ABC's HD Quality? (1 Viewer)

[Steven_ R]

Have had Comcast HD STB for a little under a week now. I have a 1080i HD ready TV (Sony 61HS10) and it seems like the ABC HD image is not as good as the NBC and HBO HD signals. I know that ABC uses the 720p technology. Since that signal is presumably upconverted to 1080i, does it makes sense that the ABC picture quality would be worse than the native 1080i broadcasts? Also, so far, I've been generally unimpressed with most (but not all) of the HD broadcasts). The picture quality is occasionally great, but more often not any better than a good DVD. Now, that's still a lot better than the non-HD cable signal, but I keep wondering if either Comcast does not have the proper equipment in place or if they are using so much compression to offer all the "digital" and HD channels that the image quality suffers.

Steve

 

[Jim Robbins]

I haven't seen any difference between ABC and CBS HD on my Sharp M20X but my resolution is limited to the 16:9 area of 1024x768 pixels. I receive both via OTA.

 

[TysonL]

Sounds to me like you're watching material shot on film mostly(most all evening OTA broadcasts). Have you seen college football on cbs on saturdays? You'll get a taste of HD video in 1080i natively.

Tyson

 

[Steven_ R]

Unfortunately, Comcast does not have CBS on HD. Do you know if either NBC or ABC broadcast any sports in HD?

 

[Lew Crippen]

Check this thread out for some ESPN HD coming events. And this thread for ABC HD sporting events.
You might also check HDNet, as it has a lot of sports.

 

[Steven_ R]

Two more strikes for Comcast - no HD for ESPN and no HDNet.

 

[Michael St. Clair]

720p and 1080i both look best shown native. Neither looks as good when 'sideconverted' to the other. I say 'sideconverted' because they are both extremely strong for different kinds of material.

 

[Lew Crippen]

Two more strikes for Comcast - no HD for ESPN and no HDNet.

You might start lobbying Comcast now for ESPNHD when it arrives in April. As for HDNet, it is so far only available on DirectTV (and sporadically on one OTA station here in the D/FW area). Cuban signed an exclusive deal with DirectTV when he started HDNet (a way to distinguish them from Dish). HDNet may be picked up by others when the initial deal expires.

In any case, ESPN/ABC remain committed to the 720p format. Right now it makes no difference to me, as my STB (Hughes E86) converts 720p to 1080i. I don’t know about other STBs.

 

[Bill Slack]

Ask Comcast to add HDnet too. That's what Mark Cuban has been asking people to do. The exclusive contract is set to end sometime soon, I believe. Plus HDnet is adding more channels.

Don't blame Comcast for not having HD ESPN, it won't exist until 04/03...