Watching Spark Sport (including launch and pricing)

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4 posts

Wannabe Geek

#2290909 6-Aug-2019 13:27

This is very bizarre if they site 'device compatibility'. Going for the lowest common denominator is very strange. Look at Netflix - I stream on an old android 6 tablet (nexus) for the kids through to a 4K OLED setup via NVIDIA Shield and they all look great. Sounds like their infrastructure is creaking...

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freitasm

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#2290910 6-Aug-2019 13:28

PottsyNZ:

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=12256062

NZHerald on Premium, so not sure of the full contents

From the rest of the article...

Spark Sport admits a change of the framerate from 50/60fps to 25/30fps. The decision was taken to make sure they are able to launch on a number of devices - not all of them support 1080p 50/60fps. Basically to be compatible with older devices.

They also say that some minor changes to quality were noticed and are looking at a variety of options for improving picture quality prior.

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#2290911 6-Aug-2019 13:30

So we can't specify this during the steam or on the account, if our devices are indeed capable of 50/60fps?

Surely they would default to the lower and allow you to switch?

Hopefully, that's the case.. Can anyone confirm?

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#2290913 6-Aug-2019 13:32

@Talkiet:

I'm not able to comment officially on anything to do with Spark Sport - and if I (or the official reps) posted here I suspect we'd see the same results as before - heavily negative commenting from a few overpowering the accurate and informative posts. Sorry it's just not worth the personal stress.

Cheers - N

I think we can all now admit the "heavily negative comments" were actually just noticing what Spark Sport has now officially acknowledged.

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Benoire

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#2290916 6-Aug-2019 13:35

and where also correct in their assumptions. In my opinion, the low frame rate issues is going to cause them some serious backlash. RWC fans where used to 1080i/50 which was fluid and if Spark Sport is going for 1080p/30 then there is nothing that clever algorithms can do to interpolate frames... its going to be a juddery mess.

darthmeow

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#2290921 6-Aug-2019 13:39

While my beloved F1 still looks pretty OK at 25fps, EPL looks kinda pants. If it's a device compatibility thing, perhaps a settings option for "allow 50/60fps streaming" could be a go here. Opt-in with a note that older devices may have issues with streaming the higher frame rate and if there are issues to turn this option off. Just a 2c opinion.

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#2290924 6-Aug-2019 13:41

Murda: This is very bizarre if they site 'device compatibility'. Going for the lowest common denominator is very strange. Look at Netflix - I stream on an old android 6 tablet (nexus) for the kids through to a 4K OLED setup via NVIDIA Shield and they all look great. Sounds like their infrastructure is creaking...

Netflix content is typically "cinematic" 24FPS with massive motion blur to try to make it look like movement. Sport videod with a shutter open that long wouldnt even show the ball as it would be stretched so much.

Since the days of analog TV, sport has been done at the full framerate, just interlaced. To now go and chop half of them out so that people can watch it on junk hardware is absurd. Also things that can only do 1080p 30 can usually do 720p 60 so just cap it to that.

I'm guessing this is a kneejerk reaction to some piece of junk gear that they promoted struggling with the feed. Perhaps that overpriced overheating freeview dongle cant cope or something similar that they sold people as a solution to get spark sport and now its actually too weak to do it?

Richard rich.ms

hio77

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#2290936 6-Aug-2019 13:51

OK, so I've stayed pretty quiet on this one Given commenting on here can be pretty Hectic and i dont want to miss communicate anything leading to a stuff article etc...

But do feel i need to clear up some of the Quality and Compatibility changes of recent.

Spark Sport have at this stage made a drop from 50/60 FPS down to 25/30FPS (note bitrate has not changed, so Quality should not be reduced)

The reason for this change is quite simple, Device Compatibility. While it's on the roadmap to reintroduce the higher frame rate, i can't say when this would be done.

The majority of geekzone users wouldn't be on the older hardware that was affected by the issues leading up to this change.

In saying that, the Spark Sport team have noticed there has some changes in Picture quality, and as sure they are looking into options to Bring this back up.

If there are individual questions on this, i may not be able to answer them or it may need to go by the Spark sport and comms folk before i respond - Hope you all understand.. I'm just a Messenger!

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Murda

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Wannabe Geek

#2290938 6-Aug-2019 13:57

richms:

Netflix content is typically "cinematic" 24FPS with massive motion blur to try to make it look like movement. Sport videod with a shutter open that long wouldnt even show the ball as it would be stretched so much.

Yes, they have various frame-rate capabilities for their content as demonstrated by https://www.netflix.com/title/80018499; 4k 60fps.

Agree that it's different in that Netflix is cached by a CDN but the delay inherent in live streaming (30s+) means that Spark could just stream to the edge caches and let those stream to the consumers.

I don't think them being conservative will end up winning over the majority come RWC time. Certainly has me worried.

Benoire

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#2290940 6-Aug-2019 13:58

hio77:

Spark Sport have at this stage made a drop from 50/60 FPS down to 25/30FPS (note bitrate has not changed, so Quality should not be reduced)

Thanks for acting in this way, yes its hard to be the messenger sometimes!

I've qouted the bit that I think is wrong though, Quality is framerate and resolution. A HD definition image is defined by its resolution but the quality of the stream is also defined by its framerate. A high resolution but low framerate is, in my opinion, not a quality stream. A low framerate (24fps for example) is ok for movies where they can use a lot of motion blur to hide the frames, but sports require fast shuttering to pick up ball/player movement and slow shutters will elongate the object being tracked badly... There is a reason why ESPN uses 720p/60 and Sky(NZ/UK for example) has used 1080i/50 as 1080p/30 just doesn't work for sports.

Murda

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Wannabe Geek

#2290941 6-Aug-2019 13:58

hio77:

note bitrate has not changed

As the framerate has halved, presumably the picture quality would be improved if bitrate stayed the same?

hio77

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#2290947 6-Aug-2019 14:13

Murda:

richms:

Netflix content is typically "cinematic" 24FPS with massive motion blur to try to make it look like movement. Sport videod with a shutter open that long wouldnt even show the ball as it would be stretched so much.

Yes, they have various frame-rate capabilities for their content as demonstrated by https://www.netflix.com/title/80018499; 4k 60fps.

Agree that it's different in that Netflix is cached by a CDN but the delay inherent in live streaming (30s+) means that Spark could just stream to the edge caches and let those stream to the consumers.

I don't think them being conservative will end up winning over the majority come RWC time. Certainly has me worried.

All Spark Sport content is delivered Directly from Akamai caches, so Edge caching just like netflix.

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hio77

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#2290950 6-Aug-2019 14:14

Murda:

hio77:

note bitrate has not changed

As the framerate has halved, presumably the picture quality would be improved if bitrate stayed the same?

In basic terms, yes.

As noted, a Quality drop is being investigated.

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tdgeek

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#2290981 6-Aug-2019 14:55

hio77:

Murda:

hio77:

note bitrate has not changed

As the framerate has halved, presumably the picture quality would be improved if bitrate stayed the same?

In basic terms, yes.

As noted, a Quality drop is being investigated.

Just my 2c on quality. The quality of the fixed image is the same, it appears the same. Maybe its better as the bitrate is unchanged, but it looks the same to me. If the commentary team are yakking it looks the same as before. if the cars are shown at high speed but coming towards your there is not much motion to worry about, it looks fine. If the cars are driving perpendicular, they judder like buggery. If the car is being followed perpendicular (or near), the background judders like buggery. It occasionally hurts my eyes as my eyes or brain are probably trying tp figure it out

So, the "quality" is very good, motion is very poor. I first noticed this at Wimbledon, it was getting to the point where ISO backups..... were being considered. The ball was an on off on off affair. Quite offputting.

So, I agree that visual quality is still good, its the motion effect.

Edit: If it was a non sport piece of content, possibly hardly notice.

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#2290993 6-Aug-2019 15:20

how is it possible to watch paid sports in 30fps?

and how does the bitrate compare with a sky rugby championship feed?

Involuntary autocorrect in operation on mobile device. Apologies in advance.

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