls and tells me the service was restored. My blood pressure has almost returned to normal. The only glitch now is that my Moxi Box doesn't show all the channels I'm supposed to get.
I've been calling them for the past half hour, but the line is busy. I'm looking forward to talking with them again.

Good to know that I wasn't the only one to have horrible service from charter... About 3 years ago, the service man came out to disconnect for non-payment. Which the day before I had paid the cable bill at the local charter payment office (the bank, cause the dummies at charter closed down our local office and moved everything in SE Illinois to the Taylorville office. Go figure...) but back to the story. The service man called me everything in the book, and well it can't be printed... So they disconnected it for non-payment and about 15 seconds after the service guy left, I called Charter. They said yeah we got that payment this morning. it souldn't have been cut-off. I said "It was you stupid fool, the guy just left 5 minutes ago!!!!" Well we can come out there tommorow morning between 8 and 12. I said ok, oh yeah and do I still have to pay the arm and a leg reconnect charge..... Yes! of course. Lets go foward about 3 DAYS or so. I had called EVERY day and got the same response... We schulded the service man to come out there. well I had it, I was just about to call my attorney when Charter called back. They was sending someone down from Taylorville (about 135 miles from my home town). Why, because the service man that was oh 5 miles or so away had to be at a pagent.. A PAGENT!!!!!!!!! Needless to say I was glad that within 5 months a new cable company moved into town and, we have had great service with them.. I feel sorry for the few coustmers who are crazy and are loyal to charter in my home town..

hockeynut

08-20-05, 02:29 PM

<sarcasm>

Great. I guess HD Lite is about to get lighter.

</sarcasm>

Geez. We get great news and someone complains about it. :rolleyes:

wallyj

08-20-05, 02:50 PM

Doug,
...I have just noticed a new HD demo channel that seems pretty cool. However, at night I only saw aquarium shots with music. That gets old quickly. This channel is located between ESPN HD and HBO HD, so I guess it's part of the HD pak.

Anyone know if Dish has anything like this HD Demo channel? If not, how about a background video DVD.

DroptheRemote

08-20-05, 03:14 PM

jedi,

Sorry but I must have missed your message earlier about the demo channel.

From your note, I'm assuming this must be channel 72, as 70 is HBO, 71 is Showtime and 73 is ESPN.

I'll check it out next time I'm in front of the set.

wally,

There has been a demo loop channel on DISH since the very beginning of its HD broadcasting. I'm not sure if it's full-time or even if's close to full bandwidth, but the last time I worked on a DISH system and thought to check for it, it was there.

I think the DISH demo would be found at channel 9565 (PPV and Special Events), but if that's not correct I'd be grateful if someone lets me know and I'll add it to the next edition of the St. Louis HDTV channel guide.

Current version can be found here:

Video Savant Guide to St. Louis HDTV Availability (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=5936573&&#post5936573)

sconstan

08-20-05, 04:35 PM

I have a Samsung SIR-T165 and for the last couple of weeks whenever I tune to 4-1 my box reboots. Is anyone else having this problem?

Steve

stoesser

08-21-05, 10:56 AM

Thanks guys for the help: DropTheRemote, wallyj, skippy_rq, Dave_STLMO et all.

Unfortunately, the deal for the house we were to purchase fell through so we'll be spending today,Sunday, looking for alternative housing. I'll be back asking HD questions when we find a house.

Here's something on-topic: Howard Stern in HD? As a big Howard fan I just bought Sirius for my car in anticipation of his January switch. I was also reading that the consortium of Comcast, Time Warner and Cox have the (exclusive?) rights to broadcast Howard's new, uncensored, OnDemand show.

1) Anybody know if Charter will be able to offer the show?

2) Has Howard embraced HD?

Bill

jedi35

08-21-05, 02:30 PM

Robert Simandl

08-21-05, 02:39 PM

Before we switched to a specially for Costco satellite feed from another company, we had channel 9443 playing on our HDTV's 24/7. We employees got sick of it real quick. :D

Of course, now we're really sick of our current demo feed. :D

DroptheRemote

08-21-05, 04:48 PM

jedi,

I did see your note about the DVI and Firewire on your Moto 6200 box, but apparently overlooked the rest, including the fact that you were talking about DISH.

No doubt that explains why I wasn't seeing anything on channel 72... Doh!

Thanks for clearing things up for me...

Scott Tucker

08-21-05, 07:02 PM

I posted this question a while back and don't think I got an answer.

Anyone know where in St. Louis to get the silver sensor antenna? And, would that be a good one for a the Creve Coeur area off of Ladue about a mile west of 270?

Thanks,

Scott

DroptheRemote

08-21-05, 07:48 PM

Scott,

The last I've heard, Sears stocks the Silver Sensor. I believe that you can also find lots of places to buy it online, but obviously Sears is the best bet, in the event you wish to return it.

Best Buy used to stock the Silver Sensor, but now they handle the look-alike Terk, and my personal experience with that antenna was not good.

Based on forum feedback here and elsewhere, the Silver Sensor still seems to be the best bet for an indoor antenna for receiving OTA digital stations. There might be something better out there, but if so, I haven't heard about it.

DJ_JonnyV

08-21-05, 08:17 PM

fireshoes

08-21-05, 08:51 PM

The summary for the last few pages seems to be "Charter sucks." but they are certainly doing some crazy pricing deals right now too.

redwine

08-21-05, 09:50 PM

Alright, guys, there's way too many pages of posts to sort through for me to research this, so let me put this out to you all. I'm thinking about making a deal with the devil and going back to Charter (dropped them about 3 yrs. ago) for HD, phone, and high-speed. I could save about $90/month over D*, SBC for phone, and Earthlink for DSL Who has the upper hand and going in the right direction as far as HD is concerned? One of the reasons I left Charter was it's poor customer service and random fee increases that showed up on my bill. I know a lot of this still happens, but is it that bad??? Any feedback would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

HD - Better than satellite (VOOM was best but is alas gone) for premium channels since Cinemax will soon be added. This could change soon on satellite. You pay small fee for locals but they are free with antenna as you know. No ABC.

Phone - Oh boy....Charter mandates a different account number for phone and they seem to always screw up when processing the payments. The folks who open the envelopes and read the checks can't read. Suggest using credit card payment so you can contest before they attempt to cut off your service. Other than this the phone service has been fine for me.

High-speed internet -- Works fine as long as the installers or repair guys know what they are doing. About half of them do. I had a modem stolen from me by a repair guy. This brings me to CUSTOMER SERVICE.

Customer Service -- Charter sucks and there is no indication they are getting better. If you are lucky enough to get a good installer and good equipment and don't need any repairs then Charter is a good deal (note the phone account comments).

DJ_JonnyV

08-21-05, 10:30 PM

redwine - that's exactly the type of crap that has me worried with those guys. It was bad enough with just their digital cable a few years back, but I can only imagine the problems compounded with 2 extra services they provide. From your phone service comment, it sounds like theey do not offer consolidated billing? Being in IT, that would seem like a no-brainer to implement. The thing that worries me the most is the phone billing comment you made. Is it every month that you have to call them to get things straightened out? Thanks.

StLouG

08-21-05, 10:32 PM

Doug and Wally,
Here is my original statement:

"Along with the Voom channels I now have, I have just noticed a new HD demo channel that seems pretty cool. However, at night I only saw aquarium shots with music. That gets old quickly. This channel is located between ESPN HD and HBO HD, so I guess it's part of the HD pak."

Sorry, I'd assumed that everyone would know that I was talking about DISH, since I mentioned the Voom channels. Also my bad, since I hadn't noticed the demo channel before. Maybe this channel comes and goes, but I've never seen it located between ESPN HD and HBO HD until now. It's current channel number is 9443.

Doug, I agree that this demo channel doesn't look that great when they are showing the aquarium loop, but the music is nice, although nothing is in 5.1 DD. However, I do like the quality of the demos shown during the day. Did you see my recent post about my Moto 6200 Charter box having both dvi and firewire active?

That particular channel is on a loop. Yes after awhile you will get tried of seeing the same thing over and over again. However we had some friends over the other night and they loved looking at the aquarium. They said it looked like the fish they saw while scuba diving off the coast of Jamaican. They found it very relaxing and they didn't want me to change the channel. Also did you notice the HD Pay For View channel, not a wide variety, for about two months they kept offering some type of Benji movie and always the same one. :rolleyes:

dpharvey

08-21-05, 11:03 PM

I recently went through the whole evaluation of TV, Phone, Internet access. I have 2 HD sets in the house and 2 SD sets. I've had Charter for Phone for over a year and Internet for 4+ years.

After all was said and done I couldn't find a reason not to do Charter. I have had some problems with the initial phone setup, but that was resolved and haven't had a problem since. My Internet is seldom down and is always fast. I'm pleased with the cable service for the TV's.

I called Charter and told them I was ready to move to satellite and give me a reason not to. I don't think I got a "special" deal, but am pleased with what I got:

Moxi on one TV
Standard HD reciever on one TV
Internet
All movie channels + HD package + family tier

All for $98/mo.

Phone is billed separately from the rest of the services and have never had a problem there. Bill's are paid through bill pay service on-line.

Scott Tucker

08-22-05, 12:20 AM

mjohnson71

08-22-05, 11:07 AM

I couldn't sleep last night and got up around 3am to watch some TV.

The lower channels on Charter look better; Fox Sports MW, SciFi and others. Did the stage 2 digital conversion occur last night?

phatty

08-22-05, 11:12 AM

I couldn't sleep last night and got up around 3am to watch some TV.

The lower channels on Charter look better; Fox Sports MW, SciFi and others. Did the stage 2 digital conversion occur last night?

I hope your right, stage 2 has been delayed for sometime now, but in the past Charter's pattern showed Tuesdays & Thursdays as there release days so I would be surprised to see a break in this pattern. I will check during my lunch hour when I go home and see if my reciever shows the dolby digital signal or not... I really want some digital rescue me before the season ends...

Phatty.

mjohnson71

08-22-05, 12:35 PM

I hope your right, stage 2 has been delayed for sometime now, but in the past Charter's pattern showed Tuesdays & Thursdays as there release days so I would be surprised to see a break in this pattern.

Phatty.

That's what I thought. But I must have spent a good 30 minutes switching between channels. Then again a 32" SD TV might not be the best to do the comparison with.

I will check during my lunch hour when I go home and see if my reciever shows the dolby digital signal or not... I really want some digital rescue me before the season ends...

Is that the indicator that a channel is/has gone digital? I'm still amazed FX always comes across as mono. I know FX won't be DD 5.1, but any slight improvement in sound quality would be nice.

phatty

08-22-05, 06:21 PM

That's what I thought. But I must have spent a good 30 minutes switching between channels. Then again a 32" SD TV might not be the best to do the comparison with.

Is that the indicator that a channel is/has gone digital? I'm still amazed FX always comes across as mono. I know FX won't be DD 5.1, but any slight improvement in sound quality would be nice.

Yes a reciever showing dolby digital would be one indicator (and the easiest compared to just staring at the picture quality) as to when it goes digital. All the channels that have been converted so far come in dolby digital 2 channel and the light on my reciever goes on indicating such. I forgot to check during my lunch break, but I checked right now and FX, Comedy, Sci-Fi all still were analog from what I could tell. I still saw artifacts in the picture(my moxi) and no dolby digital on reciever. Lets cross fingers and hope tomorrow is the day....

Phatty

crackity

08-22-05, 06:48 PM

I am seriously about to pull my hair out over charter as well.... I have had their service for 4 months and been on the phone with them with what seems to be at least once every 3 weeks (with a good 15 minute wait each time). I keep becoming unauthorized for channels, etc. What really makes me mad is it always seems to happen right before people come over and I go to show them the HD feeds and it makes me look like a dumbass.....

Anyhow I am soo confused about the problem because every tech says something different.

1- read me your box #, it isnt on file
2 - i am going to reset your box but I dont have your box number.... read it to me.... I cant add the box, need a supervisor, but will make sure it is added in the morning.
3 - first words out of techs mouth were you need a new box. you need to set up a 8-12 annoying appointment to get it swapped out. I was like ok, but can you at least reset my box like the past techs did to get it working in the meantime. the idiot was like oh, your box isnt associated to your account,..... that may be the problem and took back the box replacement speal.
4 - the a-hole said he was going to fix soemthing on their end, never asked for the box nuber or anything and basically hung up on me..... go figure the problem wasnt solved
5 - called up 2 days later (went out of town) to find out my box wasnt in their records and they have no clue what the previous tech even did. said he could add the box number without the supervisor. read them the box numebr and told them make note of it in their records because next time one of their employees asks me to read it, I may go crazy)
6 - again box not associated to my account.... give them the whole speal, talked to the sup. and they were thinking it was not the box. they said they were going to try something then if they determine the box needs to be replaced they would call back and get that worked out.... no call back yet..... the tech did have the nerve to make me verify the box number with the number written in the notes from a previous call.....grrrrrrrrrrr

also before all this it took me like a month to get service because the idiots showed up on a friday to install it when I had scheduled the following saturday. They finally came out and the dude managed to drop one of his tools down the stairs and put a gash in a bookshelf. I really didnt care that much as it was a recycled bookshelf that I painted black to match my decor..... but wouldnt you think he would at least apologize for it.... geez.... go figure that I would not let him within 5 feet of my receiver to hook everything up (even that took 5 minutes of persuading because he was scared I may hook up a component cable wrong).

so I basically have my box number memorized (plus thank god I decided to go the route of an equipment closet, as being able to access the rear of the closet made getting the number somewhat bearable. I cant even think about what I would be saying now if I had to pull the box out fighting cables everytime I called....)

so that is my horror story and I am now waiting to see if I need to call back again......

My current setup:
Digital with Sports Tier + HD package
Moto HD box for my HT(was happy about the working dvi port, been meaning to try the firewire to my PC)
Using analog signal in the family room and in my office.
(will have a LCD tv in my bar area as well once it is finished)

currently being charged ~ $65 a month which I feel is kinda high.

I love watching HD (whenever something good is on...... limited selection) on my projector, but besides that I really dont watch too much tv(i just like to flip channels, never try to catch certain shows, etc) and I really am ok with using the crappy analog feed to save money upstairs.... only channel I miss upstairs is Fox Soccer Channel.

You think I should stick with charter (assuming the problem is fixed now) or is there a cheaper/better option that I can do with my current viewing habits?

Sorry about the novel, but darn it I feel better now :P

redwine

08-22-05, 09:55 PM

redwine - that's exactly the type of crap that has me worried with those guys...... From your phone service comment, it sounds like theey do not offer consolidated billing? Being in IT, that would seem like a no-brainer to implement. The thing that worries me the most is the phone billing comment you made. Is it every month that you have to call them to get things straightened out? Thanks.

The reason always given is that the FCC mandates separate billing.

I recently went through the whole evaluation of TV, Phone, Internet access. I have 2 HD sets in the house and 2 SD sets. I've had Charter for Phone for over a year and Internet for 4+ years.........

......Phone is billed separately from the rest of the services and have never had a problem there. Bill's are paid through bill pay service on-line.

The secret here is to not pay by your own bank's electronic payment service. Charter does not accept electronic payments for phone but do for everything else. My bank, using the e-pay for a non-e-pay bill will print up and issue a check with the appropriate Charter account number printed on it and mail it to Charter. Well....Charter takes about 2-3 weeks to process this and many times they credit the payment to the wrong account since the phone account and cable account are only a few digits different. There is no "attach this statement with check" when you pay this way. Charter has messed this up for me three times in 2.5 years.

This is why I recommend using a different payment method for Charter phone if you go that way.

I think once you get a good tight solid install from Charter and understand their inefficient and absurd customer service practices you can get some real value from their service. Remember only Charter has Video On Demand and I have been enjoying that more now that it seems to be reliable.

skippy_rq

08-22-05, 10:46 PM

Charter's own e-bill site has the option of auto pay or no auto pay. I use it and do not use auto pay. I have to log in, review my bill, and pay what I want to pay. That is the easiest and quickest.

Scott Tucker

08-22-05, 11:52 PM

Thanks Doug. I'll check Sears, and let everyone know how it works after I install it.

Scott

Installed the silver sensor on the stand behind the TV, and now my Father in law gets all the local digital stations. Great antenna! He is one happy guy with a new Mits 62" DLP and 7.1 surround.

Scott

jedi35

08-23-05, 02:49 AM

Gosh, I'm still trying to figure out how in the heck I've missed DISH's hd demo channel 9443 until now. I must be brain dead, or perhaps I somehow knew that I wouldn't have much need for this channel, so I always skipped it? No, I remember surfing quite a bit from TNT HD on up to the hd ppv, and only now is 9443 popping in for me. Maybe my 942 had it blocked for some reason, I don't know.

I appreciate that DISH called me 3 times today to update me about when my tech would be arriving to solve my lack of signal on my sat. 2 tuner input problem. It was a lazy day anyway, and had other things that I wanted to do at home. The call was originally setup for 12-5pm, but the tech didn't arrive until around 9pm. Once again, I wasn't upset because they let me know that there was a bad problem on the previous job, and kept me posted. I was just glad that I was still going to get a service call that late. The tech was fairly sure that my problem involved a bad LNB when she arrived, but after she took a look at the wiring job in the basement done by the tech last week, she knew that it had nothing to do with the LNB(she still had no problems climbing up on my roof in the dark). Things just needed to be re-wired with a seperator at my 942, as a dead line was connected to sat tuner 2. She also was disgusted at the sloppy work, improper grouding, and lack of professionalism demonstrated by the last guy. I'm up and running now, with everything working like it's supposed too. She'll be back in the morning to clean things up, hook up better grounds, take pictures, etc. Overall, I'm pretty pleased with this resolution.

DroptheRemote

08-23-05, 04:27 AM

jedi,

Playing it very cool on the TV tech babe servicing.

It sounds like this went down pretty much like in "The Italian Job"...

duihlein

08-23-05, 07:38 AM

phatty

08-23-05, 07:48 AM

Jedi,
....
Charter Digital Question,
When a channel is converted to digital does it remain on the smae "channel"? Or does the analog remain on the lower channel and the digital appear on the > 100 channels? I was under the impression the analogs remain.

Dave

The analog remains where its at.. And the digital automatically gets remapped to the new location when using a digital box. So in other words the number you turn too stays the same no matter if your using digital or analog.... Looks like we missed out on another Tuesday deadline as well. Still no additional digital channels from what I could tell. At least not channels I care about.

Phatty

abcward

08-23-05, 07:52 AM

The last I heard, the conversions "were on hold indefinitely".

:(

oby

08-23-05, 07:58 AM

On Charter last night, at least on my television, ESPN HD was blacked out, and on the regular ESPN channel, they had a feed of ESPN NEWS running. The game on ESPN HD was Atlanta at Chicago. Any other Charter customers not able to get the ESPN HD game last night? Why would that particular game be blocked out, here in St. Louis?

wilkemp

08-23-05, 08:52 AM

It was blacked out for me also.

ABCWARD: Any reason why it was put on hold and does this also affect the 3 new HD channels supposedly coming Sept 15th?

fireshoes

08-23-05, 09:03 AM

I didn't get home til the last out of the 9th, but it was not blacked out on D*.

Jedi, the Dish HD demo channel is on 61.5, so that's why you never saw it before. I was the same way when they installed the second dish at work. I thought it was added when the Voom channels were, but it's actually been up for a long time.

STL

08-23-05, 10:40 AM

bailorg

08-23-05, 11:32 AM

abcward

08-23-05, 01:31 PM

ABCWARD: Any reason why it was put on hold and does this also affect the 3 new HD channels supposedly coming Sept 15th?

I'm guessing the delay was because of all the service calls due to the power outage. That in itself has caused tons of calls about phone service. I would guess they would resume once everything slows down...but again, only my guess.

cagmo

08-23-05, 02:55 PM

A quick Charter question.

I've had Charter HD service (by choice, no DVR) for 18 months now. Like everyone else, I'm unhappy with their customer service, but I like the flexibility.

Anyway, I have a MOTO box (5100, I think). The DVI port was disabled by Charter on the box. My TV does have a DVI input.

From other posts here, it sounds like Charter's HD boxes now have the DVI port enabled. Is this worth doing, realizing that Charter may not show up when they say they are going to? My father just waited 3 whole days for them to show up a few weeks ago. Is the difference between what I have now and DVI worth waiting around at all?

Thanks.

abcward

08-23-05, 03:07 PM

cragmo,

the DVI port is enabled on the 5100...have you tried it?

Joseph Clark

08-23-05, 07:03 PM

DJ_JonnyV,
You might consider using Vonage for phone service instead. You'll pay less and get more (in features and free long distance). If you happen to be like me and don't use your landline much (less than 500 minutes a month) then you can get an even cheaper package that's almost half of what Charter charges! :eek:

Definitely worth looking into the Vonage option. I was set to sign up with Charter for phone service, but even though they were upgraded in my area for HDTV, they weren't ready for their phone service. I went the Vonage route and despite a couple of hiccups, it's been very solid, and it's considerably cheaper than Charter's service.

DroptheRemote

08-23-05, 07:20 PM

Summary of Annual Charter Shareholder Meeting

http://www.tmcnet.com/usubmit/2005/aug/1175659.htm

For masochists (or euphoric recent escapees), there's a webcast of the entire meeting available at the Charter Communications web site... :cool:

abcward

08-23-05, 07:32 PM

Joseph Clark

08-23-05, 08:03 PM

DroptheRemote

08-24-05, 07:55 AM

DirecTV Gets Ready to Take On TiVo

The following is from today's USA Today:
_______________________________________

NEW YORK — DirecTV CEO Chase Carey sounds sincere when he says he has "no bone to pick with TiVo." But that isn't stopping him from turning the No. 1 satellite company — until recently TiVo's most important ally — into the digital video recorder (DVR) pioneer's potentially most dangerous rival.
_______________________________________

The full story can be read here. (http://www.usatoday.com/tech/products/services/2005-08-23-directv-tivo_x.htm)

cagmo

08-24-05, 08:10 AM

cragmo,

the DVI port is enabled on the 5100...have you tried it?

I haven't tried it recently. When it was installed in March 2004, the tech told me it was disabled. I did try it a few weeks later and got nothing.

I'll try it again. Could they have enabled it remotely? They haven't been to my house since they installed it.

Robert Simandl

08-24-05, 08:14 AM

One thing I notice in that USA Today article is, the new DirecTV DVR's will NOT have a thirty second skip. Wonderful interactive features or not, that's a deal breaker for me!

GlendaleHDTV

08-24-05, 08:55 AM

abcward

08-24-05, 08:58 AM

Anyone else having lipsync issues on NBC-DT (watching via Charter/Moxi)? The last two nights, its been very noticeable to me (watching Medium, The Office). I've never noticed this before, and I don't have any issues on any other channels which makes me think its not a problem with my display (Sammy DLP).

GlendaleHDTV,

I too am a Charter/Moxi watcher and I watched The Office last night [basketball episode was hilarious]. I had no lipsync issues at all.

GlendaleHDTV

08-24-05, 09:41 AM

ABC - Thanks. I'm hoping it isn't my display, but since this is kind of a "known" issue with the Sammy DLP's I suspect it may be. Oh well, that's why I bought the extended warranty! Are there any Ultimate Electronics still around?

PWSHER

08-24-05, 09:56 AM

One thing I notice in that USA Today article is, the new DirecTV DVR's will NOT have a thirty second skip. Wonderful interactive features or not, that's a deal breaker for me!

I thought I couldn't live without the 30 sec skip also until they incorporated the new fast forward software in version 3.2. Now no matter how fast you FF it compensates. When you see the start of the show you just hit play and it automatically backs up just the right amount depending on how fast you are fast farwarding.
After just a few tries you get the feel for it and using the double ff speed it nails it every time. The problem with the 30 sec skip was that sometimes they were only a minute and sometimes 3 minutes. I love the new FF on Moxi. I haven't watched a commercial in months.
Wayne

Robert Simandl

08-24-05, 09:56 AM

The St. Peters UE is still here, right next to Mid Rivers Mall.

tcfila

08-24-05, 10:08 AM

Do we still have an insider at American TV in the forum? If so, do they or anyone know when the new store on Mid Rivers Mall Dr will be open?

Thanks,
Tim

wmschultz

08-24-05, 10:44 AM

The St. Peters UE is still here, right next to Mid Rivers Mall.

Hey Bob, any deals for me if I come in???? I could use a new HD-Tivo :D

Robert Simandl

08-24-05, 10:52 AM

Hey Bob, any deals for me if I come in???? I could use a new HD-Tivo :D

That's a question for Tom Grooms. I work for Costco across the parking lot and it's been a while since I've stopped in to say hi. :D

Robert Simandl

08-24-05, 10:56 AM

Do we still have an insider at American TV in the forum? If so, do they or anyone know when the new store on Mid Rivers Mall Dr will be open?

Tim,

I believe that would be fireshoes. And I think the sign in front of the building says it's opening very early September.

DroptheRemote

08-24-05, 11:06 AM

Robert,

I agree that the 30-second skip is an essential feature, but considering News Corp.'s massive stakes in advertising-driven assets (FOX Network, FOX Sports Net, FOX News, FX, etc), I'm not even a teeny bit surprised that they would exclude this.

Maybe we should start the clock ticking on how long it will take some enterprising company to begin offering HD-TiVo mods to handle MPEG-4 processing? Probably a longshot, but then again this is the sort of brick wall that spurs innovation (or hacking)...

abcward

08-24-05, 12:23 PM

Do we still have an insider at American TV in the forum? If so, do they or anyone know when the new store on Mid Rivers Mall Dr will be open?

Thanks,
Tim

I just want to throw my 2 cents in here and give a two thumbs up for American. Between their customer service, pricing and selection, this company has all my appliciance and electronics business these days. No offense to the other stores but I am very satisfied with how American conducts business.

[I have no affiliation with American at all]

stoesser

08-24-05, 12:40 PM

Hello all,

Not an HD question but not sure where else to post this so local St. Louisans will read it.

While waiting to buy a house we're staying with our Aunt in St. Charles (70 and 5th St) and she did not have digital cable.

So, we ordered the set top box and had it installed. Auntie has 4 TVs connected with, of course, multiple splits. We weren't getting many channels and I was told by Charter it was because of a weak signal in house. Charter came out and replaced relevant splitter and put the TV with the digital box closer to the front of the splits. We're getting all stations but have some annoying pixelization on digital channels.

Is there anything more Charter can really do? An amplifier maybe? Anything I could do myself.

Thanks in advance.

Bill

Tom Grooms

08-24-05, 02:41 PM

American (Cottleville) is soft opening on September 1st, grand opening Sept. 2nt

aspec2

08-24-05, 07:36 PM

Cagmo

If you go to the setup menu and it says "DVI/YPbPr" then the DVI port is active. I think you need the 6200 box for it to be active. It's the reason I traded my 5100 for one.

Walt

moman19

08-24-05, 09:58 PM

Anyone else having lipsync issues on NBC-DT (watching via Charter/Moxi)? The last two nights, its been very noticeable to me (watching Medium, The Office). I've never noticed this before, and I don't have any issues on any other channels which makes me think its not a problem with my display (Sammy DLP).

I'm watching OTA on my Toshiba and I see no sync issues.

jedi35

08-25-05, 12:04 AM

Thanks guys for clearing up my issue with not noticing the DISH hd demo channel until now. It makes sense, since that channel is on the sat at 61.5, and I'm only just now getting that signal. Guess I'm not going crazy, or atleast not yet. I did ask the phone rep if I would have access to any additional hd channels besides Voom now that I have 61.5, and was told that no other channels were available. Typical, huh??

Doug,
All of my "smoothie" efforts with the DISH chick were for naught, as she turned out to be about as masculine as a guy. She looked like it, talked like it, and certainly smelled like it. She hasn't been back to fulfil her promise to clean up my grounding issues, and to take before and after pictures for company records. I guess I'll have to call again.

DroptheRemote

08-25-05, 07:13 AM

Sneak Peek for Homegrown DirecTV DVR

The following excerpt is from today's TVPredictions.com newsletter:

_______________________________________

Should TiVo be worried about the new DIRECTV Digital Video Recorder? In a word, yes.

DIRECTV announced recently that it will launch a new DVR in October and stop marketing its current DVR from TiVo. The two companies are winding down a long-term marketing agreement to sell the TiVo service. To date, more than two million DIRECTV-TiVo DVRs have been sold.

However, DIRECTV has decided to now market a DVR from the company NDS, which is owned by the same corporate parent, News Corp. (DIRECTV will continue to provide service to existing TiVo customers.)

TVPredictions.com has obtained a copy of the manual for the new R15 DIRECTV Plus DVR, which will not be available until October. The set-top has the usual features found on most DVRs, such as pausing live TV and fast-forwarding and rewinding at high speed. But it also has some new bells and whistles that could make even the most loyal TiVo owner consider a replacement. For instance:

Live Buffer
Like TiVo and most DVRs, the DIRECTV Plus receiver will automatically save a program to your hard drive while you watch. This enables you to fast-forward, rewind and pause live TV. However, the DIRECTV Plus will permit you to back up 90 minutes if you haven't changed the channel while watching. TiVo and most DVRs only have a 30-minute rewind feature. The 90-minute rewind feature will come in handy if you join a 60-minute or 120-minute show in progress.

Cruise Control
The set-top will display a program frame-by-frame if you
hit the Fast Forward button after you hit Pause. This could be a hit with sports fans who want to take a closer look at a controversial call.
_______________________________________

For the complete article, click here. (http://www.tvpredictions.com/directvdvr082405.html)

Robert Simandl

08-25-05, 07:54 AM

DroptheRemote

08-25-05, 08:48 AM

Robert,

I thought the same thing about ReplayTV when I read that.

I don't think any of the new features are anything like major innovations. I do find the ability to bookmark within recorded programs appealing, but it's still no more than a "nice to have, " not "must have."

STL

08-25-05, 09:28 AM

I think it's funny how TVPredictions.com tried to make it sound special that they saw a copy of the manual for the new R15. I myself saw it online about a month ago! LOL

djearl81

08-25-05, 10:46 AM

The directTV DVR sounds a lot like the DISH 522 DVR. It could go back 2 hours if you haven't changed the channel and it could also do frame by frame. Yes Robert...it does have 30 second skip.

Anybody been having issues with CBS signal lately? I used to get it in the 80's very quickly. Now it hangs around in the 40's for a few seconds before jumping up and locking on.

Joseph Clark

08-25-05, 11:57 AM

[B][SIZE=3]Live Buffer
Like TiVo and most DVRs, the DIRECTV Plus receiver will automatically save a program to your hard drive while you watch. This enables you to fast-forward, rewind and pause live TV. However, the DIRECTV Plus will permit you to back up 90 minutes if you haven't changed the channel while watching. TiVo and most DVRs only have a 30-minute rewind feature. The 90-minute rewind feature will come in handy if you join a 60-minute or 120-minute show in progress.[/URL]

This makes it sound as though they (TVPredictions) expect you to be able to join a 60 or 120 minute program in progress and rewind that show, which obviously is not what the new DVR can do.

The Dish 921 has a two hour buffer and 30 second skip, too (although the 30 sec advance is a little flaky sometimes).

Scott Tucker

08-25-05, 12:13 PM

I don't mean to sound like a curmudgeon, but the 90 minute buffer's just not that big a deal. My 1999 ReplayTV had a buffer that lasted as long as hard drive space would allow (i.e., several hours). Gimme that 30-second skip back any day!

I used to have the Replay as well, and liked it. I never did like the 30 sec. skip feature though. I much prefer to skip forward at 2 to 3 times speed until I see the actual start of the program. With the 30 sec. skip it seemed like most of the time it never stopped at the right place, so I was always using the FF/RW buttons anyway. I'm not even aware if my current SD Tivo has a 30 sec. skip, so I won't miss it if the new D* DVR's don't have it. Robert, is it really going to be a deal breaker for you?

Scott

Robert Simandl

08-25-05, 12:39 PM

I used to have the Replay as well, and liked it. I never did like the 30 sec. skip feature though. I much prefer to skip forward at 2 to 3 times speed until I see the actual start of the program. With the 30 sec. skip it seemed like most of the time it never stopped at the right place, so I was always using the FF/RW buttons anyway. I'm not even aware if my current SD Tivo has a 30 sec. skip, so I won't miss it if the new D* DVR's don't have it. Robert, is it really going to be a deal breaker for you?

Scott,

Yup. I love just hitting that skip button 4-6 times (and then rewinding for a second or two), and the commercial break is over and done with. And I haven't seen a single ad.

Your current Tivo does have that feature. To activate it, start playing a recorded show and hit select, play, select, 3, 0, select. The little button that currently takes you to the end of the show will then become the thirty second skip button.

When we carried standalone Tivo's at work, that was the feature that sold them the best. Not the pausing live TV or any of those other features you always hear advertised first. It was the 30-second skip (I did tell people how to activate it since Tivo's don't do it out of the box).

I hear Tivo will be doing a standalone HD unit early next year. I hope they sell millions of 'em since they'll be losing most of their DirecTV business really soon now.

STL

08-25-05, 01:46 PM

I skip commercials but using the 30-skip four to 6 times, and if I overshoot I used the 7-second-back button to compensate. I find it a lot faster and easier than using the FF.

cagmo

08-25-05, 01:55 PM

Cagmo

If you go to the setup menu and it says "DVI/YPbPr" then the DVI port is active. I think you need the 6200 box for it to be active. It's the reason I traded my 5100 for one.

Walt

Thanks to you and ABC.

My DVI is disabled. Charter is coming out to swap it out for a new one that isn't disabled (or at least they say they are coming).

hall316

08-25-05, 05:27 PM

For anyone with DTV wanting to get the HD-dvr might want to check out this thread here. http://www.fatwallet.com/t/18/509440/ It seems you can get one for $299 with a rebate now.

fireshoes

08-25-05, 07:38 PM

American (Cottleville) is soft opening on September 1st, grand opening Sept. 2nt

The latest as of today is that Sunday will be the soft opening. I'll be in Iowa all weekend so if you go there on Sunday and they aren't open, don't yell at me! ;)

If you want to check Sunday just call any of the store phone numbers to ask. All calls are routed through an operator at the Bridgeton store.

jedi35

08-25-05, 07:46 PM

If the price of the HDTivo drops to a couple hundred dollars or so in the next year for new customers as well, I wouldn't mind picking up one. This way, I could still use it for additional OTA recording even after the MPEG4 switch.

Robert Simandl

08-25-05, 10:45 PM

Hey Jedi,

The HD Tivo is nothing but an expensive doorstop without an active DirecTV subscription.

duihlein

08-26-05, 08:02 AM

Due to the recent storms I've become aware of some slight cracks in our foundation. :(

Can anyone recommend a good Structural Engineer to look at it. I don't want to bring in a "Foundation Repair" company till I know what's wrong for certain.

Thanks
Dave

wmschultz

08-26-05, 10:51 AM

For anyone with DTV wanting to get the HD-dvr might want to check out this thread here. http://www.fatwallet.com/t/18/509440/ It seems you can get one for $299 with a rebate now.

I just called DirecTV. I got a new one for $199. Now I just have to figure out who
is going to do the install so I can tell them to just drop it off at my house. I am
just doing a swap out, so I don't need them to install anything.

DroptheRemote

08-26-05, 12:27 PM

In case you missed it, "The Late Show with David Letterman" will have its HD debut this Monday evening.

DroptheRemote

08-26-05, 12:29 PM

Robert,

If I'm not mistaken, I believe the HD-TiVo will work as an OTA receiver without a DirecTV subscription, but it will not record.

DroptheRemote

08-26-05, 01:05 PM

And as long as I'm doling out HD programming reminders, might as well include these, too:

* ESPN2-HD will be available on DirecTV from Friday, September 9. Note that it was originally reported that DirecTV would make this channel available from Sep 8, but that now the official word from DirecTV is for the 9th.

* The next Cardinal games in HD on KPLR-DT are set for Saturday, Sep 3 (6:05 pm) and Sunday, Sep 4 (1:05 pm) against Houston. After that weekend, there's just one more scheduled HD game on KPLR-DT, on Saturday, October 1 (3:15 pm) against Cincinnati.

It's kind of surprising that we won't be get the regular season finale at Busch in HD -- it would be nice if that could still be arranged. Then again, there's going to be playoff baseball, so if the Cards get past the NLDS, there's a good chance we'll see the final game at Busch in HD, one way or the other.

Maybe KPLR can arrange to cover the stadium implosion in HD in November or December...

dweebe

08-26-05, 01:28 PM

* The next Cardinal games in HD on KPLR-DT are set for Saturday, Sep 3 (6:05 pm) and Sunday, Sep 4 (1:05 pm) against Houston. After that weekend, there's just one more scheduled HD game on KPLR-DT, on Saturday, October 1 (3:15 pm) against Cincinnati.

It's kind of surprising that we won't be get the regular season finale at Busch in HD -- it would be nice if that could still be arranged. Then again, there's going to be playoff baseball, so if the Cards get past the NLDS, there's a good chance we'll see the final game at Busch in HD, one way or the other.

Maybe KPLR can arrange to cover the stadium implosion in HD in November or December...

I've been keeping an eye on the KPLR website hoping the last regular season game would be HD. Maybe they're holding off until ESPN announces which game they'll "grab" as their Sunday night game. My guess it that ESPN will show whatever game has playoff implications. But if there are none they'll hopefully show the game and thus it will be in HD.

Then again hopefully the last game at Busch II to be broadcast in HD will be a Cardinal World Series victory in game 4 or 5 from Fox. :D :D :D

I assume all four of the local stations will broadcast the implosion of Busch. Hopefully one (or more) will rent a HD truck so that the event will be archived in HD.

dweebe

08-26-05, 01:33 PM

BTW: I wonder if we'll even have Fox Sports Midwest-HD for the 2006 Cardinal season? :rolleyes: :rolleyes: :rolleyes:

abcward

08-26-05, 01:35 PM

BTW: I wonder if we'll even have Fox Sports Midwest-HD for the 2006 Cardinal season? :rolleyes: :rolleyes: :rolleyes:

I would prefer to see FSMW-HD going by the start of the Blues season....

dare to dream!

dweebe

08-26-05, 01:43 PM

Just realized I had a brain fart.

ESPN and ESPN-HD won't be showing any baseball games on October 2 so there's no reason for KPLR to be headging their bets. That night ESPN will be showing football with the Big Red vs 49ers. (Even though the ESPN website shows that slot being blank for ESPN and ESPN-HD: only ESPN-Deportes has the slot filled.)

Sorry. :o

wmschultz

08-26-05, 03:19 PM

Just realized I had a brain fart.

Sorry. :o

I knew I smelled something. :eek:

kugumby

08-26-05, 04:15 PM

"I would prefer to see FSMW-HD going by the start of the Blues season...."

AMEN, Brother!! Anyone have Neil's direct line?

epalau

08-26-05, 04:18 PM

i was just thinking about this since Stern has been hyping his On Demand show in the future... why doesn't DTV or ES offer In Demand? Is it purely a bandwith limitation?

I dislike some (many) things about Charter, just like everyone else, but after experiencing the beauty of going through HBO/Showtime/etc.'s monthly lineup and picking whatever fit my fancy at the time, I was a hairsbreath away from "ditching the dish."

Sure, I can record something to dvr and watch it at my convenience, but that takes prior knowledge of what I'll want to watch...InDemand... a bevy of options to fit my current mood.

rcman2

08-26-05, 10:17 PM

i was just thinking about this since Stern has been hyping his On Demand show in the future... why doesn't DTV or ES offer In Demand? Is it purely a bandwith limitation?

This is all you need to know about why D* doesn't carry any of the InDemand HD channels:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=554504

WinstonSmith

08-27-05, 12:05 PM

Regarding the HTPC posts from a few pages back.....

How hard is it to get a DirecTV HD receiver hooked up to an HTPC so that you can use the HTPC as both an OTA HD DVR and to replace the costly DirecTV HD DVR?

DroptheRemote

08-27-05, 12:40 PM

Winston,

As far as I know, there's only one way to record from DirecTV HD to an HTPC DVR and that solution is MUCH more expensive than the HD-TiVo. It basically involves buying an older model RCA DTC-100 HD DirecTV receiver and sending it off to a company that modifies it with a Firewire output.

I don't believe that hack is available on other DirecTV HD receivers, but maybe someone else here knows more.

Maybe the situation has changed, but the combined cost of the DTC-100 and the hack work was well over $1,000 when it was the only solution for recording HD from DirecTV.

Your best bet might be to try to find one on eBay by searching for DTC-100 and "Firewire."

One other thing to consider about the DTC-100 solution: This receiver is now coming up on it's 6th birthday, so it is near the end of its service life. In other words, don't overpay for something that may fail tomorrow and would probably be difficult/impossible to service.

WinstonSmith

08-27-05, 01:01 PM

Agreed. That's not really an option.

i'm still interestd in the HTPC idea, and still think that the eMachines, while certainly not perfect, would be a good starter PC for the HTPC and after upgrading the video card and adding a wireless card, could be fairly decent for what i'm wanting to do.

For those who might be interested, here's a link to the Circuit City version of the eMachines I'm talking about. (http://www.circuitcity.com/ssm/eMachines-Desktop-Media-Center-PC-T6522-/sem/rpsm/oid/127600/rpem/ccd/productDetail.do) Its a little more expensive, but has more features. And the Best Buy link which is a bit less expensive but has a couple fewer features. (http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage.jsp?skuId=999939000050002&type=product&productCategoryId=cat01173&id=pcmprd39200050002)

Joseph Clark

08-27-05, 02:04 PM

Robert Simandl

08-27-05, 09:19 PM

Winston,

I use the HTPC for recording OTA HD, streaming audio and video from the server in the other room, and streaming radio over the net. For recording DirecTV, I'd suggest a cheap SD DirecTivo sitting next to the HTPC. That will let you record everything except *D's HD channels.

That's easily your best option other than springing for the HD Tivo.

DroptheRemote

08-28-05, 09:40 AM

Winston,

My experience with HTPCs is limited, but one thing I've recently learned is the importance of having the correct video levels coming from a computer's DVI outputs.

Therefore, in assembling the components of your HTPC, you should be sure to purchase a video card with driver/software support for outputting DVI Video Levels (video range of 16-235), not just PC Video Levels (0-255).

The correct DVI output for home theater video purposes is 16-235 (DVI-Video), and you will run into a number of issues if your only output choice is DVI-PC. This would be a particularly troublesome issue if your display can only be configured for DVI-Video.

In the past, the computer world has clung to PC (0-255) video, but this is now changing and more and more cards and drivers are supporting the ability to output DVI-Video.

So make sure that the video card you buy has drivers/software that support DVI-Video.

jedi35

08-28-05, 04:34 PM

Bob,
I think I'd be willing to pay for a minimum package from D* in order to get the HD Tivo operational for recording OTA. Do you know what the smallest package costs?

DroptheRemote

08-28-05, 04:57 PM

jedi,

The basic DirecTV package (Total Choice) is $41.99 per month. Adding the HD service to that would bring your monthly cost to $52.98, and the $5.00 monthly TiVo charge pushes that up $57.98.

Note that Total Choice and the HD package wouldn't automatically include either HBO-HD or Showtime-HD -- the first of those packages would cost $12.00 per month and the second would be $11.00.

As a new subscriber, you would normally be able to get a break on some of this for some introductory period (maybe 6 months free on the HD package), but in view of the $299 deal on the HD-TiVo, there might not be a lot of scope for further incentives.

abcward

08-28-05, 05:16 PM

Questions on D*'s HD-Tivo $299 offer....

1) This offer is for new customers too? If so, what is the commitment?

2) When D* goes to MPEG4 I am assuming these HD-Tivo's will not work anymore?

Thanks!

Bruce

DroptheRemote

08-28-05, 05:38 PM

Bruce,

I know the $299 deal has been offered to both new and existing DirecTV customers. I would assume that the (additional) commitment is 1-year, but I haven't heard that officially. I doubt that it would be longer than that, but who knows until you ask.

On the MPEG-4 obsolesence, I don't think this is going to be a practical issue for at least a couple of years. Understand this is nothing more than my opinion and you should recognize that unlike my calibration work, there are no guarantees attached to my opinion -- especially when it's provide free of charge. :)

The reason that I don't think this is going to be a near-term issue is that DirecTV is primarily adding all of this additional bandwidth in order to compete more effectively with cable in terms of providing HD local programming. They are investing a huge amount of capital in this effort and the quickest road to payback is getting new subscribers on board with new equipment, rather than spending time and effort with existing customers switching to the MPEG-4 hardware. Existing customers who move over to MPEG-4 hardware aren't going to add much, if any, additional revenue to the bottom line. So, from DirecTV's perspective, forcing existing subscribers to MPEG-4 hardware is only going to steal away inventory and technical/customer support bandwidth that they'd much rather focus on capturing new (high revenue) HD customers.

Of course, at some point existing national HD channels will get shifted over to MPEG-4, but my guess is that won't happen until at least HD locals are rolled out to the top 100 US markets, a process that is likely to take 18 months at the very least, and based on how DirecTV typically meets targets, likely longer.

But again, that's just my opinion, so "caveat emptor."

DroptheRemote

08-28-05, 07:40 PM

Winston,

Here's some additional information about HTPC video cards, specifically information about those that have been certified for home theater use by the ISF's Imaging Science Research Labs.

http://www.internet-nexus.com/2005_08_28_archive.htm#112524303654806944

While the card reviewed and referenced in the links isn't HD-capable, there are other certified cards available at the ATI web site:

http://www.ati.com/technology/isfcert.html

WinstonSmith

08-28-05, 10:22 PM

How do I know if the video card has DVI Video support? I was looking around on the ATI website and was unable to find that specific feature on any of the cards, though I know I'm probably missing it.

I very much like ATI cards, and was hoping to be able to get a lower-end, previous generation card, such as the 9800XT or 9800 Pro. However, if its necessary, I will obviously purchase a new generatoin model.

I'm leaning towards a Fusion HD card and the eMachines from Circuit City linked to above.

Its my understanding that I could then use the MCE software or the Media Portal software w/ the Fusion card.

Just to clear it all up..... which ATI card would be best? Would that Fusion card function as I indicated?

Finally, will those ATI cards work well in that eMachines? It seems to me that they will, but I always want to check just to not make a big mistake... since I've looked at so many.

With the new TV season coming up, I want to be able to take full advantage of my new HDTV set and Silver Sensor.

Thanks, as always. You guys are the best.

DroptheRemote

08-29-05, 09:36 AM

Cuban Says Compression is Compromising HDTV

The following story was highlighted in today TVPredictions.com newsletter:
___________________________________________________

Beverly Hills, Calif. - Consumers are getting a raw deal when it comes to viewing the best quality of high-definition television possible, said Mark Cuban, co-founder and president of Denver-based HD.Net.

Speaking to more than 200 members of the television-manufacturing industry last week during an HDTV conference, Cuban said most HD content is compressed or made smaller, underutilizing HDTV sets capable of showing programming with extremely high resolution.

"It's all really depressed derivatives of what we really could see," he said.

Cuban was the keynote speaker for the conference sponsored by DisplaySearch, an Austin, Texas, market-research and analysis firm for the TV-display industry.

Cable and satellite companies are compressing HD video so they can fit and send more programming over their networks. Picture quality is being sacrificed and will continue to be sacrificed, Cuban said.

"It's your turn for your industry to stand up and say something, or else you're going to be the redheaded stepchildren that keep on getting kicked around," he said.
___________________________________________________

For the complete story, click here. (http://www.denverpost.com/ci_2981415?rss)

DroptheRemote

08-29-05, 09:39 AM

Winston,

I'm trying to find out more about DVI-Video levels on the cards that have been tested by the ISF Labs, as well as trying to determine other non-ATI cards that provide this support. I've posted a note on the ISF Forum about this, and will relay any information I learn there.

In the meantime, I'd suggest you head over to the HTPC section of AVS and do some searches or post specific questions to that more expert group.

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/forumdisplay.php?f=26

wmschultz

08-29-05, 12:07 PM

I know the $299 deal has been offered to both new and existing DirecTV customers. I would assume that the (additional) commitment is 1-year, but I haven't heard that officially. I doubt that it would be longer than that, but who knows until you ask.

On the MPEG-4 obsolesence, I don't think this is going to be a practical issue for at least a couple of years. Understand this is nothing more than my opinion and you should recognize that unlike my calibration work, there are no guarantees attached to my opinion -- especially when it's provide free of charge. :)

There is a 2 year commitment now. But the most you could be out on that is an additional $300. DirecTV is prorating their 2 year commitment at $12.50/month.

I did ask about the MPEG-4 thing and the lady put me on hold and came back and said that there is some press release or something that said they will swap out HDTV customers equipment when necessary. I already knew that, but I was just double checking.

I'm supposed to be "installed" tomorrow, does anyone know what company does this for St.Charles residents?

DroptheRemote

08-29-05, 12:20 PM

wm,

Thanks for passing on the details of the $299 deal on the HD-TiVos. And congrats on landing a sweet deal -- I know you're going to enjoy it, hopefully for a couple of years.

One other note about the timing on the HD-TiVo's ultimate obsolesence. A lot of people got very, very agitated about this when DirecTV announced its MPEG-4 plans at CES in early January of this year. Now, here it is almost September, and DirecTV still hasn't rolled out MPEG-4 locals to even the top 10 metropolitan markets. According to the latest I've heard, the Top 10 (or 15) won't happen before late October or early November.

So, right there, nearly a year has whizzed by. Obviously the pace is about to pick up and there's no question that every day takes us a day closer to HD-TiVo's complete obsolesence. But I still believe I've still got a very good shot at 2 more years of undisturbed use.

If I make it that far, whatever happens, happens. At that point, I'd be nearly at the 3-year mark, and if I reach it, my only regret will be the $500 I've effectively forked out to have my HD-TiVo in January 2005 rather than September 2005.

But then, that's the nature of early adoption, or lack of self control (too close to call)... ;)