Local PBS station in San Jose was taken over by KQED and they added an OTA HD channel. Watched Van Morrison and Heart . Wow real HD . Have Directv HD and get locals OTA but they all 2 hd channels. Just amazed at the PQ and sound. Amazing took it to a new level .I guess this is what its supposed to be. Incredible. Pbs HD forever!

Well PBS HD here suck so bad I don't consider it as a HD. It looks like a upconverted DVD player with
pixelation hell.

Well PBS HD here suck so bad I don't consider it as a HD. It looks like a upconverted DVD player with
pixelation hell. Same as here in the DC area, the pixelation is terrible.

Local PBS station in San Jose was taken over by KQED and they added an OTA HD channel. Watched Van Morrison and Heart . Wow real HD . Have Directv HD and get locals OTA but they all 2 hd channels. Just amazed at the PQ and sound. Amazing took it to a new level .I guess this is what its supposed to be. Incredible. Pbs HD forever!

My local PBS HD channel also looks terrific.

Now you can see the difference between real HD and the nasty compressed stuff that Direct TV provides. This is why so many complain about DTV.

The problem with PBS is usually that they compress a lot due to a couple of subchannels. The Seattle station (KCTS) switched to 720p instead of the previous 1080i a couple of months ago, and the result is pretty good, way less pixelation and macroblocking.

My local OTA PBS looked pretty good, when I don't have MP problems, until they added a second subchannel. I can now see a degradation of PQ.

Well PBS HD here suck so bad I don't consider it as a HD. It looks like a upconverted DVD player with
pixelation hell.Same as here in the DC area, the pixelation is terrible.Yep... WETA PBS in DC (http://www.weta.org) has the worst HD PQ... even OTA... too many subchannels squeezed into insufficient bandwidth. :mad:

And the audio is only 2.0 :(
WETA ruins my favorite shows... SoundStage and Austin City Limits.

PBS should be embarassed by WETA's HDTV PQ... especially since DC is home to PBS's Headquarters (Arlington) (http://www.pbs.org/aboutpbs/).

Austin City Limits is neither HD nor DD5.1, so it's pretty tough to make it any worse than it already is. I agree about the poor quality on Soundstage caused by multicasting though, as our local station KAET carries Create on a subchannel and the chief engineer doesn't even acknowledge that multicasting noticeably degrades the PQ.

My big issue with PBS HD is not PQ (even the Widescreen HD looks pretty great to me), but the fact that PBS seems to ignore the channel almost entirely other than listing the schedule. Take a look at pbs.org and you wouldn't know they even had an HD operation. The weekly promo email I get from WGBH (one of the flagship stations of the network) talks about the SD station, World, Create, Kids and even the NPR affiliate - not a word about PBS HD.

Austin City Limits is neither HD nor DD5.1That's good to know... in an odd way, I think I can relax and enjoy it more knowing that the soft picture and 2.0 sound is normal... pixellated, but the on-stage performance is still worth watching.

I really wish WETA would give DC the opportunity to see (and hear) SoundStage in its full HD glory.

Austin City Limits is neither HD nor DD5.1,

It is 2.0 sound, but here in Austin, they send out the broadcast over their HD Channel (KLRU-HD). That channel only runs 5 hours a day, so during the other times, they actually advertise that you can watch it in HD at 9PM on Wednesdays (or whatever the day).

At least it was last night, I'll record the replay tonight (1 AM) on my HD DVR box and check it out on my 100" screen to confirm (hopefully I can tell the difference between SD and HD on that size, especially with the wide shots)

On top of all that crappy picture quality the PBS HD is mostly Off-Air here.

my local PBS station has HD programming in the weirdest time zones. For example they would play HD programming 2-6 am and it goes back to SD throughout the day

No PBS-HD at all here in Atlanta, a top 10 market. What a joke. <raspberry>

No PBS-HD at all here in Atlanta, a top 10 market. What a joke. <raspberry>
On top of that in Atlanta we have 2 competing PBS stations :confused: (oxymoron but true). One is analog only and the other is digital but only SD 2.0. :eek:

Guess this isn't too far OT. Watched The Best of Masterpiece Theater Sunday evening, a 1.5-hour, top-12 countdown based on viewers voted preferences. There were two segments requesting funding. They were suggesting various donation amounts, and for the top $1500 will send all the available DVD sets (20?) .(Recall 3 of the finalists were: I Claudius, Bleak House, and Upstairs Downstairs.)

A google search doesn't turn up hints or offers of Masterpiece Theater HD discs yet. E-mailed BBC-A's store mentioning I'd purchase HD discs but not 480i versions. -- John
-

PBS-HD here in Chicago used to be 1080i with only one subchannel (the main, analog's twin), and looked utterly spectacular.

But they've gone to 720p and added 2 more subchannels in the past year or so, and now they don't look that great at all.

Here are links to several recent articles that explains what PBS stations are choosing to do. Some explanations of why some people feel that the WOW factor is missing...

http://www.current.org/

In the run toward digital multicasts, pubTV is up to a trot

NEW With the Spanish-language channel, V-me, recently joining other local and national channels for public TV's digital multicasts, the program supply is forcing stations to make hard choices in alloting DTV bitstreams, writes tech-watcher David Liroff. There's less high-def than in network TV, but ironically the PBS HD Channel's synthetic HD often hogs more channel space than the real thing, says engineer David Felland. Meanwhile, APTS finds that most viewers are clueless that analog TV sets will stop working in less than two years.

http://www.current.org/dtv/dtv0702choices.shtml
http://www.current.org/dtv/dtv0702bitstream-liroff.shtml
http://www.current.org/dtv/dtv0704felland.shtml
http://www.current.org/dtv/dtv0702aptssurvey.shtml

Consider that in the Bost metro area at least - about 5 to 6 years back the over the air PBS-HD feed was nearly the only consistent HD programming - with cable and satellite HD basically not being ready yet and very little on the networks or simply the local channels not converted over to HD capability

Now at that time PBS HD was absolutely crystal clear - althught they must have shown that battleship going through the Panama canal 1000 times along with the individual state sponsored tourist HD publicity documentaries

It was basically an HD endless loop of the same programs but the quality was so good, one didn't mind

I hope PBS is not going to HD Lite - too much of that already happening

I live in Port Angeles, Washington, and have Wave Cable, a small cable company. Switched from DirecTV a year ago. The switch has more than been rewarded by the terrific PBS station out of Seattle. It is the best HD channel I get. Great programs and the best picture of all the stations I get which includes all the networks and NG and Discovery. PBS has kept me from even thinking about going back to DirecTV. Thank you Seattle public TV.

I am really impressed with the PBS HD in New Jersey. I live in the sticks and am forced to use Bob's Internet/Cable and Surf Shop as my provider, (but somehow PBS is still very good)

Here are links to several recent articles that explains what PBS stations are choosing to do. Some explanations of why some people feel that the WOW factor is missing...

http://www.current.org/

In the run toward digital multicasts, pubTV is up to a trot

NEW With the Spanish-language channel, V-me, recently joining other local and national channels for public TV's digital multicasts, the program supply is forcing stations to make hard choices in alloting DTV bitstreams, writes tech-watcher David Liroff. There's less high-def than in network TV, but ironically the PBS HD Channel's synthetic HD often hogs more channel space than the real thing, says engineer David Felland. Meanwhile, APTS finds that most viewers are clueless that analog TV sets will stop working in less than two years.

http://www.current.org/dtv/dtv0702choices.shtml
http://www.current.org/dtv/dtv0702bitstream-liroff.shtml
http://www.current.org/dtv/dtv0704felland.shtml
http://www.current.org/dtv/dtv0702aptssurvey.shtml
Thanks for the links. That first one, with a bit rate chart--per the caption anyway--from a PBS engineer is intriguing. It's the signal noise, he writes, that makes 480i upconverted to 1080i require more bandwidth and a higher bit rate. The comparison chart (true 1080i versus upconverted) is color coded to the chart caption. Might be interesting to compare that chart with a spectrum-analysis chart covering the full range of HD frequencies similar to that made by dr1394 of a 720p stadium crowd scene (http://archive2.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?postid=5466046#post5466046) (sublinked). That plot illustrates the rapidly diminishing amplitudes of higher-frequency signals that create the finest details. -- John

EDIT: BTW, the dr1394 plot, made with some free/low-cost PC software (see llink), is a spectrum analysis that looks similar to plots created by teenager Mary Masterman who won this year's Intel Science Talent Search with a home-built <$300 spectrograph machine.

Since I live near New York City and Philadelphia, and the Trenton NJ capital, NJN, I get THREE PBS's. However Comcast only pipes the Philly network version to me in HD, so I have to bust out the antenna to pickup the NJN Digital broadcast.

Here are links to several recent articles that explains what PBS stations are choosing to do. Some explanations of why some people feel that the WOW factor is missing...

http://www.current.org/
Those are really interesting articles.

The broadcast networks have indeed placed their bets on HD instead of multi-casting. But that results at least in part from their parent companies’ ownership of dozens of cable program services that give them abundant multicast-like program service options.

To make the point: If NBC, CBS, ABC and Fox had to use DTV multicasting to send MSNBC, MTV, ESPN or Fox News and other cable siblings to viewers, the network stations would be broadcasting a lot less HD.
The number of viewers actually watching HD is even smaller than the number who own HDTV sets. According to an In-Stat report in December, approximately 60 percent of U.S. HD set owners (15 out of 25 million) don’t access any source of HD programming at all. They tell researchers that they bought their new sets not to watch HD programs, but because the sets were digital—with clearer pictures than their old sets—and they liked the wider screens. Even though they now own HD-capable sets, they report that they’re not willing to pay the additional fees charged by cable and satellite providers for HD services. Apparently, they are not taking advantage of free over-the-air HD viewing options, either.
Yikes. Well there's always HD DVD and BluRay.
Some stations may find that their local cable operators would be willing partners in distributing program streams that don’t fit—in full quality, anyway—in the 19.4 Mbps bitstream. Most viewing of our DTV programming is likely to be via cable, rather than broadcast, and some stations now deliver programming (both analog and digital) directly to cable headends. With the agreement of your local cable operator, the number of program services you provide need not be limited by your over-the-air DTV bandwidth.
Interesting. Why not IPTV or Joost?

In northern Minnesota, where Lakeland Public Television is the only over-the-air broadcaster serving much of its viewing area, Bill Sanford, the g.m. and director of engineering, emphasizes programming choice over the best possible HD pictures. Lakeland PTV is offering viewers one HD plus five SDs.

Wow, has anyone here seen this PBS from Bemidji? Having 6 SDs is extreme but having 5 SDs and one HD is just plain ridiculous.

Here are links to several recent articles that explains what PBS stations are choosing to do. Some explanations of why some people feel that the WOW factor is missing...

http://www.current.org/

In the run toward digital multicasts, pubTV is up to a trot

NEW With the Spanish-language channel, V-me, recently joining other local and national channels for public TV's digital multicasts, the program supply is forcing stations to make hard choices in alloting DTV bitstreams, writes tech-watcher David Liroff. There's less high-def than in network TV, but ironically the PBS HD Channel's synthetic HD often hogs more channel space than the real thing, says engineer David Felland. Meanwhile, APTS finds that most viewers are clueless that analog TV sets will stop working in less than two years.

http://www.current.org/dtv/dtv0702choices.shtml
http://www.current.org/dtv/dtv0702bitstream-liroff.shtml
http://www.current.org/dtv/dtv0704felland.shtml
http://www.current.org/dtv/dtv0702aptssurvey.shtml

Great links, these were perfect for my monthly recap (http://dtvswitch.blogspot.com/2007/03/twenty-three-months-and-counting-whats.html) (where you've been properly thanked in the BROADCASTING section).

I've receive 3 PBS HD affiliates OTA where I live, 2 from Miami and 1 from West Palm Beach.
WPBT Miami has 2 sub-channels, an sometimes letter-boxes HD programs in SD on it's
primary channel. WLRN Miami has only one SD channel on the air. It's the poor stepchild,
owned by the Miami-Dade County Schools.
WXEL in West Palm Beach has two sub-channels, but during the evening when the primary shows HD programs, the subs just have a slide referring viewers to the main channel.
A static slide takes up very little bandwidth, so most of my PBS viewing is done on WXEL.

Walt

Bob: I'm glad you (and others) also found those "Current" articles of interest. Nice blog you're running. I'll be checking it regularly...

Back to this thread topic: While I'm only running a 720p projector, I find that the truly HD programs from my PBS station (WTTW 11-1) do have the "wow" factor even though they're running HD plus 3 SD channels. The "widescreen" shows look quite good, but the lesser quality is quite obvious. The SD subchannels are not worth watching at all on the big screen, but would be tolerable on a small CRT.