VOOM to employ Windows Media 9

[jimboeau]

Peanut Gallery = Berkley Liberals

 

[Ilya]

One important comment on the WMV9 topic, in case you haven't realised this yet:

Once WMV9 (or MPEG4 for that matter) is deployed, not only VOOM will be able to deliver twice as many channels, but their DVR will be able to store twice as many movies on that 250GB drive! Isn't that great?!!

 

[Ken F]

Once WMV9 (or MPEG4 for that matter) is deployed, not only VOOM will be able to deliver twice as many channels, but their DVR will be able to store twice as many movies on that 250GB drive! Isn't that great?!!

I wouldn't go that far. The spec is 39 HD now, and the press release states "over 60." Thus, the improvement is closer to 50%.

I suspect much of that capacity improvement also refers to new 720p channels. The efficiency improvement with WM9 (and H.264) is much greater for progressive formats like 720p than it is with 1080i.

 

[Ilya]

I wouldn't go that far. The spec is 39 HD now, and the press release states "over 60." Thus, the improvement is closer to 50%.

Ok, maybe not twice, but even a 50% increase in the DVR capacity is not that bad! It's like getting a 380 GB drive insted of 250 GB...

 

[larrybud]

....
Internet explorer is a great example. Version 6.0 is the last one. You will get no improvements unless you buy the next version of windows, or subscribe to MSN internet service (supports the next version of IE built in to the MSN software).

Geez, so don't use it. The fact is, it's NOT a MONOpoly. You DO have choices. There are a ton of browsers out there, and there are other operating systems out there.

When Bill Gates can make you stand on your head, then I'll tell you he has too much power.

Without getting too OT, what the government has done to Microsoft is like telling GM that they can't put their own radios in their cars, or to force them to sell the car with different tires.

 

[larrybud]

I fully agree that MS puts out buggy software and then patches the Hell out it once the bugs are reported

They ALL do that. I find it amusing that the bashers continue to use their products when there are alternatives.


Sell your product for more than your competition=Price gouging
Sell your product for the same as your competition=Price Fixing
Sell your product for less than your competition=Dumping

What's a businessman to do?

 

[slacker9876]

and as i said MSFT has 50 BILLION yes in cash whats a billion for a takeover and getting them into the SAT business???

I would prefer they take over the SAT world. The reason I have Voom (less than 24hrs now) is because D* would not give me what I wanted in HD. Once the Voom PVR hits, I'll dump D* all together.

As a Linux newbie, I can say Linux is far better than Windows at security and free software, but Microsoft still have the most highly compatible OS out there. But I do like Linux better ... all the same.

Go Bill Go! Go Bill Go!

 

[giveuspurehd]

EDIT: After calming down, I realized this frees up room for RSNs (Fox Sports in particular) in HDTV. Let the countdown to Astros HD begin!

cubs must come first.

 

[PBHDinSD]

M$ don't do something for nothing. Ever see the price of there software. Sure its cheap now to obtain dominance. They the squeeze comes into play. They are not doing this out of the goodness of there heart. They always see a big pay off down the road somewhere.

All codecs are free to the consumer. that's want they want.

MS wants you to buy the wm9 HD DVD disc for 21.99. There's where the money is. MS will get a cut.

PS A codec is not like another piece of software (ie MS IE)

 

[Scotty]

I skipped from the beginning to the end of this thread, and I'm new here, so forgive me if I missed something in between, but it sounds like you've all been talking about M$ supplying the next compression technology for VooM.

We have all picked up the best in HD satellite broadcasting and now many of you are writing that you are excited about M$ jumping into the fray. I for one, am not. M$ panders to the lowest common denominator, creating cheap products that just get by. Not only that, they make proprietary products that only get used in the Windows monopoly.

MPEG-4 is a much broader standard that gets used by anyone. And it is going to be part of the Quicktime standard from Apple. Anyone who has seen a quicktime video next to a window media video has got to see that quicktime is the better product. If you don't beleive me, some of the top producers of films choose to put their trailers on the web in Quicktime format, because it is the superior product. So if MPEG-4 is the next advance in quicktime, I'd say it will be far superior in video quality to anything out there. Maybe you don't get as much compression, but you get better picture quality. And isn't that what we bough our HDTV's for?!

What do you all think? Have you seen quicktime? If not, check out some of the trailers at http://www.apple.com/quicktime/.

Scotty

 

[stratguy]

I wonder if that means that voom receivers will start crashing 2 or 3 times a day now LOL

 

[jimboeau]

I skipped from the beginning to the end of this thread, and I'm new here, so forgive me if I missed something in between, but it sounds like you've all been talking about M$ supplying the next compression technology for VooM.

We have all picked up the best in HD satellite broadcasting and now many of you are writing that you are excited about M$ jumping into the fray. I for one, am not. M$ panders to the lowest common denominator, creating cheap products that just get by. Not only that, they make proprietary products that only get used in the Windows monopoly.

MPEG-4 is a much broader standard that gets used by anyone. And it is going to be part of the Quicktime standard from Apple. Anyone who has seen a quicktime video next to a window media video has got to see that quicktime is the better product. If you don't beleive me, some of the top producers of films choose to put their trailers on the web in Quicktime format, because it is the superior product. So if MPEG-4 is the next advance in quicktime, I'd say it will be far superior in video quality to anything out there. Maybe you don't get as much compression, but you get better picture quality. And isn't that what we bough our HDTV's for?!

What do you all think? Have you seen quicktime? If not, check out some of the trailers at http://www.apple.com/quicktime/.

Scotty

wm9 is the best quality codec out there to date including mpeg 4 and quicktime. I look forward to the deployment of it........

"windows monopoly" your verbage exposes your bias.....

 

[DarrellP]

Scotty, try reading this entire post, all your verbage has been hashed out to the death.

 

[Ken F]

Scotty,

Like Darrell says, this was all extensively discussed in the thread. To summarize, the current MPEG-4 standard used by Apple isn't very well suited for HDTV. It was designed with DVD resolution and lower in mind. Windows Media 9, by contrast, was designed for use at HD resolutions. You can find some some HDTV trailers here. I recommend the ScoobyDoo2 trailer in 720p if you have a slow computer, or 1080p if you have a fast system. If you have a Mac, you'll need the WM9 player for OSX.

The next-generation version of MPEG-4, called MPEG-4 part10 or H.264, is designed for use at HD resolutions. This H.264 codec is expected to be competitive with WM9 for HD. Apple has announced support for this next-generation version of MPEG-4 and will be using it with a future release of Quicktime (Quicktime 7.0) coming later this year.

The VOOM STB upgrade will support all of these codecs -- the older MPEG-4 standard, WM9, and H.264. They are supporting all three with the set-top box so they can use whatever they find to deliver the best performance at the uplink. They plan to test equipment using each of these codecs. The current plan is to use WM9, as that offers the best performance for HDTV today, but that is all subject to change. If they find H.264 to offer better performance for HD in two years, then they can use that instead.

Not only that, they make proprietary products that only get used in the Windows monopoly.

WM9 is currently in the standardization process with the SMPTE. The open standard will be known as VC9. In 6-9 months, it's expected to be just as open as MPEG-2 and MPEG-4. It is already available for licensing by anyone for less money than MPEG-4, with no rate increases guaranteed for 10-14 years. Some Linux vendors have already announced deals to license WM9.

VOOM receivers will not be using a version of Windows. Linux will not be using Microsoft software. The WM9 codec is no more a "Windows thing" than MPEG-2 is a "MacOS thing." WM9 is a set of mathematical algorithms that define the format; anyone with the technical skills can write their own software or design their own hardware to support it.

If you don't beleive me, some of the top producers of films choose to put their trailers on the web in Quicktime format, because it is the superior product.

The Quicktime web site is an Apple marketing tool. You'll notice that most studios also offer their trailers in Windows Media format on their web sites. In many cases, these trailers use an older version of WM to support obsolete systems, so the quality is not necessarily indicative of what the current WM9 can do.

I don't know if you were aware, but WM9 is spec'd as part of the HD-DVD standard. Earlier this year, the DVD Forum and movie studios compared MPEG-4, H.264, and WM9 at HD resolutions, and found WM9 to offer the best picture for HDTV. H.264 (the next version of MPEG-4) placed a closed second in the voting, and was also chosen to be part of the HD-DVD standard. MPEG-2 was included for backward compatibility. The current / older version of MPEG-4 used by Apple was judged to be inferior to both standards at HDTV resolutions, and will not be used for HD-DVD.

Recent articles on WM9 / H.264:
http://www.eetimes.com/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=21400091
http://www.eetimes.com/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=20000137

 

[riffjim4069]

Ken, that was an excellent post - all relevant MPEG-4/WM9 information in a concise format! It would make an outstanding "Hot Topic" or FAQ :up

 

[gutter]

I am hoping ,as several posts have mentioned, that the PQ will also improve. I really don't want more channels if the PQ is going to be the same. Although I think my conern may be more with the Motorola STB from VOOM. The PQ of OTA from my previous Sammy tuner was much sharper and crisper than the Motorola seems to be able to put out. Compression, I don't think, is going to help the OTA thru the current receiver.

I have Called VOOM with my concern and they offered to switch boxes. I hope that works. ON the way out, the tech called to say that his truck blew up. Naturally. May not belong in this thread but for me the key is still the PQ "Wow" experience. Anything that will put that back, I am for.

 

[CraziFuzzy]

The only downside of those WM9 samples on the microsoft site are that, while they are in fact 720p and 1080p, this simply describes the vertical resolution and the fact that they are non-interlaced.

720p standard is 1280x720x60fps, these files are indeed 1280x720, but depending on the source, they are either 30fps or 24fps.

1080p should imply 1920x1080x60fps, while these are 1440x1080x24fps.

These files are nowhere near the bitrates that the broadcasts would be, as most are set at 8Mbps, so even scaling up the framerate to the 60fps (or 30 for 1080i) and bumping the 1080 resolution up to the full 1920 would still provide similar quality as the samples, while staying within the ~15Mbps streams we are using currently.

 

[Ken F]

crazi,

There is no 1080p/60 defined in ATSC table 3. It defines 1080p/24 and 1080p/30 -- the maximum. The 720p format can be in 24, 30, or 60 fps (if you want to get technical: 23.976, 24, 29.97, 30, 59.94, and 60 hz).

All the content on that site sourced from film -- compare it to the content on HBO. That's why it's at 24fps. If it was at 720p60, it would be using repeat flags, so there'd be little to no additional bandwidth required -- but more cpu required. HBOHD, for example, is usually delivered at 24fps with repeat flags for 1080i/30 (of course, they have some video content too)

As for 1440x1080, it's common to encode that way, because that's the max acquisition resolution supported by a number of current HD cameras. The HDNews channel on VOOM is encoded and delivered at 1440x1080i, for example.

 

[CraziFuzzy]

i understand the purpose of the 24fps, on film based material. I know a lot of people see 1080p and assume 60fps, so I wanted to make sure that this was apparent. I have seen a few sports broadcasts that were 720p (60fps) and the motion is unparalleled. People see 1080p and think they are getting the higher resolution, with that same lifelike motion, which is usually not the case. It is possible with WM9 to do this, but the bandwidth would be so high, or the compression rate so high, that it would not be worth the improvement over 720p.