Operators select video quality issues as primary reason for complaints
We can't say we're shocked to hear it, but new data released by Symmetricom explains that cable operators have identified video quality problems as the primary reason customers call in with complaints. Potentially more disturbing, however, is the note that "only 31-percent [of carriers surveyed] said they use network monitoring tools to discover quality problems," while 61.9-percent learn of said issues via angry subscribers. As expected, these very facts are the same reasons given for high customer churn (along with high prices), and while 40-percent of respondents suggested that VOD is causing the most quality concerns today, 51.6-percent stated that HD is "expected to produce the most quality problems one year from now." Here's a tip -- stop shoving three HD channels on a single 6MHz slot, and we'd bet the quality complaints drop significantly.[Image courtesy of Donna Earl Training]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
why not the LS2LS7? @ Apr 1st 2008 2:32AM
I'm sorry, but "a QAM" isn't actually a technical term. The term would be "channel" or "6MHz slot".
QAM is a modulation, not a slot. OTA uses 8-VSB instead of QAM, so are you going to say KQED puts 5 channels in one 8-VSB?
Thomas New @ Apr 1st 2008 3:13AM
Your an idiot. How are you going to say that Quadrature amplitude modulation(QAM) isnt a technical term? Why are you bringing up OTA. OTA is different than cable when it comes to filtering signals through a modulation. "stop shoving three HD channels on a single QAM" is a perfectly fine sentence. If you think you know something because you think your smarter then someone who is a professional just keep your comments to yourself; and if you have a problem with what engadget writes then go somewhere else.
why not the LS2LS7? @ Apr 1st 2008 3:50AM
I said "a QAM" isn't a technical term, not "QAM" isn't a technical term.
No, OTA and cable aren't different here. Both use 6MHz slots and both squeeze the same amount of data in a 6MHz slot. It's just that OTA uses 8-VSB (in the US) and cable uses 64-QAM or 256-QAM. The reasons they use different modulation is that 8-VSB has advantages for being carried through the air (where signals have to compete with weaker signals from farther away on the same frequency bands) and 64-QAM and 256-QAM have advantages for being carried on a cable.
Both use ATSC encoding (by FCC regulation). CBS has a policy of broadcasting only a single virtual channel in a 6MHz slot, while other channels like KQED (PBS here in Northern California) broadcast 5 SD virtual channels (during the day) or 1 HD virtual channel and 1 SD virtual channel (in the evening) in a single 6MHz slot. In both of these cases, all the data is carried in single MPEG-2 transport stream (TS), and the receiver must decide which packets in the TS pertain to the virtual channel they are displaying/recording and which are for another virtual channel.
KQED's video quality suffers horribly and for the same reason as Comcast's transmissions, that is, they're just trying to squeeze too much into too little bandwidth. In KQED's case though they are doing it at origination, while Comcast is taking an already compressed signal and removing further data (sometimes called combing) from an already compressed signal.
DirecTV (and Dish) are not required by law to use ATSC (which uses MPEG-2), so DirecTV uses MPEG-4 AVC (H.264) for most of their HD, Dish does similarly. DirectTV boxes output with ATSC-type timings (like 1920x1080/60i or 1280x720/60p) but they don't use ATSC for their video signaling.
If people want to talk about what Comcast is doing, they should say a "single 6MHz slot", or (less specifically), "a single transport stream".
Carney @ Apr 1st 2008 8:55AM
I suspect a large portion of these complaints are from people with new HDTVs who are outraged that their 4:3 standard-def picture is pillar-boxed (with vertical black bars on the left and right) rather than filling the screen, thus giving them their "money's worth". Loud demands from the ignorant to get their SD in distorted, butt-ugly Stretch-O-Vision (tm), thereby magically tranforming it into HD, cannot be appeased by any means but compliance.