Native Resolution Pass Through (REVISITED)

[BCH]

I had started another thread concerning native resolution pass through where I indicated that I was conversing with E* tech support regarding the implementation of this feature.

It was my original intent to post the result of those discussions but I became so frustrated with the answers I was receiving that I lost interest. Recently another member sent me a private message inquiring about the progress of the discussions. It was then that I decided to post all of the correspondence exchanged between tech support and myself, so that all members would have access to this information. For some it may be a long read, and I warn you that I become so frustrated, and it may have shown in my last full message, that I contemplated cancelling my dish network account.

All of the information below was copied and pasted from the original emails.


Question

During the April 2006 Tech chat Dan Minnick indicated that a software update to offer native resolution pass through on the Vip622 receiver would be available by summer 2006. What is the status of this update?

Dish Network Reply

Thank you for your e-mail. The VIP622 receiver does pass any high definition over the air signal through to the television in native format, provided the signal is transmitted in native high definition. We hope we have properly addressed your concerns. If you have further questions you can respond to this e-mail or access our online technical support at the following link:
http://tech.dishnetwork.com/departmental_content/techportal/index.shtml
A Technical Service Representative is available via live chat 1:30 PM-10:00 PM (MDT) 7 days per week regarding your concerns. Please click the following link to use this option.
http://tech.dishnetwork.com/departm...al/content/tech/techchatadvcustformrf23.shtml
Thanks,
Joe B.

My Reply

Thanks for the reply,

But your answer did not address my question or the comment made by Dan Minnick. If my question had been passed to Dan Minnick for an answer I am sure it would have been properly addressed. I will attempt to phrase the question as simply as possible.

All of your HD receivers require that the user select a "TV type" (Vip622, Menu 6 - 8 - TV type) which modifies, or scales, the incoming signal to a particular (480i - 480P - 720P- 1080i) resolution, and passes it to the television. The question originally posed to Mr. Minnick was to add an option to the TV type menu that would allow the receiver to pass the signal it receives to the television with no modifications, or quite simply in its native resolution. Hence the term, Native Resolution Pass Through. Any modification, or scaling, would be accomplished by the television and not the HD receiver. When asked, on a previous tech chat in either March or April 2006, if this modification was possible, Mr. Minnick responded that the software changes to accomplish this task would be available by the summer. The context of the answer indicated that he was referring to the summer of 2006.

My question again. What is the status of the implementation of native resolution pass through, in Dish Network HD receivers, that Mr. Minnick indicated would be available by summer of 2006?


Dish Network Reply

Thank you for your e-mail. The display setting should be set to as high a resolution as the television is capable of displaying. The over the air antenna will pass through a high definition signal. This is referred to as Native Resolution Pass Through. An over the air signal, when it is passed through, is not processed by the receiver and simply "passed through" to the television in the format that is being transmitted over the air. This feature has been implemented. We apologize for the confusion, we are always looking for ways to improve our service, and we appreciate your input. We will forward your comments and concerns to the proper department; however, we can not promise this will be implemented. Thank you again for choosing Dish Network and please feel free to contact us again with any future concerns.
We hope we have properly addressed your concerns. If you have further questions you can respond to this e-mail or access our online technical support at the following link:
http://tech.dishnetwork.com/departmental_content/techportal/index.shtml
A Technical Service Representative is available via live chat 1:30 PM-10:00 PM (MDT) 7 days per week regarding your concerns. Please click the following link to use this option.
http://tech.dishnetwork.com/departm...al/content/tech/techchatadvcustformrf23.shtml
Thanks,
Joe B.

My Reply

Unfortunately, we are still on different pages. The question posed to Dan Minnick was concerning native resolution pass through for all signals both SATELLITE and OTA. The implementation of native resolution pass through will allow the television to scale the incoming signal to the native resolution of the set, and relieve the satellite receiver of any scaling responsibilities. Mr. Minnick stated that this update would be available by summer of 2006. What is the status of this update? I am positive if you posed this question to Mr. Minnick you would have the correct answer in less than sixty seconds

Dish Network Reply

Thank you for your e-mail. Your concern regarding native resolution is not particularly a valid concern as most local networks are transmitting up-converted HD signal which is not considered Native HD. Native High Definition Resolution is simply when the program is recorded in 1080i format with Dolby Digital 5.1 encoded; transmitted uninterrupted to the point of reception (your TV). At this point the TV will then be displaying Native Resolution. I must reiterate that most network stations are only transmitting up-converted HD. Due to this, it is physically impossible to transmit to the TV the actual resolution that the program was originally recorded unless by chance the receiver is on the resolution that the program is being transmitted. I would strongly recommend that you connect your off-air antenna to the TV so that it will display the transmissions for you. The only reason to connect this directly to your receiver is for the off-air digital recording capability. Currently, Dish Network broadcasts all of our High Definition programming in MPEG-4, 8-phase shift keying, 1080i format. Unfortunately, due to the lack of true 1080i Native Resolution, some of this programming is up-converted to meet these requirements. This is similarly true for all network afilliates.
We hope we have properly addressed your concerns. If you have further questions you can respond to this e-mail or access our online technical support at the following link:
http://tech.dishnetwork.com/departmental_content/techportal/index.shtml
A Technical Service Representative is available via live chat 1:30 PM-10:00 PM (MDT) 7 days per week regarding your concerns. Please click the following link to use this option.
http://tech.dishnetwork.com/departm...al/content/tech/techchatadvcustformrf23.shtml
Thanks,
Phillip J.

My Reply

There still appears to be a disconnect regarding an answer to the original question. I am the one who originally posed the question regarding native resolution pass through to Mr. Minnick on a previous tech chat. He clearly understood the question and commented that he had been in a discussion with a coworker prior to the tech chat that covered this subject. There was a segment on that particular tech chat, just prior to my question, that reviewed the native resolutions of various televisions and the corresponding settings in Dish Network receivers. There was never any discussion or question relating to OTA HD reception. Considering the answer, and the comments Mr. Minnick made regarding the discussion of this subject with a coworker, it was very clear to him that the question I posed dealt with passing the SATELLITE signal to the television with no scaling by the, in this case VIP622, receiver. All scaling would be accomplished by the television.

Based on the email answers I have received, I would have to conclude that Mr. Minnick's answer to me, and the discussion he had with a coworker, were misguided and totally lacked any foundation. I hope you have copied the various answers to my questions to Mr. Minnick, because he and an unnamed coworker, appear to have the same impressions I do regarding the advantage of implementing native resolution pass through of SATELLITE signals in Dish Network HD receivers. I am sure he would be enlightened by your answers.

I will close with this question. What was Mr. Minnick referring to, when he stated that a software update to implement native resolution pass through would be available by summer 2006?


Dish Network Reply

There was no reply from Dish Network


My Reply


There were two additional attempts made to get a response from Dish Network. The first attempt contained a copy of my last reply prefaced by the statement below.

I submitted the following response, and question, to you on February 20. Unfortunately I have not received a response.

The second attempt consisted of the following message.

The previous message, submitted Feb. 20, has not been responded to. The basic question in my very first message still remains unanswered. As a comparison, I submitted the same question to the August Tech Chat, regarding Mr. Minnicks April Tech Chat answer, and received a direct concise reply as shown below. Rebekah S. had no issues understanding the question, but it appears all other replies have been unable to provide a simple direct answer.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Question:

During the last tech chat Dan Minnick indicated that native resolution
pass through should be implemented by this summer. Is the implementation of this update on schedule?

Reply:

Thank you for your e-mail. The Tech Forum is correct, we are on schedule for native resolution pass through.

We hope we have properly addressed your concerns. If you have further questions you can respond to this e-mail or access our online technical support at the following link: http://tech.dishnetwork.com/departme...al/index.shtml.

Thanks,

Rebekah S.
Technical E-mail Support
Dish Network


Dish Network Reply

I have been waiting since March 13, 2007 for their reply.

 

[kstile]

Thank you for your persistence on this issue. The CSR's knowledgebase-cut-and-paste to your original queries would be laughable if it weren't so predictable and pathetic. Keep up the good fight and maybe, someday, this will happen.

 

[Rukes]

Thanks for this too, this is definately something that will help me (Having a 4:3 HDTV that supports all HD resolutions).

The best way I usually describe it:
"I have a TV that supports 1080i and 720p. When a 1080i channel is on, it should tell the TV "this is a 1080i signal" in which the TV will change to it's 1080i mode. Same goes for 720p. The current way the DVR does it is by having the user manually change the HDTV resolution."

The sad thing is many other DVRs support this (such as the new D* one, and the Moxie one for cable TV)...

 

[kstuart]

Only someone who can contact the Engineering Department could get an actual answer.
Contacting Customer Support by email of any corporation usually ends up with the same cut-and-paste responses having absolutely nothing to do with the question.
This is because the actual technical people are too busy to answer emails (they would never get any work done otherwise).

PS "Native resolution pass through" is one of those things (like HDMI) that seemed far more important before I bought an HD set than it turned out to be when I made the purchase. I simulated native resolution pass through by simply changing the menu setting every time I changed to a channel with a different resolution. I found that, in every case, the best results were obtained by leaving the menu setting at the same setting as my TV's native resolution (720p).

My guess is that this is largely because Dish uses non-standard resolutions to broadcast both HD and SD channels, and so the DVR's scaler is always involved in scaling, and so the PQ is better if you don't also have the TV scale.

I certainly think that other setups and TVs will have different results (especially if you have an 1080p set). I just wanted to point out that the reality may be different than the theory (mostly because Dish doesn't use the channels' original resolutions).

 

[8bitbytes]

I think this sentence from the answers that were given sums up where the disconnect is and why the Dish responder doesn't understand the question:

Currently, Dish Network broadcasts all of our High Definition programming in MPEG-4, 8-phase shift keying, 1080i format.

Apparently, ALL HD is converted by Dish to their special 1080i format and then sent out to the customers. There is nothing to pass through. So, any pass through technology added would only affect OTA.

 

[lakebum431]

But is that even true? Cause I don't think it is.

 

[KKlare]

They still use MPEG-2 for the core HD including some VOOM. A change would finishing the obsoleting of the 921 and 942. The "old" channels are still 1080i but have been reduce to a nonstandard 1440 horizontal, which is not 1080i by definition. So clearly the Dish person misspoke.
-Ken

 

[8bitbytes]

He didn't misspeak about 1080 - 1080i is 1080i, that's all he said. What you are saying is 1440 x 1080i is not true HD but all they care about is the 1080, not the horizontal.

The MPEG is wrong of course but the 1080i is still Dishes 1080i and that's what they push everything out as, according to their answers.

 

[lakebum431]

Are you sure? I am pretty sure that they have several channels in 720p (ABC, ESPN, HGTV, FoodHD, etc.)

 

[gadgtfreek]

Ill just keep pressing menu-6-8 when I settle on a channel until E* decides to make this elementary function happen.

 

[DWS44]

Ill just keep pressing menu-6-8 when I settle on a channel until E* decides to make this elementary function happen.

Do you honestly see enough difference in PQ to warrant bothering to do that?

 

[gadgtfreek]

Do you honestly see enough difference in PQ to warrant bothering to do that?

Some of the 480i channels look screwy to me upconverted to 1080i/720p by the 622. And there's no way in hell Im going to leave a 720p channel on 1080i and vice versa. I want the dvr sending native(or as native as possible) to my tv. I want my tv doing the work, not the dvr.

Also, 75% of the HD I watch is OTA, so of course I want native pass through.

 

[primetimeguy]

And there's no way in hell Im going to leave a 720p channel on 1080i and vice versa.

You see that big of a difference?

Also, 75% of the HD I watch is OTA, so of course I want native pass through

What do you mean by this? How is OTA different than satellite channels?

 

[gadgtfreek]

You see that big of a difference?



What do you mean by this? How is OTA different than satellite channels?

I havent seen any HD local(Comcast only) that looked as good as Over The Air. OTA is the true resolution of the network(720p/1080I) and not compressed so I do not want the dvr messing with it. I want it passed through at its native to the tv. And from what everyone here says, E* uses crazy resolutions so thats how OTA would be different. OTA comes in how its intended, not compressed/hd lite/crazy resolution and whatever voodoo all the providers like to work on channels. When I am home, I watch all my OTA HD local on my tv, dont even use the dvr.

I am not going to tell you that it's that big of a deal, Im just saying that I prefer native pass through to letting a dvr work it. I trust my tv more than the dvr to give me the best picture so I want the setting thats going to guarantee me the best PQ, even if it marginal. It may be paranoid, but I will continue with menu-6-8.

Feel free to leave the box on the native resolution of your tv, but I choose not to.

 

[8bitbytes]

Are you sure? I am pretty sure that they have several channels in 720p (ABC, ESPN, HGTV, FoodHD, etc.)

I'm just going by what the Dish person said - For Dish HD channels, they braodcast everything at 1080i and upconvert anything that isn't 1080i to their special brand of 1080i some folks lovingly call HD-Lite.

Makes sense that they would force everything into the same type of signal to then beam out to customers.

To get the correct answer on what Dish is sending, we need the guys with the equipment used to check bandwidth to tell us what is really being sent down to us.

 

[Jim5506]

If my memory serves me correctly, I have seen discussions of bit rate and bandwidth comparing the 720p and 1080i channels on Dish.

I am almost sure Dish does NOT alter 720p to 1080i on any channels, but may reduce the resolution on 1080X1920 to 1080X1440 on 1080i channels.

I believe 720X1280 is passed unaltered by dish on ESPN, etc.

Why convert 720p to 1080i when 720p uses 10% fewer pixels in the first place.

 

[KKlare]

If my memory serves me correctly, I have seen discussions of bit rate and bandwidth comparing the 720p and 1080i channels on Dish.

I am almost sure Dish does NOT alter 720p to 1080i on any channels, but may reduce the resolution on 1080X1920 to 1080X1440 on 1080i channels.

I believe 720X1280 is passed unaltered by dish on ESPN, etc.

Why convert 720p to 1080i when 720p uses 10% fewer pixels in the first place.

Progressive 720p is 1440 raster lines per frame (1/30 sec) and is thus more than interleaved 1080 for 1080i. What reduces the rate is the horizontal 1280 vs lite 1440 to full 1920.
-Ken

 

[primetimeguy]

Progressive 720p is 1440 raster lines per frame (1/30 sec) and is thus more than interleaved 1080 for 1080i. What reduces the rate is the horizontal 1280 vs lite 1440 to full 1920.
-Ken

?????????

Isn't 720p 720 lines, but at 60 frames/sec, so 720*1920*60 = 55,296,000

and 1080i is 1080*1920*30 = 62,208,000.

So 1080i takes about 12% more bandwidth than 720p

But HD-Lite would be 1080*1440*30 = 46,656,000. So Dish would be saving bandwidth doing all channels this way, but as others have mentioned I believe the 720p channels are sent as 720p.

 

[kstuart]

I trust my tv more than the dvr to give me the best picture so I want the setting thats going to guarantee me the best PQ, even if it marginal. It may be paranoid, but I will continue with menu-6-8.

I am amazed at how many guys paticipate in technical discussions, and then use their emotions entirely. Why not put chicken entrails on top of the TV to make the PQ better ?

The satellite companies do not broadcast at the standard 1080i resolution. So, the DVR is always going to be doing converting and scaling. Setting the DVR at your TV's native resolution is going to decrease the number of conversions. In theory, this should be the best you can do. But, there are a lot of variables, and the only way to verify what works best is to try all combinations on your own TV setup.

 

[whatchel1]

HD Lite discussion

This is getting into the same oh same oh. It is again obvious that most have not read the ATSC standards for SATELLITE ATSC transmission. 1920 X 1080 is the OTA standard along with the 1 standard for 720p 1280 x 720p. The standards for Sat has 3 for transmission. 1440 x 1080 & 1280 x 1080 are both permitted standards for sat as well as the 1920 x 1080. As far as native pass thru they did state that OTA is native but the others may not be. How many other sat nets are 720p? OTA will always look better it is less compressed and goes thru on one conversion. Where as Sat has to take the original then encode it to send it to the uplink then take that and probably decode that signal. Next it has to be encoded for the trip up to the sat and finally decoded at your sat receiver. Then it will be scaled out to your monitor at the setting you have chosen. So if you have one of the new monitors that will take multiple resolution choose the one that looks best.