Hotels' new-tech TVs have guests fuming - USA Today

"Elmo P. Shagnasty" wrote in message
...
In article ,
"Charles Tomaras" wrote:

After 50 years of SD television the US at least has officially retired
SD. I
no longer think of HD as premium, I think of it as STANDARD.

No one has retired SD.

The only thing that was retired was OTA analog.

Cable still delivers analog. And OTA still delivers SD.

You're on crack if you think the "standard" is HD. In your mind, maybe.
You WANT only HD, but it's nowhere near the standard.

All I can say is that I work as a professional sound mixer for "film" (not
too often any more) and video. I haven't been on very many SD video shoots
in a number of years now at least. EVERYTHING and EVERY Camera I work with
these days shoots at HD resolutions. Not a single program I've worked for in
the last good period of time is targeting SD. So I can unequivocally say
that SD is gone as an aquistion format from my experience.
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0866384/




Or are you one of those confuseniks who bought into the gummint's
marketing scheme to sell OTA digital to the world? "Look, now it's
DIGITAL, it's BETTER, and it's HD!" Digital is not by definition HD,
and frankly there's much less HD going out over the air than anyone in
this newsgroup had predicted several years ago.

I'm not a confusenik... I actually work around video and audio and know that
the video we are shooting today looks better than the video from yesteryear
and the digital audio recording portions of those cameras and the separate
recorders I use also sound much better than those of years past.

As for broadcasts...if I were to roll back the clock 10 years and compare my
58" plasma tv of today with my 58" Pioneer Elite 480 SD widescreen set from
2000 it would also be a night an day difference both in what I can see and
what I can receive.



Yes, plainly you're confused if you think that "the US has officially
retired SD". You think that digital equals HD. It doesn't. Get over
it.

As I mentioned.....SD is quickly on it's way out....kind of like a retired
person whose putting in a few days a month! I just don't consider HD
resolutions as PREMIUM any more and I consider SD resolutions as merely
acceptable. The cable companies are going to milk it for as long as they can
but it ain't premium.....HD is the new standard and not the exception.

"Charles Tomaras" wrote:

After 50 years of SD television the US at least has officially retired SD.

I currently receive 26 SD-only OTA channels.
And the 17 "HD" channels show a lot of SD material.

--
Intelligent Life Is All Around Us
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"Charles Tomaras" wrote:

I know there are still many sources of SD but I expect soft pillows and
reasonable thread counts in my sheets when I pay for a hotel room. Instead
we get the video equivalent of straw and canvas. It just seems like HD has
been around long enough now that the "hospitality" industry should be
providing it.

I don't know why anyone is surprised. Hotel TVs have always sucked.

--
Intelligent Life Is All Around Us
http://intelligentlife.info/

In article ,
says...
The article linked to, and the people on here have missed the real reason
for the lack of HD programming in hotels....Equipment Cost.

Perhaps the examples you give apply in some locations for some reason.

As I mentioned in my post that started this thread, I've stayed at properties
where a standard local cable feed with clear QAM is provided to all sets. No
special equipment or costs above and beyond what would be charged for the
multiple set commercial property standard expanded analog cable package.

whosbest54
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On 02/10/2010 02:16 AM, Charles Tomaras wrote:

"Floyd" wrote in message
...
The article linked to, and the people on here have missed the real
reason for the lack of HD programming in hotels....Equipment Cost.
Sure, DirecTV charges extra for HD....a whopping $25 per hotel. It
cost about $2700 per HD channel for the receiving equipment, plus, the
hotel has to buy special TVs that are capable of descrambling the
"special" tv signal that the program providers have dictated.
The program providers and the entertainment industry are paranoid that
someone will check into a hotel and pirate a movie or PPV event. Their
solution is to demand that the HD tv channels be scrambled with a
proprietary Pro-Idiom encryption system. The encrypted signal must be
scrambled all the way "into" the TV, so the TV must have a special
descrambler card installed($60-80), and only certain brands of TVs are
compatible with this system.
The incorporation of HD into hotels, requiring a ton of money, has hit
at a bad time. Hotels are experiencing bad economic times, and room
occupancy rates as well as room rental rates are down. Spending 25-30
thousand dollars to add 10 HD channels just isn't going to happen in
the average hotel. And to make matters even worse, the hotel that uses
this proprietary system must sign agreements that say if a hacker
breaks the code then the hotel must buy new equipment with a new
encryption system to continue receiving the HD signals. After all the
piracy of TV signals over the years, no wonder they aren't standing in
line to buy new HD systems.
The solution will be for the entertainment industry to allow the
hotels to distribute the HD signals using more economical components
that would cost about $400-600 per channel.
SD programming will become a thing of the past, and requiring hotels
to buy HD equipment costing six times what they currently spend for SD
equipment is unfair.

Well I guess the only way to change it is to demand it so the hotel
feels it's worth it to install. Often we don't have a choice and have to
take what lodging is available but when I do have a choice from here on
out I will start asking if they provide HD in the same way I've asked
and demanded high speed internet for the last decade.

And you'll pay for it, too. That of course is your choice. For many of
us on tight budgets, the presence of HD in our hotel rooms is very, very
low on our list of priorities. But then, many of us don't want to waste
our precious trip time sitting in front of a hotel TV.

Naturally, YMMV.

TJ
--
90 per cent of everything is crud.

- Theodore Sturgeon

Floyd wrote:
The article linked to, and the people on here have missed the real reason
for the lack of HD programming in hotels....Equipment Cost.
Sure, DirecTV charges extra for HD....a whopping $25 per hotel. It cost
about $2700 per HD channel for the receiving equipment, plus, the hotel has
to buy special TVs that are capable of descrambling the "special" tv signal
that the program providers have dictated.
The program providers and the entertainment industry are paranoid that
someone will check into a hotel and pirate a movie or PPV event. Their
solution is to demand that the HD tv channels be scrambled with a
proprietary Pro-Idiom encryption system. The encrypted signal must be
scrambled all the way "into" the TV, so the TV must have a special
descrambler card installed($60-80), and only certain brands of TVs are
compatible with this system.
The incorporation of HD into hotels, requiring a ton of money, has hit at a
bad time. Hotels are experiencing bad economic times, and room occupancy
rates as well as room rental rates are down. Spending 25-30 thousand
dollars to add 10 HD channels just isn't going to happen in the average
hotel. And to make matters even worse, the hotel that uses this proprietary
system must sign agreements that say if a hacker breaks the code then the
hotel must buy new equipment with a new encryption system to continue
receiving the HD signals. After all the piracy of TV signals over the
years, no wonder they aren't standing in line to buy new HD systems.
The solution will be for the entertainment industry to allow the hotels to
distribute the HD signals using more economical components that would cost
about $400-600 per channel.
SD programming will become a thing of the past, and requiring hotels to buy
HD equipment costing six times what they currently spend for SD equipment
is unfair.


You are correct. The problem is securing content. Pro-Idiom an LG
product can be incorporated in there HD sets that are currently in
hotels or are being installed. I believe that the Pro-Idiom module can
be installed in other manufacturers sets as well. It does require a
transcoder in the headend for each channel that needs to be secured with
that system. I believe the headend cost about 20K per hotel. If you
considered the hotel spent about $700-$1000 per room for the TV sets you
would think the headend cost would be easy to justify.

Remember when motels used to advertise that they had color TV to entice
people to stay at there place?

The upgrade will come as hotels see the need to update their equipment.
I believe the major supplier here is Lodgenet. Of course they can get
OTA HD for free if they add an antenna to the property but this is not
normally the way Lodgnet supplies there headends.

By the way I believe the major users of hotels are business travelers,
not vacationers. They use the TV to unwind at night.

Bill Cohn

"Elmo P. Shagnasty" wrote:
In article ,
"Charles Tomaras" wrote:

After 50 years of SD television the US at least has officially retired
SD. I no longer think of HD as premium, I think of it as STANDARD.

No one has retired SD.

The only thing that was retired was OTA analog.

Cable still delivers analog. And OTA still delivers SD.

You're on crack if you think the "standard" is HD. In your mind, maybe.
You WANT only HD, but it's nowhere near the standard.

Or are you one of those confuseniks who bought into the gummint's
marketing scheme to sell OTA digital to the world? "Look, now it's
DIGITAL, it's BETTER, and it's HD!" Digital is not by definition HD,
and frankly there's much less HD going out over the air than anyone in
this newsgroup had predicted several years ago.

Yes, plainly you're confused if you think that "the US has officially
retired SD". You think that digital equals HD. It doesn't. Get over
it.

So the explanation I posted six hours earlier than yours wasn't good
enough?

Chip

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Usenet Newsgroup Service $9.95/Month 30GB

Charles Tomaras wrote:
"Elmo P. wrote in message
...
In ,
"Charles wrote:

After 50 years of SD television the US at least has officially retired
SD. I
no longer think of HD as premium, I think of it as STANDARD.

No one has retired SD.

The only thing that was retired was OTA analog.

Cable still delivers analog. And OTA still delivers SD.

You're on crack if you think the "standard" is HD. In your mind, maybe.
You WANT only HD, but it's nowhere near the standard.

All I can say is that I work as a professional sound mixer for "film" (not
too often any more) and video. I haven't been on very many SD video shoots
in a number of years now at least. EVERYTHING and EVERY Camera I work with
these days shoots at HD resolutions. Not a single program I've worked for in
the last good period of time is targeting SD. So I can unequivocally say
that SD is gone as an aquistion format from my experience.
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0866384/




Or are you one of those confuseniks who bought into the gummint's
marketing scheme to sell OTA digital to the world? "Look, now it's
DIGITAL, it's BETTER, and it's HD!" Digital is not by definition HD,
and frankly there's much less HD going out over the air than anyone in
this newsgroup had predicted several years ago.

I'm not a confusenik... I actually work around video and audio and know that
the video we are shooting today looks better than the video from yesteryear
and the digital audio recording portions of those cameras and the separate
recorders I use also sound much better than those of years past.

As for broadcasts...if I were to roll back the clock 10 years and compare my
58" plasma tv of today with my 58" Pioneer Elite 480 SD widescreen set from
2000 it would also be a night an day difference both in what I can see and
what I can receive.



Yes, plainly you're confused if you think that "the US has officially
retired SD". You think that digital equals HD. It doesn't. Get over
it.

As I mentioned.....SD is quickly on it's way out....kind of like a retired
person whose putting in a few days a month! I just don't consider HD
resolutions as PREMIUM any more and I consider SD resolutions as merely
acceptable. The cable companies are going to milk it for as long as they can
but it ain't premium.....HD is the new standard and not the exception.



Yes. The "standard" is set by the leaders: CBS, NBC, and ABC all all
delivering (mostly) HD material (some of their SD feeds come from
subsidiaries).

By the way, in 2012 analog over cable will also be phased out!!

RickMerrill wrote:

By the way, in 2012 analog over cable will also be phased out!!


That date is not set in stone. Some cable companies (like mine) have
said that they are going to have some analog channels (their very basic
package) through (at least) 2014.

John

You can add hospitals to that list, too.


I work in a hospital where we are starting to put in flat-panels to
replace the old tubes, but our cable provider does not provide any HD
channels ( even clear QAM) and the STB's are ancient.

Meanwhile we still have our rooftop antenna with an amp that only
serves to provide reception for our main MUZAC FM radio. So I just
simply ran a cable into our shop and we have free OTA HD. Quite nice
if there is a football or baseball game on. Its amazing how many
people have no idea they can get free HD with just an antenna.