# Closed Captioning Question



## annenoe (Oct 19, 2003)

Just curious. Using HR10-250, our captions are noticeably screwed up when watching HBO HD and Showtime HD - they toggle back and forth between complete and accurate and total gobble-de-guck. No problems on all other SD channels or OTA HD. So, it appears that it's only the D*TV broadcast HD channels (those are the only two D*TV channels I have).

And I really, really, really, really need CC for Deadwood. 

Any ideas?


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## phox_mulder (Feb 23, 2006)

I've noticed similair problems with HBO and SHO HD.

No gobbledygook, but it'll be fine for a while, then it will stick on one phrase through a couple minutes of dialog, then pick up and be fine for a while again.

I'm going to hazard a guess and say it has something to do with DirecTV's compression scheme.

A different problem that I've noticed on TNT-HD is the captioning is almost never in sync with the speaking.
One day it will be a full 7 seconds ahead of the spoken dialogue,
next day it will be 5 seconds behind the spoken,
then the next day it will be right on.
Only program I'm watching on TNT-HD is Saved.


phox


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## TyroneShoes (Sep 6, 2004)

(Then you are really missing something with "The Closer").

When analog video is encoded to MPEG-2, typically the line 21 CC is left uncompressed. If compressed, it can be intermitttent, or missing altogether. The way CC for ATSC is handled is somewhat the same, and this would mean that the DBS uplink probably gets unmolested captioning from HBO/SHO. But then I can't see why that would differ from CC from HDnet or other HD channels. Since DTV HD is recompressing somewhat, it makes sense that this might be partly at fault. But DBS has a lot of experience encoding SD to MPEG-2 without a CC problem, which is also something that any garden-variety SA Tivo can do, so it doesn't seem like there should be an issue. This makes me wonder if it really is specific to HBO/SHO. Can anyone verify that those are the only HD channels with this problem?


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## rminsk (Jun 4, 2002)

I wonder if line 21 is being screwed up by the resizing (not recompressing) to DirecTV hd-lite.


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## phox_mulder (Feb 23, 2006)

HD closed captioning is different from SD closed captioning.

SD has it in line 21, HD has it as part of the digital stream.

The HR10-250 is doing the actual decoding/displaying of the HD CC 
when it's tuner(s) are being used, either OTA ATSC or HD via satellite.

The TV's built in CC decoder is doing the displaying of the SD Analog CC.

If the TV's ATSC tuner is being used for OTA, then it is doing the decoding/displaying of the digital CC.

This is why it works fine for SD via D*, TV doing the decoding,
and OTA HD, because it isn't compressed by DirecTV.

DirecTV has been dealing with SD CC for many years, so they have it down,
HD CC on the other hand is very new, so they don't know what they are doing yet.


phox


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## phox_mulder (Feb 23, 2006)

TyroneShoes said:


> (Then you are really missing something with "The Closer").


That's one of those shows I wish I would have started watching from the beginning, but don't want to jump in now and not know what's going on.

Shield is another, but luckily SpikeTV is showing them from the beginning.

As to TNT-HD's captioning problems, I know exactly what's going on.

The show isn't Digital Closed Captioned, TNT is grabbing the captioning from the SD channel, and inserting it into the HD channel, the same way we're doing it here at the station I work at.
Depending on how behind or ahead the HD channel is from the SD channel,
the captioning ends up being ahead or behind.
If I had two TV's in the same room, I could watch the SD and the HD side by see the delay.

I see the same thing when I record my channel and watch it later, OTA of course,
just not to the extremes I see on TNT-HD,
as our HD channel is only 1-2 seconds behind our SD channel.

phox


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## TyroneShoes (Sep 6, 2004)

I see your point, but 608 CC for NTSC and 708 CC for ATSC both end up as a part of a compressed MPEG-2 digital stream when received as a DBS signal, regardless of whether the channel is a SD DBS channel or a DT/HD DBS channel. Even though they start out very different, they end up playing back from your HDD in a very similar manner, with CC encoded in a very similar manner. The OP states or leads us to believe that both SD and HD channels are being watched using the HR10. I'm not sure any of that helps, but everything viewed through a HR10 is from an MPEG-2 (and therefore both encoded and compressed) source.


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## phox_mulder (Feb 23, 2006)

phox_mulder said:


> DirecTV has been dealing with SD CC for many years, so they have it down,
> HD CC on the other hand is very new, so they don't know what they are doing yet.


Added this line while you were replying, I think that's the problem, plain and simple.

phox


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## annenoe (Oct 19, 2003)

Let me make a quick correction and see if anyone can make sense of this...
Am right now switching back and forth between 40-year-old virgin on HBOHD and A love song for Bobby Long on ShowHD. 40-year old CC is crap, and showing up in Initial Caps. Love Song CC is OK and showing up as all caps. 
So, does that throw the HD theory? Or are you saying some will work, some won't - it's a crap shoot?

BTW, settings are Std=CC1, Digital=Off, all others are set to auto


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## TyroneShoes (Sep 6, 2004)

phox_mulder said:


> That's one of those shows I wish I would have started watching from the beginning, but don't want to jump in now and not know what's going on.
> 
> Shield is another, but luckily SpikeTV is showing them from the beginning...


Not to hijack, but if you'll permit a short sidebar:

"The Closer" is episodic, and there is very little serialized content. IOW, you can jump in anytime and you will have not really missed anything important. Come on aboard. Monday's ep was the best this year (still airing).

In fact, I can catch you up in two sentences: 40-year-old Brenda Leigh Johnson is from the deep south, was brought in to straighten out LA Priority Homicide division, desperately needs a GPS system because she continues to get lost in LA traffic, has a romantic history with her boss, a long-suffering boyfriend in the FBI, and a sweet mother who she can't seem to act like an adult around, plus she has a serious addiction to Ring Dings. There was initial resistance to her as an outsider, but she won her crew over by the end of the last season simply by virtue of the remarkable talent she has for closing cases and interviewing suspects. That's it. You now know everthing necessary to watch any ep.

"The Shield", also in my all-time top 5, is very serialized, and you do really need to watch from the beginning, in order. This is a great show to catch on DVD for that reason (also because there is no locally-available HD version, and the SD quality of FX and Spike on DBS or cable is crap).


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## phox_mulder (Feb 23, 2006)

TyroneShoes said:


> Not to hijack, but if you'll permit a short sidebar:


We couldn't call this a discussion forum if the threads didn't veer off topic. 

Maybe I'll give it a try, my TiVo's are pretty empty this time of year.

Might have to spring for some Shield DVD's if Spike doesn't pick up the pace before the last season starts (or are we midseason?) on FX.

phox


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## mattack (Apr 9, 2001)

annenoe said:


> Am right now switching back and forth between 40-year-old virgin on HBOHD and A love song for Bobby Long on ShowHD. 40-year old CC is crap, and showing up in Initial Caps. Love Song CC is OK and showing up as all caps.


I believe that's totally irrelevant. It seems to be based upon which company did the closed captioning, but I haven't kept track of it to be sure.

For example, some shows use ALL CAPS most of the time, but put dialog when the speaker is offscreen in normal case (capitalize first letter of sentence and so on).


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## RainyCity4 (Jun 23, 2003)

I'm not having much luck in DirecTIVO (Non-HD) forum, so I'm jumping in here and hope someone here could help me.

I noticed that you are complaining that DirecTV is messing up closed captions on HD channels, well I am seeing exact same problem on "local" channels (ABC/NBC/CBS) in which captions are OK but frequently, a letter or two are dropped from a word on R10 on SD TV.

Example: Helo, My nam is Brent"

On my R-15, it is even worse. In fact, it is exactly same as your HD TIVO's, entire words or even entire sentence are completely scrambled.

Some of you were suggesting that it had something to do with HD stream, I beg to differ because I'm seeing same symptoms (to an extent) on R10 and R15 (worse) and I'm using Standard Definition channels.

Do you know anyone at DirecTV I could call and ask them to check into this? It seems to be a West Coast problem (Nobody in DirecTIVO SD forum noticed the same problem and they all don't live anywhere near West Coast...Go figure).

Brent


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## TyroneShoes (Sep 6, 2004)

CC is kind of fragile. It has little if any redundancy, so is vulnerable to a lot of problems that can crop up, including impulse noise, waveform rounding (for analog) and attenuation. It can also slip onto the wrong scan line, masking it from the decoder. There doesn't seem to be a rigid standard for decoders, or for encoders, for that matter. And it can also get out of time by a minute or more.

It's not rigidly enforced, other than certain programming must have some flavor of it in place, whether it works well on all decoders or not. And the captioning itself seems to often leave a lot to be desired, especially when its done by speech recognition. Check out G4 for some truly weak "live" captioning.

The deaf have a really powerful lobby, which got captioning shoehorned into every TV and every program. Too bad they are so misguided on the technical or compliance front


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## Bierboy (Jun 12, 2004)

TyroneShoes said:


> (Then you are really missing something with "The Closer").
> ...


Off topic, but I tried "The Closer" and could not get into it. Love "Saved" though.

Back on topic, I also notice that CC for Fox shows (HD) lags consistently.


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## Capmeister (Jan 20, 2005)

I have the same problem with my FoxHD (WSYM Fox47 in Lansing, MI) so the CC lag is a NATIONAL FoxHD problem, I think.


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## TyroneShoes (Sep 6, 2004)

Except where it isn't.


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## Capmeister (Jan 20, 2005)

Well, it might be everywhere, but intermittant. I've heard reports from other locales that (like mine) sometimes it works, sometimes it is out of synch.


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## TyroneShoes (Sep 6, 2004)

Trust me, it's not a national problem, at least for FOX, because we don't have any such problem here. If we have the littlest problem with CC, our in-box fills up overnight with reports from a very vocal CC advocate group.


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## RainyCity4 (Jun 23, 2003)

Hey Tyrone,

Can you PM me the contact information of the advocate group? They might could help me learn how to set up an advocacy group here in NW.

Thanks.

Brent


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## TyroneShoes (Sep 6, 2004)

I'd be happy to, except as far as I know it is not a formal group, rather a large number of concerned individuals who reach out regularly to broadcasters. But, I would bet that there is indeed a formal advocacy group, likely with a high internet presence. Not sure how connected to the broadcasters they might be, but broadcasters are motivated to listen.


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## RainyCity4 (Jun 23, 2003)

I would be very careful in determining if this is DirecTV's fault or not.

I had the exact same problem (in Standard Definition) with FOX channel last year and every other channels were fine. Finally, I decided to contact FOX (they had "feedback" form on their website) and complained about it and they had a VP of Engineering contact me and it turned out to be a hardware related issue (they had upgraded their CC hardware) and they fixed it and captions has been perfect ever since.

It happened again with Discovery Channel last fall (Captions does not appear at all or starts very late) and again, I filed a complaint on their feedback page and the issue went away promptly.

If only HBO and SHO (HD) are exhibiting this issue, try contacting both of them and complain.

If you know for sure it is a DirecTV issue, I have the VP of Regulatory Affairs' contact information (FCC referred me to her and she responded to me VERY promptly!). She was the one who helped me get the ball rolling on the "delay" in CC I'm experiencing with my R10. 

FCC also set up a webpage where customers could file reports on mishandling of CC's and then they would follow up on it (They gave me the link but I lost it). I'll try to find the link and let you know.


PM me if you want her contact information.

Brent


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## orinaccio (Sep 18, 2003)

Ive posted in this forum a number of times about this problem, and I agree, DirecTV's responses to this can be frustrating. Sometimes it feels like their computer is telling the CSRs that their first response should be "Blame the TV" - many of them start off by stating that the TV provides the captions, not the DirecTV/Tivo box (used to be true for SD programming, not true anymore with HD tuners now required to have the closed captioning chip as well as televisions). From there its usually a long discussion in which I find it necessary to educate the CSR and their supervisor. 

I have noticed different types of issues with all HD channels. Most noticeably - HD HBO, with their omission of a few words, a line of text, or overlapping words. Ive seen problems on local HD channels as well. 

Frankly, HD HBO is unwatchable - these issues seem to appear just when someone says something important, and it becomes very frustrating to watch. My wife has forbidden me from recording any HD shows - the captioning problems drives her nuts. 

The last time I complained, they sent me a new HR10-250 box stating that it must be a hardware issue. To no surprise, the problem didn't go away. I intend to complain again shortly and see what new gems they will come up with again to explain this.


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## TyroneShoes (Sep 6, 2004)

orinaccio said:


> ...Frankly, HD HBO is unwatchable - these issues seem to appear just when someone says something important, and it becomes very frustrating to watch. My wife has forbidden me from recording any HD shows - the captioning problems drives her nuts...


I assume you mean the CC. I was trying to decode Jamie Foxx's mumbling on "Colaterall" the other night (great melee scene in the dance club) and yes, about a third of the lines were completely missing. Video looked great, tho.


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## chris_h (Dec 17, 2003)

IneedCCs said:


> This occurs on most of DirecTV's HD channels, whether watched live or on TiVo. HBO-HD is the worst, followed by SHO-HD. The programming on these channels is unwatchable due to these captioning problems.
> ...
> HDNM is a little different. The captions don't disappear as often, but when they do disappear, they're gone for a long time.
> 
> ...


IneedCCs,

I only use CCs on those rare occasions where I go "what did he say" and I turn them on using a macro. I gather you use them almost constantly.

This sounds to me like you might not be getting a good signal on some satellites/transponders. You may want to do some research on channel mapping to transponder, then check signal strengths on those transponders. Fixing this could be as simple as tweaking your dish alignment.

Also when you say problems occur whether live or on Tivo, it is worth noting that if you are watching on an HR10-250 (the only HD Directivo) then the content still goes to the hard drive when watching live. So if you had a hard drive problem, it would still show up on pre-recorded content or via the live buffers. Based on your description, I don't think this is the issue.

If you want to tell me the next two or three shows you plan to record on HBO-HD, I can try to record them (if there is a tuner avail) and see if I see an issue. You would have to send me a very detailed description of the issue (program time/date/channel, time into program, scene description, CC text, and problem description). Hint: If NFL football is on, my tuners are not available.

You do not say if the video quality on the programs with issues is okay or experiencing breakups. Please do tell.

edit: fix details of recording to add more detail.


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## chris_h (Dec 17, 2003)

TyroneShoes,

I would expect for the entire data stream, including digital CCs to be covered by the same level of FEC. Would you concur?

Thanks in advance.


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## chris_h (Dec 17, 2003)

I agree it does not make sense for us to compare a program since we are on different feeds. Are any of the other three people with this issue on the west coast feed of HBO?

Also, if you are part of an advocacy group of some kind for users of CC, it might make sense to see if any of them get HBO-HD via another carier such as cable, and find out if they see the same issues.

I will definately check the CC on the next movie I record on HBO-HD. I watched a few minutes of captions on "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory" about a week ago and they were fine.


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## bicker (Nov 9, 2003)

I couldn't find any standards for the usability of closed captions. It seems like the FAA forgot to put any such standards into the regulations.


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## TyroneShoes (Sep 6, 2004)

chris_h said:


> TyroneShoes,
> 
> I would expect for the entire data stream, including digital CCs to be covered by the same level of FEC. Would you concur?
> 
> Thanks in advance.


Certainly. But I don't see that as a potential trouble point. The CC is coded into 188-byte digital words right along with the video, audio, DRM, and everything else. Being digital, decoding should present a virtual copy of the coded input. What this means to me, and this is just assumption on my part, is that if you have CC problems due to improper decoding (improper in this case equaling missing or corrupted bits) you would very likely see sporadic problems with video and audio as well, regardless of the FEC level or symbol rate. What we know for sure is that the CC issue does not track a video or decoding issue. IOW, I do not really suspect a problem with CC after the encode point, but before it.

There is one thing that can cause CC problems after the encode point, and that is compression. For 608-style (analog) CC video servers typically leave an option for leaving line 21 uncompressed, which is not really a solution, but a ubiquitous workaround. But for 708-style CC, which is what ATSC uses (and I assume the process is similar for QPSK and whatever signal conditioning DTV uses for a digital feed) that should not be a problem. But then that doesn't rule out DTV and what they do to these signals as being the culprit, or at least one of the usual suspects.


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## TyroneShoes (Sep 6, 2004)

IneedCCs said:


> ...these regulations require DirecTV to pass along to its subscribers closed captions in the same condition in which they receive them from the program providers...


Many vendors go the extra mile, by stripping the CC at the intake point, reconstituting it, and reinserting it at the transmit point, which is a relatively expensive. Of course this will not solve problems not associated with degradation before they receive it, which will not help things after we receive it.

I have a method to help eliminate the HR10 CC feature as the problem, which is to set it to 480i with CC on, then turn on CC on your TV as well. This will overlay your TV CC over the HR10 CC. But, you should still be able to see if the data in each is the same. If it is, the HR10 CC feature can not be at fault.

It would also be interesting to see if a CATV feed of the HBOHD channel would have the same issues for a CATV sub. That would either eliminate DTV altogether (and point the finger at HBO), or be the smoking gun we could pick up and point right at them.


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## bicker (Nov 9, 2003)

IneedCCs said:


> In plain English, in essence these regulations require DirecTV to pass along to its subscribers closed captions *in the same condition* ...


Could you point out the specific section? I couldn't find the word "condition" anywhere, and don't see anything that requires anything other than supporting CC (in any condition -- I couldn't even find a basic utility clause!!!) I need this for my wife, who is hearing impaired and wants to start putting in complaints for each instance of messed up CC she experiences.


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## TyroneShoes (Sep 6, 2004)

But, if the "key words" include the rest of the statement...



> ...with the original closed captioning data intact in a format that can be recovered and displayed by decoders meeting the standards of part 15 of this chapter unless such programming is recaptioned or the captions are reformatted by the programming distributor.


...this could also be interpreted as if the vendor receives corrupted captioning or captioning that comes in on the wrong line (and there are problems that can shift it to the wrong line), or for whatever reason, the onus is on the vendor to reconstitute the captioning to a quality level that can be decoded at home, even if the vendor never received it that way in the first place.

Its just like if a TV station receives a program with bad video, they are expected to not air it and get a replacement that meets the requirements. They are not allowed to just air it in a degraded fashion simply because that's what was originally provided to them. CC has the same status.

This might explain why many vendors go to such lengths to preserve the integrity of CC. Too bad DTV isn't in that group. Maybe the common carrier rules are different for DBS and they are allowed to do this while a broadcaster is not.


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## bicker (Nov 9, 2003)

IneedCCs said:


> The key words are "with the original closed captioning data intact". In plain English, that means in the same condition in which it was received.


Uh, perhaps. My wife is having is three problems:

1) Lack of timing synchronization, with captions occurring either significantly prior to or after the corresponding dialog, sometimes as much as four or five seconds. Recent examples are Saved on TNT and Bones on Fox. Both were the HD versions of the programs. (Are there lower standards for HD broadcasts?)

2) Horrible captioning, with wrong words, incredibly poor spelling, and a lot of skipped phrases. That's to be expected in live programming but not in recorded programs like Mythbusters on Discovery, where my wife noted it just yesterday.

3) No captions, such as many programs on Discovery Channel (but that might not be the case any longer... she gave up on Discovery, except for Mythbusters, because of this).



> But what DirecTV is delivering now is unacceptable -- there are so many missing lines of dialogue, the HD channels are unwatchable by those (like me) who rely on closed captioning to watch TV.


However, my wife reports the same issues as you do, and we're not DirecTV customers. Why do you think DirecTV is at fault, given that we have Comcast?


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## bicker (Nov 9, 2003)

So your problems aren't extreme as the ones that we're experiencing? Okay I must have misunderstood. Sorry.


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## phox_mulder (Feb 23, 2006)

bicker said:


> 1) Lack of timing synchronization, with captions occurring either significantly prior to or after the corresponding dialog, sometimes as much as four or five seconds. Recent examples are Saved on TNT and Bones on Fox. Both were the HD versions of the programs. (Are there lower standards for HD broadcasts?)


That problem is pretty widespread, and easily explained.

It happens when the station doesn't have equipment to deal with HD captions properly, so they are stripping out the SD captions and re-inserting them into the HD feed.

If you put 2 TV's in the same room, tune one to the SD channel and one to the HD channel, you'll see that the SD channel is 2-5 seconds ahead of the same program on the HD channel, thus the captions being ahead of the dialogue on the HD channel.
The only explanation I can think of as to why they would be so far behind the dialogue on the HD channel, is if the station is delaying both SD and HD feeds, and somehow the HD feed gets delayed less, either operator error, or less/different commercials in the HD version.

Best bet would be to call the offending Station, or in the case of TNT, call TNT.

Captioning on Saved on TNT-HD was so bad the other night, it had to be at least 6 seconds behind,
I deleted the HD version and watched the back up SD version I recorded on the R10, 
and the captioning was spot on.

phox


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## TyroneShoes (Sep 6, 2004)

phox_mulder said:


> That problem is pretty widespread, and easily explained.
> 
> It happens when the station doesn't have equipment to deal with HD captions properly, so they are stripping out the SD captions and re-inserting them into the HD feed...


I'm afraid that really doesn't explain much regarding the sync issue, but it does explain one variation of the sync issue. That would also be, IMHO, bush-league engineering. It also doesn't make a lot of sense, since most stations pass the HD feed intact, including the embedded captions. There is rarely a need to extract captions from the SD feed for any purpose, let alone reinserting them into a HD feed which virtually 100% of the time includes its own CC. Those few stations who downconvert to HD-SDI and reconvert to SMPTE310 also typically find no need or desire to meddle with CC, as it is usually handled pretty transparently even in that case.

But it is worrisome. The local WB (ne CW) affil here will broadcast one segment of a network HD program fairly intact, or in sync, and the next segment will have CC that is as much as 20 seconds early. You have to go back and watch the commercial directly adjacent to the segment to get the CC for the upcoming segment.

I doubt they are doing anything purposefully to make that happen, as TV stations never do anything on purpose that either doesn't directly provide or protect a revenue stream, or unless the FCC makes them do it. Unfortunately, they are also doing nothing purposefully to KEEP it from happening.

I find CC annoying even when its as in sync as it can get. Even then, seeing the lines slightly early or late degrades the viewing experience. In a sitcom it can destroy the comedic timing, and in a drama it can destroy the dramatic timing.

This is a system with a lot of problems, and a lot of potential trouble points, including but not limited to bad engineering, badly designed equipment, lack of proper understanding of the system and how it is used by viewers, lack of interest in making it work properly, lack of consistent decoder technology, and just plain bad captioning technique to begin with.

The folks with the powerful lobby that forced this system on all of us (which was not necessarily a bad idea) were very successful in making CC ubiquitous. What they were not successful at was providing or enforcing any kind of plan to make it work properly, which is a shame, because it is technically very possible to do that. Bottom line, it's a mess, and I don't expect it to get significantly better for a long time.


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## phox_mulder (Feb 23, 2006)

Whatever the reason, the station I work at is doing exactly what I described.
And I see the result when watching the digital channel either at work, or at home.

We have done it this way, per instructions from both the manufacturer of our equipment, and CBS who told us we had to get that specific equipment, since we first went on the air with a digital channel.
I'm sure this was all done prior to the ATSC Closed Captioning standard being agreed upon, and the fact that HD content from CBS wasn't captioned due to the different standards being played around with.

I believe it also has something to do with the 27 hours of non HD on the digital channel, and is affecting the 3 hours of actual HD in primetime.

The upconverter or frame syncs on either end aren't passing the captions, so they are extracted prior to the input frame sync, upconverter and output frame sync, then reinserted in.

Now, just recently in the past 6 months or so, CBS is captioning their HD material, but we are still doing captions the way we've always been doing them, again due to the other 27 hours of SD.
Switching to the captions sent by CBS on the HD programming for 3 hours a night would require a major break in the chain to bypass the equipment that has to be there for the other 27 hours, both prior to primetime, and following primetime.
Then again after the late news for Letterman, then again at the end of Letterman.

Throw in the ancient HD delay servers we are using, that might be another hurdle that won't pass the HD captions correctly.
I know our backup HD video tape machines can't even pass 5.1 audio, rendering them useless for 90% of the HD programming we air.

Yes, two totally seperate systems for delaying SD programming on the Analog channel, and HD programming on the digital channel.
Both started, paused, and played by human hands and a clock, which easily explains the sync being ahead at times, and behind at times.
All of primetime is delayed, nothing is aired "live from the network", therefore the HD isn't being passed as it was sent.
Heck, we're even seperating the audio from the video, then combining them again prior to transmission.

I'm sure with the right equipment we could do it the right way, but this way is following the letter of the law, captions being passed as they were received, and the powers that be must be happy with that.
There's always the curse of no money, and what little money there is going to things that the higher ups can see bringing money back into the station, which Closed Captioning doesn't do, at least according to them.

Another interesting tidbit.
There was an episode of CSI, the original Vegas version, a year or so ago that had a totally different opening sequence on HD than it did on SD.
SD had close up action happening, CSI folk arriving on scene, finding the body, etc.
HD had a really cool Vegas flyover that wouldn't look as cool on SD.
Voiceover was the same though, so captioning wasn't reall affected.
Proof that simulcast HD and SD sometimes isn't the same.


phox


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## TyroneShoes (Sep 6, 2004)

Wow. That kind of underlines my point about it being a mess. But that's still an anecdotal situation and hardly describes the general issues we see with CC in most every instance.

I take back my "bush-league" comment, as that was probably unfair. It's only fair if that is a choice made from multiple options, and completely unfair if that is the only choice.

I'm curious, what HD delay server is so ancient as to not pass 708 CC? Are they HD-SDI or what? Most HD servers today are ASI based, so everthing is pretty transparent. It sounds like you're trying to do HD without automation, which seems like it would be an operational nightmare.

And doesn't CBS provide a mountain feed? I thought only MyTV didn't provide feeds to all time zones. Even FOX provides feeds to all time zones, including a special feed just for Arizona (who marches to their own drummer), for just two stations who carry HD. Of course they make it very simple by using MPEG splicers. The CBS affils here seem to have no issue with CC or delaying prime.


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## phox_mulder (Feb 23, 2006)

TyroneShoes said:


> I take back my "bush-league" comment, as that was probably unfair. It's only fair if that is a choice made from multiple options, and completely unfair if that is the only choice.


We were very rushed to get our digital channel, and thus HD on the air.
CBS threw all this equipment at us and said get it done.
This was 5-6 years ago, (not good on timeframes, 9/11 seems like it was 2 years ago or so) and we are still using the same equipment.


TyroneShoes said:


> I'm curious, what HD delay server is so ancient as to not pass 708 CC? Are they HD-SDI or what? Most HD servers today are ASI based, so everthing is pretty transparent. It sounds like you're trying to do HD without automation, which seems like it would be an operational nightmare.


It's Panasonic, says "DVCPro Server" on it, AJ-HDR150,
it has input Codec's and output Codec's (AJ-HDP151), and a RAID array of hard drives.
SDI sounds right, they were old technology when we got them, if I remember correctly, it wasn't even made for HD, the Codec's had to be added into the system to produce something the Server could record and play back.

When CBS started using Metadata for 5.1/2.0 switching, we found the input Codec was not passing it, or not passing it cleanly.
We had to send one back to Panasonic so they could figure something out, they did, then sent us an upgraded chip to install into the other 3 codec's.
I don't think the server is having problems with Closed Captioning, but upconverting during the day, getting that captioning working on the Digital channel that's the problem, so the HD captioning suffers, but at least it's whole, not missing parts like HBO and SHO HD.


TyroneShoes said:


> And doesn't CBS provide a mountain feed? I thought only MyTV didn't provide feeds to all time zones. Even FOX provides feeds to all time zones, including a special feed just for Arizona (who marches to their own drummer), for just two stations who carry HD. Of course they make it very simple by using MPEG splicers. The CBS affils here seem to have no issue with CC or delaying prime.


No mountain feed from CBS.
Eastern, Central and Pacific get a feed, but not us.
We take the Eastern feed and delay it an hour, both SD and HD programming.
Neither delay is automated, they are both started, paused, played and stopped by human hands.

Since you're in the "know", we are still using Tektronix Profiles for our SD network delay, SD commercial playback and syndicated program playback.
PDR 100's, 200's and 300's still chugging away.

We had an Omneon budgeted for this year, but Super Doppler Radar took priority and the money.
One Omneon would have replaced all the PDR's, and the HD Panasonic servers, and be automatable(?).

Now I'll get fired for releasing "Proprietary" CBS technology. (of 10 years ago) 

phox


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## TyroneShoes (Sep 6, 2004)

phox_mulder said:


> ...we are still using Tektronix Profiles for our SD network delay, SD commercial playback and syndicated program playback.
> PDR 100's, 200's and 300's still chugging away.
> 
> ...Now I'll get fired for releasing "Proprietary" CBS technology. (of 10 years ago)
> ...


Nahhhh! They might fire "phox", if they could figure out who that is, but probably not you  .

Since we're going OT, check for a PM, please.


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## TyroneShoes (Sep 6, 2004)

IneedCCs said:


> "Bottom line, it's a mess, and I don't expect it to get significantly better for a long time."
> 
> Tyrone -- As a hearing impaired person who relies on captioning, I don't view things quite the same way...
> 
> I'm sure that, as an engineer, there are plenty of reasons why you feel "it's a mess", but as an "end-user", I think captioning is a god-send and, all things considered, in pretty good shape _if the people responsible for maintaining its integrity_ (by whom I mean the executive officers of the company, not its engineers, who I am not impugning) give a damn and treat captioning complaints seriously and give them the attention they require and deserve.


Well, that's exactly what I mean by it being a mess. They don't. So I think we share pretty similar views, actually. Don't let my pessimism deter you in your quest, tho, I'm with you all the way.

I feel your pain, and I agree that CC is a terrific idea, just poorly executed more often than not. I would love to see a grass-roots movement to improve things, because I'm afraid that is what it will take. Power to the peeps!

Even just the simple things that make it better, like one-button captioning, or the option to go to CC on mute...stuff that makes sense. I'd love to see the hearing-empaired lobby, powerful as it is, make that mandatory on TV sets and PVRs.


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## orinaccio (Sep 18, 2003)

I'm based in L.A. and have been observing the same issues described above. As stated earlier, I'm on my second HR10-250, which was my CSR's response to my complaint on HD captioning. Captioning issues remained, which was no surprise to me. 

Ive gone through this before with the standard definition DirecTV/Tivo box (which I still have) and I'm going through this again with the HR10-250 it seems. The problems were resolved with the old SD DirecTV/Tivo box by subsequent software fixes, and this leads me to suspect that the issues plaguing the HR10-250 is possibly software related. However I recognize the problems could very well lay elsewhere in the hardware or transmission. 

The only thing that is clear is that the problems are consistent among numerous users. Moreover, i have not seen a single HR10-250 user that says they are NOT experiencing the same issues when watching a program in its entirety in the affected channels. I eagerly await word from anyone that says that they are not experiencing these issues, but if this issue is consistent and widespread as it looks like it is, then we should be approaching this in the same way we would if audio on HD channels were afflicted with comparable problems for every viewer. Who would want to bother with subscribing to HD channels if audio got cut or garbled every now and then on a channel? 

For the poster that mentioned 5 minutes of captioning appeared to be fine, i urge you to watch a HBO-HD program (I do not receive SHO-HD but it sounds like the issue is similar) in its entirety, as was suggested by others. I also suggest try watching without audio - you will find that you become lost quite easily with the missing words, lines and corrupted dialogue that surface every now and then in a program, sometimes after you've watched it for a good five or ten minutes stretch. As others point out, programs on affected channels are unwatchable in this form and extremely frustrating, especially if the dialogue is important (which it is on most shows). 

I would also like to add that the same problems exist also on local HD channels, ABC, Fox, CBS and NBC.

Edit: I would like to point out that the video quality of the HD channels are otherwise excellent. I have no idea about the audio (being hearing impaired), but i have not noticed any unusual sounds that might indicate corruption or feedback.


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## chris_h (Dec 17, 2003)

I watched "In her shoes" last night which had recorded previously off of HBO-HD (west). For the first hour or so, I had on CC and audio. I would say the captions were normal for about 80% of the time. Yes, I realize that 20% of bad captioning makes the program unwatchable for folks who need them. 

The types of issues I saw with CC I think could be explained by bit errors in the CC data stream. I am admittedly unfamiliar with the CC data protocol, but I am pretty knowledgeable about computer protocols in general. Here are some examples of the things I saw which were bad:
1) Lines of dialog missing in captioning.
2) The "black box" which contains the white letters was aprox 10 times larger than needed to contain the dialog.
3) A case of captioning that should have said "could have sworn I had" showed up as"could have sworndwornd I had" (maybe the word sworn was meant to be bold or italics?).
4) part of "black box" turned a different color. once it was green, once it was pinkish.
5) captioning disappearing too soon. In other words, it was only on the screen for maybe 5 to 10 frames, and should have been on the screen for 1 to 2 seconds.

We all know that Directv processes the video to down-res to HD-Lite on most HD channels, including HBO-HD. I wonder if somehow this process is affecting the CC data too? Or maybe the CC is stripped out and added back in after the down-res processing, and the "adding back in" process is not going right.

There are other possibilities as well. Maybe the issue is further up the distribution chain. I think if it were an issue with the signal from HBO to their satellite (space they probably lease) then you would see it nationwide on all distribution outlets, including cable. AFAIK, this is not happening. It could also be an issue with the receiver that Directv uses to get the signal from HBO. I suspect that Directv has redundant receivers here.

It is unfortunate that Directv has been so unresponsive in fixing this issue for you. I think your plan to complain to the FCC is your best bet. You may even want to consider providing them a recording as an example.

I also suffered thru  a rerun of Bikini Destinations from HDNET, and saw solid CC, but it disappeared for aprox 20 seconds one time, like what you see there too.

I also took a look at an OTA broadcast of cops via KTXL, fox40. The captions disapeared after aprox 5 frames pretty consistently. I think this is a case of poor captioning.


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## IanInSF (Apr 20, 2004)

The cc options have separate lines for standard and digital captions. I notice that when I'm watching HBO-HD, I get better results if I turn off the standard and turn on the digital.


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## chris_h (Dec 17, 2003)

IanInSF said:


> The cc options have separate lines for standard and digital captions. I notice that when I'm watching HBO-HD, I get better results if I turn off the standard and turn on the digital.


Interesting. I did not think to try that. I have a macro to turn them both on, and another macro to turn them both off.

I also tried viewing the "standard" captions via 480i (HR10-250 hooked to a Hitachi 53UWX10B TV via component cables) and they did not even show up. I wonder if the standard captions do not show up when the digital captions are on. I got the impression from the post by TyroneShoes that they would.


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## chris_h (Dec 17, 2003)

IneedCCs said:


> You've done a very good job of describing the problems I've had, including the green and pink boxes and large black backgrounds for the text. I haven't mentioned those (and other) things because I didn't want to nit-pick.
> ...
> My complaint is at the FCC. Stay tuned for updates on the situation.


I don't consider it nit-picking at all. I think that this level of detail is what will be needed in order to bring an eventual resolution to this problem. I think that the details I provided do point to bit-level corruption of the digital CC data stream.

Please do keep us posted on the FCC route, and any input/resolution you get from Directv. I wish you luck.


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## TyroneShoes (Sep 6, 2004)

chris_h said:


> I don't consider it nit-picking at all. I think that this level of detail is what will be needed in order to bring an eventual resolution to this problem. I think that the details I provided do point to bit-level corruption of the digital CC data stream.
> 
> Please do keep us posted on the FCC route, and any input/resolution you get from Directv. I wish you luck.


That sharp smack we all just heard was probably the sound of a hammer hitting a nail on the head. A separate sharp smack for each of all 3 points, actually.

There is a lot of FEC and other redundancy in digitally distributed content to allow degraded reception to still create a perfect picture, perfect sound. But, maybe some corners are being cut in the area of CC. IOW, maybe there is no real error correction or other measures that will insure a good result for CC in every situation. I still would like to hear from CATV HBOHD viewers, to see if they see the same thing.


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## Aaron3001 (Oct 10, 2003)

I use the CC because i am hard of hearing. i do have the HR10-250 and watch the HD networks and HBO. The problem i see is on my tv the words are gettinged cut off by one or 2 letters on the right siide. also, if i turn off the Digital CC on the dish and leave standard CC on, watch the Tonight Show. i get enlgish CC folllowed by spanish CC, WTF? maybe it's cause i live in CA.  but i do notice some of the problems being talked about, getting CC on the HD channels, having it stop for 2 or 3 mins then coming back or missing dialog, it does suck. i'm not totally deaf, i wear hearing aids wand i wear headphones while watching Tivo'd shows so i don't miss anything.


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## chris_h (Dec 17, 2003)

IneedCCs,

No offense taken. No appology necessary. I have literally picked nits, and it is an even more detail-oriented process than this! Like I said, I provided the details in the hopes that the information would lead to an eventual resolution, once you finally get someone from Directv to wake up and smell the garbage CCs. I continue to wish you luck with that.

I was able to finally get the standard CCs to show up on the show "In her shoes" and they were fine. I had to set my TV on 480i, with CC setting of the TV on, and the HR10 set to standard CCs on. I was also able to view the bad digital CCs simultaneously. So that tells me that the two versions of CC are different data streams.

I wonder if the bad digital CCs are just another sign of growing pains in the digital TV realm.


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## chris_h (Dec 17, 2003)

I know this won't come as much of a surprise to anyone. I recorded another airing of the "In her shoes" movie and looked for two very specific cases of garbled CCs. They were fine on the second showing. This just means that whatever is causing the corruption is not deterministic. Not surprising, but still a good data point, methinks.


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## orinaccio (Sep 18, 2003)

I taped two different showings of the same movie myself too, over the weekend. 

I can confirm that the missing lines, words, and garbled CC's do not occur at identical periods. For example, one line that went missing on one showing, may appear just fine on the other showing of the same film. However, a line will go missing on the second showing that had appeared without problems on the first showing. 

The frequency and level of captioning problems seem to be identical. Every few minutes a problem with the captions will surface, so one showing of a program is not "better" with captions than the other.


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## TyroneShoes (Sep 6, 2004)

All of that would point to the captions being intact in the source material, and becoming corrupted along the way. It would also point to the original MPEG2 compression not being the culprit.

If you extent that line of thinking, it might point towards what I was speaking of earlier, which is not enough error correction and redundancy in the delivered bit stream for CC, which could be as a result of the secondary compression and statmux that is used to fit everything into that bit stream.


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## orinaccio (Sep 18, 2003)

Wonder if the new 6.3 software update will address the captioning issues with HD channels. 

Software updates to my standard R10 DirecTV/Tivo box helped a great deal with the captioning problems that previously plagued it. 

I am keeping two of the films that I previously recorded to document captioning flaws, and will compare it with the same film recorded after the update whenever I get it.


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## phox_mulder (Feb 23, 2006)

I think it will help somewhat.

I think part of the problem is related to the main problem with the HR10, it's extremely slow,
the processor is doing too much, which slows it down, and perhaps loses track of the captions.

Once everything is running faster, it might clear some of the caption problems up.

I don't think it will fix all though,
as there are still breaks in captioning that I'm seeing on the R10 every now and then,
just not near as often, or as long.


phox


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## Capmeister (Jan 20, 2005)

Capmeister said:


> Well, it might be everywhere, but intermittant. I've heard reports from other locales that (like mine) sometimes it works, sometimes it is out of synch.


Update on this... WSMH is now in my area and their Fox CCing is fine. Interesting.


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## Capmeister (Jan 20, 2005)

Regarding FOX's HD CCing, in my area WSMH 66 just went digital. Their CC on their HD channel has lag, just as local WSYM 47 does. Not on their own commercials, but on Fox network shows and ads there is lag. AND I was able to watch their SD channel and an HD at the same time. The HD CC being sent is for SD--it's timed with the SD picture. The HD picture is timed differently so the CC is out of synch.


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## bicker (Nov 9, 2003)

I suspect that a timing lag of less than 10 seconds, while rendering CC pretty useless for those who use them, would still be considered passing through the CC as they're transmitted. The regulations don't specify any limit for timing lag.


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## Capmeister (Jan 20, 2005)

No. CCing has to be useful, however, and I would think the FCC would act.


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## chris_h (Dec 17, 2003)

I have the new 6.3 software running on my HD-Tivo. I just watched a little bit of "Phantom of the Opera" recorded after the software update. There is some improvement, but my guess is that it still does not meet the required level to be watchable. If I have time to watch any of the movies I recorded on HBO-HD I will watch them with captioning on and report back. It should be interesteing to see if there is any correlation between CC issues and DD audio dropout (which I also have on record, see the other thread).

IneedCCs, do you have 6.3 yet?


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## chris_h (Dec 17, 2003)

IneedCCs said:


> I'm still convinced that something about the manner in which DirecTV is turning around the signals they receive from program providers is corrupting the CC data, and that only corrective action of whatever they're doing is going to render these channels watchable.


I agree. And thanks for not shooting the messenger!


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## bicker (Nov 9, 2003)

Capmeister said:


> No. CCing has to be useful, however, and I would think the FCC would act.


Well, I rather doubt that the FCC would act, even if the CC was clearly in violation. And that's a shame. However, with regard to the delay, and with regard to a determination as subjective as "useful," there is little doubt in my mind that the benefit-of-the-doubt will go to the broadcaster.


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## orinaccio (Sep 18, 2003)

I called Direct TV recently and reached an office described as an "Advanced Tier 2" ( I had asked specifically for a department that has experience with and works on High Definition units/Tivo units). The customer rep began by saying she was unaware of captioning issues (the first response that many of us seem to get) but would speak with the supervisor.

After speaking with her supervisor the conversation shifted and we started to discuss what could be done to address the problems I've been experiencing. She said that she believed the 6.3 upgrade would address some of the captioning issues, and suggested that I wait to see how it worked for me.She told me that the 6.3 upgrade roll-out would be completed by October 5th (not sure if this has been delayed due to the stoppage mentioned in another thread).

She also suggested providing me with a H20-700 unit (non-tivo) as a replacement. I answered by saying that I preferred to wait and see from other customers if the captions were an improvement or not on that unit. I have not heard from this website or www.dbstalk.com (I posted two queries there and so far no response) on the quality of the captions, so I am hesitant to replace my unit with a box that could be worse.

Finally, they refunded me my high def package payments.

Right now Im waiting to see how 6.3 works out and will go from there.

Im still surprised by how customer support reps are unfamiliar with the captioning problems. I dont want to speculate as to why, but it seems that they are extremely poor in their record-keeping and reporting of captioning complaints.


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## bicker (Nov 9, 2003)

Rather, I suspect that there are so few complaints that each individual CSR is as likely as not to have never encountered one.


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## chris_h (Dec 17, 2003)

Another data point, the digital CCs on the second selection (spanish) were clean. My spanish is not what it used to be, so it is possible that there were missing words/lines, but I really do not think so. I watched for about 30 minutes on "Phantom of the Opera" from HBO-HD before nodding off. Yes, I know that no one should be expected to learn spanish just to be able to use D*. I still found it interesting that this data stream was clean. Could be coincidence.


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## TyroneShoes (Sep 6, 2004)

My guess is that expecting 6.3 to improve CC might be wishful thinking. I don't think the real problems with CC are on the radar of anyone other than those who are vexed by them, and I don't expect first of all that Tivo even imagines that there is a problem, let alone one that can be fixed by an up rev to their OS. I'd like to be pleasantly surprised, but if it were to happen, a definite surprise is exactly what it would be.


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## TyroneShoes (Sep 6, 2004)

It could be done within the STB OS software. Obviously, how it is displayed (yellow font, blue font, different font, drop shadow direction, etc.) is handled there.

But the problem is not in how well the software or hardware decodes it as much as it is in what happens to the CC on the way to the STB. It goes through a very hostile environment of 46,000 miles of free space and atmosphere, for one thing, and is squeezed and massaged endlessly before that. It could simply be that it does not have the robustness or redundancy to survive all of that intact.

Add on top of that the fact that the encoding and decoding methods are not strictly spelled out as far as the precise method employed, and different programs from different sources as well as different algorithms in STBs make it a bit hit-or-miss.

But sadly, the biggest obstacle is that few care, or even understand that there really is a problem with this system. There would have to be a significant groundswell of "I'm mad as hell, and I'm not going to take this anymore!" before we would see this fixed, I'm afraid. Hope we all live to see that.


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## TyroneShoes (Sep 6, 2004)

Actually, SD CC is a lot more vulnerable to degradation, ironically enough, but the potential for degradation in the path for HD from a sat is much higher so the end result is more problems with digital CC. SD CC is done very differently.

I'm not sure where I "missed the mark" for you, but if you ask specifically, I will be happy to explain, and no offense taken, so ask away.


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## orinaccio (Sep 18, 2003)

It probably is wishful thinking that software revisions (6.3) may fix closed captioning issues. 

however, updates to the software on my DirecTV/Tivo (standard definition unit) DID fix the captioning problems that previously plagued it. It used to be really bad, although not as bad as the HD captioning issues. This is where I am basing my hopes that 6.3 will do something to improve the situation, although it admittedly has no basis in anything except that the symptoms seem to be similar.


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## chris_h (Dec 17, 2003)

orinaccio said:


> It probably is wishful thinking that software revisions (6.3) may fix closed captioning issues.
> 
> however, updates to the software on my DirecTV/Tivo (standard definition unit) DID fix the captioning problems that previously plagued it. It used to be really bad, although not as bad as the HD captioning issues. This is where I am basing my hopes that 6.3 will do something to improve the situation, although it admittedly has no basis in anything except that the symptoms seem to be similar.


See my post on 9-21-2006. I had a unit running 6.3 (it died) and recordings made when this software was active still showed the same issues, but it was some better. I attribute the improvement more to coincidence than the 6.3 software.


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## jimest (Jan 27, 2002)

I just found this thread by doing a search for closed captions.

I am watching "Heros" that I recorded on my Time Warner SA8300HD and the closed caption only displays about every other sentence.

It is recorded on the NBC HD channel, I am beginning to think that the closed caption problem is related to High Def and not any particular receiver.


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## bicker (Nov 9, 2003)

We had no trouble with CC with Heroes when we watched it this week, but this wasn't TWC and not the SA8300HD, so I would look at those two aspects as the source of the problem, rather than NBC HD itself.


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## orinaccio (Sep 18, 2003)

For those that subscribe to this thread, please note theres a new stickied thread on this forum - perhaps we can all participate and provide additional data relating to the captioning problems we are discussing here.

http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=320325


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## TyroneShoes (Sep 6, 2004)

Of course that thread is limited to SHOHD, but then there is a free preview this week, so maybe more of us who have a CC concern can chime in.


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## Aaron3001 (Oct 10, 2003)

phox_mulder said:


> I've noticed similair problems with HBO and SHO HD.
> 
> No gobbledygook, but it'll be fine for a while, then it will stick on one phrase through a couple minutes of dialog, then pick up and be fine for a while again.


I see this problem on my HR10-250, which is the only problem i have with CC unless it doesn't show up on that show. but it happens on my HD locals as well when i tivo CSI Miami, LV or ER. so even with the release of firmware it's still a problem.


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