NTL aspect ratios

Gadgie

Normally I have my ntl digibox set to '4:3 letterbox mode', but have noticed in recent weeks that regular 4:3 broadcasts are being cropped to 16:9 and then zoomed to 14:9. This is especially true on the four Irish channels, but I've seen it on other channels too. So now I have to leave the digibox in 16:9 widescreen mode, which means I have to switch it back to letterbox mode if I want to watch anything in anamorphic widescreen. Has anyone else noticed this? I'm in Waterford. Sort it out ntl!

Also, the feeds for BBC One and Two, UTV and Channel 4 seem to have switched from anamorphic widescreen to digitised versions of the analogue feeds.

mike65

Yeah same here, its variable sometimes my digibox won't switch ratios when looking at 16:9 channels like News 24 sometimes the framing changes cos of the feed itself from NTL or maybe whoever supplies them.

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=304781 and there's a few more threads like this knocking about.

Mike.

Gadgie

They're so crap. What the hell kind of software crops a 4:3 picture to 16:9? Never hear of it, do you? I'm just glad I'm only paying a tenner a month for the digital and not the basic pack on top of that.

Mayo Exile

My mate in Dundalk seems to have problems with aspect ratios with Chorus MMDS. When the box is set to 16:9 the only channels seemingly displaying correctly are BBC News 24 and Sky One when in widescreen. Others like BBC 1 and 2 are showing 'stretched' images when his Sony widescreen TV is set to 'wide'. Also RTE 2 when showing premiership football, the TV flicks to 14:9.

Are Chorus simply broadcasting the wrong images? Do they care?

gary_s

I'm on NTL's basic analogue service (and don't even have a widescreen tellybox), and would definitely like to see them rebroadcast channels like Sky News, Sky One etc in the compromise 14:9 aspect ratio.

For example, on the new Sky News screen format, there's some annoying half-hidden text in the bottom left of the picture (though you may well need full 16:9 to see this properly) and the opening titles for "Deadwood" were always a disaster with text disappearing off the screen (which I guess shouldn't happen if program makers keep text within the "safe zone", but maybe that doesn't apply in the US?).

Anyway contact Customer.Support AT ntl.ie if you also want this!

gary_s

Now NTL seems to have switched BBC1, BBC2 and UTV from 14:9 compromise aspect ratio to good old-fashioned 4:3! (I'm guessing they're now taking the feed for these channels by satellite, rather than the regular analog signal - in fact teletext no longers works for these 3 channels).

chorus techy

Mayo Exile wrote:

My mate in Dundalk seems to have problems with aspect ratios with Chorus MMDS. When the box is set to 16:9 the only channels seemingly displaying correctly are BBC News 24 and Sky One when in widescreen. Others like BBC 1 and 2 are showing 'stretched' images when his Sony widescreen TV is set to 'wide'. Also RTE 2 when showing premiership football, the TV flicks to 14:9.

Are Chorus simply broadcasting the wrong images? Do they care?

Chorus pull in all their feeds for RTE 1, RTE 2, TV 3, TG 4, BBC 1, BBC 2, UTV, Channel 4 and I think EuroSport aswell from analogue sources - they just convert them to digital, hence the lack of widescreen and pretty crap picture quality. Do they care? Obviously not

JohnC.

BBC1, BBC2 and UTV are all still 14:9 here on NTL MMDS. But then we are also waiting for RTE to be switched to proper widescreen too. It is on NTL cable, isn't it?

Gadgie

Noticed BBC was back to anamorphic widescreen tonight - didn't check UTV or C4.

Aside from C4 there's no excuse for them to be anything other than anamorphic widescreen as they are broadcast this way FTA on satellite and the feeds can be pulled from there.

SPDUB

gary_s wrote:

Now NTL seems to have switched BBC1, BBC2 and UTV from 14:9 compromise aspect ratio to good old-fashioned 4:3! (I'm guessing they're now taking the feed for these channels by satellite, rather than the regular analog signal - in fact teletext no longers works for these 3 channels).

CH 4 was among the group last night wednesday) as well

It seems to happen occasionally for a day or two unlike the prolonged period it happened for about 2 years ago

ETA The BBC are still affected though ,on NTL analogue which is all that is available to me

gary_s

NTL Dublin says:


I can advise that at the moment we are doing essential maintenance on our network and while this is been worked on we are using a back feed up which means that we cannot provide teletext on the channels in which you mentioned in your email and this will also affect the ratio format.

We are doing our utmost to have this issue resolved as quickly as possible and once this resolved the format and the teletext will return as normal.

mike65

NTL Waterford are in a 16:9 mood with the "UK4" all widescreen on digital as is M&M on 510. I've noticed the text is back for a week or so having been unavilible for a while. What chance some consistancy of service?

Mike.

Gadgie

mike65 wrote:

What chance some consistancy of service?

Not a hope. We are still without widescreen RTE despite their website announcing that it is available to all digital cable customers.

And the 4:3 channels are being cropped to 16:9 again. *sigh*

JohnC.

It is rare that I see TG4, but I have just noticed that is in widescreen. Has it been for long? It's a bit crap that they can have TG4 widescreen but not RTE.

Mossy Monk

what programme was in widescreen on TG4?

Gadgie

Mossy Monk wrote:

what programme was in widescreen on TG4?

I checked earlier and it was a 4:3 programme incorrectly stretched (but not cropped) to widescreen.

The "UK 4" all back to analogue feeds again today.

JohnC.

Mossy Monk wrote:

what programme was in widescreen on TG4?

It was that Survivor crap. It wasn't stretched, but proper widescreen. And the ads were in widescreen too.

I'm just checking again now. Something called An Bothar Fada. It seems to be stretched a little.