The Virgin Media Television thread

deezell

Ireland played in low resolution, England played in HD. We were starved of pixels. Take 6 nations off VM.

Elmo

Xpose goes to an hour on Friday Nights, TSOCS to air Monday to Thursday. from 3rd March

JMcGee

Anyone know why VM1 picture quality is only 25fps and VM Sports channels are a silky smooth 50fps? Streaming from iPhone to Apple TV.

iseegirls

Elmo wrote: »

Xpose goes to an hour on Friday Nights, TSOCS to air Monday to Thursday. from 3rd March

Probably the right decision. I'm guessing that the Monday and Wednesday shows on VM2 have been dropped then for Xpose with this decision.

deezell

JMcGee wrote: »

Anyone know why VM1 picture quality is only 25fps and VM Sports channels are a silky smooth 50fps? Streaming from iPhone to Apple TV.

A mixture of historical and bandwidth reasons. Broadcast Analogue signals were interlaced, that is only every second line (row of pixels in modern parlace) were transmitted at 50fps, alternating between frames of odd and even rows, so the effective frame rate is 25 fps. The display scanned at 50fps so you can't see the flicker. Bandwidth is halved. The 20ms delay from odd to even could create visible motion disparities, especially on a pure digital implementation of the analogue standard, say on a freeze frame.
25 fps digital for streaming can be full frame, with the display rate bumped to 50 or 100, simply by repeating the frame. Interpolating the pixels from one frame to the next to give an interim frame will smooth out the motion. The algorithms for digital encoding are so advanced these days that fps doesn't have the same meaning as regards encoding the final stream, as if can be displayed in any resolution and frame rate you wish, the visible result quality being a function of the power of the display processors and the sophistication of the processing code.
It's nice to reflect on the fact that original colour analogue tv's had a memory equivalent of 1 line of horizontal colour information, like a recording of 64us, equivalent to a few hundred bytes perhaps, and this was achieved in the analogue domain using an ultrasonic acoustic signal sent down a piece of glass tube. This micro stored line was used to average out line to line colour errors. How things have changed!

Elmo

iseegirls wrote: »

Probably the right decision. I'm guessing that the Monday and Wednesday shows on VM2 have been dropped then for Xpose with this decision.

Yeah both dropped.

icdg

It really is a dragged out death that Xpose is suffering, it once aired five days a week.

JMcGee

deezell wrote: »

A mixture of historical and bandwidth reasons. Broadcast Analogue signals were interlaced, that is only every second line (row of pixels in modern parlace) were transmitted at 50fps, alternating between frames of odd and even rows, so the effective frame rate is 25 fps. The display scanned at 50fps so you can't see the flicker. Bandwidth is halved. The 20ms delay from odd to even could create visible motion disparities, especially on a pure digital implementation of the analogue standard, say on a freeze frame.
25 fps digital for streaming can be full frame, with the display rate bumped to 50 or 100, simply by repeating the frame. Interpolating the pixels from one frame to the next to give an interim frame will smooth out the motion. The algorithms for digital encoding are so advanced these days that fps doesn't have the same meaning as regards encoding the final stream, as if can be displayed in any resolution and frame rate you wish, the visible result quality being a function of the power of the display processors and the sophistication of the processing code.
It's nice to reflect on the fact that original colour analogue tv's had a memory equivalent of 1 line of horizontal colour information, like a recording of 64us, equivalent to a few hundred bytes perhaps, and this was achieved in the analogue domain using an ultrasonic acoustic signal sent down a piece of glass tube. This micro stored line was used to average out line to line colour errors. How things have changed!

I'd appreciate it if you could just answer my question

Elmo

JMcGee wrote: »

I'd appreciate it if you could just answer my question

Puts my Xpose post to shame

iseegirls

icdg wrote: »

It really is a dragged out death that Xpose is suffering, it once aired five days a week.

The return of the ITV soaps, and moving The 7 O'Clock Show to 6pm killed it really. The 6OSC and the then named 7OCS have never achieved the same ratings as to what Xpose got.

The times and channels across one week was a mess after the soaps returned. 2 episodes on at 8pm and one episode on 7.30pm on TV3, then 2 episodes on 3e at 8pm.

This move will either kill T6OCS or Xpose. If ratings are good for Friday, then nothing stopping them putting it back in its place

Elmo

iseegirls wrote: »

The return of the ITV soaps, and moving The 7 O'Clock Show to 6pm killed it really. The 6OSC and the then named 7OCS have never achieved the same ratings as to what Xpose got.

The times and channels across one week was a mess after the soaps returned. 2 episodes on at 8pm and one episode on 7.30pm on TV3, then 2 episodes on 3e at 8pm.

This move will either kill T6OCS or Xpose. If ratings are good for Friday, then nothing stopping them putting it back in its place

Virgin Media own report is very interesting: -

Xciting changes ahead for Xposé!
We're moving to a supersized timeslot on Virgin Media One!

Virgin Media Television has today announced changes to the popular fashion and entertainment show, Xposé.

As of March 4th, Xposé will move from Virgin Media Two to the group’s flagship channel Virgin Media One. The show will air in a new supersized time slot from 6pm-7pm every Friday night.

Karen Koster, Glenda Gilson and Cassie Stokes will continue to present the show, offering viewers a bumper packed 60 minutes of all the latest celebrity and red carpet news to kick start your weekend.

As a result of this programming change, Virgin Media Television also announced that The Six O’Clock Show will now run from Monday to Thursday with Martin King and Muireann O’Connell offering the best in entertainment, chat and cookery.

and a link just in case https://www.virginmediatelevision.ie/xpose/article/entertainment/285771/Xciting-changes-ahead-for-Xpos

quoted in full to highlight the supersized press release, pity there are no press releases from Virgin Media open to the public.

JMcGee

deezell wrote: »

A mixture of historical and bandwidth reasons. Broadcast Analogue signals were interlaced, that is only every second line (row of pixels in modern parlace) were transmitted at 50fps, alternating between frames of odd and even rows, so the effective frame rate is 25 fps. The display scanned at 50fps so you can't see the flicker. Bandwidth is halved. The 20ms delay from odd to even could create visible motion disparities, especially on a pure digital implementation of the analogue standard, say on a freeze frame.
25 fps digital for streaming can be full frame, with the display rate bumped to 50 or 100, simply by repeating the frame. Interpolating the pixels from one frame to the next to give an interim frame will smooth out the motion. The algorithms for digital encoding are so advanced these days that fps doesn't have the same meaning as regards encoding the final stream, as if can be displayed in any resolution and frame rate you wish, the visible result quality being a function of the power of the display processors and the sophistication of the processing code.
It's nice to reflect on the fact that original colour analogue tv's had a memory equivalent of 1 line of horizontal colour information, like a recording of 64us, equivalent to a few hundred bytes perhaps, and this was achieved in the analogue domain using an ultrasonic acoustic signal sent down a piece of glass tube. This micro stored line was used to average out line to line colour errors. How things have changed!

I had to watch the game at 25fps on VM1 today, but right now I can see the replay at 50fps on VM Sport. The bandwidth is obviously there as all the games on the sports channels run smoothly. Just don't understand why VM1 is so poor in comparison.

Maz2016

Just watched an interview with 3 of the chasers (recorded 2 weeks ago) They said ireland is in advanced talks with the vixen to do The Chase Ireland. Wonder if this would take off?
See 1:45
https://youtu.be/5jpdpbR295o

Elmo

Maz2016 wrote: »

Just watched an interview with 3 of the chasers (recorded 2 weeks ago) They said ireland is in advanced talks with the vixen to do The Chase Ireland. Wonder if this would take off?
See 1:45
https://youtu.be/5jpdpbR295o

Don’t see why not but only as a daily show not prime time weekly.

Maz2016

Elmo wrote: »

Don’t see why not but only as a daily show not prime time weekly.

If virgin were doing in, it would almost certainly be prime time

iseegirls

Maz2016 wrote: »

If virgin were doing in, it would almost certainly be prime time

If Virgin were doing it, they'd record 26 episodes and split them over a 5 year period probably.

its_steve116

icdg wrote: »

It really is a dragged out death that Xpose is suffering, it once aired five days a week.

I think the powers that be are losing interest in the show. There's only so many times we can listen to gobby stuck up D4 heads telling us about the Kardashians/Love Islanders.
Steve

Elmo

Consolidated financial statements for parent company Virgin Media Inc show that some £14.5 million of the group’s total £1.2 billion turnover for the three months to the end of September 2018 was generated through ‘other’ sources – primarily broadcasting revenue in Ireland.

https://fora.ie/virgin-media-ad-sales-brexit-4501179-Feb2019/

around 60m per year.

iseegirls

Elmo wrote: »

https://fora.ie/virgin-media-ad-sales-brexit-4501179-Feb2019/

around 60m per year.

Haven't looked into it that much, but there must be a Virgin Media advert for either mobile, TV, broadband on what must feel every ad break they have across the 3 channels.

There just seems to be a drop in Irish productions going on with the Channel. No Clubhouse returning during the rugby season, Gogglebox disappeared, absolutely no mention of Pat Kenny ever returning. Red Rock will end in a few weeks time. Xpose cutting back and Six O clock Show trimming off an episode. The prime time schedules are full of repeated ITV documentaries.
They must have only a selection of 50 films to choose from across their 3 channels. The Snapper will again air this Sunday. They showed 3 film premieres last year in total.
Their twitter is useless - constant mixing up of channels. They've been tweeting WWTBAMillionaire on VM1, even though it's on VM2 amongst other gaffes.
Complete lack of identity between the 3 channels.
They're lucky they have the soaps and Rugby to boost their ratings and give an illusion that everything is OK.

Maz2016

iseegirls wrote: »

Haven't looked into it that much, but there must be a Virgin Media advert for either mobile, TV, broadband on what must feel every ad break they have across the 3 channels.

There just seems to be a drop in Irish productions going on with the Channel. No Clubhouse returning during the rugby season, Gogglebox disappeared, absolutely no mention of Pat Kenny ever returning. Red Rock will end in a few weeks time. Xpose cutting back and Six O clock Show trimming off an episode. The prime time schedules are full of repeated ITV documentaries.
They must have only a selection of 50 films to choose from across their 3 channels. The Snapper will again air this Sunday. They showed 3 film premieres last year in total.
Their twitter is useless - constant mixing up of channels. They've been tweeting WWTBAMillionaire on VM1, even though it's on VM2 amongst other gaffes.
Complete lack of identity between the 3 channels.
They're lucky they have the soaps and Rugby to boost their ratings and give an illusion that everything is OK.

Wow, when you put it like that - it really does show how bad things have gotten

dulpit

Virgin media are clearly not concerned about running a quality service, they just want to run a service that makes money, they don't care about public perception. If you view them through that prism, it all makes sense. It's frustrating for one of our 3 broadcasters to be like that, but not much can be done..

Elmo

dulpit wrote: »

Virgin media are clearly not concerned about running a quality service, they just want to run a service that makes money, they don't care about public perception. If you view them through that prism, it all makes sense. It's frustrating for one of our 3 broadcasters to be like that, but not much can be done..

You make regulations.

1. When liberty global tookover the CPCC should have stated that the Broadcast channels must remain separate to UPC (now Virgin Media)
2. that HD and +1 must be provided to all platforms including saorview.
3. That both the BAI and ComReg insure the above.
Later when this wasn't done
1. CPCC should have insisted that Virgin Media keep broadcast and platforms separate when taking over UTV Ireland
2. BAI should not have allowed name change to Virgin Media Television
3. again an opportunity to insist on all services going on Terrestrial TV.
Later when this wasn't done
1. Not providing them with a licence for Virgin Media Sport, unless clearly separate from their free channels.

dulpit

Elmo wrote: »

You make regulations.

1. When liberty global tookover the CPCC should have stated that the Broadcast channels must remain separate to UPC (now Virgin Media)
2. that HD and +1 must be provided to all platforms including saorview.
3. That both the BAI and ComReg insure the above.
Later when this wasn't done
1. CPCC should have insisted that Virgin Media keep broadcast and platforms separate when taking over UTV Ireland
2. BAI should not have allowed name change to Virgin Media Television
3. again an opportunity to insist on all services going on Terrestrial TV.
Later when this wasn't done
1. Not providing them with a licence for Virgin Media Sport, unless clearly separate from their free channels.

Reckon that regulations would ever be imposed?

Elmo

dulpit wrote: »

Reckon that regulations would ever be imposed?

It's not hard to say you can't be anti-competitive / to say you can seem to be horizontally aligned to avoid giving your channels unfair advantage or your platform unfair advantage.

Certainly TV3 has advantages with being part of Liberty Global and viasavera but those advantages need to be kept to a minimum, unless Liberty Global was to invest in Independent productions.

A lot of talk about Communicorp and O'Brien, but not a word about Liberty Global and John Malone.

Surely both organisation in terms of Ireland equal one another?

Elmo

In fairness to Virgin Media their audience share has increased.

For the year its up 7%, with increases for both one and TWO, THREE is down 6% (increase does not include SPORT).

For the second half of the year they are up 4% (includes rebanding).

The 4 quarter of 2018 saw them up 4%, from the previous quarter, after the rebrand.

JMcGee

dulpit wrote: »

Virgin media are clearly not concerned about running a quality service, they just want to run a service that makes money, they don't care about public perception. If you view them through that prism, it all makes sense. It's frustrating for one of our 3 broadcasters to be like that, but not much can be done..

At least their app is head and shoulders above that of RTE and Airplay works!

lertsnim

JMcGee wrote: »

At least their app is head and shoulders above that of RTE and Airplay works!

They don't allow use with Chromecast so it is a pile of ****e for some. The new RTE Player works just fine for me and also with Chromecast.

dulpit

JMcGee wrote: »

At least their app is head and shoulders above that of RTE and Airplay works!

Picture quality of stream is poor, very noticeable when watching the 6 nations last few weeks.

decor58

JMcGee wrote:

At least their app is head and shoulders above that of RTE and Airplay works!

Can't load the VM player on Samsung bluray, the 3player loaded and worked fine.
Is the VMplayer available on other brands, tv's or other smart products, or have VM restricted app downloads.

Ten Pin

5th March CL on RTE2* & VM1** at same time (8pm)

*Dortmund V Tottenham
**Real Madrid V Ajax