[mythtv-users] HD recordings reverting to SD?

[ccmail at bellsouth.net]

Mitch Gore wrote:

> Here is a funny HD story for you!

I've got one too -- when I first got an HD TV I also got an HD DirecTV box so I could see some of their channels in HD, including my local stations in the Central Florida area.  One night a show I was wanting to watch on a local station provided by DirecTV was advertised as being HD (even on DirecTV's channel guide) but was clearly being shown as SD.  I assumed it was a DirecTV problem since they provide both the SD and HD versions of the local stations -- I thought they were accidentally feeding the SD source to the HD channel.  I called DirecTV's help number and amazingly I was able to get through (after being transferred several times) to someone in their main control room who could verify what was going out on the various channels.  She said the local station was actually supplying them SD material on their HD channel.  Apparently DirecTV gets their local stations from around the country like the rest of us -- using OTA antennas in the locations where they provide local station
s.  The OTA video is routed back to DirecTV central where it gets broadcast on the satellite.  Anyway, I switched to viewing that channel OTA myself and sure enough it was being broadcast in HD!  I didn't try to call the local station but the problem went away shortly anyway -- somebody else must have called them to complain!

Chuck