Direct TV is Poor service

wrote:
On 19 Jun 2008 22:37:33 GMT wrote:
| wrote:
| On 19 Jun 2008 14:46:12 GMT wrote:
| | wrote:
| | On Thu, 19 Jun 2008 06:49:14 -0500 John Carrier
| | wrote:
| |
| | | Two gripes: They pulled several HD channels from their HD
| | | package and made them an extra cost option ($5 IIRC). The DVR
| | | uses a database to determine what OTA broadcasts it gets vice
| | | just doing a search like any TV tuner.
| |
| | And presumably it is getting the OTA broadcasts wrong?
| |
| | It gets them right IF they are in the database.
| | I believe it is provided by Tribune. If you have
| | wrong info, contact your local station and let
| | them know to get it updated.
|
| So the database is wrong. And so the tuner behaves wrong because the
| database is wrong. Bzzzt. Bad design. DTV Bad. DTV Bad. DTV Bad.
|
| Did you read the part where I said the database is maintained
| by Tribune? It's up to them to get the information correct.

I'll try to rephrase to make it clearer:

Designing a tuner so it depends on some database that may or may not be
accurate by intent or neglect is a bad design. A tuner should just tune
on the basis of what is actually there.

I agree with you on that. The H20 scans, but not the HR20. Weird.

Chip

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On Sat, 21 Jun 2008 22:45:20 -0700 SAC 441 wrote:
| said:
| ----"Designing a tuner so it depends on some database that may or may
| not be accurate by intent or neglect is a bad design.A tuner should just
| tune on the basis of what is actually just there."----
|
| Reply:
| Really? Well,that would kind of negate the TIVO model now would it not?

No, it wouldn't. Merely TUNING should be doable based on what signals are
there. Being able to program a recording in advance based on the name of
the show is when the database is useful. And of course we depend on that
database being properly managed.

But the TUNING aspect should work w/o the database when you manually tune
it to channel XX. It should also let you schedule a recording by channel
and time without the need for the database.


| Sure it is not perfect by any means,but I kind of like it.Basic tuners
| in my mind's eye are just plain boring.I like the fact that it is
| attempting to find programs I like based on information and then
| auto-recording it.Sure,it can be flawed but the dynamics of having to
| wade through all that information yourself is just too mundane and
| ploddingly slow to me.To each his own.IT systems follow the GIGO
| (Garbage In/GarbageOut) principle,I accept that.It sure beats what came
| before though.

Sure, that's a great feature to have. I'd want it, too. But if I tell it
to go tune to channel 44 right now, or to record channel 24 at 8:00 PM for
2 hours, it shouldn't need a data base to accomplish THAT.

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| Phil Howard KA9WGN (email for humans: first name in lower case at ipal.net) |

wrote in message
...
And how much personal information do you have to give them to make the
lease?


I had to promise them my first born.