audioguru said:
The only times I notice digital compression of a picture are during overseas fast-motion soccer games and car races. Since satellites are used it occurs both on analog and digital reception. Locally I just watch slow hockey and baseball games and compression isn't obvious.
It would only occur on both if the analogue satellite feed if from the digital source. For a while in the UK we had both analogue and digital satellites running - putting them on side by side, on identical TV's (useful working at a TV shop!), really shows the difference up. On the digital satellite you get lower definition, movement artifacts, and just generally poorer, the analogue was so much better.
But digital TV isn't about quality, it's about costs for the broadcaster, so analogue has to go :cry:
I got digital cable TV when it was invented. The salesman lied or just didn't know that only their few newest stations were digital. I was very disappointed when I switched between analog and digital and saw no difference. Luckily their digital box was better than being at no extra cost. I got and still get a discount for having both their digital TV service and high-speed internet service on cable.
Now all the stations are digital, and I can switch the old stations between analog and digital. There is an enormous difference in improved definition and lack of noise (snow) with digital.
With good analogue reception there is no snow!. Cetainly if you have snowy analogue, digital looks better - simply because of the lack of snow, and people generally aren't used to spotting the defects on digital TV.
The American digital High Definition system is very clear, but only if the TV set is right in front of your face, up close. In the future when plazma or LCD screens are huge it will be a big improvement and I might get it.
The UK HDTV service is due to start tests this summer, from satellite, run by BSkyB - the normal terrestrial services have no current plans to follow suit.
My boss went to an exclusive demonstration the other week, he said it was amazing!. As there are not even test transmissions at the moment, it was demonstated from a professional HD VCR - it was so expensive it came with it's own guard, who wasn't allowed to leave it's side
I don't like those large-screen "projection" TVs that they have today. If you are off-axis you don't see anything and their brightness is low anyway. Surely the lifetime of their little water-cooled CRTs inside is low! I don't notice much improvement with the large-screen projection TVs that use an LCD switcher/shutter thingy inside. :lol:
As they are only low resolution you have to sit a long way from them, I don't like them either!.