Avoid Uverse unless it's your only choice. From what I've read, it's way over compressed plus you can only have two to four HD streams at a time(depending on your location.)
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UVerse or Direct TV
I just moved into a new place and these are my two best options for service at the moment. At my old place, I used to have Verizon FIOS, so I'm actually leaning toward UVerse quite a bit.
I also plan on getting UVerse internet (FWIW), so I may save a little with a bundle on TV and Internet. The problem with UVerse is that it's a waiting game at this point. They are in the final stages on launching it in our new development, with a release date of August or so. The problem is these dates can always change and I might be waiting forever.
My other option is Direct TV. The nice things here is that the complex has the Dish on top of the building, so I can simply pick a plan and a box, then plug and enjoy. Plus, it's only a 1yr as opposed to a 2yr like most Direct TV agreements. Of course, I worry about service during strong storms but I did manage with Dish a while back .
What does everyone think? I mainly watch sports and I probably watch 90% HD programming.
I also plan on getting UVerse internet (FWIW), so I may save a little with a bundle on TV and Internet. The problem with UVerse is that it's a waiting game at this point. They are in the final stages on launching it in our new development, with a release date of August or so. The problem is these dates can always change and I might be waiting forever.
My other option is Direct TV. The nice things here is that the complex has the Dish on top of the building, so I can simply pick a plan and a box, then plug and enjoy. Plus, it's only a 1yr as opposed to a 2yr like most Direct TV agreements. Of course, I worry about service during strong storms but I did manage with Dish a while back .
What does everyone think? I mainly watch sports and I probably watch 90% HD programming.
1 - 20 of 21 Posts
Directv is the choice for sports. Uverse has more HD channels than Directv.
I have Directv and love it. The PQ is fantastic. The DVR's are great.
I haven't seen Uverse so I can't comment on them but I know some people who have it and love the service.
I have Directv and love it. The PQ is fantastic. The DVR's are great.
I haven't seen Uverse so I can't comment on them but I know some people who have it and love the service.
I recommend going to an AT&T store that has U-Verse and look at the picture quality yourself, when I looked at it compared to DirecTV it looked bad, too much macroblocking in fast motion. Also don't like the limit to the number of HD channels you can have at one time, for me 2 doesn't cut it. If you can go with U-Verse for internet and voice and DirecTV for video, since AT&T bundles DirecTV with their products you should get a discount doing so.
Based on forum feedback, DirecTV has better HD image quality compared to U-verse.
Most families, according to surveys, watch no more than 15-17 or so channels in a given month.
So which do you watch, which are important to you in HD, and which are available to you on UVerse or DirecTV?
Then factor in the comparable prices and your choice shouldn't be all that difficult.
We certainly can't tell you what you would like since we have no idea about the parameters of your TV viewing.
(By the way, I moved from CA to FL several months ago, and have since experienced many T-storms here, and never lost DirecTV signal, although the storms do seem to cause the boxes to need more frequent resets.)
So which do you watch, which are important to you in HD, and which are available to you on UVerse or DirecTV?
Then factor in the comparable prices and your choice shouldn't be all that difficult.
We certainly can't tell you what you would like since we have no idea about the parameters of your TV viewing.
(By the way, I moved from CA to FL several months ago, and have since experienced many T-storms here, and never lost DirecTV signal, although the storms do seem to cause the boxes to need more frequent resets.)
The biggest problem with U-Verse is the limits of concurrent HD feeds. Using two HR20s I can record 4 HD programs at a time, but with U-Verse I'm limited to 2 no matter how many boxes I may have.
Two observations 1. Direct has an esata port for an external hard drive. Uverse does not at this time. 2. PQ on Direct is much better
Uverse just became available in my town. I'm a current D* sub seriously considering switching. I really expected HD PQ to be a deal breaker. My local AT&T store has Uverse and D* side by side on identical TV's. I looked at many different channels for a long time and could tell absolutely zero difference in HD PQ in terms of motion, resolution, macro blocking, compression artifacts and pixellation. I was shocked. I know Uverse has lower bandwidth, but they must be doing something to compensate for it. I'm really scratching my head now about all the reports of poor HD PQ on Uverse. Have any of these people actually seen Uverse, or do they just repeat what they've read? I have very good eyesight and know a bad picture when I see it, i.e., cable. Does anyone have a logical explanation for the good PQ I'm seeing?
Could be how the HDTV's are set up, could be a ringer HD feed, or other. Bottom line is that the consistent opinion is U-verse has less HD image quality than DirecTV. I've seen it myself, and a number of other trusted forum members have had both at the same time.
Quote:
Originally Posted by mdavej /forum/post/17050013
Uverse just became available in my town. I'm a current D* sub seriously considering switching. I really expected HD PQ to be a deal breaker. My local AT&T store has Uverse and D* side by side on identical TV's. I looked at many different channels for a long time and could tell absolutely zero difference in HD PQ in terms of motion, resolution, macro blocking, compression artifacts and pixellation. I was shocked. I know Uverse has lower bandwidth, but they must be doing something to compensate for it. I'm really scratching my head now about all the reports of poor HD PQ on Uverse. Have any of these people actually seen Uverse, or do they just repeat what they've read? I have very good eyesight and know a bad picture when I see it, i.e., cable. Does anyone have a logical explanation for the good PQ I'm seeing?
Could be how the HDTV's are set up, could be a ringer HD feed, or other. Bottom line is that the consistent opinion is U-verse has less HD image quality than DirecTV. I've seen it myself, and a number of other trusted forum members have had both at the same time.
Are you saying the stores get special feeds with higher bitrates and less compression than are possible for ordinary subscribers? That would certainly explain the picture I saw. But it's a complete misrepresentation of their service. Can they legally do that?
No, I'm saying what they are doing, I'm saying what could be done.
I have no idea.
Quote:
Originally Posted by mdavej /forum/post/17051113
Are you saying the stores get special feeds with higher bitrates and less compression than are possible for ordinary subscribers?
No, I'm saying what they are doing, I'm saying what could be done.
Quote:
But it's a complete misrepresentation of their service. Can they legally do that?
I have no idea.
From what I understand with U-verse a lot of the limits on bandwidth have to do with how close the custoemer is to a 'node' (typical for DSL), so it is possible that particular store is situated well for a good signal. Also the bandwidth on U-verse is 'shared' so you can get a better picture if you are not otherwise using the bandwidth for anything else, like other channels, phone or internet. See what happens to the picture when it is recording 4 channels.
Good point. I'll try that.
Quote:
Originally Posted by CardiacArrest /forum/post/17052704
See what happens to the picture when it is recording 4 channels.
Good point. I'll try that.
I'm watching this like a hawk. There's a SLIC hut (node?) at the entrance to my neighborhood. So, I'd expect that my bandwidth would be good. I'm currently using Mediacom for my voice and IP and E* (that the proper abbrev for Dish/Echostar?) for my TV. Mediacom had an awesome deal where I canceled my home phone and switched to them for voice and IP. My current phone bill was about $55 a month plus about $45 for Mediacom IP. I switched to Mediacom for both and got the intro rate of $60 for both. I saved $40 a month but now the honeymoon is over. Mediacom is now $100 a month for voice and IP. I'm considering two options, U-Verse for all three (voice, IP, TV). Or, I may just get Vonage to reduce my voice bill. I know my IP bill will go up a little but I'm at least going to save $20-$25 a month. The reason I mention this is because Vonage requires a one year commitment and that would prevent me from getting U-Verse.
The other questions I have that I haven't seen discussed on the AT&T site or in the few threads I've seen is how the U-Verse system is wired. I assUme the main feed is a copper pair that's repeated from the fiber transmission line. Are there options for coax OR Cat6 when connecting TVs inside the home? Is one or the other required to make these connections? I wouldn't think the TV portion would be wireless, right? Can anyone point me to some diagrams of typical setups?
Thanks,
Jeff
The other questions I have that I haven't seen discussed on the AT&T site or in the few threads I've seen is how the U-Verse system is wired. I assUme the main feed is a copper pair that's repeated from the fiber transmission line. Are there options for coax OR Cat6 when connecting TVs inside the home? Is one or the other required to make these connections? I wouldn't think the TV portion would be wireless, right? Can anyone point me to some diagrams of typical setups?
Thanks,
Jeff
How about the HD picture quality difference between U-Verse & Dishnetwork?
Quote:
Originally Posted by Ken H /forum/post/16822852
Based on forum feedback, DirecTV has better HD image quality compared to U-verse.
How about the HD picture quality difference between U-Verse & Dishnetwork?
Having switched from DirecTV to Dish, I will say Dish is slightly worse, I would assume still better than U-Verse.
I tried uverse twice. The 1st time I had it for 3 months then cancelled it due to audio dropouts over hdmi. That was 2 years ago. I switched from cable to them when it came available. The picture quality was definitely better than cable and has more had channels. The cosistant audio drop outs made it unwatchable so I switched to directv. During those 3 months, I had roughly 6 or 7 techs come out to see if they can fix. They had no idea. I figured it out on my own that it was deffinately an hdmi handshake issue with their set top boxes and my yamaha avr. I've been happy with directv but just a couple weeks ago, I had a uverse door to door salesman stop by. According to him, they made some major upgrades to the system including pause and rewind on any box. Their prices were great and had an awesome promotion so I decided To try them again. Had it installed Monday 8/20/12 and not even 24 hours, I cancelled the service. It was awful. Picture quality was washed out, kind of looked like a water colors painting. Lots of pixelating and arifacts. Fast motion scenes were really bad with lots of trailing. They did however fix the audio dropouts on their new motorola and cisco boxes. The new model numbers had a better hdmi chipset which seemed to solve the issue. I didn't cancel my directv and cox Internet because I had my doubts. Now the Internet was not acceptable. I had the 12 mb installed and with a speedtest , it was reading less than 1 to about 1.5 max. The range was horrible. 40 to 50 feet away, lost signal. I tried all 11 channels on the router with no change. They don't even use n technology. They're still using b and g only. Also, uverse has 2 types of installs. The original with the residential gateway and the inid which I had both times. The inis allows you to get the service if your far away from the vrad. The inids consists of pair bonding from the pole to your house. See the following link. http://www.pace.com/universal/gateways/2wire/gateway-platforms/homeportal-inid/ To sum it up. Directv and cox Internet blows away uverse in every way except for the amount of hd channels available with uverse.
UVerse forces you to get showtime and starzs to get some sports channels and other basic channels. Also no nhl network.
Quote:
Originally Posted by sll0037 /t/1162637/uverse-or-direct-tv#post_16818935
I just moved into a new place and these are my two best options for service at the moment. At my old place, I used to have Verizon FIOS, so I'm actually leaning toward UVerse quite a bit.
I also plan on getting UVerse internet (FWIW), so I may save a little with a bundle on TV and Internet. The problem with UVerse is that it's a waiting game at this point. They are in the final stages on launching it in our new development, with a release date of August or so. The problem is these dates can always change and I might be waiting forever.
My other option is Direct TV. The nice things here is that the complex has the Dish on top of the building, so I can simply pick a plan and a box, then plug and enjoy. Plus, it's only a 1yr as opposed to a 2yr like most Direct TV agreements. Of course, I worry about service during strong storms but I did manage with Dish a while back .
What does everyone think? I mainly watch sports and I probably watch 90% HD programming.
UVerse forces you to get showtime and starzs to get some sports channels and other basic channels. Also no nhl network.
1 - 20 of 21 Posts
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