Can I get Sky+ any clearer ?

golfnuts

Just bought a new 40'' LCD TV and Sky+ reception is very blurred and hazy. For example, Some faces are blurred on programmes.. what I mean is they're just not cyrstal clear like my old 32'' Sony flatscreen which I had for 6 years.

Would this be a problem with the TV or maybe would I need a stonger or better connection from the sky+ box to the TV?

I have it rigged up with a scart at the moment.

Any suggestions would be great !

GNuts.

mathias

scart being analog it will need to be a good quality one for a good picture , if you have any more try switching them and see if it makes a difference.

Also , check your output on your sky box and make sure its set to RGB , make sure the scart your using is fully populated , meaning all 21 lines are used , and make sure the input of your TV is set to RGB as well.

failing that , adjust the picture settings on your TV , flat panels are rarely well set up out of the box.

check the colour and picture settings on your TV , if Dynamic is set , turn that off , its brutal with analog , set it to normal , set all the other picture settings to around 50%.

For 40 inch flat panel , you should be well able to get a good clear picture. Its fine on mine.

golfnuts

Cheers Mathias,

The scart I'm using is missing a few pins on it so would that mean its a crap one I'm using?
Were would I get a better quality one and is there a brand name I should look out for?

Just annoying payin out 1200 blips for a new TV and cant get a good reception!

Tony

Go for one with all pins connected, no particular brand names spring to mind although the thicker cables tend to be better quality.

golfnuts wrote: »

Cheers Mathias,

The scart I'm using is missing a few pins on it so would that mean its a crap one I'm using?
Were would I get a better quality one and is there a brand name I should look out for?

Just annoying payin out 1200 blips for a new TV and cant get a good reception!

fat-tony

golfnuts wrote: »

Just bought a new 40'' LCD TV and Sky+ reception is very blurred and hazy. For example, Some faces are blurred on programmes.. what I mean is they're just not cyrstal clear like my old 32'' Sony flatscreen which I had for 6 years.

Would this be a problem with the TV or maybe would I need a stonger or better connection from the sky+ box to the TV?

I have it rigged up with a scart at the moment.

Any suggestions would be great !

GNuts.

Short answer - should have bought a plasma:D

Seriously though, this may be a problem with the signal processing on your LCD. What's the make and model? Sometimes the processing causes strange effects on the picture. Whether you're using an RGB connection or a composite connection, you should still get a reasonable picture from (say) RTE 1 or BBC 1 or SKY News. A good Sony CRT tv is difficult to better on an LCD screen unless you have a good quality model. I assume you are comparing the pictures using the same SKY+ box?

watty

There is no significant difference to Plasma.

The two issues are:

The number of pixels (cheaper HD ready has 1366x768, rather than the native HD of 1920 x1080 or slightly better 1920 x1200 for SD & HD).

The technology / chipset used to rescale the picture to the native pixel resolution of the TV. This can badly blur the image.

HD broadcast in Ireland/UK is ONLY 1920 x1080 @ 16:9. Non-HD is always 288 lines doubled to 576, or 576 lines. Horizontally it is 384, 544, 704 or 720 (and a few others). Also the width of the pixel (how many native pixels it crosses) depends on if 4:3 or animorphic 16:9, so for a Widescreen plasma/LCD there are 8 to 10 horizontal resolutions to do, all with 576 lines.

This scales poorly on many LCD/Plasma, which is one reason a good CRT will still give better pictures. An LCD / Plasma/DLP only does its native resolution properly.

A HD flat screen with 1920x1080 or 1920x1200 native pixels can do HD properly but everything else will get blurred or artifacts. Also any so called HD Ready at ANY other resolution will blur HD too.

Also almost all flat screens are either not true 25i or else 50p. All broadcasts in Europe are 25i only. No 50p. Converting to 100Hz or 50p may reduce flcker slightly, but ALWAYS either adds artifacts or blurs the image. the 720p mode only used in some NTSC countries such as USA. 1080p is only used by game consoles. Progressive DVD players are actually 24p, telecine to 30p (or repeat frames for 60p) or speed up to 25p (or repeat frames to 50p). Film or Digitally shot Cinema is always 24p. Conversion from p to i is easy and does not add artifacts or blur for 25i (It adds artifacts but no blur for 30i). So conversion from Progressive to Interlace saves half the transmission bandwidth with only penalty is increase flicker on one line high edges/ detail. You can't go back from Interlace to Progressive though with out blurring by 50% when there is movement.

Tony

Please not this debate all over again, it has been well covered already.

golfnuts

fat-tony wrote: »

Short answer - should have bought a plasma:D

Seriously though, this may be a problem with the signal processing on your LCD. What's the make and model? Sometimes the processing causes strange effects on the picture. Whether you're using an RGB connection or a composite connection, you should still get a reasonable picture from (say) RTE 1 or BBC 1 or SKY News. A good Sony CRT tv is difficult to better on an LCD screen unless you have a good quality model. I assume you are comparing the pictures using the same SKY+ box?

Model is Samsung R series LE40R82B. I dont know the difference between RGB or Composite inputs or outputs so I'm fecked on that one ! I can see the picture but its just not clear you need to sit a fair bit back from the set to watch it.
Yes using the same sky+ box as i used with my old TV (Sony 32''Flatscreen)

Can I connect the tv to the sky+ box through the HDMI outlet at the back of the sky+ box, would that be any better ?
The HDMI outlet seems smaller on the Sky+ box than it is on the TV, why would this be or do the HDMI cables come in different sizes?

Tony

The sky + box does not have a HDMI socket. Usually AV1 scart can take in RGB

golfnuts wrote: »

Model is Samsung R series LE40R82B. I dont know the difference between RGB or Composite inputs or outputs so I'm fecked on that one ! I can see the picture but its just not clear you need to sit a fair bit back from the set to watch it.
Yes using the same sky+ box as i used with my old TV (Sony 32''Flatscreen)

Can I connect the tv to the sky+ box through the HDMI outlet at the back of the sky+ box, would that be any better ?
The HDMI outlet seems smaller on the Sky+ box than it is on the TV, why would this be or do the HDMI cables come in different sizes?

Brian68GT

Firstly, there is a significant difference between LCD and Plasma on SD signals. With HD, both look great. My dad just bought a 46" bravia and he feels its nowhere near as good as my Pioneer 50" plasma, and he has Sky HD with HDMI output etc, i only have Sky+ with scart. But thats another argument.

with regards to your Sky+, you shoud have a great image, its obviously your settings and possibly your cable. Turn off all of the digital stuff, it just makes the picture worse and make your sharpness about 50%. Make sure your not set to 'Dynamic' of 'Vivid', thats just to make the Tv look bright in the shop, it'll sho up any flaws in the picture at home.

As mentioned above make sure the Sky+ is set to RGB and the same on your TV. Not all of your scart inputs may be rgb. You can tell if its an RGB socket by a picture of a square with three dots in it printed into the plastic casing beside the socket.

mathias

The HDMI outlet seems smaller on the Sky+ box than it is on the TV, why would this be or do the HDMI cables come in different sizes?

At a very rough guess I would assume you are looking at a USB port or a eSata port here , as the ordinary sky + box does not have a HDMI slot.

As far as I know , HDMI slots are all the same size , although thats only as far as I know , there could quite possible be a mini version but I havnt seen one yet.

golfnuts

Sorry lads, might need the aul mince pies sorted out. I did see some sort of usb looking port though on the back of the sky+ box but didnt read what it said on it. I'll have a fiddle around with it and fingers crossed.

Thanks for all the replies kids.

GNuts

auggie2k

Do the newer Sky + boxes has component slots at the back? I know the Sky HD does...

Tony

auggie2k wrote: »

Do the newer Sky + boxes has component slots at the back? I know the Sky HD does...

Not so far

watty

Component is no better than SCART. SCART would even work for HD. Component is a USA thing because they never had RGB or RGB SCART. They got Psuedo HD years ago (because ordinary US TV is 30% to 50% poorer signal quality than out European system) before HDMI was available. Hence Component.

Any copy protected HD in Europe won't output at full resolution on Component, only on HDMI.

So you are not missing anything.

You can get a RGB SCART to component convertor that hardly affects quality if you have a wierd non-SCART set.


Sky+ *DOES* have a USB port. One idea was for a portable media viewer fed from it. But either the DRM or price was not correct. BSkyB is now done some deal with Sony about content for PSP, but no idea if that will use the USB. Currently it has no function.


If Sky+ *DID* have an HDMI port it would make no difference.

What are the two TV sets like from a DVD player with same SCART cable in RGB mode?

mathias

If Sky+ *DID* have an HDMI port it would make no difference.

Not from my experience anyway , obviously one being a digital and one being an analog output, the electronics handling each signal in the set is going to be different and hence the output is going to be different.

I have a sky HD box , the quality difference between the HDMI and the Scart on RGB is considerable for SD , with the HDMI being way out in front , Obviously I havent taken apart my set to find out why , but the HDMI route definitely produces a better SD picture than the scart , clearer and not nearly as colour saturated , with no movement blur during sports etc.

Having said that , the Scart was perfectly watchable , I dont want to give anyone the idea it was a bad picture , just that the HDMI was better.
To the OP , get some fully populated cables and adjust the TV settings , it should be fine.

watty

Because on Sky HD the HDMI is upscaled to HD better than the RGB SCART to internal upscaler.

If it was Sat box with no HD and no upscaler, then you would see no difference.

fat-tony

watty wrote: »

Because on Sky HD the HDMI is upscaled to HD better than the RGB SCART to internal upscaler.

If it was Sat box with no HD and no upscaler, then you would see no difference.

I'd agree with mathias - the HDMI output on the SKY HD box is visibly better than the SCART output on SD on my tv - Panasonic plasma. There is no upscaling - it's 576 progressive on SD from the SKY HD box - unless you set the SKY box to upscale to 720 or 1080 - the tv does the upscaling in my case. The SCART output quality difference may be down to the signal path in the SKY box and/or tv. I have found that the SCART output on the SKY HD box is visibly better than the SCART output on the SKY+ box, though.

I think the original poster has some serious mis-setting problems in his LCD - this is not a HD vs SD debate - nor a Plasma vs LCD debate (note the smiley in my previous post watty;)) The o.p. has a SKY+ box, which should give reasonable pictures on high bandwidth channels like RTE, TV3 etc. - particularly if he is using a good quality cable, fully populated and with the SKY+ box set to RGB output.

fat-tony

Did I say TV3 was a quality channel in my last post:o Well the picture is high bandwidth, apart from the programming ... and don't get me started on the audio compression .....

watty

Yes on BBC / RTE is should be like DVD.
If a SCART is inferor to HDMI for SD, then there is rubbish SCART cables or rubbish SCART input circuit on TV.
My DVD to TV is better than DVD on PC or on any TV I have seen running SD in a Showroom. My ordinary Sky box and ordinary FTA box give indentical BBC1 quality on same TV.

You need FAT SCART with individual coaxs in it. Not all individual wires with a common screen.

However SCART inputs have always varied tremendously between TVs, and also where there is more than one SCART in, only one might do RGB.

An LCD / Plasma needs to convert the signal to a digital format, so if it has cut corners on Analogue (Composite, Component, SCART, S-Video, RF Analogue) conversion, then HDMI will be better.
However a CRT unless doing 100Hz conversion basically just drives the tube with 3 amplifiers direct from the RGB, no additional signal processing. This could be why a decent CRT outperforms EVERY LCD/Plasma I have ever seen in a showroom on SD as they are rarely feed even with RGB, never mind HDMI. I have a good Philips 37" HD LCD in work and on SCART RGB it is slightly inferior to the CRT, but much better than any of the SD LCDs I have seen.

It would be interesting to test some LCDs / Plasmas with a 3rd party professional RGB SCART to HDMI and see if the quality issue is RGB output on Sky box or Analogue conversion on TV. The latter is more likely as really good Analogue conversion is costly. A top of the range PC graphics card seems to do conversion of resolution on DVI connector to 19" LCD Monitor to Native pixels much better than the LCD does it.

golfnuts

fat-tony wrote: »

I'd agree with mathias - the HDMI output on the SKY HD box is visibly better than the SCART output on SD on my tv - Panasonic plasma. There is no upscaling - it's 576 progressive on SD from the SKY HD box - unless you set the SKY box to upscale to 720 or 1080 - the tv does the upscaling in my case. The SCART output quality difference may be down to the signal path in the SKY box and/or tv. I have found that the SCART output on the SKY HD box is visibly better than the SCART output on the SKY+ box, though.

I think the original poster has some serious mis-setting problems in his LCD - this is not a HD vs SD debate - nor a Plasma vs LCD debate (note the smiley in my previous post watty;)) The o.p. has a SKY+ box, which should give reasonable pictures on high bandwidth channels like RTE, TV3 etc. - particularly if he is using a good quality cable, fully populated and with the SKY+ box set to RGB output.

Cheers Mathias for trying to get the original post back on track

Puggy

Love posts like these. They bring out the passion in everyone! I've a collection of scart leads in a bag, and had been moving things around and connected a thin one up to my FTA satellite box. Picture quality was much more blurred, put in a thick cable and picture quality was much improved.

As Watty said, you need a scart lead with a screen on each core including signal wires. Also sometimes components can affect each other, you may have to move things around. I found the sub-woofer was affect by the lcd tv.

Finally dont forget that betamax was better than vhs, quality does not always win out.