Verizon FiOS HDTV - Page 5

Heheh, score one for Howard county. For some reason they get both baltimore/washington locals on comcast.

Yeah, but thats only SD. I was over there in Columbia working on a friends HDTV setup. His Comcast STB only has Baltimore HD channels in its lineup. But both Wash/Balt SD channels.

I've had FIOS since July here in upstate NY, It is great and if the Video service is as good I will have to try it. TimeWarner has not impressed me in the time I have had a HDTV, about 3 years. The customer service is poor and the HD lineup is nothing special. I think Verizon will give them a run for their money when they activate the video service in the Albany area.

My parents in Laurel, MD are still getting FOX HD from Baltimore and DC - a lingering effect of the Comcast-Sinclair dispute.

I would switch from Comcast to FIOS in a heartbeat if it were available to me, even if I had to give up INHD1/2 and Comcast SportsNet.

Thought you guys might find this interesting...
http://www.i4u.com/article4365.html

I currently have Verizon DSL, haven't jumped to FIOS yet cause DSL became such a darn good deal after they rolled out the fiber in my neighborhood. I'll probably jump ship from Comcast when we get TV if the price point is right, which based on the way they are pricing internet compared to Comcast I'm hoping it will be.

Noticed the guy said even his SD looked better in the interview. I'm excited about the potential all this bandwidth provides Channel lineup mentioned also looked solid.

I'm surprising myself by how much weight I'm putting on Very Good Standard definitionn picture quality. I thought that my days of SD concerns were well in the past, but now that there is the chance of regaining excellend SD PQ, I'm getting a little excited.

Dish Network's SD channels look very poor on my Plasma. At first I thought that Plasmas just stunk for SD, then then I got some ATSC SD digitals and that PQ was great. So I knew it was the provider and not that plasma that was the cause of my woes. Plus DVDs look great on the Plasma. Dish did have great SD PQ back in 2000 when I first started to use them, but since the over compression of "must carry" its been terrible ever since.

What do you think the chances are of FIOS being able to be run into an HTPC and be able to record HD feeds and the regular feeds as well? All it will be is a Cat-5 line run into the box, and I bet somone, hopefully Verizon!, can create a program or hardware that would work with Media Center 2005.

I just got it installed last week, and the thing smokes. I'm running the 5 down right now, since hardly any sites out there are using the bandwidth to upload that fast (DSL reports didn't even gauge my speed!).

Anyway, it rocks, and I am just amazed that the Cat-5 from the outside box into the router is all that's needed. The install was fantastic, and I like the battery back up!

Can't wait to see what they offer in the video department.

Wow this sounds great I guess we have some new legit competition on the horizon. I have been with D* 9 years now but this may be just what makes me move as I know cable never will.

In the picture in the article, it still shows coax hooked up to the wall, which would make sense as you don't want to rewire your entire house. It may be that the black box, talks to the cable box so as to only allow through necessary channels at any given time to ensure that your home cabling has enough bandwidth. (I'm just making this up as I go along by the way, there's no facts to this just conjecture) Which would also allow the possibility of cablecard. I don't think cat5 is the delivery mechanism inside the home.

But 20+ HD channels to start certaintly sounds nice.

FYI: Verizon's Fios TV service is going to be just regular cableTV technology. The ONT box on the back of my house has a regular old F connector coax jack. They wil use the same coax in your house to deliver the tv programming. Their set top box is the same one from motorola that Comcast and others use.

They will likely migrate to IPTV one day, but at this point in time, they are going with the proven cable tv technology. The only difference is that run the signal opticallly on the fiber, and then change the signal over to electrical on the coax. Cable companies do this too. They just run the optical parts in their network, and their final run is coax to your house.

So I expect that regular QAM tuner card will work as well with Fios as it does with Cable. Of course what they encrypt is a whole other story.

The box they installed on the back of my house has "Video" with an Ethernet jack above it. Interesting. And the install guy said copper is gone and that it would be a Cat-5 connect. Maybe I have a newer box? Could that be?

Any news on when Orange County in California might get FIOS? I really hate my internet provider and any alternative would be great.

It makes sense for Verizon to use good ole coax because of one big reason. Cost.

Seeing as how most STB's are made to work with coax, this makes it much easier because alot of cable STB's can be used by Verizon, keeping the cost relatively low, especially for a new service when they're trying to compete with cable. Also, many homes are wired w/ coax, so this makes for an easy switch for current satellite and cable subscribers. If the house had to be rewired w/ fiber, you can bet the cost would rise considerably, just because of the installation alone.

I can't wait for verizon tv service to be available in the dc metro area. Cable's prices are much higher, and satellite's quality is just bad. Verizon's prices are the same as a comparable satellite package, but with VOD, and better PQ. While I was looking forward to Directv's new mpeg4 service w/ more hd, I think it still won't be good enough in areas where it's competing w/ verizon tv service.

I can verify that it is coax to the box but there is a network interface that uses CAT-5 (only 1 required per household) for the video on demand, etc.

John

How many DVR tuners at this point JJ?

My Cablevision cable runs 9-10mb down. Plenty of places to take full advantage of that!

Tuners in 1 box? - 2 that I know of.

The Ethernet port in your ONT is for data service.

As it was explained to me, coax will be used to deliver video to the STBs and there will be a CAT-5e line from the router to 1 STB to handle VOD. I'll try to grill my manager for info since he just attended a video install class this week.

AS far as switching to FIOS TV from D*. Not too sure. Having lifetime DVR service through D* may keep me there. Unless they're gonna run a great deal for employees.

I've been happy with FIOS for Internet (I can get close to 15 Mbps in real-world use, not just tests) and I'm very interested in FIOS TV when it's offered, but I'm not going to jump on it before I find out a few things. The folks who have it in Keller TX don't seem to be saying much about it. They're probably too busy watching TV.

Some things I'd like to know from someone who actually has the service:

If you hang an analog TV or VCR on the cable, what do you get?

If you hang a digital receiver that handles unscrambled QAM on the cable, what do you get?

Some reports say the Verizon STB or DVR has IEEE 1394 ports. If true, are they active? Can I record to D-VHS? How about to a PC?

Does the STB provide simultaneous HD and composite/S-Video outputs, or must I select one or the other?

Since the fiber is not shared with the neighbors as cable is, it might be possible to send each house only the channels it is subscribed to, in which case scrambling would be unnecessary. But I don't know if they do that.

The rate for standard service is a bit lower than cable (though still more than I'd like to pay for the few channels I would ever watch) and the price for the Showtime/Starz/Encore bundle is so low I'd probably take that too. But the DVR price is a bit high and the charges to change the level of service, other than to drop it completely, are downright punitive. That suggests Verizon plans to bait and switch: sign people up for a good price, then jack the rates so high they know many will want to cut back.

Can't say too much at this time unfortunately. STB's will output simultaneously to component (HD) and S-Video/composite.

More later.

John

First off I'll state that I don't have the service and I'm just pulling this out of my a**...but I have some thoughts...


probably nothing...fiber optic should be a purely digital signal, which will probably require a digital cable box at every tv in the house


this might get you stations, because why scramble when they might be able directly control which stations are sent to you to begin with....but i'd guess nothing so that you have to rent boxes


pictures i've seen show motorola cable boxes, firewire recording works great with motorola boxes, fcc mandates that any HD enable box have firewire enabled. D-VHS should be a go, PC will be determined by 5C, my guess is that verizon will be using the same line of moto boxes so many other places use


personally i think it would both good and bad if they did this...bad side is that they have an exact record of every show you watch...good side is imagine all that bandwidth available for HD if they only have to send a couple simultaneous shows (1 show for each digital box you have) to your house instead of every channel all at once


well with DSL and Fios internet that seem to prefer signing us up for a contract (1 year contract gets you a discounted rate sort of thing), but i have found the rates with or without contract better than comcast, and the service has never gone down, unlike my friends with comcast

i actually called and asked and turns out that verizon will void the 1-year contracts with no fee, no questions asked if you move somewhere and verizon doesn't offer service there, so I have found them to be fair and pretty hassle free

How much?

In the pricing guide it was listed at 12 or 13 bucks a month.... thats hardly "high". (from the official verizon thread had a pdf with pricing)

that includes the HD DVR box, and the DVR fee?

thats a few bucks less than Im paying for my 6412 through adelphia. certainly not what i would call high.

You are mistaken. Those rules apply to cable providers. Verizon does not come under that provision.

Yes, that (12.95) includes the HD DVR and all associated fees. A "standard" HD box is 9.95/month.

ALL Cable TV signals are on the line, the tuner "slices" out the channel you want to watch.

When watching IPTV, (unlike cable TV or satellite TV), the only channel sent to your STB is the one you are watching.

Not true.

Verizon's video offering is IPTV. 24 IP streams, each stream carrying multiple program ID's (video and audio channels).

They are using the BMR 1200 broadband video router from BigBand Networks and delivering the video over GigE SM fiber.

No reason Verizon couldn't adopt what the older cable companies have in the works: switched broadcasting (SB), summarized in this recent post . SB differs from per-channel subscribing but in some ways has similar results. -- John

EDIT:Perhaps someone will differentiate between SB and IPTV (post above); they seem very similar. IPTV = internet protocol TV.

Sorry bud but your wrong. They are using the BMR 1200 for VOD services and two way talking only. They aren't using IPTV today nor in the next couple of years but they do have plans in the long term to go all IPTV. For now they will be using QAM 256 with switched broadcasting hardware.