What's TWC doing to clear up 8000HD image fuzziness?

Archived from groups: alt.tv.tech.hdtv (More info?)

Find with a comparison of HD images between my new SA8000HD and an older HD
converter that 8000HD images are too soft. I'm with New York's Time Warner
Cable, and my 8000HD uses Passport 1.5.159 firmware.

Read in a AVS forum that someone measured only about 900 lines of resolution
(HDNet test pattens) with his 8000HD, but also got about 1290 lines with
another converter and even more with a Motorola converter from another cable
company (about 1335 I recall)..

Threads at AVS suggest it's simply the firmware video drivers, and that
cable systems with non-Scientific Atlanta converters mixed in, such as the
Pace hardware, can't optimize firmware for the 8000HD.

Any solutions in the works--other than the newer 8300HD, not available here
yet, that supposedly has better actual resolution? thanks.

Archived from groups: alt.tv.tech.hdtv (More info?)

"JDeats" <jeremy@pdq.net> wrote in message
news:<b0738dc6.0411191831.1010d233@posting.google.com>...

> "John Blake" <jblake@bamspam.com> wrote in message
> news:<qRqnd.8074$Yh2.2743353@twister.nyc.rr.com>...

> > Find with a comparison of HD images between my new SA8000HD and an older
> > HD

> > converter that 8000HD images are too soft. I'm with New York's Time
> > Warner

> > Cable, and my 8000HD uses Passport 1.5.159 firmware.

> >

> > Read in a AVS forum that someone measured only about 900 lines of
> > resolution

> > (HDNet test pattens) with his 8000HD, but also got about 1290 lines with

> > another converter and even more with a Motorola converter from another
> > cable

> > company (about 1335 I recall)..

> >

>

> This doesn't surprise me at all. I had a Motorola HD digital cable box

> with TWC Houston and swaped it out for the 8000HD and immediately

> noticed a bit of a drop in HD quality (I did not confirm this, this is

> just what my eyes were telling me), I suspected the new box drops some

> of the resolution to make the DVR feature possible (how much I wasn't

> sure), so there is that possibility.

Thanks for addtional confirmation. Believe the AVS poster, in the HDTV
recorders forum, mentioned that both his recorded and realtime HDNet
readings indicated the same low resolution. Suggests that the video output
circuit, not related to the DVR section is at fault, even though the DVR is
always recording.

>The other possibility is that the

> poster (on AVS Forms) television is incapable of displaying full HD

> quality. This is actually more common than you think, many CRT

> rear-projection sets labeled as being HD-1080i supportive, can't

> really handle the full 1080i resolution.

Notice he mentioned getting 1335 lines with his Motorola box, though.
Believe ~1700 lines is the rez limited for *sampled* signals. But HDNet's
patterns appear to electronically generated (not sampled) because it was
mentioned that someone, using HDNet from DirecTV earlier, had seen about
1920 lines using a Toshiba LCoS RPTV (discontined) capable of resolving that
resolution.

>

>

> > Threads at AVS suggest it's simply the firmware video drivers, and that

> > cable systems with non-Scientific Atlanta converters mixed in, such as
> > the

> > Pace hardware, can't optimize firmware for the 8000HD.

> >

> > Any solutions in the works--other than the newer 8300HD, not available
> > here

> > yet, that supposedly has better actual resolution? thanks.

>

> Just be glad you're a cable subscriber and that this problem is

> something for the cable company to fix (dish owners can look forward

> to investing in HD-DVR hardware that will be outdated within 2-3

> years, probably sooner). HD-DVR is still sort of "experimental", truth

> is if the demand weren't so high products like the 8000HD would still

> be in R&D, they are far from perfect, but the demand is so high SA

> couldn't resist. It may hurt them in the long run...

Yes, would like to hear of any 'fixes'. Seems like most 8000HD users have
this fuzziness problem. But there's a hint, from a few posts, that some
cable systems installed a fix that cured it. Agree that SA--and the cable
firms--seem to have exceeded their competencies.