Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Home Theater problem of HD channels from Dishnetwork

Hi, Guys:

I need some help for my home theater setup with HD reciever from Dishnetwork. I have a Yamaha RXV-2600 reciever, Philips 42' plasma HDTV. I always get great HD receptions from comcast digital cable, but just switched to Dishnetwork on Monday because of the cost.

Here are the connections i tried:

setup 1: video: HD reciever---DVI/HDMI---Yamaha 2600---HDMI----Philips HDTV
Audio: HD reciever---Optical----Yamaha 2600
setup 2: Video: HD reciever---DVI/HDMI---Philips HDTV
Audio: HD reciever---Yamaha 2600
I could not get real good HD quality video with both setups except ESPNHD, but i always can get excellent HDs with comcast HD reviever (setup 1). Another problem i have is : I could not get Dolby Digital sound(It always shows the Stereo in the info screen). I am wondering if the Dishnetwork HD channels were broadcasted that way or not?

I appreciate your suggestions.

Happy new year to all the Axiom fans!

Han

I have Dish Network now and have no issues like that at all. I have had cable and DirecTV in the past as well.

Which Dish HD receiver do you have? Which HD channels are you having issues with specifically?

I have the 811 HD reciever from Dishnetwork. I have the TNTHD, ESPNHD,HDnet, HDnetMovie,DiscoveryHD,HBOHD and ShowtimeHD. Only ESPNHD are up to High definition quality. All the others look like DVD quality. It was razer sharp when i watched DiscoveryHD with comcast HD reviever (My wife and little boy really enjoy it), but not the dishnetwork HD receiver. In terms of sound quality, it is just plain stereo sound. I watched the "The day after tomorrow", "I Robot". The sound was awesome.

Thanks,

Han

I have the 942 receiver.

For sound, make sure the receiver is set to do Dolby Digital.

For video, you might be finding that Dish is compressing the signal more than the local cable company.

A good resource forum for help is http://www.dbstalk.com/

Thanks, Curtis. I have set the audio for HD reciever for Dlby Digital/PCM. I just feel it has more compression than comcast. I will check the dbstalk.com site.

thanks again.

Han

Hi, Curtis:

Do you get Dobly Digital sound from the dishnetwork HD channels? It shows Stereo sound most of the time when i push the info button on the HD reciever remote. It always DD sound from comcast HD digital cable. I have talked to Tech support from Dishnetwork many times and they sent a techician to my house to check the connetions. I called them to cancel it, but they insist to send a senior field manager to check for me again. I just want everyboday who wants HD channels to be cautious before you sign up. My experience is cable provides the best HDs for now.

If it is broadcast in DD5.1, I get it just fine.

I've has DISH HD for about 6 months now and all those channels you mentioned are crystal clear for me. I have viewed some of those channels on Comcast from a friend's house and I feel Comcast compresses more. Also, MOST of the Discovery feeds are usually in Dolby Digital, and also HDNet movies are ALWAYS broadcast in Dolby as well. When I flip channels my Denon lets me know what type of signal its receiving from the Dish 811 box. If its in stereo, then I use DTS:Neo and obviously leave it alone if its in Dolby.

Just today was watching Discovery and still enjoying the super clean images for the nature documentaries. Something sounds odd if you're not getting a Dolby signal from movies in HD (which is HDNet, HBO-HD and SHO-HD). Just let the tech come out and see if there are any problems.

thanwu, it's not just you. It's because all the channels you mention that look good are 1920x1080. All Voom and some Dish as well as all DirecTV channels are 1280x1080. We like to call it HD-Lite. Just in the past month Dish started to down-rez and DirecTV has been doing for over a year. You check the facts at two places:

Dish Bitrates
DirecTV Bitrates
Satelliteguys.us

The last link has ALL the details you'll ever need on satellite. I’m not sure about other cable companies but in most areas Comcast transmits true HD. I noticed my HD go to crap Jan. of 2005 when DirecTV started their down-rezing. I’m still holding on to DirecTV until after March when Dish releases their new mpeg4 boxes and to see if they stop the down-rezing. With Dish's announcements at CES, the down-rezzed channels may not be back any time soon. BTW, I’m not here to argue what anyones eyes see, sure it may look good to some, mainly because you haven’t seen true HD or your set doesn’t support true HD rez.

Thanks all. I have the same feeling as Abyss. It is downgraded HDTV signal from Dishnetwork. I compared the DVD movie with the HD movies(HBOHD and ShowtimeHD). They looked like the same quality as my DVD movie. It has distinct difference when i watched the same HD channels on comcast HD reciever. Another thing bothers me is the sound. I could not find the Dolby Digital sign in my HD programs(push the info button on the reciever). It always (or most of the time) shows in the decription: (HD) (CC) (Stereo), even with the HBO "Sopranos". The Tech support told me that is because it was broadcasted in Stereo. What a joke!
Anyway, thank you guys very much. I will try to cancel my Dishnetwork if it is possible. I just got it for one week before i returned my comcast HD box.