Heavy compression on SoHo

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#619504 4-May-2012 13:47

Jas777: Ruff,

The bit rate might not be all of the problem?

As Sky uses 1080i and Bluray uses 1080p this surely makes a difference too?

Not really as all the good stuff is progressive to start with. Only sped up to 25 fps to match pal rates that should have been abandoned when they went digital.

Any display will pick that and deinterlace in film mode

Richard rich.ms

ruff

63 posts

Master Geek

#619565 4-May-2012 14:42

interlaced vs. progressive is not an issue.

It's the compression.

JimmyH

2886 posts

Uber Geek

#619868 4-May-2012 22:30

Jas777: Ruff,

The bit rate might not be all of the problem?

As Sky uses 1080i and Bluray uses 1080p this surely makes a difference too?

No, it's the compression. If you want to take the interlacing out of the argument set your Blu Ray player to output 1080i instead of 1080p (you can set this on most of them). While you may notice a marginal drop in quality, it will still be much, much better than Sky's HD offering.

I shudder to think how bad it will get if they find the bandwidth for the new Olympics Channels by further starving the existing channels!

MarkX

109 posts

Master Geek

#622099 9-May-2012 10:11

May just be my imagination but I definitely noticed an improvement in the picture quality of this weeks episode of Game Of Thrones. Perhaps Sky have responded to the criticism that they have received.

ruff

63 posts

Master Geek

#622104 9-May-2012 10:16

Yeah - I thought it looked a bit better also.

Still not a great picture, but at least there was no visible blocking on faces!

thecripplernz

252 posts

Ultimate Geek

#623012 10-May-2012 16:54

I noticed the blocking on Mad Men! Thought i was going mad.

When questioned on the Soho FB page, they said everything played fine on their end, and that
there must be something wrong with my decoder...

liars!

thecripplernz

252 posts

Ultimate Geek

#634316 1-Jun-2012 17:53

are you guys still having trouble with soho picture quality?

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rugrat

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#634391 1-Jun-2012 20:36

I'm happy with it. I've only got a 32 inch tv though, probably more would show on a bigger tv.

I think the quality has gone up though, maybe they got the frequencys that were shut down with the aussie channels on them.

ruff

63 posts

Master Geek

#634526 2-Jun-2012 09:48

Hi,

Quality has improved.

Which is great... shame we have to complain about it to have any action taken...

seenit

13 posts

Geek

#637900 8-Jun-2012 16:22

Heya guys, just thought I'd share my experience with Soho quality here.

I'm a Soho (HD) subscriber but have just been recording most things due to being busy. Having just sat down and caught up on all the recorded GOT episodes I was utterly disappointed in the picture quality. The compression makes faces bland and monotoned. For comparison's sake (and eagerness to watch the final episode), I illegally downloaded the final episode and found that despite being a tv rip (which would have been further compressed by the uploader), the quality was noticabley better than on Soho (and minus the annoying logo and "available in HD" pop ups).

What prompted me to write this is I have just turned on Soho and found the new show Veep is on. I have watched a few minutes of it and am now going online to download it illegally in order to watch it in decent quality. To me, my case seems to portray a hilariously sorry state of affairs in our subscription broadcasting.

Anywho, just though I'd share my $0.02

ruff

63 posts

Master Geek

#637946 8-Jun-2012 17:26

Yes, overall it's pretty bad isn't it.

I have decided to ditch SoHo and just rent / buy BluRays. The quality and experience is just so much better.

hypnotoad

26 posts

Geek

#638479 10-Jun-2012 14:47

I haven't noticed any of the issues that have been mentioned here.

What TV's are you guys watching? Do you run the signal through a Home theater amp or direct to the TV?

thecripplernz

252 posts

Ultimate Geek

#638480 10-Jun-2012 14:52

Direc to tv

ruff

63 posts

Master Geek

#638493 10-Jun-2012 15:42

Samsung46" LED
Through a home theatre amp, hdmi.

I am fussy though, but then... I do film images for a living and I work with the same cameras being used to shoot these shows, soI am aware of just how good they can look.

Throw a bluray in and look at the quality difference... it is massive, then remember that blurry is a compressed format also!

seenit

13 posts

Geek

#638499 10-Jun-2012 16:07

I have the decoder running through the receiver at the moment but I also sometimes have sky setup to run through Mediaportal on my htpc which provides a preferable picture than that from the decoder but only two tuners so it's not as practical.

Sky sport's HD is gorgeous through my setup, I've just found Soho and Sky Movies Greats to have too much compression going on. FTA HD channels through sky are alrightish but definitely inferior to the terrestrial transmission.

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