Official AVS Comcast / Cableco Moto 5100 / 6200 Topic! - Page 14

Just read this entire thread to here. what great information.. thank you to everyone. A few questions mostly for miatasm


1) firstly, thanx specifically for providing quality info. May i ask what part of south jersey you are in? I am moving to ocean county in a few months (Bricktown area) and would love to arrange for you to be my installer.
2) Is there pricing info anywhere on comcasts website for different packages? zip will be ~08723/08724
3) Is there status of shipping of dvi equipped boxes as was mentioned that were being built?
4) Status of CBS-HD .. this is a biggie for me
5) any thought of WB's digital?
6) as I am unfamiliar with the box, can it also do ota hdtv when attached to an antenna? or do you need an additional box?

thanx in advance
-Jeff

To address some issues here, the problem with the centering of 6-1 has nothing to do with the operation of the box but is due to the overscan of your TV. I noticed the same thing via cable and OTA with my 34" set but never saw the problem on any plasma that I had seen. You saw the same thing with HD NET when the right side of their logo was cut off. Now that I have a plasma as well with minimal overscan, I have no centering issues at all while I still have it with the 34". Both a being fed with 5100 boxes. Yes, I have two. So it is an issue with your TV's overscan, not the signal.

The pixelization you see on PBS on the pom poms on the football game clip are fast motion artifects with the 1080i signal. It has nothing to do with your 5100. I have seen the same thing on all of the other STB's I have seen showing this same loop. If you sit back 6 feet from the screen or more, you should not be able to even see them.

Being new to the HD arena, please excuse the question if it is a bit to simple. It seems that ABC broadcasts its HD in 720p and NBC broadcasts in1080i. Will the 5100 adjust for this or do I have to change a setting on the box depending on the station I am watching??

You would only need to change a setting if you insisted on watching shows in their NATIVE format. You can set the 5100 to output 1080i or 720p, and it will do so for any HD show. Usually, most people set the output to whatever their display handles natively, if their display handles both natively, they would set the output to the format they watch most often (probably 1080i).

One setting works well enough, though my wish-list would include a setting that lets HD through without scaling.

Claude

PS This can be much more complicated if you let it be. For example, my 10HT PJ handles 768p natively, and it does well with 720p input. On the other hand, I'd rather the PJ scale from 1080i to 768p than have the 5100 scale 1080i to 720p which the PJ then scales to 768p.

For probably 80% of users, it should be set to 1080i.

Thanks Claude for the answer. You lost me there with the last comment but I think I understand. I'll leave it on 1080i.

"If you sit back 6 feet from the screen or more, you should not be able to even see them"

I sit 8 feet back and it's plain as day. This is the only time such a thing occurs, never on any other TRUE HD material.

Bill

That sounds like a compression artifact. Too low of a data rate for the action being recorded. Could have been done originally (most likely,) or it could be that WHYY is recompressing, or it could be the Comcast is recompressing. It's doubtfull it is your display.

This does *not* sound like an interlacing artifact that you should expect with a 1080i source.

Bill_B4 - Don't remember anything bad with the Eagles/Giants game a couple weeks back (other than the outcome). And usually the broadcast is very good on ABC for the Monday night football games. Not HD, but better than the Analog feed on comcast. The next game we see on ABC should be a little bit better!
JWhip - as for the pixilization on WHYY, I agree that its visible from across the street let alone 8 ft. :-) Its pretty bad on some shots.
And whats overscan? Forgive my ignorance on this issue but its nothing I remember coming across before. I just assumed the problem had something to do w/720p--> 1080i on my TV or the cable box since my TV won't show 720p and I don't see this shift on any other channels.

I have a 43" Samsung dlp, which displays native 720p. My 5100 arrives on 1/24. I will connect the box via component cables ONLY to my HD input on the DLP which accepts 480p and higher resolutions. I will set the output resolution on the 5100 to 720p and my display as 16:9.

What do I do with the 4:3 override? I can't set it to 480i, as I won't be connecting via s-vid or composite. Also, the HD component input on my DLP won't accept 480i signals. I could set it to 480p, and let the DLP upscale the 480p signal to 720p. Or, I could set it to "OFF", and let the 5100 do the scaling of 480i SD to 720p. Is this correct? Will either the 480p or "off" settings have an effect on the on-screen menus?

Thanks for the help,

mattG

Set it to off and it will get up-converted to 720p. You'll see the menus, and you'll get black pillars to the sides.

I don't own one, but I've heard the pillars could cause burn-in on a Plasma.

Joe12,

Mgold1999 said he has a dlp, so there's no chance of burn-in.

Oops, for some reason I was thinking he said plasma. I guess I'm too lazy to let my eye's scroll upward before typing. ;-)

Has anyone found a way to emit discrete on/off codes from the 5100 remote?

I have seen the same pixelation on the PBS loop from Scranton's WVIA, Channel 39 in Allentown, Channel 12 in Philly and in PBS in NYC on many different receivers. It is in the signal and not caused by the 5100. Regarding overscan, all consumer TV's have it to varying degrees. There is something called a safe area where the broadcasters place their graphic overlays so they do not appear to be cut off on miscentered. You will not notice overscan at all if there were no graphic overlays. Go into Tweeter and watch their HD sets doing HD Net and as long as the HD NET logo is in the right hand corner, you will be able to see the varying degrees of overscan. Basically, the set is not displaying the entire full picture and is losing small amounts of information on all four sides of the pictures. There is a big difference in the overscan on my plasma vs. my 34" Panasonic direct view.

I can safely say that the PBS pixelation wasnt present when I got my box initially (about 2 months ago).. now its very present.. ESPECIALLY RED's!!!

Matt:

I set the 4:3 override to 480i with the 5100 connected to my receiver with only component cables. This worked fine, with menus intact and my TV able to properly scale the non-HD material. It has no effect on any progressive or HD material.

Don't know if this is a special feature of my receiver (B&K 307) or if it's true of every receiver, but my 5100 connection couldn't have been simpler: 1 component video cable and one digital audio cable!

BTW, for anyone who hasn't installed the 5100 yet, I strongly advise that you be present during the installation, ready with the high quality cables you need. My installer was very nice, but he took 1 look at my HT system and said he's only connected the box directly to a TV! Needless to say, I made all the connections while he went to turn on HBO outside the house!

-HMA

I have seen the PBS loop now for three years and have always seen the pixelation on the Auburn-Alabama highlights.

Thanks for the replies, all. The HD component inputs on the Samsung DLP sets only accepts resolutions of 480p and higher. It will not accept 480i. So setting the 4:3 override to 480i wouldn't work with my TV. Joe12's suggestion of 4:3 override to "OFF" would allow the 5100 to scale 480i to 720p. I'll try it.

Audio question. With the video hooked up via a single set of component cables, can I hook up BOTH digital audio (via coax or toslink) to my Lexicon DC-1 pre/pro, AND 2-channel analog (RCA) to my TV? I'd like the wife and kids to be able to watch TV through the TV's speakers without firing up my A/V system.

Thanks, all.

Matt

Using both audio hookups SHOULDN'T be a problem. I know I can get sound through the TV's speakers by switching to it's "Antenna" input. That usually the way the wife watches it as she finds my HT system daunting.

Cheers!
Bill

Last question. I promise. It may be posted somewhere earlier in this thread, but DVI is listed in the on-line literature as optional on the 5100. Has anyone determined if/when this will be available?

Matt

Not anytime soon. Too many issues surrounding it's use.

I'm sorry I have been extremely busy lately , and as always I will try to answer your questions.

First this one DVI will be avail. sooner than you all think. The next generation 5100's (which are being built now will have DVI incorporated. I do not know how and when they will be released to Comcast or the customers but they will have them, sooner than later. Please be patient, I'm sure someone will post here when they get one....

miatasm send you a pm

Jeff I did get your PM sorry for the delay (a 3 year old & 2 year old that apparently need the computer more than I do!!)

I do not work or live in the Ocean County Area, so I can't help you there sorry about that.

There is no place on the Comcast.com site for pricing. But it seem sthat would be a good idea though......

There is no status on the shipping of the DVI boxes but I would assume it would be, at the latest, early 2nd qtr. Just my educated guess, considering I was told about a month ago the were being built now.

No updates on the status of CBS, I think this is a biggy for everyone.

My personal thought on how WB's digital looks.....it look very good as a start....it needs some improvement but otherwise good....if you meant on the possibility of Comcast getting it up online, I wouldn't think anytime soon considering the limited amount of programming and it not being one of the big three. That also goes for UPN.

No the 5100 doesn't do OTA HD also. Its only function for HD is to decode QAM modulated signals not OTA (8vsb) signals.

thanx so much for all your info!

I have a come accrossed part numbers for all types of custom cables that Comcast supposedly offers, including a transcoder, but have yet to find out who & where these pieces are being supplied by. I will do some more research to try and come up with more info. Assuming this I expect that the 5100 is putting out tri-level sync.

I have recieved news that the analog PQ firmware should be ready to go first week of February. The locations that it will be launched then are unknown as of now, and the exact properties of the firmware update aren't released yet, but Analog PQ is the major one of course.

Speaking of Firmware, I've seen users on this forum constantly posting their firmware versions on this forum, and they all are posting different numbers completely. I've seen 50.00, 00, 04, 51.00-1132, ect. It make for some confusing reading. I would hope that we could all get on the same page with these numbers, by posting the ACTUAL Firmware# from the Diagnostics menu. The following procedure accesses these numbers:

Power the 5100 "off" --> Press "select" --> This will access the Diag. Menu. --> Arrow "down" to selection "d08 code modules" --> press "select" --> The Bootloader & Firmware numbers are at the top --> My box has 02.15 as the Bootloader & 02.40 for the Firmware. My box has the latest updates.

ARGH!!!! I want Smallville and Enterprise in hi-def !!!

My local rep said he thought WB was on the way, along with CBS...

I will be getting Comcast HD installed tomorrow morning. I have a question concerning the 5100. If you set the 4:3 Override mode to 480p or off (720p), does your 16:9 TV allow you to stretch the image to fill the whole screen?

Thanks,

Frank T. Lee