Review of SKY HD box - 6 days on

fat-tony wrote: »

Having had the HD box since Monday, I thought it might be useful to share my experiences of it.

It's connected to my Panny PV500 via HDMI and SCART - no RF (aerial) cable is used as I'm getting rid of my NTL/Chorus connection shortly. My Pioneer DVD player is connected to the TV via component connection and is set for progressive output. I use a Denon amp for surround sound and the SKY box is connected to it via optical cable. See my sig for equipment details.

First off, if you are waiting for a HD install and have got a new card from SKY, make sure the installer uses it as it is pre-set for the HD channels. The guy who installed my HD box and moved my existing SKY+ box (I was getting multi-room) used my existing card in the HD box and the new one in the SKY+ box. As a result, he left me after the install with no working HD channels but the SKY+ box was working fine - which was not what I wanted! Anyway, I sorted the problem out with the SKY call centre, who got me to switch the cards back and enabled the premium channels very quickly.

The HDMI output from the box is set to auto by default and this outputs 576p on the standard def (SD) channels. On my setup the HDMI picture is superior to that from the SCART on SD channels. I'd say that this is due to the progressive output from the box on HDMI vs the interlaced picture on SCART. On high bandwidth channels like RTE, particularly with a good quality program source (Home & Away - which is recorded in HD originally) you get a superb quality picture which would challenge DVD progressive output. Left on automatic, the HDMI signal carries the relevant information to allow the TV to switch resolution from 4:3 to 16:9 on widescreen programmes on SD channels. You can set the box to force output 720p or 1080i on all channels. I must say that I can't see any picture benefit from this on SD channels as I'd say the upscaling on the box is pretty basic - SKY want you to pay a premium for HD viewing in any case! A side result of manually setting the box to 720p or 1080i is that ALL channels are output in 16:9 as this is the HD picture aspect ratio standard. So you get stretched output on non-widescreen output SD channels.

If you leave the box on auto, you get 576p on SD channels, correct aspect ratio and when you change to a HD channel, the box switches to 1080i. All HD channels are output by the box at this resolution. On HDMI, my Panasonic loses the picture for about a half second while it switches from 576p to 1080i. This effect has been noticed on lots of different TVs - see avforums.com - and the impact varies. I don't have a problem with it particularly, and you can eliminate the effect by fixing the resolution to 720p or 1080i, but you get the stretched picture on 4:3 programmes on SD - make your choice!

If you have a VCR or other SCART connected device, you will need to connect the HD box to your TV via SCART or RF lead in addition to HDMI (or component). The box does not output the signal from the VCR over its HDMI connection. I have SCART and HDMI connection to the TV so it's not a problem. The HDMI lead outputs a digital sound connection to the TV as well as the Dolby Digital output via the optical lead.

What's the HD like!!!

Well, the pictures from Discovery and Nat Geographic HD are excellent. Most of the programmes on these channels are HD sourced and the info bar on the EPG indicates when this is the case. The box outputs these as 1080i - I could not see any difference when I changed the box to 720p. If you force the box to output at 576p you see a reduction in resolution ok. My TV has a native resolution of 720 so it has to downscale 1080i signal anyway. Someone with a 1080 res TV should post a review! Resolution isn't everything anyhow - it's down to the quality of the panel and electronics - ultimately it's the overall package which determines how your picture is presented.

I viewed the "Revenge of the Sith" from Box Office HD during the week. The amount of detail and colour range was incredible. It just blows ordinary DVD away! The quality from genuine HD programming on SKY Ports HD (cricket and England v Belarus) is amazing. The BBC HD preview, which I added manually (10847, 22000, 5/6) is stunning quality - particularly the clips from Planet Earth. The World Cup matches are due to be shown here, hope that SKY/BBC don't cripple the channel beforehand. You can't record the "additional channels" so, if you want to watch the World Cup in HD, you'll have to watch it live on a SKY HD box or get a Humax or other HD-compatible box with a harddisk for timeshifting - I believe there are software issues with these boxes though, due to the compression codecs used by the BBC. Works fine on the SKY HD box, though! Watty (moderator) has a concern that the BBC HD signal has been downscaled at some point in the transmission chain. All I can say is that, on the screen, the BBC HD picture is equivalent or even better than the paid-for SKY HD channels - even the fully HD ones.

Note that SKY1 have a HD variant which is showing upscaled versions of SD programming, some in 14:9 ratio with black bars at the side! The picture quality increase over regular SKY1 of these programmes is just barely noticeable. Occasionally there are genuine HD-sourced programmes (Rescue Me, 24) which are noticeably better in PQ. Overall - most impressive pictures have come from Planet Earth on the BBC HD trial, with live sport in second place.

The box itself is a bit of an ugly beast - doesn't match any of my other kit! All in black, with a silver section, it looks bigger than the SKY+ box, but is actually the same size. The harddisk is noisy in operation - you can hear the heads seeking if the TV volume is low, though you can turn off the "Instant Rewind" if this bothers you unduly. The disk is a Maxtor 300GB but with only 160GB for "personal" (according to the blurb in the manual) use. I have flound that the disk is "sluggish" to respond to the remote control - you press fast-forward, nothing happens, press again and suddenly you are on 30x. Suspect that a software upgrade will fix this at some future date. There are USB ports and an ethernet and SATA connections but these are for "future use". Usual RF in/out, svideo, SCART for TV and video, component, HDMI and optical connections and phono outputs for stereo. Ventilation slots at the sides, with the heat being output on the left. Channel change, standby is on the top of the box. Recording/playback controls are on the front-left.

I'd welcome feedback from other users of the box - what's good, what's bad.