It would be pretty trivial to provide a letterboxed 4:3 SD output from a cable box. My Xbox as a WMC extender does that. That would eliminate the need for a separate SD feed.
When will cable and dbs providers end simulcasting SD channels in their lineups?
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The History Channel, in particular, when viewed here in the Pacific Time Zone, will have one feed three hours later than the other feed. Same with BBC America. I had used that on rare occasion to record a show when I had two other channels scheduled for recording in a given time slot--that 3-hour difference allowed me to record the third, even though it was an SD feed. But local HD stations have the same content on both the HD feed and the SD feed. That's not counting subchannels used for other content, such as broadcasting MeTV, Antenna TV, or THiS TV, or our PBS affiliate that has a different program lineup for their "Plus" channel (SD).
Earlier today I stumbled across this link: http://www.nielsen.com/us/en/newswire/2012/high-definition-is-the-new-normal.html
It mentioned that over 3/4ths of the US households have at least one HD TV. But then it states that only 29% of prime-time English-language viewing was true HD (e.g., some are using non-HD boxes, or tuned to non-HD sources). (These are from a month sampled in 2012.)
The 71% SD prime time viewing could be why cable operators duplicate almost every HD feed with an SD feed. Maybe too many people are too cheap to pay for HD service.
I never thought of myself as being on the leading edge, but I am among the 29% who watch most prime time shows in HD, so maybe I am more leading edge than I had imagined.
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The History Channel, in particular, when viewed here in the Pacific Time Zone, will have one feed three hours later than the other feed. Same with BBC America. I had used that on rare occasion to record a show when I had two other channels scheduled for recording in a given time slot--that 3-hour difference allowed me to record the third, even though it was an SD feed. But local HD stations have the same content on both the HD feed and the SD feed. That's not counting subchannels used for other content, such as broadcasting MeTV, Antenna TV, or THiS TV, or our PBS affiliate that has a different program lineup for their "Plus" channel (SD).
Earlier today I stumbled across this link: http://www.nielsen.com/us/en/newswire/2012/high-definition-is-the-new-normal.html
It mentioned that over 3/4ths of the US households have at least one HD TV. But then it states that only 29% of prime-time English-language viewing was true HD (e.g., some are using non-HD boxes, or tuned to non-HD sources). (These are from a month sampled in 2012.)
The 71% SD prime time viewing could be why cable operators duplicate almost every HD feed with an SD feed. Maybe too many people are too cheap to pay for HD service.
I never thought of myself as being on the leading edge, but I am among the 29% who watch most prime time shows in HD, so maybe I am more leading edge than I had imagined.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Mark12547 /t/1517815/when-will-cable-and-dbs-...ng-sd-channels-in-their-lineups#post_24373436
Thanks for that. Here's another survey from a year ago that looks at some other aspects of HD penetration as well. http://broadcastengineering.com/hdtv/75-percent-us-homes-have-hdtv-set
I think extra cost has definitely contributed to this fact. I don't know how all providers are addressing this but Charter dumped their charge for HD tier last year, which was only $5/month anyway. So at this point any Charter customer with an HDTV just needs to take their SD STB to the Charter store, trade it in for an HD box at no extra charge and they will have HD content to view. I think a couple of factors are at work here. I'm actually happy with Charter's services but one of their faults IMO is lack of effective communication with customers and educating them about services available and changes they institute. I honestly think many people with HDTVs who have never watched their sets with HD content do not know what they are missing. Charter probably couldn't give every customer who wanted an HD box one if everybody with an SD box showed up tomorrow, so they probably are happy enough for this to evolve over time. I learned on a similar thread I posted elsewhere that DishTV still charges for HD tier, so I'm guessing others do as well and that may well be a major stumbling block for many of those who don't watch in HD.
Interestingly to me, I also run across many people who don't seem to notice a difference between watching SD and HD, or care about it anyway. My own young adult children don't and I know there is nothing wrong with their visual acuity. I'm not sure what that's all about and I'm old enough to remember watching hockey games on a 19" B&W TV with snow and ghosts and being thrilled about the ability to watch the game. Now I complain if a game is only available in SD and am disappointed that I still have NHL Network in SD only. Even when local news was in SD it was just so lacking on a big screen. Come to think of it, screen size and viewing distance probably plays a role in many homes. If you have a 32" HDTV and are sitting 12' away, it wouldn't matter.
I was a fairly early HD adopter and saw the difference right out of the gate with a 57" RPTV and there wasn't a lot of HD content back then either. There's been no going back for me and I guess I have to acknowledge that my perspective is the minority.Quote:
I never thought of myself as being on the leading edge, but I am among the 29% who watch most prime time shows in HD, so maybe I am more leading edge than I had imagined.![]()
I've been doing a little more reading about how the distribution of TV content is evolving and these SD channels occupying RF bandwidth on cable and satellite might become a moot point. Whether it becomes a combo with IPTV or just all goes there remains to be seen.
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