Saturday, January 28, 2006

Sky+ HD with "True" HD Ready TV - Is it the only option for the World Cup?


This year I decided to make a new years resolution that was achievable for me:

  • Get to the gym 3 - 4 times a week ... ???
  • Cut down my drinking levels to those Doctors always mention .... ???
  • Bring HD TV to my home ready for the World Cup ... NOW THAT'S MORE REALISTIC!
I have been keenly reviewing the progress towards HD TV in the UK over the last couple of months. Having researched whats available and the options for HD TV I came to the following conclusions:

  • Must have a "True" HD Ready TV - 1920x1080p as a growing percentage of programming will be delivered in this format within 12 months
  • Its got to be the right size for my lounge - That means 42" is to big (10 feet to our sofa)
  • It has got to look good (my wife controls the living room!)
  • I need a TV with reasonable speakers (AV Reciever and Surround Sound Speakers is my next New Years Resolution!)
  • A TV must have all possible connection options
  • FREE View is not an option as it will never support HDTV (certainly not before 2012)
  • A PVR capability that can support at least 40 hours of "True" HD TV (approx 300Gb)
  • Ethernet Connection (I want to move content around my home wireless network)
  • MPEG4 Compression - I have always preferred open-standards that are portable across networks
As usual I have high expectations, but I want to make sure that the choice I make is solid for at least 6 - 8 years. My research has lead me to the following choices on the best way forward:





Of course the main problem at the moment is that I don't know the cost and availibility of the SKY HD BOX.

Are there any other realistic options?


posted by Steve Bailey @ 6:13 pm   1 comments

1 Comments:

At 23/2/06 1:59 pm, Anonymous Anonymous said...

muahaha... found you...

as far as hdtv goes, you're a bit early, really. by about five years or so.

sky are launching hdtv at the moment, and the rumour on the pricing is £299 for the box, and £9.99 extra for the hd subscription. the box will only use hdmi or analogue component connections - no ethernet connection is planned. the programmes themselves will be broadcast in both 720p and 1080i - and the programme creator will control this. and don't forget that the sky-hd box is basically still only a sky+ box - which means that the information is not stored on the hard drive in a portable format anyways.

obviously they've still got to confirm all of this, but based on the pricing of sky+, it seems likely to be accurate.

as to the resultion of the screen that you'll be using to view it, don't worry too much about it. plasms tvs, for example, actually have rectangular pixels, which means that the resolution is screwed anyways. every tv will have some sort of scaler built into it to allow for picture adjustment, and every piece of picture information will be run through that before it hits the screen. as such, you're better off paying attention to the quality of the scaler than to the exact 'resolution' of the screen involved.

another thing to consider is that all hdtv signals will be compressed using mpeg layer 4. while it's better than the mpeg-2 in use on current digital systems, it's still not perfect. it will still leave artifacts on-screen, and you're also likely to have issues with colourisation.

and that's something else to take into account - most people don't realise that flat-panel screens only have a limited colour palette available to them. as anyone who's viewed images on a pc screen that have more colours than the monitor is able to display, this plays havoc with the display of the image.

there are plans afoot for both a telewest box and a freeview hd box this year, both of which should be available in time for the world cup. there are no plans, however, to provide 1080p support in this country in the near future.

what i would say, though, is that i took back a philips flat-panel display because the picture quality was apallingly bad, and switched it for a panasonic flat-panel. make sure you have a look at it, and take something that you're familiar with to watch on it. better yet, get it home, play with it there, and send it back if it doesn't meet your standards.

as an aside, though, avoid getting a display panel with built-in speakers. the speakers provided are always low-powered, and what's more the extra electronics in the panel just give more points of failure.

you're far better off pickup up even a cheap amp/speaker combination than relying on the built-in speakers. and with high quality surround-sound amplification available from the likes of denon, sony, and yamaha for around £150 for high-quality entry-level amplifiers, it's often *cheaper* to buy an amp and a display panel without speakers. and it sounds a lot, lot better, too.

 

Post a Comment

<< Home