[mythtv-users] Re: Quality of Capture of HDTV satellite

Steve Bower sbower at cisco.com
Wed Nov 17 22:55:38 UTC 2004


>>>>> "Robin" == Robin Smith <1canuck2 at gmail.com> writes:

Robin> I would like to make a decision on satellite soon, and would like
Robin> to know if it is at all worth me going for HiDef satellite if all
Robin> I am going to do is capture through the svideo in on my PVR250? I
Robin> rarely watch live TV (esp. since MythTV came into my world)

Robin> The two questions are:

Robin> Will the capture quality be better than regular basic cable
Robin> capture quality?

I don't have experience with capturing HD downconverted to svideo, but I
did spend a couple of years watching it that way before I got my HDTV
(the tuner was a much cheaper "try it out" expense!).

The quality should be MUCH better than what you see on regular basic
cable.  After learning to love the picture of HDTV downconverted for my
standard def TV, I got a hipix card for an htpc to be able to record and
play back that way (I was already spoiled by tivo at that point).  It
was very nice.

Robin> What will it do with widescreen satellite programming?

I believe it depends on the STB.  Any of them will give you black bars
top&bottom (like watching a widescreen DVD), some may let you "zoom" the
picture (losing the left&right sides), a few may let you expand the
picture anamorphically (stretch vertically, which would get you the best
vertical resolution without losing parts of the picture).  If you can do
this stretch, you should be able to use the aspect ratio controls in
mythfrontend to restore the aspect ratio (or watch it stretched if that
floats your boat!).  IIRC my dish 6000 can do that stretching, but I
haven't used its svideo out since I got my HDTV last year.

If you have the chance to check out some receivers at a local retailer,
that should get you a definitive answer.

Robin> I'd appreciate some comments or opinions on whether this is worth
Robin> doing.

I think if you can verify the receivers' capabilities, it'll be worth
doing.  If you're uncertain, choosing a retailer with a return policy
would be wise.

  Steve.


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