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JCM · 12-16-2005, 08:14 PM

Before I get to the question, here's some background: I have a Hitachi 51F510 HDTV, a Dish 811 receiver, and a Sony DVP-NS300 DVD player. The Sony is several years old. Now as I understand it, this DVD player puts out 480 interlaced lines, which my Hitachi upconverts to 1080 interlaced lines. I also understand that the 811 will put out 480p, 720p or 1080i signals. I have tried the 811 on all these settings without a noticeable difference in the Hitachi's picture. (I apologize for spelling out the basics, but I want to be clear about where I'm coming from with this question.)

My Hitachi does a terrific job of upconversion on the DVD signal. I find many (but not all) movies to be virtually indistinguishable from either an OTA or a Dish high definition program. For example, I watched "The Island" on DVD yesterday and was blown away by the quality of the picture -- and this from a relatively primitive player.

On the other hand, the standard def signal from OTA and Dish is usually pretty bad. Although some channels seem to be better than others, none approach the quality of my DVD player. I find the picture on most SD channels to be "fuzzy."

Now here's the question: is there any technical reason the quality of the broadcast can't be as good as that of my aging DVD player, considering that the vertical resolutions of both are the same? Or does the problem lie with the quality of the original program and not with the broadcast medium?

I've seen a lot of discussion on this forum dealing with upconversion and quality of standard definition broadcasts on large-screen TVs, but I haven't seen this specific question about the reason for the difference in quality between standard definition DVDs and standard definition broadcasts addressed.

12-16-2005, 08:14 PM	#1
JCM High Definition is the definition of life. Join Date: Dec 2004 Posts: 42	Question on Dish vs. DVD Quality Before I get to the question, here's some background: I have a Hitachi 51F510 HDTV, a Dish 811 receiver, and a Sony DVP-NS300 DVD player. The Sony is several years old. Now as I understand it, this DVD player puts out 480 interlaced lines, which my Hitachi upconverts to 1080 interlaced lines. I also understand that the 811 will put out 480p, 720p or 1080i signals. I have tried the 811 on all these settings without a noticeable difference in the Hitachi's picture. (I apologize for spelling out the basics, but I want to be clear about where I'm coming from with this question.) My Hitachi does a terrific job of upconversion on the DVD signal. I find many (but not all) movies to be virtually indistinguishable from either an OTA or a Dish high definition program. For example, I watched "The Island" on DVD yesterday and was blown away by the quality of the picture -- and this from a relatively primitive player. On the other hand, the standard def signal from OTA and Dish is usually pretty bad. Although some channels seem to be better than others, none approach the quality of my DVD player. I find the picture on most SD channels to be "fuzzy." Now here's the question: is there any technical reason the quality of the broadcast can't be as good as that of my aging DVD player, considering that the vertical resolutions of both are the same? Or does the problem lie with the quality of the original program and not with the broadcast medium? I've seen a lot of discussion on this forum dealing with upconversion and quality of standard definition broadcasts on large-screen TVs, but I haven't seen this specific question about the reason for the difference in quality between standard definition DVDs and standard definition broadcasts addressed.