HD quality died

[philgreg]

I recently moved and had DTV install the hardware i brought with me in the move. I previousy had exceptional HD quality and now the quality is poor at best (i could really use a handful of choice words to describe how poor it is)....what the heck hapened?? Same tvs and the same hardware......installation is the only difference! The obvious change i know of in the installation is a SWM. would this make the resolution poor?? I am so pissed that i have all this stuff that worked great before and now it sucks!!

[Sykotic]

Where to start? Your tv is using a HD cable from the box to the tv (componant or HDMI)? The SWM should have no effect on PQ.

[texasbrit]

If your receiver is connected via either HDMI or component (not composite) then the most likely issue is that your DirecTV box is not set to output HD resolutions. Or it could be set to "hide HD channels" in which case you would only see your locals etc in SD.

[J-Rod]

Or could it be that the coax cable is of the lesser quality than the RG6, if its an older home maybe it hasn't been upgraded. Could that difference be what is being seen as poorer quality HD?

[texasbrit]

Originally Posted by J-Rod

Or could it be that the coax cable is of the lesser quality than the RG6, if its an older home maybe it hasn't been upgraded. Could that difference be what is being seen as poorer quality HD?

The cable would not affect the picture quality. Because it's a digital signal, pretty well you either get it or you don't.

[J-Rod]

Originally Posted by texasbrit

The cable would not affect the picture quality. Because it's a digital signal, pretty well you either get it or you don't.

I'm with that understanding, BUT and I'm reaching here, could the less quality cable, older, maybe a bad joint here or there, split-out 5 ways from Sunday, and isn't the older cable more prone to interference like from all these cell towers, radio, etc. etc.? That might have been ok with the basic cable SD customer, but now as I see a new person is moving in that has HD taste and knows what his picture should look like... and these 20 yrs of cable weaving in the attic or walls has left a mess. The reason I say most of this is because I agree with what you say, its digital you get it or you don't. If it's not up to par it could only be a few other things, alignment, line of sight, wind (installation sub-par i.e. dish sways). What about multiswitch's do they go bad? Or lets say maybe the home owner prior to him was a cable subsriber and the service line is still connected, could there be "noise" from that line?

[joed32]

I would call Directv and complain.

[chirshey]

I would call Direct, explain your situation and ask for some technical support.

[texasbrit]

Originally Posted by chirshey

I would call Direct, explain your situation and ask for some technical support.

Agree. FYI 99.9% of the time issues with video quality turn out to be problems with the settings, on the DirecTv box or the TV. Like having the wrong sat in sat set-up, the wrong resolution setting on the DirecTV box or the TV, etc

j-rod. - it's just about impossible for any of those things to affect picture quality. You could pick up interference on cables between the DirecTv box and the TV, but that's usually obvious. If you have HDMI, you could get "sparklies" if you are using too long a cable of the wrong diameter to the TV. But that's just about it.