http://www.tvpredictions.com/nielsen100307.htm
How do I get on their survey list?

http://www.tvpredictions.com/nielsen100307.htm
How do I get on their survey list?


For sports, Terrible. For HD shows, Not that bad though. Heroes looks consitantly great.

In order to be outraged by this thread one has to believe that Swanni has some sort of credibility. Otherwise, most just roll their eyes at the stupid sh!t he says.

It was a study from Nielsen not Swanni. This has also been reported from other places as well.

Here is a link to the Neilsen press release.
http://www.nielsen.com/media/2007/pr_071003.html

NBC HD looks great to me....

NBC HD looks great to me....

Ever watch a Notre Dame game, SNF, Nascar, Golf?

Ever watch a Notre Dame game, SNF, Nascar, Golf?

Not a sports fan....so no.

NBC HD looks great to me....

NBC HD looks great to me as well. The Office and Life, among others, really look good.

I found this to be interesting:

" When asked which network offers the best picture, Discovery HD Theater was first with 12.7 percent; CBS and NBC tied for second."

Discovery HD uses HDCAM which is 1440 x 1080i, while CBS and NBC use HDCAM SR which is 1920 x 1080i. This brings the more pixels is better theory into question.

The study said ESPN HD was the most popular sports channel, Discovery HD was the most watched channel for documentaries and HBO HD was the most watched channel for movies.

Thank you Nielsen. It's insight like that that makes your service so valuable. :rolleyes:

I found this to be interesting:

" When asked which network offers the best picture, Discovery HD Theater was first with 12.7 percent; CBS and NBC tied for second."

Discovery HD uses HDCAM which is 1440 x 1080i, while CBS and NBC use HDCAM SR which is 1920 x 1080i. This brings the more pixels is better theory into question.

NBC and CBS tied in PQ should bring the whole survey into question.

Discovery HD uses HDCAM which is 1440 x 1080i, while CBS and NBC use HDCAM SR which is 1920 x 1080i. This brings the more pixels is better theory into question.It seems clear, though, that many CBS, NBC, etc. tapes delivered to the network as HDCAM SR tapes (no filtering limitation at 1440) could have had HDCAM tape (1440 limit) somewhere in the capture/editing path before final delivery on HDCAM SR. Also the HDCAM-origination tapes, long acknowledged as the source of most 'wow-effect' 1080i, are converted to 1920X1080i within the editing path; that is, upconversion from 1440 to 1920. And specs for studio cameras show, as you'd expect, a limiting resolution (not format resolution), after filtering for viewing, of ~1700 lines from ~74-MHz sampled video. Then there's still that nasty STB end-effect, which seems to be limiting HDNet's test pattern effective resolution (not format resolution) to ~1300 lines for most here anyway. (BTW, as several current posts in the calibration forum point out, HDNet seems to have currently dropped its test patterns. [Edit: Now they're back, slated for Oct. 20, 6:30 am ET. ] (http://www.hd.net/program_search_results.html?keyword=test&whattosearch=title&ws=) -- John

Edit: Find most NBC viewing okay here as I'm seeing it via a fiber/cable head-end link, not subject to inadequate nationwide distribution tech (too low a bit rate?) or apparently even degradation from the SD weather and news channels also piped to my cable head end as multicasting. But then, as mentioned, I'm limited to ~1300 lines effective resolution from my STBs.

Ever watch a Notre Dame game, SNF, Nascar, Golf?

I guess I must be lucky, but I have never had any problems with NBC Sports. I don't watch Nascar or Golf, but football has been fine.

I guess I must be lucky, but I have never had any problems with NBC Sports. I don't watch Nascar or Golf, but football has been fine.

NBC's football PQ is ok, though not as good as Fox, IMHO. But their golf telecasts are abominations, primarily because they use SD cams everywhere except for the towers and try to pass off the footage as "HD." :rolleyes:

ESPN PQ stinks and they play with the colors!!!

there is some sort of magenta color shift. To think people like this crap!!!

NBC and CBS tied in PQ should bring the whole survey into question.I know I'm preaching to the choir, the problem is that PQ varies among affiliates. There's been reports that CBS looks worse in some markets than any other network. Fox is the only network that looks consistent between markets, but they can be hampered by all the streams stat muxed in the 73 Mb/s sat distribution.

The acid test will come Aug. 08-24 2008, to see how NBC puts on the Beijing 2008 Olympics.

The technical aspects of the coverage from Athens was well-documented by viewers posting in this forum as quite flawed, both for audio (a first for supposed DD5.1 from NBC) and video. Many explanations and excuses were expounded (50/60 and PAL/NTSC conversions from the native country's cameras, too low a bitrate than was really required, too high a compression during US distribution, etc.).

The net result to the viewer was simply one of badly pixelated motion sequences (especially on running, jumping, swimming and diving) and audio levels that were way way way too low (except when you got one of the zillions of commercials inserted here in the US which, by comparison to the Athens audio, were way way way too high).

I find NBC's prime time shows to have improved in picture quality over the past few years, e.g. "Las Vegas" which early on couldn't even handle a "flying camera" through the casino without making the whole screen go all blocky. Things have changed markedly here, and "low-motion" sequences (and other similar shows) now look gorgeous.

Low-motion sports (e.g. The Masters) look gorgeous in 1080i, even from NBC.

I still find NBC's audio to be much too low (at least here in LA, on TWC), and CBS's to be MUCH higher (i.e. local highest!) by comparison.

I find CBS's sports coverage (e.g. US Open Tennis) to be gorgeous in 1080i. And I prefer their high audio level, through truth be told I prefer ABC's which is between NBC's and CBS's.

It seems pretty obvious that NBC is cutting some corner somewhere. Football gets very pixellated if anything moves. Which happens from time to time.

Low-motion sports (e.g. The Masters) look gorgeous in 1080i, even from NBC.

I still find NBC's audio to be much too low (at least here in LA, on TWC), and CBS's to be MUCH higher (i.e. local highest!) by comparison.<dialnormrant>
The actual overall audio levels of the networks are very close. What makes the overall volume differ so much is the AC3 (aka Dolby Digital) dialnorm value. This parameter controls an attenuator in the AC3 decoder. CBS/CW uses -31db, which has zero attenuation. NBC uses -22db which has an attenuation of 9db. Fox uses -25db which is 6db attenuation. ABC does not transmit dialnorm to the stations so it's set by the station itself. ABC O&Os are around -27db to - 25db (4 - 6db attenuation). The default setting from Dolby is -27db.

Very few decoders allow the dialnorm parameter to be ignored, but on one that does the volume difference between stations is diminished, especially when going between CBS and NBC.

The dialnorm value is sent by CBS and NBC to their affiliates using metadata. CBS also uses the metadata to switch the stereo mode from 2 channel stereo to 5.1, and can do so on each program element including commercials. NBC used to do that but has stayed in constant 5.1 mode since the last Olympics, regardless of whether the show is 2.0 or 5.1. I don't know what purpose the metadata is serving right now on NBC since it doesn't appear to vary, but that may change shortly. CBS's dialnorm also doesn't vary. Affiliates of CBS and NBC that use the network metadata can alter their station encoders for a different dialnorm than what the network is sending. I'm sure both networks would frown upon that, but it would probably make for better consistency in a given market. That's only a pipe dream in major markets like NY, LA and Chicago as the CBS and NBC stations there are O&Os and have their hands tied.
</dialnormrant>

The Masters is broadcast by CBS.

AFIAK, CBS O&Os are not multicasting. NBC O&Os generally have at least Weather Plus, some have more. Fox reserves about 15-16 Mb/s of a station's ATSC channel for its HD stream via their splicer.

NBC is the worst HD quality imo. In the shows I watch, the instant there's fast movement I get pixels the size of cars and the show becomes practically unwatchable.

NBC is the worst HD quality imo. In the shows I watch, the instant there's fast movement I get pixels the size of cars and the show becomes practically unwatchable.


Probably a problem with your TV...I have no such issues when I watch NBC HD..it looks great on all shows I watch.

NBC's HD issues with artifacts on motion are well documented on AVS. It's a combination of almost universal multicasting by affiliates coupled with a lower bitrate used for the network distribution compared to ABC and CBS/CW. It's not a problem with one's display, although some settings such as sharpness being too high will accentuate the visibility of the artifacts. Episodics are generally in 24P which put less strain on the transmission chain compared to 60i sports.

Episodics are generally in 24P which put less strain on the transmission chain compared to 60i sports.That's interesting. How so? Seems the 2-3 pulldown of 24p for 1080/60i delivery would approximate original 1080/60i capture. Using MPEG repeat flags for 24p? Thought few program sources actually did that. -- John

In my area NBC is terrible. We are currently having issues with not only the PQ but there is a very annoying popping sound coming from HD. Sports on NBC are a joke. Golf consistantly changes between HD and SD cameras.

NBC and CBS tied in PQ should bring the whole survey into question.

Yes it should.

That's interesting. How so? Seems the 2-3 pulldown of 24p for 1080/60i delivery would approximate original 1080/60i capture. Using MPEG repeat flags for 24p? Thought few program sources actually did that. -- JohnGreater redundancy, and I think the increase in motion blur helps too. Also 24P production tends to have less fast panning although that seems to has changed. From empirical observation there's less blocking than in 60i sports. Many report that shows on NBC do not suffer from the artifacts that sports does. MPEG repeat flags would help on the network distribution but likely would not be passed to the station's encoder.

Heroes and Sunday Night Football are basically the only shows I consistantly watch on NBC. Heroes looks great, but SNF looks terrible.The local affiliates news programs look very good also. I feel it has something to do with the equipment the network uses for live feeds. Are they using true HD equipment on the field?

Heroes and Sunday Night Football are basically the only shows I consistantly watch on NBC. Heroes looks great, but SNF looks terrible.The local affiliates news programs look very good also. I feel it has something to do with the equipment the network uses for live feeds. Are they using true HD equipment on the field?For SNF yes, but for golf many cameras are upconverted SD. I don't think the SNF backhaul is the issue as I've heard they are using high bit rates. Heroes is produced in 24P while SNF is 60i.

That's interesting. How so? Seems the 2-3 pulldown of 24p for 1080/60i delivery would approximate original 1080/60i capture. Using MPEG repeat flags for 24p? Thought few program sources actually did that. -- John
I think that if a GOP contains repeated fields the encoder will still take advantage of the redundancy. The repeat flags work much better of course.

Heroes and Sunday Night Football are basically the only shows I consistantly watch on NBC. Heroes looks great, but SNF looks terrible.The local affiliates news programs look very good also. I feel it has something to do with the equipment the network uses for live feeds. Are they using true HD equipment on the field?SNF HD looks just as good as the local and NBC Nightly News HD segments. No serious macroblocking/pixelation issues that I can see. Not quite as good as CBS, but quite good enough. NBC Primetime HD looks great too. And that's with the usual WeatherMinus sub on WXIA in the ATL (CBS has no sub here, I think).

Golf is certainly abysmal nationwide for all the reasons mentioned before (garish colors, brightness issues, use of SD handhelds, etc.) but SNF and primetime HD problems must be local issues.

It seems clear, though, that many CBS, NBC, etc. tapes delivered to the network as HDCAM SR tapes (no filtering limitation at 1440) could have had HDCAM tape (1440 limit) somewhere in the capture/editing path before final delivery on HDCAM SR. Also the HDCAM-origination tapes, long acknowledged as the source of most 'wow-effect' 1080i, are converted to 1920X1080i within the editing path; that is, upconversion from 1440 to 1920. And specs for studio cameras show, as you'd expect, a limiting resolution (not format resolution), after filtering for viewing, of ~1700 lines from ~74-MHz sampled video. -- John
No one on this forum would be able to tell the difference between 1920 and 1440 in a blind taste test on program material. HDCam SR was chosen for several reasons. Just one of them was the ability to do 1920 horizontal pixels. While that's what jumps out at you in a spec sheet comparison, the actual pictures on real scenes are almost indistiguishable.

Especially after being compressed down to ATSC bitrates.

NBC and CBS tied in PQ should bring the whole survey into question.No kidding. Makes you wonder what they watched, as anything NBC has to backhaul looks really bad. "The Tonight Show" on an affiliate without a subchannel really IS on a par with CBS. Or was. Haven't seen anything on an NBC affiliate without a subchannel since I left Cincy. But I remember when they had HDNet doing backhauls of the Olympics and Kentucky Derby. STUNNING. So, it CAN be done. Just wish it WERE being done. :(

No one on this forum would be able to tell the difference between 1920 and 1440 in a blind taste test on program material. HDCam SR was chosen for several reasons. Just one of them was the ability to do 1920 horizontal pixels. While that's what jumps out at you in a spec sheet comparison, the actual pictures on real scenes are almost indistiguishable.

Well, certainly not those of us with 720p TVs. Or small TVs.

No kidding. Makes you wonder what they watched, as anything NBC has to backhaul looks really bad. "The Tonight Show" on an affiliate without a subchannel really IS on a par with CBS.Not sure if I understand that as "The Tonight Show" is backhauled from Burbank to NYC.

SNF HD looks just as good as the local and NBC Nightly News HD segments. No serious macroblocking/pixelation issues that I can see. Not quite as good as CBS, but quite good enough. NBC Primetime HD looks great too. And that's with the usual WeatherMinus sub on WXIA in the ATL (CBS has no sub here, I think).

Golf is certainly abysmal nationwide for all the reasons mentioned before (garish colors, brightness issues, use of SD handhelds, etc.) but SNF and primetime HD problems must be local issues.

What size is your TV? I have a 50 inch plasma and a 106 inch projector and NBC looks terrible on D* and OTA. I live in the DC area so maybe ATL is just better PQ but I see macroblocking even on Jay Leno. Heros and Law and Order can look good from time to time but for the most bad ALL NBC PQ is bad. All sports are terrible and the Notre Dame games are a joke.

Maybe your TV is smaller or you are sitting back pretty far?

What size is your TV? I have a 50 inch plasma and a 106 inch projector and NBC looks terrible on D* and OTA. I live in the DC area so maybe ATL is just better PQ but I see macroblocking even on Jay Leno. Heros and Law and Order can look good from time to time but for the most bad ALL NBC PQ is bad. All sports are terrible and the Notre Dame games are a joke.

Maybe your TV is smaller or you are sitting back pretty far?

Something is wrong between the tv station and what is appearing on your tv screen. That covers quite a bit of ground, but does not include the NBC network itself. (Presuming D* is using the NBC local)

All the OTA networks except Fox require re-encoding of the network feed by the station for broadcast. Therefore the PQ can vary widely between markets depending on the bandwidth allocated to the HD stream and the type of HD encoder being used by the station. NBC's network feed is also at a lower bitrate compared to the other OTA networks (Fox's splicer system excluded) which could cause less efficient encoding by the affiliate's ATSC encoder.

Not sure if I understand that as "The Tonight Show" is backhauled from Burbank to NYC.

But isn't the Tonight Show backhauled on fiber to NYC where as all the live sports on NBC are backhauled via satellite.

Quite often events are backhauled on both fiber and satellite for redundancy. Both usually use MPEG2. Fiber can use higher bitrates than satellite, but sats can still be over 40 Mbs. JPEG2000 is another standard that can be used on high bitrate lines like 270 Mbs. Uncompressed HD feeds on longer distance feeds is rare if done at all.

But isn't the Tonight Show backhauled on fiber to NYC where as all the live sports on NBC are backhauled via satellite.
I am almost positive that SNF uses fiber for the primary backhaul and satellite for the backup.

What size is your TV? I have a 50 inch plasma and a 106 inch projector and NBC looks terrible on D* and OTA. I live in the DC area so maybe ATL is just better PQ but I see macroblocking even on Jay Leno. Heros and Law and Order can look good from time to time but for the most bad ALL NBC PQ is bad. All sports are terrible and the Notre Dame games are a joke.

Maybe your TV is smaller or you are sitting back pretty far?42" plasma and I sit about 8ft. back. NBC HD is very good here, across the board.

ESPN PQ stinks and they play with the colors!!!

there is some sort of magenta color shift. To think people like this crap!!!

I think ESPN upconverts some of their games. You can see one game and it looks great and another game just looks okay. They're not using the same equipment for every game. Fox's NFL coverage seems to be the same. Of course, both of those only broadcast at 720 and not 1080 like CBS, NBC, and Discovery.

As far as live events, I think some of it also has to do with the type of set you watch it on. When we had our CRT set, I always thought the live events looked better than those recorded on film. We bought a LCD set at the first of the year and I think the live events look worse.

I have noticed since swtiching to a LCD set, the reds are more prone to pixelization on a LCD set than on a CRT set. That can also play a factor with someone's picture quality.

Probably a problem with your TV...I have no such issues when I watch NBC HD..it looks great on all shows I watch.

i wish it was a problem with my TV. Then I'd just get me a new one, but when I watch shows on ABC, CBS, and FOX, they don't have those artifacts.

Whatever the reason - whether it be Weather+ or bad compression (or probably both), fast-motion on NBC-HD makes me want to hurl.

OK, OK! NBC sports HD is poor quality. Today's Boston College / Notre Dame game looked awful. Very soft and pixelated upon movement. Long shots of field looked ok. I have seen some problems with movement on the NBC pro game as well. Regular programming looks good, however.

NBC looking top notch here so far....zero issues or grumblings.

Again, NBC looks great except for sports and it is NOT the 1080i factor. (versus 720p)

Again, NBC sports in the ATL look great except for golf (due to mix of HD/SD) and it has everything to do with your local channel or subchannels and/or cableCo, NOT the NBC feed.

Notre Dame/BC looked great yesterday, as usual for NBC football.

I don't know if it's WHDH's (Boston) fault or NBC's fault, but 'Heroes' is one worst looking shows that I watch--unbelievably blocky at the slightest bit of movement.

Yeah, and I can't tell you if it's NBC or my local station but the HD quality (aside from The Tonight Show) it pretty low.

Heroes looks great on WBAL. Football just looks okay.

Again, NBC sports in the ATL look great except for golf (due to mix of HD/SD) and it has everything to do with your local channel or subchannels and/or cableCo, NOT the NBC feed.

Notre Dame/BC looked great yesterday, as usual for NBC football.

The ND game and SNF both looked blocky on motion here. The ND game looked like crap when it was re-broadcast on the Universal HD channel yesterday too (sports on that channel generally looks just as bad as anything on NBC), so I'm not sure how my local NBC affiliate would be to blame. It could be the cable company (TWC), but everything but these two channels with NBC programming always looks great.

The ND game and SNF both looked blocky on motion here. The ND game looked like crap when it was re-broadcast on the Universal HD channel yesterday too (sports on that channel generally looks just as bad as anything on NBC), so I'm not sure how my local NBC affiliate would be to blame. It could be the cable company (TWC), but everything but these two channels with NBC programming always looks great.

other way around for me, more pixels on local NBC and looked better on mpeg4 Dish with Universal HD.

Doesn't WHDH have two subchannels on an older encoder? That would explain the crap picture quality.

I don't have an HDTV, so I can't comment on true OTA PQ on WRC-DT here.

I can't stand SNF on NBC-HD. I think it's terrible compared to other sports feeds...take a look at TBS-HD for the NLCS. Stunning.

I'm on TWC-NY/NJ on a 56" 1080p at 11 feet.

This has been discussed ad nauseam including by myself. The question remains is there anything that can be done about it? How do we let NBC know about this? I can't believe that they know about it and simply do not care. Who do you inform? How do you inform them? The NFL season is not even half over with nor is the college season. What do we do???

This has been discussed ad nauseam including by myself. The question remains is there anything that can be done about it? How do we let NBC know about this? I can't believe that they know about it and simply do not care. Who do you inform? How do you inform them? The NFL season is not even half over with nor is the college season. What do we do???

Oh they know. NBC doesn't really take HDTV seriously. Especially my local affiliate. They just randomly forget(?) to switch to the Hi def feed all the time. On Friday's they play the "New Mexico Sports Report" after the news, which for some reason means Leno isnt in HD. Conan is never in HD here :mad:

NBC doesnt have any of their reality/gameshow's in HDTV.

But besides all that, and besides sports, their HDTV pic quality is usually pretty good, oh and also Chuck it doesn't look so good.

And as far as macroblocking on football goes, yes its bad. But I do see it some on CBS too, just not as bad. Used to be ABC's MNF was best, Fox's 720p isnt quite as good, but for most games its the best there is OTA.

other way around for me, more pixels on local NBC and looked better on mpeg4 Dish with Universal HD.

When you say better, do you mean CBS/ABC/ESPN quality, or just an improvement on the crap that usually passes for HD football on NBC?

This has been discussed ad nauseam including by myself. The question remains is there anything that can be done about it? How do we let NBC know about this? I can't believe that they know about it and simply do not care.

It's been this way for years, so I don't understand how they could not know about it. But then I don't understand how it could not be fixed by now either. Surely somebody who works for NBC has turned an HDTV on during a football game at some point and thought, "Wow, this looks like crap, we should do something about this."

Heroes and Sunday Night Football are basically the only shows I consistantly watch on NBC. Heroes looks great, but SNF looks terrible.The local affiliates news programs look very good also. I feel it has something to do with the equipment the network uses for live feeds. Are they using true HD equipment on the field?

The NBC source I get from Comcast must be much different than the one you are receiving. Heroes is the worst looking HD show I have been watching. Horrible noise and motion issues along with random horizontal white lines during dark scenes. Surprisingly, the HD commercials during the hour look pretty good... :rolleyes:

It's been this way for years, so I don't understand how they could not know about it. But then I don't understand how it could not be fixed by now either. Surely somebody who works for NBC has turned an HDTV on during a football game at some point and thought, "Wow, this looks like crap, we should do something about this."From the comments in this thread it should be obvious by now that it only looks like crap in some areas, not others. So why is this NBC's fault? Yep, they need to put pressure on affiliates and cableCos, but you could say that about any network.

There has been some terrible looking programming in Los Angeles lately. First FOX HD channel was showing color smearing and blocking for Angel playoff games and UCLA football games. But, this was probably Time Warner Cable causing the problems. If you looked at the SD channel these artifacts were not there. Then ABC this weekend put out the ugliest signal for a football game I have seen in 20 years. You wanted to scream at the guys in the truck "Look at the crap you are broadcasting"! This time it wasn't TWC, because all other ABC programming came in cleanly in HD.

But, TWC does earn double bonus points for being terrible. They added TBS-HD to the line card. Yeah! But, then they mapped this onto the Fox-HD channel and wiped out the FOX programming. Yes, the same programming on two channels. It has been over a week and it still is wrong. TWC obviously doesn't look at what they are broadcasting, either.

They all want our money every month, but where is the quality control?

From the comments in this thread it should be obvious by now that it only looks like crap in some areas, not others. So why is this NBC's fault?

I already pointed out that the same ND game looked crappy on my local and Universal HD here - and does every Sunday when they do their rebroadcast. How is that not NBC's fault?

I earlier considered the possibility that it's my cableco, but come to think of it, I've compared cable vs. OTA several times in the past, and there's no difference related to this. I think that eliminates the possibility that my cableco's messing something up.

So you tell me, if it's not my local affiliate, and it's not my cableco, whose fault is it? And how is that whatever's causing this problem isn't doing it in your area?

It is NBC's fault that their O&Os carry subchannels.

It is NBC's fault that their O&Os carry subchannels.
Yep. At least CBS got the picture, and made sure that their O&Os have no subchannels.

Yep. At least CBS got the picture, and made sure that their O&Os have no subchannels.

Last season my NBC affiliate had the local broadcast of an NFL Network game (Chiefs@Raiders). I forget why exactly they were doing this, something the NFL Network was required to do or something. But anyway, with their stupid weather subchannel running it still looked as good as any football CBS shows on Sunday. It actually may have been one of the best looking HD football broadcasts I've ever seen. So how is it that the subchannel didn't effect that NFL Network game, but it messes up the SNF and Notre Dame games?

This gets back to the effects of cascaded MPEG encoders. An encoded feed going to a station's MPEG ATSC encoder might look pretty good when viewed directly, but there may be artifacts in the source that lowers the efficiency of the station's encoder. MPEG 2&4 depend on image redundancy both inter-frame and intra-frame to lower the amount of compression required. NBC's network feeds have been reported to be around 25 Mbs while others like ABC and CBS are in the 40 Mbs range.

The final OTA product will be the product of the network and station encoding. One station's encoder might be able to better deal with the artifacts of the incoming feed better than another. And, of course, there is the subchannel factor of how much bandwidth is being allocated to the HD stream. I've seen NBC O&Os reported with only 14 Mbs.

I already pointed out that the same ND game looked crappy on my local and Universal HD here - and does every Sunday when they do their rebroadcast. How is that not NBC's fault?Uh, because the same game does not look crappy on WXIA-DT in the ATL (either OTA or QAM)? And SNF looks great too, just to show that it's not one broadcast.

We're going around in circles, but nothing you've said convinces me that you don't have a local affiliate and/or cable problem, just like everyone else complaining in this thread.

Uh, because the same game does not look crappy on WXIA-DT in the ATL (either OTA or QAM)? And SNF looks great too, just to show that it's not one broadcast.

We're going around in circles, but nothing you've said convinces me that you don't have a local affiliate and/or cable problem,

Not even the facts that it's not just me, it's not just here in this city, it's crap OTA, which pretty much leaves my cableco out of the equation, it happens on a nationwide NBC cable channel that my local has nothing whatsoever to do with, and my local is perfectly capable of broadcasting great HD football when the feed comes from somebody not NBC?

Okay, whatever, you're right, it clearly can't be a problem from the network.:rolleyes:

The final OTA product will be the product of the network and station encoding. One station's encoder might be able to better deal with the artifacts of the incoming feed better than another. And, of course, there is the subchannel factor of how much bandwidth is being allocated to the HD stream. I've seen NBC O&Os reported with only 14 Mbs.

Does this account for Universal HD looking like crap too (but only in certain areas, I guess)? And I mean the exact same quality of crap as on NBC. Other networks may have an occasional artifact in a football broadcast, but I could watch five seconds of a game produced by NBC and know that's where it came from. It has a "look" to it when anything moves that nobody else has.

42" plasma and I sit about 8ft. back. NBC HD is very good here, across the board.


From the comments in this thread it should be obvious by now that it only looks like crap in some areas, not others. So why is this NBC's fault? Yep, they need to put pressure on affiliates and cableCos, but you could say that about any network.

You probably can't even see the problems, I'm guessing that TV doesn't even do 720 native, let alone 1080. And you aren't very close. So I'd have to question your all-encompassing statements about how great NBC is, and your ridiculing of other posters.

Some of the stuff mentioned in this thread is indeed local troubles. But NBC football is the worst on the air right now (lots of blocking), yet their shows mostly look fine. This is an issue with how they get live TV to us. That's partly network, if not 100%.

Looks like crap here, too, OTA in the Chicago market on a 50", 768p plasma at 11 ft.

Also noticed it some during one of their primetime HD shows the other night.

You probably can't even see the problems, I'm guessing that TV doesn't even do 720 native, let alone 1080. And you aren't very close.What can I say? All I have is a 42" 1024x768 plasma, but why would I want to be closer than 8' from it? I don't have a 56" or a projector, so I'm calling it like I see it. And in Atlanta, NBC football looks great. I'm not the only one in this thread that says that NBC looks fine, but if it looks like crap for you then it does. To me, this is a local problem, but then again maybe it's a 'my TV isn't good enough for you' problem.

IMO, to say that NBC looks like crap everywhere or that their PQ sucks (as a blanket statement) is just wrong, because it certainly doesn't for a 42" plasma viewer at 8' back in the ATL. ;)

One thing about picture quality is that many people just don't see flaws in picture quality. We've lived most of our lives associating television with bad colors, fuzzy details and swirling noise that most people are just thrilled with anything better.

I don't think I'd notice mosquito noise if I didn't know how to recognize it. Now that I do, I see it all the time during SNF. Other people in the same room will say how sharp it looks and how you can read the names on the jerseys and how the colors are amazing. As soon as there's motion and the image starts to shimmer and sparkle and the edges of objects lose their definition, I know the MPEG encoder is trying very hard to fool me. I can freeze the motion and show people the blurry blocky mess they're really seeing but they still don't see it at regular speed.

Another thing I've noticed with my NBC affiliate with filmed material is that the duplicate frames usually fix up the previous messed up frame. I showed an example of that in the Chuck thread where the camera panned and the green blocks from a chair smeared over white curtains for one frame. I saw this smear immediately but no one else in the room did.

I'm one of those people who doesn't have a problem with NBC HD quality most of the time. Exceptions would be during some of the Notre Dame games as well as some of the SD golf shots. However, I think SNF looks great and is more detailed than what I get from my CBS affiliate. There is some macroblocking but not any more than I get from the CBS stations. I'm watching WLWT (Cincinnati) and WDTN (Dayton) for NBC and WKRC (Cincinnati) and WHIO (Dayton) for CBS. Each one of these affiliates has exactly one subchannel. WLWT has WeatherPlus, WDTN has an SD simulcast, WKRC has CW SD subchannel, and WHIO has WeatherNOW. I usually measure WLWT at about 16.9-17.0 Mbps for the HD video stream. The CBS affiliates are slightly lower, around 16 Mbps.

Would anyone like to trade transport stream files for an upcoming Sunday Night Football game for quality comparison? I use BeyondTV to record so it records to .tp files.

Would anyone like to trade transport stream files for an upcoming Sunday Night Football game for quality comparison? I use BeyondTV to record so it records to .tp files.

Can I email you a 24GB file? :confused:

Can I email you a 24GB file? :confused:
No, but there are other ways to exchange files.

We could also agree upon a specific clip that would be say, 2 minutes long or so?