Whats the point of Freeview?
 

On Thu, 09 Oct 2008 23:15:17 +0200, J G Miller
wrote:

However, compare a top quality analog picture (with only 312 ???
lines of resolution)

Eh? 625!

with a 720p

In the same ballpark

or 1080i

To call itself HD, should have been progressive, not interlaced.

HD picture broadcast
with adequate bit rate and you will not want to go back to analog.

Well, as my larger Panny has just curled up its tootsies, I may be
about to find out ...

But why should those who can get a decent analogue picture have to
have a *worse* one when they have to switch to digital, especially as
all the hype has been promising us *better* pictures.
Because that is government policy viz "to let the market decide" and in
the bourgeois democracy that is the UKofGB&NI that is what people
effectively voted for at the last election (whether they voted for
Faux Labour or Conservative and Unionist Party).

I didn't say, 'must', I said, 'should', so a naive political diatribe
is not an appropriate answer.

so why are we arguing?
We are not arguing -- we are discussing the point that a significant
proportion of people are always going to be resistant to technical
change and argue

IME, they mostly argue when the change is not an improvement. When
the change is an unqualified improvement, there is usually not much
resistance.

Whats the point of Freeview?
 

In article en.co.uk,
Roderick Stewart wrote:
In article , Tony sayer wrote:
I came to the conclusion recently that an awful lot of people haven't
seen just how good an analogue PAL picture can be on a really good set
with a good decoder...

Most of them are probably too young to remember.

I'd have said really good decoders on domestic sets are quite recent. Most
in the early days of colour were pretty dreadful. Then, of course, there
was the degradation caused by analogue VTRs. So really we're talking about
after DigiBeta arrived.

(And *much* too young to remember what good HD looks like).

My gast was flabbered when I first saw it on an Eidophor at IBC.

Rod.

--
*Even a blind pig stumbles across an acorn now and again *

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

Whats the point of Freeview?
 

Thanks for the facts and figures Tony. I've a question for you ...

270 Mb/s = 33.75MB/s (bits to bytes)

HD is 1920 x 1080, SD is 720 x 576
(possibly even worse 640 x 480 - I can't remember which I used)

33.75MB x (720 x 576) /(1920 x 1080) = 6.75MB/s

which means that, unless the 270 figure involves some initial
compression, my seemingly reasonably grounded estimate was 220% too
high! Can you explain why a PC capture card should need per pixel 2.2
x what pro equipment uses? I can't make it out why that estimate is
not even the right order of magnitude, which I would have expected it
to have been.

Taking your figures from now on though, and the best case of 4Mb/s on
Freeview, for the benefit of others here who may not bother to work it
out, that's 1.5% of what it started out as!

Explains a lot ...

On Thu, 9 Oct 2008 21:12:35 +0100, tony sayer
wrote:

And FWIW most all TV is originated in a digital format usually around
270 odd Megabits..

Its then sent out to the analogue PAL encoded transmitters at 34
M/bits..

On freeview it ends up at the viewers telly at some 1 to 4 if your lucky
M/bits..

Nothing wrong with digital transmission as such, its just what's done
with it before its delivered;(...

Whats the point of Freeview?
 

In article , mr deo
scribeth thus

"Jeff Layman" wrote in message
...
Marcussy wrote:
on a more serious note dear Java Jive

We are talking about MPEG compressed video here, it is not a lossless
compression there will be some "artefacts of compression" or
"blockiness" if you will when compared to a real world image to the
eye. These become much more apparent with the connections /equipment
issues I raised.
If those things are not an issue with their kit then the vast
majority of people the vast majority of the time will not see any
significant blockiness or artefacting. As per, MP3 audio tracks sound
fine to most people most of the time but it "ain't HI-FI" and a
"trained musical ear" will say it does not sound right/the same. As
a musician I can't bear to listen to MP3 tracks compressed below
192K, most people use 128K or 64K compression level it's fine for
their ears.
SO to summarise.

Freeview offers a lot more content delivered via the existing
broadcasting infrastructure, much of it is good programming, a lot of
it is repeats & crap (like all the other TV service suppliers). The
picture quality is OK and better than analogue for much of the
population as you either get a perfect transmission or you get
nothing watchable as there are no issues of ghosting and snowy
pictures etc etc.

I think you may have hit the nail on the head with your "for much of the
population". But there is a problem for those who don't have a
satisfactory
freeview signal. Which would you rather have for the final episode in a
long-running serial you've been waiting for - some snow or ghosting, and
an
infrequent sound buzz, or nothing at all (maybe a few interrupted blocky
pictures with broken sound if you were lucky)? I'd be a bit annoyed with
the
former, but have steam coming out my ears with the latter.

It will be interesting to see if there are far less complaints about
blocking, etc when analogue goes and the freeview signal strength
increases.

--
Jeff
(cut "thetape" to reply)



This is one reason why the freesat spinoff was able to take place..
If you live in a listed building and cant put the dish on the grounds then I
guess you really are stuck ;P


There are listed buildings around with aerials thereon they just need
more care siting them than what the average sky cowboy can give!..
--
Tony Sayer

Whats the point of Freeview?
 

In article , Java Jive
scribeth thus
Thanks for the facts and figures Tony. I've a question for you ...

270 Mb/s = 33.75MB/s (bits to bytes)

HD is 1920 x 1080, SD is 720 x 576
(possibly even worse 640 x 480 - I can't remember which I used)

33.75MB x (720 x 576) /(1920 x 1080) = 6.75MB/s

which means that, unless the 270 figure involves some initial
compression, my seemingly reasonably grounded estimate was 220% too
high! Can you explain why a PC capture card should need per pixel 2.2
x what pro equipment uses? I can't make it out why that estimate is
not even the right order of magnitude, which I would have expected it
to have been.

A bit beyond me immediate experience but I expect Mark Carver would know
if he's around ... Mark?....


--
Tony Sayer

Whats the point of Freeview?
 

On Thu, 9 Oct 2008 19:45:43 +0100, "Jeff Layman"
wrote:

Marcussy wrote:
on a more serious note dear Java Jive

We are talking about MPEG compressed video here, it is not a lossless
compression there will be some "artefacts of compression" or
"blockiness" if you will when compared to a real world image to the
eye. These become much more apparent with the connections /equipment
issues I raised.
If those things are not an issue with their kit then the vast
majority of people the vast majority of the time will not see any
significant blockiness or artefacting. As per, MP3 audio tracks sound
fine to most people most of the time but it "ain't HI-FI" and a
"trained musical ear" will say it does not sound right/the same. As
a musician I can't bear to listen to MP3 tracks compressed below
192K, most people use 128K or 64K compression level it's fine for
their ears.
SO to summarise.

Freeview offers a lot more content delivered via the existing
broadcasting infrastructure, much of it is good programming, a lot of
it is repeats & crap (like all the other TV service suppliers). The
picture quality is OK and better than analogue for much of the
population as you either get a perfect transmission or you get
nothing watchable as there are no issues of ghosting and snowy
pictures etc etc.

I think you may have hit the nail on the head with your "for much of the
population". But there is a problem for those who don't have a satisfactory
freeview signal. Which would you rather have for the final episode in a
long-running serial you've been waiting for - some snow or ghosting, and an
infrequent sound buzz, or nothing at all (maybe a few interrupted blocky
pictures with broken sound if you were lucky)? I'd be a bit annoyed with the
former, but have steam coming out my ears with the latter.

Speaking for us we can get a fairly reasonable analogue signal with a
very good aeriel on top of a long pole above our roof. OTOH The
freeview box shows 40% signal strength and 0% signal quality and just
shows a holding image.

It will be interesting to see if there are far less complaints about
blocking, etc when analogue goes and the freeview signal strength increases.

I thought the blocking was compression artifacts?

--
(\__/) M.
(='.'=) Owing to the amount of spam posted via googlegroups and
(")_(") their inaction to the problem. I am blocking most articles
posted from there. If you wish your postings to be seen by
everyone you will need use a different method of posting.
See http://improve-usenet.org

Whats the point of Freeview?
 

On Thu, 09 Oct 2008 22:22:17 +0200, J G Miller
wrote:

On Thu, 09 Oct 2008 19:45:43 +0100, Jeff Layman wrote:
It will be interesting to see if there are far less complaints about
blocking, etc when analogue goes and the freeview signal strength
increases.

And the FFT parameter is finally changed from the prehistoric 2k and
brought into the modern age of 8k.

What noticable difference will this make?

--
(\__/) M.
(='.'=) Owing to the amount of spam posted via googlegroups and
(")_(") their inaction to the problem. I am blocking most articles
posted from there. If you wish your postings to be seen by
everyone you will need use a different method of posting.
See http://improve-usenet.org

Whats the point of Freeview?
 

Mark wrote:

On Thu, 09 Oct 2008 22:22:17 +0200, J G Miller
wrote:

And the FFT parameter is finally changed from the prehistoric 2k and
brought into the modern age of 8k.

What noticable difference will this make?

Less impulse interference (mopeds, light switches, thermostats etc)

Whats the point of Freeview?
 

In article , Java Jive
wrote:

However, compare a top quality analog picture (with only 312 ???
lines of resolution)

Eh? 625!

Or even 575.

(Or perhaps it's 576 these days, but I don't know in how many cases the
extra line actually contains picture information).

Rod.
--
Virtual Access V6.3 free usenet/email software from
http://sourceforge.net/projects/virtual-access/

Whats the point of Freeview?
 

In article , Dave Plowman (News) wrote:
Most of them are probably too young to remember.

I'd have said really good decoders on domestic sets are quite recent. Most
in the early days of colour were pretty dreadful. Then, of course, there
was the degradation caused by analogue VTRs. So really we're talking about
after DigiBeta arrived.

There was intelligent life before DigiBeta you know. :-) Some decoders were
pretty good, especially if you built them yourself to BBC design, and not
all broadcasts had been through a VTR. Those were the days when "live"
actually meant live, and not just "recorded in one take".

Rod.
--
Virtual Access V6.3 free usenet/email software from
http://sourceforge.net/projects/virtual-access/