HD, not impressed

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Discussion

croyde

Original Poster:

23,025 posts

231 months

Monday 19th September 2011
quotequote all
Well I plumbed for Sky HD+ and have just set it up.

First impressions:

So I had a 28" CRT which had great, sharp pictures with Sky, Freeview and Analogue then went to a 42" Plasma where everything looked rubbish and blurred.

So now I have clear sharp pictures again but they don't really blow me away, unlike the monitors at work when we are working with HD and 3D, and not only have I had the expense of a new Panny G30 but have had to shell out for HD and a Blu Ray player plus the extra cost of the discs.

I have found the change very underwhelmimg or maybe I am just too fussy.

Conclusion, get a bigger screen and be prepared to spend a lot more in order to get the similar quality that you had with your older smaller TV set.

I have the HD box set to output in 1080i, the highest setting, even though the telly can handle 1080p. Should I change the Panasonic's settings?

Cheers.

Erijaso

505 posts

256 months

Monday 19th September 2011
quotequote all

Thats my worry.

I've still got my CRT Tosh picture frame 36" tv. I'm worried that when I upgrade, there may not be the big leap in quality of the picture that I'm expecting.

Ah well, just waiting for my tv to breakdown, but its still going strong.

cjs

10,772 posts

252 months

Monday 19th September 2011
quotequote all
Change the HD box to output 720p and see if that improves things, Sky HD is broadcast in 720p. Are you watching native HD channels? What does Skynews HD look like?

Are you sitting too close ? You need to be back about 2x the screen width.

You are using an HDMI cable aren't you? You're not watching via a scart or RF cable.

Edited by cjs on Monday 19th September 13:12


Edited by cjs on Monday 19th September 13:14

eybic

9,212 posts

175 months

Monday 19th September 2011
quotequote all
When I used to work for Hitachi, they tested their TV's on Eurosport HD because apparently it is one of the bext pictures, this was 3 years ago so maybe there are other channels now.

croyde

Original Poster:

23,025 posts

231 months

Monday 19th September 2011
quotequote all
cjs said:
Change the HD box to output 720p and see if that improves things, Sky HD is broadcast in 720p. Are you watching native HD channels? What does Skynews HD look like?

Are you sitting too close ? You need to be back about 2x the screen width.

You are using an HDMI cable aren't you? You're not watching via a scart or RF cable.

Edited by cjs on Monday 19th September 13:12


Edited by cjs on Monday 19th September 13:14
Cheers, I'll try changing to 720p. Currently some of the Sky HD channels have a very pronounced judder, especially on the Wright Stuff this morning, they almost looked like robots. Maybe they are laugh

Also the speech on the Sky HD channels looks ever so slightly out of synch although the Freeview HD looks fine.

Currently swapping BBC HD preview between Sky and the TV's Freeview and have to say the sound and picture are slightly better on Freeview HD.

I am about that distance from the screen and it is connected via HDMI.

Cheers.


Edited by croyde on Monday 19th September 13:32

Trustmeimadoctor

12,673 posts

156 months

Monday 19th September 2011
quotequote all
cjs said:
Change the HD box to output 720p and see if that improves things, Sky HD is broadcast in 720p. Are you watching native HD channels? What does Skynews HD look like?

Are you sitting too close ? You need to be back about 2x the screen width.

You are using an HDMI cable aren't you? You're not watching via a scart or RF cable.

Edited by cjs on Monday 19th September 13:12


Edited by cjs on Monday 19th September 13:14
erm sky is 1080i and very low bitrate its not an outstanding picture by any stretch of the imagination

chris watton

22,477 posts

261 months

Monday 19th September 2011
quotequote all
Trustmeimadoctor said:
erm sky is 1080i and very low bitrate its not an outstanding picture by any stretch of the imagination
You are right. I find that there's very little difference to Sky HD (movie channels) and an 'upscaled' DVD disc picture.

surfymark

886 posts

232 months

Monday 19th September 2011
quotequote all
chris watton said:
Trustmeimadoctor said:
erm sky is 1080i and very low bitrate its not an outstanding picture by any stretch of the imagination
You are right. I find that there's very little difference to Sky HD (movie channels) and an 'upscaled' DVD disc picture.
I have found the same. But then I can't tell much difference between a Blu-Ray and an upscaled DVD either really.

However, if you are into Football, try watching an HD match on Sky or on BBC. There is a world of difference and much better than SD on either a Plasma/LCD or an old CRT.

HTH
M

croyde

Original Poster:

23,025 posts

231 months

Monday 19th September 2011
quotequote all
Watched a bit of the rugby on ITV HD (Freeview) the other day and that was impressive, just a shame I'm not into footie or rugby.

swiftpete

1,894 posts

194 months

Monday 19th September 2011
quotequote all
Sky HD isn't a very good example of HD programming. Some things look alright, but I think they try and get away with having it as bad as they can get away with and still technically call it HD.
If you want to see quality from your new telly, you'd be better off watching blurays. Nature documentaries generally look good on sky HD though so check some of those out.

Trustmeimadoctor

12,673 posts

156 months

Tuesday 20th September 2011
quotequote all
how far away are you sitting from your new screen ?

the issue you may be finding is the fact your new tv is so large you can now see the flaws on the tv picture that were hidden by the low resolution and small size of your previous screen

croyde

Original Poster:

23,025 posts

231 months

Tuesday 20th September 2011
quotequote all
Sitting about 6 to 8 ft from the screen.

Another question:

I Sky plussed Spooks off BBC 1 HD last night and I'm sure the bit I saw "live" looked good but watching it off the disc today it looks almost SD.

I never noticed a difference in recordings and live on the old Sky+ box but do the newer HD boxes have a system to maybe save space thus not recording in proper HD.

I have gone through the menus to see if this can be changed but have found nothing.

Cheers.

Scott W

571 posts

244 months

Tuesday 20th September 2011
quotequote all
Spooks is not filmed/broadcast in HD and therefore you won't notice any difference on the BBC HD channel. On your Sky planner you can set it up to show all of the content that is in HD to be shown in orange. This should make things a little easier for you to see what content is HD and what is not.

Depending on the show you record HD recordings can take up a between 1-4% but this does a) depend on the size of your HD box HDD, b) how long the show is and c) what quality the HD feed is for that show. We got a new SkyHD box a couple of months back as part of their roll out of upgrading Thomson boxes and we've had quite a few hours worth of HD content stored on there and we've not dropped below 80% yet so I think you'll be fine for space.

croyde

Original Poster:

23,025 posts

231 months

Tuesday 20th September 2011
quotequote all
Whale Oil Beef Hooked.

Just amazed that one of their top offerings is not shot in HD. I film a lot of music for the BBC and Channel 4 and I have not seen an old SD camera for a few years.

qube_TA

8,402 posts

246 months

Tuesday 20th September 2011
quotequote all
HD telly isn't that great TBH as there isn't the bandwidth to do it justice, still miles better than SDTV on a CRT though.

With blueray films and games HD sets look great.


V8covin

7,371 posts

194 months

Tuesday 20th September 2011
quotequote all
I've just cancelled my HD subscription because in my opinion the improvement over SD is minimal.
Now that may be down to my particular circumstances,a 37" Samsung LCD,sitting 10 feet from the tv and failing eyesight lol

rhinochopig

17,932 posts

199 months

Tuesday 20th September 2011
quotequote all
I've been really impressed with the BBC HD channels on Freesat. The Life series (which I have on BD) looks almost as impressive on BBC HD. It misses that last bit of wow WRT colour and obviously the resolution is lower, but it's still very very impressive all the same.

Trustmeimadoctor

12,673 posts

156 months

Wednesday 21st September 2011
quotequote all
V8covin said:
I've just cancelled my HD subscription because in my opinion the improvement over SD is minimal.
Now that may be down to my particular circumstances,a 37" Samsung LCD,sitting 10 feet from the tv and failing eyesight lol
your sitting twice as far away as the max recommended thx viewing distance to see the benefits of hd

obviously you dont need to sit the recommended 3.5' - 5' but it would help you see the difference

y2blade

56,141 posts

216 months

Wednesday 21st September 2011
quotequote all
croyde said:
Well I plumbed for Sky HD+ and have just set it up.

First impressions:

So I had a 28" CRT which had great, sharp pictures with Sky, Freeview and Analogue then went to a 42" Plasma where everything looked rubbish and blurred.

So now I have clear sharp pictures again but they don't really blow me away, unlike the monitors at work when we are working with HD and 3D, and not only have I had the expense of a new Panny G30 but have had to shell out for HD and a Blu Ray player plus the extra cost of the discs.

I have found the change very underwhelmimg or maybe I am just too fussy.

Conclusion, get a bigger screen and be prepared to spend a lot more in order to get the similar quality that you had with your older smaller TV set.

I have the HD box set to output in 1080i, the highest setting, even though the telly can handle 1080p. Should I change the Panasonic's settings?

Cheers.
press the "Information" button..look in the corner on the info box does it say HD?
a lot of programs are Broadcast in SD even though they are on the "HD" channels



surfymark

886 posts

232 months

Wednesday 21st September 2011
quotequote all
Trustmeimadoctor said:
your sitting twice as far away as the max recommended thx viewing distance to see the benefits of hd

obviously you dont need to sit the recommended 3.5' - 5' but it would help you see the difference
What are the recommended distances are rather how do you work them out? Is there a site you can point me to?

I currently have a 42" but am thinking of upgrading to a 50" so the distance we should sit would be useful. We probably currently sit about 8' away (would need to measure) and the set currently looks quite small!!

cheers
M