My Digital Life

My HDTV Adventure...Slingbox part 2

My previous HDTV to Slingbox experience was not positive. The components and HDMI outputs did not work simultaneously on the Comcast SA 8300HD DVR. I am very happy to report that the Directv HR20 DVR component and HDMI outputs work simultaneously. I can now use the Slingbox player even if my Sony KDL46XBR2 in on.

I can also report that SlingPlayer is working well on my new Thinkpad X60 Tablet with Windows Vista Business.

My HDTV Adventure...DBSTalk

With my Directv Tivo DVR there are two main forums I frequent when I have questions: the Tivo Community Forum provides general information and the DealDatabase.com forum which is more geared to provide software solutions. Both of these sites have forum areas for the HR20, however DBSTalk.com seems to be emerging as the forum of choice.

It seems that the DBSTalk.com forum is being used by Directv to help with debugging the HR20 software. From what I have read, I feel lucky that my HR20 experience is starting with version 0x145 of the DVR software. It looks like previous versions were not up to par, almost akin to my experience with the Comcast Scientific Atlanta 8300HD.  Once they understood that the number of unhappy HR20 owners was growing and at the prodding of the DBSTalk.com forum moderator, they seem to have reacted very quickly to provide fixes. This is just another example how forums can be extremely important to Customer Service organizations (take note Comcast). Yes there are a lot of inane comments posted and there are the folks who think beta = production quality, however once you filter those posts out there always seem to be extremely valuable information from individuals who seem to know what they are talking about. In my experience with forums, I have probably solved 90% of configuration related issues without using  a company's customer service. Companies are realizing this and starting their own forums, however I think independent forums provide a better source of open product discussion. The caveat is for those forums to keep their independence and for companies to provide measured responses when forums cross the line into what might be considered proprietary. In the end it will benefits both sides.

Anyway if you have a Directv HR20, I highly recommend visiting the site...It has already helped me immensely to find Tivo like functionality in my HR20.

My HDTV adventure...Tivo withdrawal

One of the biggest differences between the competing cable services (satellites, cable, IPTV) is the user interface of the DVR. I have used the Tivo interface for the last six years and I was in shock how much better it is. The SA 8300HD interface is just clunky and here are some of the most obvious functionality that is missing.

• No intermediate 15 minute time markers on the playback status bar. Without these markers it is harder to estimate how much time remains on a show.
• No quick advance feature to go directly to the next marker.
• No ability to resume playback where you paused a show, if you play a different recorded show in the interim
• No full title or keyword search of the guide data.
• No wishlist feature to enter program titles tor keywords  not necessarily in the guide. Tivo then can be set to records shows that match.
• No way to prioritize the list of shows you want to record when a conflict occurs.

Also on Directv we are used to record Pay Per View movies, we can then view them over multiple day. Comcast and Verizon FIOS limit you to an On Demand period of 24 hours. This is pretty lame, although it is probably driven by the movie studios.

Well after hassling Directv and going through the retention desk, I was able to create a new order and they will attempt to install a second time on April 4th.

My HDTV adventure...Slingbox

I received a Slingbox Pro last Christmas along with the component connection adapter in anticipation of my HDTV service installation. The Comcast SA 8300HD has both HDMI and component connections. I thought I could use the HDMI output for my TV and the component connection for the Slingbox simultaneously. The version of the firmware on my 8300HD is 1.88.25.1 and it does not allow both outputs to work simultaneously, I assuming it has something to do with the wonderful  HDCP copy protection...It does however switch automatically to component if HDMI is not active. So has long as my HDMI switcher is off, I can get Slingbox to work with the component connection.

I did find that the S-Video output on the 8300HD does work simultaneously with the HDMI output. I probably will be using S-Video for simplicity, although I still need to compare the video quality between the two.

I also found out that my neighbor across the street had Directv HD running. The installers gave him the same speech about the trees, however he was much more forceful than I was and they were able to find a line of sight his roof. I have asked Directv to reschedule my installation, their work order system was down, but they plan on calling me back with an install date. Probably another month out...but probably worth it, Directv's packages and pricing structure is just better.

My HDTV adventure...Scientific Atlanta 8300HD DVR and HDMI

As I mentioned in yesterday's post, I wanted the digital cable signal to be passed through the SA 8300HD DVR directly to my Sony KDL46XBR2 using HDMI. The component connection forces the 8300HD to convert the digital signal to an analog signal. The reason I wanted to use the Sony's XBR processor to perform the conversion is that the Sony's Bravia Engine Pro should do a better job than the 8300HD. After I got HDMI to work, I can vouch that the picture is noticeably crisper that with the component connection.

The 8300HD has a very nice wizard which lets you setup how you want it to send output to your TV. It even helps you validate if your TV can handle the signal. The wizard is accessed by powering the 8300HD off and pressing the Guide and Info button simultaneously on the front panel. The wizard is easy to use and self explanatory, however if you want additional information a user guide is available here.  The unfortunate thing is that the in order for the media industry to accept the transmission of a pure digital signal from one component to another (HDMI), they wanted copy protection. This copy protection was added and is called HDCP. The problem is that there does not seem to be an easy way for vendors to test HDMI and HDCP  interopability between components (how about a WIFI type certification...). I went ahead and used the wizard using my HDMI connection to my TV. All the settings seem to work during the wizard process, but once I exited the 8300HD reverted back to 480i (Standard Definition) even for HD content. After a long Sunday scouring the forums, I came to the conclusion that I may be forced to use a component connection which has no copy protection, however there was one post on the AVS forum which pointed me in the right direction. Going through the wizard process using the component connection and then using the HDMI connection for normal viewing. I setup a component connection, performed the setup and the HDMI connection worked. It was allowing the TV to view the native resolution of the video being received by the 8300HD. SD channels were being viewed at 480, HD channels were being viewed at 720p or 1080i. The were however two noticeable problems:

1. Every time their was a resolution switch,s the channel switching was very slow. It seems the HDCP handshake between the 8300HD and the TV is not smooth.
2. Sometimes during the resolution switch from SD (480) to HD (720 or 1080), it looks like the TV rejects the HDCP handshake and displays snow. The weird thing is that by switching the TV off and on, the video displays correctly at the right resolution.

The wizard provides 6 different pass through settings(1080i, 720p, 480p Wide, 480i Wide, 480p, 480i), to reduce the display lag time between channels switches, I just picked 1080i, and 480i. I chose 480i since Comcast transmits all SD channels in 480i. I will let the TV perform the wide screen adjustments. ABC and Fox transmit in 720p, I chose to let the 8300HD upconvert them to 1080i. This is a digital to digital conversion and the quality of the image should not be affected. The snowy screen does not always happen and although it is inconvenient, I can live with it for now. Especially since I am not even sure I want to keep Comcast.

Another issue is that the component and HDMI outputs do not work simultaneously, although I have read that some individuals have it working. This presents a problem with my SlingBox which I connected with component inputs. I can't use it if the TV is on. I may have to switch back to S-Video, more on that tomorrow.

My HDTV adventure...my TV service nightmare

I have been looking for an HDTV for a while and really wanted an LCD for the following reasons:

• No burn in issues
• No glare
• Lower power consumption
• Panel does not loose luminance over time

However there have been drawbacks to LCD:

• Viewing angle
• Slow refresh rates on high action frames
• Black level
• Price

Sony seems to have addressed all of these issues with their KDLxxXBR2 series LCD HD TVs and last December the price was in my range. I purchased the 46" version. To date I have been very happy with the set. With the purchase of this HD TV I needed to upgrade my Directv service. After negotiating a free DVR, installation and one year of free DVR service, I scheduled the installation for March 19th, nearly 2 months after calling. After not showing up on the 19th, the Directv installer was able to show up with his supervisor on the 20th. They looked at my backyard full of grown tulip poplar and decided there was no way for me to receive the Directv HD signal This is due to the fact that the pointing angle of the oval HD dish would be to low to clear the top of the trees. I currently have a round dish which clears the trees fine for the 101 degree position of the Standard Definition satellites. Although I am not happy, the installation supervisor's diagram and explanation seem to make sense. My only current alternative for HD service is an off air antenna or Comcast. Verizon FIOS is being installed on my street but I don't see it being active before May or June. I am lucky to receive all the local station off air HD signals with my old attic mounted VHF/UHF antenna. I have seen complaints about the Sony ATSC tuner but I am pretty impressed given the low tech setup I have.  However off air leaves out HBO and we love those HBO series, so I head down to the Comcast office.

I was surprised to see that Comcast had a DVR with HDMI output, the Scientific Atlanta 8300HD. I left the office with one. Within 24 hours the service seemed operational, but within another 24 hours the DVR was displaying a message that I was not authorized. After calling Comcast they dispatched a technician who told me that it was a problem with an account setting and they could have fixed it over the phone. He called and got the account problem resolved.

I was very happy the find out the 8300HD recognizes theThecus eSATA drive enclosure with 2 500GB Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 SATA drives in a RAID 0 configuration giving me one Terabyte of storage. I had bought the enclosure and drives in preparation for use with the Directv HR20 and was very happy that it works with 8300HD.

I found a very helpful AVS forum entry here, full of useful information regarding the 8300HD. I was able to validate that it was using 911GB of the external storage by enabling diagnostic mode (on the front of the unit hold the select button down until envelope flashes on display, then press info button. use page up/down button on remote to cycle through pages).

Screen print of external storage partition using Sling Player via component output (more on that issue later).

I am however getting some pixelation every 7 - 10 minutes on HD channels which gets to be annoying. My Internet signal is so strong that Comcast had installed an attenuator at the modem, so I figured the HD service should be fine. I am now using a splitter which does not seem to have affected the Internet service (http://www.speakeasy.net/speedtest/  average 7Mbps down/263Kbps up). I need to recheck all my connections and coax connectors before I call Comcast again.

My next issue came with the HDMI connection which seem to work fine as long as the 8300HD configuration was not altered and it performed the upconversion of the Standard Definition (SD) channels. This meant that all of the output was in 1080i. Well I paid what I consider a lot of money for the Sony XBR and all of the published reviews point to the fact that it performs a great job at displaying native resolution signals. I wanted to have the 8300HD pass through the image resolution it received from Comcast to the TV. Unfortunately, once I started mucking with the setup to pass through the SD signal directly to the TV, HDMI went haywire and forced everything even HD down to the 480i resolution. I finally resolved the issue and will post my solution tomorrow...

Go to Part 2.