# First impressions of new TiVo



## Bigg (Oct 31, 2003)

I got a Premiere XL4 today, and I'll post more about it later, but it's not doing well in first impressions. First of all, the HD menus are completely unusable, and the SD menus are slow as molasses, but sort-of tolerable, since they are about the exact same speed as the S2. So apparently, TiVo has not advanced the speed of their menu system since 2004.

The installation was also a pain, as it had to connect to the internet 3x, and now it's still processing all the guide data.

One nice surprised was that I have XoD on a SA system that's not listed as having it, and the CableCard setup was great. Out of the companies I've dealt with today, the only one that was good was Comcast. Apparently the world is upside-down today.

The TiVo app is pretty cool too, I was remote controlling it, and the keyboard is great for typing things in to search. We'll have to see how the rest of it is tomorrow when I try to program stuff to record.

The remote is great too. Not quite the S2 peanut, but pretty nice, and it actually is smart enough to turn the AVR and TV on!!!!! I love how it's smart enough to figure out how to do all that at once. We had the S2 remote in it's last days tricked to control the AVR, but now one remote to rule them all, at least at 5:30 in the morning when I just want to watch TV. The only thing is can't do is switch inputs, but I guess I can't complain, as most setups aren't switching using video processors that have discreet codes from the TV and AVR.


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## Arcady (Oct 14, 2004)

Again, the interface will be slower the first day or two, since the TiVo has to download, index, blah, blah, blah. It's also slow for a while after a reboot.

The SDUI should be way faster than a S2 after the first day or two, and the HDUI will improve, but always remain slightly slower than a two-tuner Premiere. The next version of the TiVo will likely contain a chip similar to the Mini, which is said to be nice and speedy, but of course it is not recording four things at one time like an Elite/4/4XL.


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## mattack (Apr 9, 2001)

SD menus are slow as molasses? That's weird. I'd call them very fast, definitely faster than S1.


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## Bigg (Oct 31, 2003)

Turns out I don't actually have XoD yet, but it should be coming soon. All the menus are a lot faster now. Still not sure if I like the whole HD thing. They are cool looking, but they're also visually cluttered. I may just be a creature of habit, coming (several years back) from an S2.


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## Bigg (Oct 31, 2003)

The HD menus got a lot better after the first day. The HDUI is decent. The one thing that's annoying is how many format switches it does. It should be able to handle putting TiVo Central up in whatever format the channel you are watching is in to avoid the format changes.

The box is pretty good overall. The activation process was a nightmare, as TiVo's website is basically broken all around, and they had like 6 duplicate accounts from the last time when I tried to buy a Slide Remote. I missed that deal because of their nonfunctional website, BUT I actually don't mind the iPhone app method, as it's free, and it works really well for text entry. I just set the peanut down and use the keyboard on the iPhone, which also avoids having to learn a new 'board.

I put all my SP's in, and that took a while, but once I got them in, it's been good. I couldn't figure out how to set deafult SP settings, if there is a way.

The video quality seems better than the MCE machine, I don't know if that's just because of native mode out to the scaler, or if the setup of a standalone CE device is somehow better than Windows for video. The remote that turns everything on is AMAZING. So much better than using 3 remotes to turn everything on and off.

TiVo's whole menu system makes a lot more sense than MCE, just about everything in fact does. The one idiotic thing is that it can't seem to handle recording a show across multiple channels, as SP's are one channels only, and it has a tough time with HD vs. SD, so I just deleted all the SD channels that have HD versions from my channels received list, and that solved the problem. Going through that, I realized how much garbage I get, with dozens of channels I've either never watched, or never heard of. TiVo was also a little stupid about picking channels, and it picked up the old HD channels in the 2XX range, which don't work anymore, they are only in the 1XXX range, so I had to clear those out as well.

Actually watching TV is so much better than with MCE, the remote is better, the responsiveness seems smoother and more consistent, if not actually any faster, so that FFing and RWing are a lot easier.

Suggestions seem like a total crapshoot, but Wishlists are already working. They can be very noisy, but with 4 tuners, I'm willing to pull in all sorts of junk and delete it quickly if I find 1 out of 100 programs is something that I want to watch. But on Wishlists, WTF is up with using the SDUI for that? It's like getting kicked out of a whole world into another when you go to do the Wishlists.

I haven't really played with the VOD stuff yet, but I'm looking forward to trying Amazon VOD at 1080p.

Sorry for the rambling post, it's been a long short week already.

I like the whole 1% full thing. We'll see what I end up staying at, maybe 3% full? It's nice to have basically unlimited storage in an HD box.


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## Arcady (Oct 14, 2004)

I set my boxes to 1080i only and then the TV doesn't switch all the time. Makes no difference to me if the TiVo scales the image or if the TV does it.


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## aaronwt (Jan 31, 2002)

The TiVo does put up TiVo central in the 720P or 1080i resolution that the channel is on. At least it does on my premieres when using the video window.


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## dlfl (Jul 6, 2006)

aaronwt said:


> The TiVo does put up TiVo central in the 720P or 1080i resolution that the channel is on. At least it does on my premieres when using the video window.


Does this depend on whether you've set the TiVo to fixed output resolution?

Also, if you're using HDMI output, don't the resolution changes cause nasty video glitches?


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## dlfl (Jul 6, 2006)

Bigg said:


> I got a Premiere XL4 today, and I'll post more about it later, but it's not doing well in first impressions.


Most of your further comments have been favorable. 


Bigg said:


> The installation was also a pain, as it had to connect to the internet 3x, and now it's still processing all the guide data.
> .........


This is nothing new is it? I guess one could be disappointed that the newer models aren't faster but the guide data download speed may be limited by factors other than the Tivo.


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## TexasDVR (Feb 20, 2013)

I have noticed varying degrees of happiness from different users of TiVo Premier.

Overall we are happy with the new TiVo Premier and it has performed well. For sure the amount of Bugs in the software and the changing from HDUI to SDUI are the mark of an unfinished product, it still manages to do its job well.

We are a first time TiVo user, about 3 months now: Premier 500G 2tuner for OTA only and our first impression are:

1. Activation was straight forward and fast. Yes it did take about a day for the box to update and configure itself and if I recall correctly it rebooted itself about 3 times before it made itself happy. Yes on the third reboot, I was getting worried. By the second day it was great. There were a couple of things on the TiVo web site that could have been a little more straight forward, so I just guessed at the answers and it turned out fine.

2. We run the box in full native mode  all resolutions sent in their original format to the plasma and HDUI as the default. For us that aspect of it works just a well as the old Sony DHG it replaced, which we also ran in full native mode. The video switching is fast enough for us so it is not a problem. It seems about the same as the Sony regarding speed/switching.

3. Coming from the Sony we did not like the TiVo peanut remote and upgraded to the Sony RM-VLZ620. For us it makes operating the TiVo much faster and easier. Remotes are a personal thing so YMMV. Basic DVR transport controls in the TiVo are lacking when compared to the Sony  the new remote addresses about a third of those.

4. We have been able to fine tune Season Pass, Suggestions, and Wishlist just the way we want them. So far (after fine tuning), Suggestions get us about 75-80% of programs we are interested in. Sometimes it will entirely miss the boat and record something way off course but that has been because the program guide was wrong form the source. Sony did have a feature called Keyword search that was a million times faster than TiVo; but the combination of Season Pass (which is much much better than Sony) and wishlist work well together as a replacement. Essentially, Season Pass records about 98% of what we watch, 1% from Wishlist, and 1% from Suggestions. Again YMMV.

The things I would like to see most on TiVo:

1. Get rid of the Bugs

2. Finish programming the HDUI and test the heck out of it before it is released (we like the HDUI over the SDUI).

3. Make stellar transport controls. There are dozen features in the nearly 10 year old Sony that could be used in the TiVo to make DVR life for the user much better.


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## aaronwt (Jan 31, 2002)

dlfl said:


> Does this depend on whether you've set the TiVo to fixed output resolution?
> 
> Also, if you're using HDMI output, don't the resolution changes cause nasty video glitches?


I have the TiVo output resolution set for 720P, 1080i, and 1080P24. If I am on an 720P channel and hit Guide or the TiVo button, the program will still be playing in the upper right corner and the output resolution will still be 720P. If the program i am watching is in 1080i, then after hitting those buttons the output will still be in 1080i.

It does causes it to resync with the resolution change. On another TiVo I have it set for only 1080i and 1080P24 output. On that one the output will always be in 1080i unless i am watching something from Amazon or Netflix that is in 1080p24.


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## Bigg (Oct 31, 2003)

Arcady said:


> I set my boxes to 1080i only and then the TV doesn't switch all the time. Makes no difference to me if the TiVo scales the image or if the TV does it.


You end up with 720i off of your 720p channels, as they are interlaced, but are still 720, which is effectively half HD. That's why native is so important.



dlfl said:


> Most of your further comments have been favorable.
> 
> This is nothing new is it? I guess one could be disappointed that the newer models aren't faster but the guide data download speed may be limited by factors other than the Tivo.


It got better after the setup process, which was kind of painful. You'd think a lot of the processing could be done on the servers, and then easily put into the box, but that doesn't seem to be the case. The HDUI is a LOT better now that the box has settled in and processed through the guide data. You'd think it would have an effective processing priority system as well to background/ de-prioritize the guide data load over the immediate UI needs.



TexasDVR said:


> I have noticed varying degrees of happiness from different users of TiVo Premier.
> 
> Overall we are happy with the new TiVo Premier and it has performed well. For sure the amount of Bugs in the software and the changing from HDUI to SDUI are the mark of an unfinished product, it still manages to do its job well.
> 
> ...


I would not agree on activation. Downloading stuff 3 times takes forever, and then the box is slow as a Louisiana swamp for quite a while.

The switching is as fast as the equipment on the other end can switch, no worse than any other components. Theoretically, a 1080p/60 mode would solve this by scaling internally, but I would still use native, as I want to offload that to my DVDO EDGE.

WHAT?!?!? The Peanut is literally the best remote made in the history of the world! The one on the S2 was a bit better than the one on the Premiere (other than the Premiere one being able to do a TV and an AVR), but the Premiere one is still awesome.

What are these "transport controls" you talk of?

I may end up turning off suggestions. We'll see. The Wishlists are great, but they are limited by the guide data. I have one for "train", and so far, I've gotten like 30 programs that are about music or kid's shows, and only one that's actually relevant, about TGV, but I can't really fault TiVo for the limited nature of what's available in the guide data.

I did notice that it's sucking in some repeats, which is disappointing. The guide data used to be near perfect on the S2, now it seems good, but not perfect. I'd kind of expect better for $500.

One new comment that I will make is that the NPL has gotten ridiculously cluttered. There's multiple folders, a bunch of other crap, and there's no way to move stuff off to some sort of silo or something for medium-term storage, since you could hold several hundred shows on a 2TB hard drive. Not a big deal I guess, but it's not as clean as the old S2, where you could literally go to NPL 0 (like inbox 0).


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## HerronScott (Jan 1, 2002)

Bigg said:


> It got better after the setup process, which was kind of painful. You'd think a lot of the processing could be done on the servers, and then easily put into the box, but that doesn't seem to be the case. The HDUI is a LOT better now that the box has settled in and processed through the guide data. You'd think it would have an effective processing priority system as well to background/ de-prioritize the guide data load over the immediate UI needs.


I was very surprised to see your initial comments about performance during the first day or so considering you've been a member here since 2003 and have almost 1900 quotes. Pretty standard reply whenever you see that kind of post by a new user is to wait until the initial load and indexing is done.



Bigg said:


> I did notice that it's sucking in some repeats, which is disappointing. The guide data used to be near perfect on the S2, now it seems good, but not perfect. I'd kind of expect better for $500.


The guide data is the same so the S2 should have recorded the same repeats as the Premiere assuming the Season Passes are configured correctly for 1st run only and the guide data is indeed inaccurate.

Scott


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## Arcady (Oct 14, 2004)

Bigg said:


> You end up with 720i off of your 720p channels, as they are interlaced, but are still 720, which is effectively half HD. That's why native is so important.


No. If you set the TiVo to 1080i fixed and watch a 720p program, the TiVo rescales the 720p program to 1080i. If you set the TiVo to native and play a 720p program, then it sends 720p to your TV and your TV switches to 720p mode, then scales to the native 1920x1080 pixels that your screen actually contains. Either way, the image is scaled. The only way to watch a "native" 720p image is to get a 720p TV that has a resolution of 1280x720. Any 1080i or 1080p set is going to scale 720p content no matter what you do.


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## mattack (Apr 9, 2001)

Bigg said:


> I put all my SP's in, and that took a while, but once I got them in, it's been good. I couldn't figure out how to set deafult SP settings, if there is a way.
> .
> TiVo's whole menu system makes a lot more sense than MCE, just about everything in fact does. The one idiotic thing is that it can't seem to handle recording a show across multiple channels, as SP's are one channels only, and it has a tough time with HD vs. SD, so I just deleted all the SD channels that have HD versions from my channels received list, and that solved the problem.


You can't set default settings, unfortunately.. I presume you mean make it so new SPs are "All Episodes", "New Only", with one minute pre & post pad.. which is what I'd do.

It's not really "idiotic", since autorecording wishlists will do what you want.

Plus, recordings (even setting up new SPs) seem to default to HD channels, and so will ARWLs nowadays. (I know that since I soon turned HD channels off since the P4 has so little storage comparatively.. I would fill it up way too quickly with HD recordings.)


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## steve614 (May 1, 2006)

TexasDVR said:


> 3. Make stellar transport controls. There are dozen features in the nearly 10 year old Sony that could be used in the TiVo to make DVR life for the user much better.


Is this in reference to the FF and RW controls?
What can the Sony do that the Tivo can't?


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## steve614 (May 1, 2006)

Bigg said:


> The Wishlists are great, but they are limited by the guide data. I have one for "train", and so far, I've gotten like 30 programs that are about music or kid's shows, and only one that's actually relevant, about TGV, but I can't really fault TiVo for the limited nature of what's available in the guide data.


You may not know this, but you can "fine tune" Wishlists to exclude key words by highlighting the keyword and pressing one of the thumb buttons.
A minus sign (-) before the key word excludes that key word in the search and parenthesis makes the key word optional.
For example, in the keyword for your "train" wishlist, you could enter:
Documentary, - Kids, - Animated, - Music. 
That would probably narrow down that Wishlist quite a bit.


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## TexasDVR (Feb 20, 2013)

Bigg said:


> It got better after the setup process, which was kind of painful.
> 
> I would not agree on activation. Downloading stuff 3 times takes forever, and then the box is slow as a Louisiana swamp for quite a while.
> 
> ...


Kind of Sort of answering two questions:

Transport Controls (what I would like to see):

Vastly improved DVR transport controls, as a minimum copy at least copy the 10 year old Sony DHG functionality: User definable FF and RW with at least the 3 speeds or maybe even 4 like the Sony, User definable Smart Que Adjust, Multi-Speed Slo-Mo, Butter Smooth FF and RW at all speeds (not jerky poppy), Consistent use of stop and exit from playback, User definable Bookmarks.

I consider those just basic elementary DVR features and they are sorely missed. For me this is TiVos weakest area. It is sort like buying a Lexus without Factory Air, Power Steering and Brakesonce you have had those things it is very hard to give them up. If you have never had them (or used them to your benefit) then you do not know what you are missing.

If I had to pick and choose just 3 of the above transport controls for the next TiVo in preference order:

1. Smart Que Adjust  User Definable
2. Butter Smooth FF/RW (this makes the smart que so super beneficial)
3. Bookmarks  User Definable

Set-Up - actually rebooting:

This one is sort of (not exactly) in the set-up mode (not really activation).

Recently I hit one of those TiVo bugs when going from the HDUI to the SDUI (because you have to, not because you want to). Anyway over this last week I noticed one of the SD screens was "blank" with no data at all. After a few days of "blankness" I thought I would try TiVo support. I am happy to report my first encounter with TiVo Support gets an "A". The response from support to correct the blank screen was to unplug for 15 seconds or more. So I did that. It goes through the Welcome screen, and perhaps a very short duration reboot. And of course plays the cartoon. So I let it do all that stuff wondering if this going to take a couple of hours. I let it be, and it corrected itself in about 5 minutes - no more blank screen.

I got a couple of other bugs that I should use TiVo support for as well, so I may give them a try next week for another one - no rush the box still works fine.


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## mattack (Apr 9, 2001)

TexasDVR said:


> 2. Butter Smooth FF/RW (this makes the smart que so super beneficial)


I'm definitely not defending it, and I would like this better too, but this is hard to do with MPEG.. especially reverse.. since frames are "diffed" in time against each other going forwards.

I think DVD players got so much better at it just because they have to deal with less data (at least if you're comparing to HD), and they could read/decode the video far faster than realtime.


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## Bigg (Oct 31, 2003)

HerronScott said:


> I was very surprised to see your initial comments about performance during the first day or so considering you've been a member here since 2003 and have almost 1900 quotes. Pretty standard reply whenever you see that kind of post by a new user is to wait until the initial load and indexing is done.
> 
> The guide data is the same so the S2 should have recorded the same repeats as the Premiere assuming the Season Passes are configured correctly for 1st run only and the guide data is indeed inaccurate.
> 
> Scott


I hadn't seen any posts about that issue, and I don't recall it being an issue with the S2, maybe it was an I forgot about it.

I think the guide data has gone downhill since I was on the S2. It should work itself out though, as it won't record the same episode twice, so after a week, there shouldn't be any more repeats coming in...



Arcady said:


> No. If you set the TiVo to 1080i fixed and watch a 720p program, the TiVo rescales the 720p program to 1080i. If you set the TiVo to native and play a 720p program, then it sends 720p to your TV and your TV switches to 720p mode, then scales to the native 1920x1080 pixels that your screen actually contains. Either way, the image is scaled. The only way to watch a "native" 720p image is to get a 720p TV that has a resolution of 1280x720. Any 1080i or 1080p set is going to scale 720p content no matter what you do.


You go from 720p to 1080i, you've lost the progressive scanning, and you only had 720 lines in the first place, so you've effectively passed through 720i. You can massage and convert the video, but in the process, you're losing data.

If you don't want to lose resolution, you use native output, then either run to a 1080p TV or a 1080p video processor like I am, and that way, you're always going up, from 1080i to 1080p or 720p to 1080p, and not losing resolution in the process.



mattack said:


> You can't set default settings, unfortunately.. I presume you mean make it so new SPs are "All Episodes", "New Only", with one minute pre & post pad.. which is what I'd do.
> 
> It's not really "idiotic", since autorecording wishlists will do what you want.
> 
> Plus, recordings (even setting up new SPs) seem to default to HD channels, and so will ARWLs nowadays. (I know that since I soon turned HD channels off since the P4 has so little storage comparatively.. I would fill it up way too quickly with HD recordings.)


Yeah. I would want to default to 10ep/KUID/1min post pad.

It is pretty idiotic. That's one of the very few things MCE does better, among a myriad of places where MCE fails. I just set up two SP's, but still, it should be able to handle it through one.

Mine were just defaulting to whatever came up in search, and I wasn't always paying attention, so I ended up with a few in blurry definition, so I just deleted the SD channels from the guide. Fixed the problem, and I never, ever, ever, want the SD channels anyways. I have an XL4, and it's not worth my time if it's not in HD.



steve614 said:


> You may not know this, but you can "fine tune" Wishlists to exclude key words by highlighting the keyword and pressing one of the thumb buttons.
> A minus sign (-) before the key word excludes that key word in the search and parenthesis makes the key word optional.
> For example, in the keyword for your "train" wishlist, you could enter:
> Documentary, - Kids, - Animated, - Music.
> That would probably narrow down that Wishlist quite a bit.


Good to know. I could try it to see if I can stem the flood. Wish they just had a 10 tuner version so I could just let it run wild. 



TexasDVR said:


> Kind of Sort of answering two questions:
> 
> Transport Controls (what I would like to see):


Those seem like highly specialized functions that very, very few users would want. I've never even heard them discussed before.

--

In general, compared to MCE, TiVo is so much of a better experience. Although the interface isn't as zippy, it makes a lot more sense, is much easier to navigate, and just works better. It's also way more stable than MCE. The remote is amazing, and a far better experience than the crappy MCE remotes out there. The picture quality is also better, possibly due to support of native mode, or other factors. The only two things I miss from MCE are cross-channel SP's, and the super-fast (if stupidly designed) UI.

Due to Comcast's out of control compression, I think I'll get an ATSC-8VSB tuner for the MCE PC when I buy a place and can have an antenna, but other than that, TiVo wins the prize, and will have my only Comcast CableCard. If need be, I'll expand with TiVo Minis.


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## Arcady (Oct 14, 2004)

Bigg said:


> You go from 720p to 1080i, you've lost the progressive scanning, and you only had 720 lines in the first place, so you've effectively passed through 720i. You can massage and convert the video, but in the process, you're losing data.
> 
> If you don't want to lose resolution, you use native output, then either run to a 1080p TV or a 1080p video processor like I am, and that way, you're always going up, from 1080i to 1080p or 720p to 1080p, and not losing resolution in the process.


The 1080p TV is reconverting whatever it gets to 1080p anyway. So it will de-interlace the 1080i signal.

And 99.9% of people don't have a fancy video processor.

I can't tell any difference between running the TiVo at 720p and connecting to a 1080p set vs. running the TiVo at 1080i fixed and playing 720p programming to a 1080p set. YMMV. But the resolution switching is too annoying, doesn't pass WAF, and gives no benefit for me.


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## mdgcvg (Mar 30, 2013)

I just got my TIVO Premiere with lifetime. Yes the install was tedious but ok. I used a IOGEAR Bridge Model GWU627 for the internet connection and it worked fine. My big issue is NO ONDEMAND services with my cable card. Apparently TIVO has not worked this out with them. This is an very important issue to get resolved. The TIVO support guy I spoke with had no information regarding this other than he did not know if anyone was doing something about this.


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## Arcady (Oct 14, 2004)

mdgcvg said:


> My big issue is NO ONDEMAND services


Unless you live in an area with Xfinity, don't hold your breath.


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## Bigg (Oct 31, 2003)

Arcady said:


> The 1080p TV is reconverting whatever it gets to 1080p anyway. So it will de-interlace the 1080i signal.
> 
> And 99.9% of people don't have a fancy video processor.
> 
> I can't tell any difference between running the TiVo at 720p and connecting to a 1080p set vs. running the TiVo at 1080i fixed and playing 720p programming to a 1080p set. YMMV. But the resolution switching is too annoying, doesn't pass WAF, and gives no benefit for me.


The point is, if you go from 1080i to 720p to 1080p or 720p to 1080i to 1080p, there's loss involved. If you go native to 1080p, you're only going up, not losing the original data. True, most people don't have standalone video processors, but most do have AVRs or TVs that can take native mode and upscale it at some level, more on the AVR side than the TVs.

How does that not pass WAF? It's all automatic, there's nothing to do other than just let the video processor/AVR/TV handle the resolution changes.


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## aaronwt (Jan 31, 2002)

Bigg said:


> The point is, if you go from 1080i to 720p to 1080p or 720p to 1080i to 1080p, there's loss involved. If you go native to 1080p, you're only going up, not losing the original data. True, most people don't have standalone video processors, but most do have AVRs or TVs that can take native mode and upscale it at some level, more on the AVR side than the TVs.
> 
> How does that not pass WAF? It's all automatic, there's nothing to do other than just let the video processor/AVR/TV handle the resolution changes.


It doesn't pass the WAF(or GFAF) because it takes much longer to change channels when going to a channel with a different resolution. This is the reason my TV in the bedroom is set to only output 1080i. And I set my GFs TiVos to only output 1080i too. So it changes channels as quick as possible. Because when it was set for native resolution output, there were complaints that it took too long to change channels.


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## Bigg (Oct 31, 2003)

aaronwt said:


> It doesn't pass the WAF(or GFAF) because it takes much longer to change channels when going to a channel with a different resolution. This is the reason my TV in the bedroom is set to only output 1080i. And I set my GFs TiVos to only output 1080i too. So it changes channels as quick as possible. Because when it was set for native resolution output, there were complaints that it took too long to change channels.


It's still only a couple seconds. You can't expect instant channel changes in a day and age where we have HD with different standards, and incredibly complex digital systems, some of which use SDV (cable) or SWiM with different TP's (DirecTV). There isn't really any reason to need fast channel changes. It's just an inherent limitation of the technology, nothing that's an actual problem.


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## Arcady (Oct 14, 2004)

That explanation wouldn't pass WAF either.

My living room and bedroom TiVos are locked to 1080i. My den TV is only 720p, so that unit is locked to 720p. I don't bother with the 1080p mode, since the only thing that seems to use it is the Netflix app, and that is worthless on TiVo.


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## aaronwt (Jan 31, 2002)

Bigg said:


> It's still only a couple seconds. You can't expect instant channel changes in a day and age where we have HD with different standards, and incredibly complex digital systems, some of which use SDV (cable) or SWiM with different TP's (DirecTV). There isn't really any reason to need fast channel changes. It's just an inherent limitation of the technology, nothing that's an actual problem.


They don't expect it to be instant, but the time to change channels can almost double when changing resolutions. That is a huge increase in the time it takes.


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## HerronScott (Jan 1, 2002)

The time to switch resolution can vary greatly among different TVs as well. My brother's was horribly long on his older Pioneer unit.

Note there should be no "loss" of data in having the TV taking 1080i input and displaying it as 1080p.

Scott


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## Bigg (Oct 31, 2003)

Arcady said:


> That explanation wouldn't pass WAF either.
> 
> My living room and bedroom TiVos are locked to 1080i. My den TV is only 720p, so that unit is locked to 720p. I don't bother with the 1080p mode, since the only thing that seems to use it is the Netflix app, and that is worthless on TiVo.


It should. It's not complicated. You just push the button and it works. That makes sense for an old 720p TV, but for 1080p TVs, the TiVo should be outputting native.



aaronwt said:


> They don't expect it to be instant, but the time to change channels can almost double when changing resolutions. That is a huge increase in the time it takes.


It's still plenty fast. And what does it matter how long it takes? The quality of native mode is higher, and that's all that counts. A few channel changes here and there won't kill you.



HerronScott said:


> The time to switch resolution can vary greatly among different TVs as well. My brother's was horribly long on his older Pioneer unit.
> 
> Note there should be no "loss" of data in having the TV taking 1080i input and displaying it as 1080p.
> 
> Scott


True. Mine takes quite a while sometimes with an AVR, video scaler and TV that all have to re-lock on the HDMI. It's not an issue.

You lose data when you go from 720p to 1080i to 1080p or 1080i to 720p to 1080p. The latter would be worse than the former.


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## lessd (Jan 23, 2005)

Bigg said:


> It should. It's not complicated. You just push the button and it works. That makes sense for an old 720p TV, but for 1080p TVs, the TiVo should be outputting native.
> 
> It's still plenty fast. And what does it matter how long it takes? The quality of native mode is higher, and that's all that counts. A few channel changes here and there won't kill you.
> 
> ...


If you can see and feel the loss in resolution do things your way, I have a new 80" Sharp HDTV and tried both ways with my TP-4 and I could not see any difference in picture quality, so my TiVo is set for 1080i, I don't mind giving up some theoretical better resolution for a faster channel change.


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## Bigg (Oct 31, 2003)

lessd said:


> If you can see and feel the loss in resolution do things your way, I have a new 80" Sharp HDTV and tried both ways with my TP-4 and I could not see any difference in picture quality, so my TiVo is set for 1080i, I don't mind giving up some theoretical better resolution for a faster channel change.


It's a shame not to feed a TV like that the best possible quality signal when there's basically no downside.


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## aaronwt (Jan 31, 2002)

Bigg said:


> It's a shame not to feed a TV like that the best possible quality signal when there's basically no downside.


We are talking about broadcast TV so right there you are not getting the best quality signal to begin with. And of course if you include the streaming apps the quality is even worse.

Sent from my HTC ReZound using Forum Runner


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## lessd (Jan 23, 2005)

Bigg said:


> It's a shame not to feed a TV like that the best possible quality signal when there's basically no downside.


Time changing channels is a downside for me when I can't see any difference, and I not sure who feels shame, will my TV get mad at me.
I understand people have things in their mind, so if it not the best signal possible it hard for some people to handle that even if they could never see any difference. IE Monster HDMI cables at 5X the price.


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## Bigg (Oct 31, 2003)

There is a difference between Monster HDMI cables and native resolution. Native resolution does make a difference. Monster HDMI cables fundamentally don't do anything different than a Monoprice cable, since the signal is obviously bit for bit the same either way.

Yes, it's not a great quality signal, but why degrade more? Shouldn't you want to do everything you can to get the best signal you can, based on what your service provider is providing?


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## atmuscarella (Oct 11, 2005)

Bigg said:


> Yes, it's not a great quality signal, but why degrade more? Shouldn't you want to do everything you can to get the best signal you can, based on what your service provider is providing?


Like Les said it really depends on if you can see the difference or not. Each person's setup is different but it is easy enough to figure out, set you TiVo to record a show on a 720p channel and see if you can tell the difference between setting your TiVo to native output versus a fix 1080i out put when you play it back. If you can tell the difference then it may matter if you cannot then it doesn't.


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## Arcady (Oct 14, 2004)

Bigg said:


> You lose data when you go from 720p to 1080i to 1080p or 1080i to 720p to 1080p.


I'd rather lose the data and keep the wife.

And as I said above, I can't see any difference.


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## lessd (Jan 23, 2005)

atmuscarella said:


> Like Les said it really depends on if you can see the difference or not. Each person's setup is different but it is easy enough to figure out, set you TiVo to record a show on a 720p channel and see if you can tell the difference between setting your TiVo to native output versus a fix 1080i out put when you play it back. If you can tell the difference then it may matter if you cannot then it doesn't.


+1


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## slowbiscuit (Sep 19, 2006)

I've never seen a diff on 1080i vs. native with any channel, so I keep it on 1080i to avoid the screen flashes.


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## Bigg (Oct 31, 2003)

Arcady said:


> I'd rather lose the data and keep the wife.
> 
> And as I said above, I can't see any difference.


There's ZERO difference in usability. The devices negotiate and sync everything for the user.


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## lessd (Jan 23, 2005)

Bigg said:


> There's ZERO difference in usability. The devices negotiate and sync everything for the user.


Just takes more time for no difference !!!!


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## HerronScott (Jan 1, 2002)

lessd said:


> Just takes more time for no difference !!!!


And no reason to believe that the scalar in the TV is any better than the one in the TiVo most people (at least enough to make a visible difference) and that would only be on 720p channels assuming you have a 1080i/p TV (or I guess it could be the other way as well but would you care as much in that direction).

Scott


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## aaronwt (Jan 31, 2002)

I know around here the local HD video looks like crap now compared to what it looked like in 2001/2002. I still have some HD recordings left over from back then and they look so much better from the 2001/2002 TV season. Now the local stations have a bunch of sub channels which they did not have back then. So the bitrates were higher for the HD broadcasts back then. Like some of my old CSI HD recordings from that season. They look so much better than what the local CBS station looks like now.


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## Arcady (Oct 14, 2004)

What did you record HD on in 2001? There was no HD TiVo until 2006.


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## aaronwt (Jan 31, 2002)

Arcady said:


> What did you record HD on in 2001? There was no HD TiVo until 2006.


I got my first HDTiVo in May/June 2004 with DirecTV. It could record HD from DirecTV and OTA. Prior to that I used a couple of HTPCs each with a HiPix card in them for recording the HD channels from OTA.(The HiPix Telemann DTV-200 card) I got a lot of use out of it recording around 30GB to 50GB of HD shows on average each week.. It was a huge PCi card that was very long. Not sure when they first came out but I got a couple of them in Summer 2001.


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## TexasDVR (Feb 20, 2013)

A few years ago when CBS did the Super Bowl they pumped out Big Fat Bandwidth and the local stations for Houston and Dallas maintained the same super high quality. The last couple of years from NBC have been pretty low quality, even at 1080i  way short on bandwidth.

That Full Bandwidth 1080i source converted in the Plasma 1080p was the closest I have ever seen to BD. The only thing that came close was the much older CSIs series that were filmed and not digital video conversions made today.

Picture quality has deteriorated in the most recent years.

Fortunately for me, running native on the TiVo and letting my display do the conversion produces a significantly better picture. When the source changes from 480i, 720p, and 1080i in the TiVo it only takes about 1 second for my display panel to get and process the change to 1080p. And if the original source is 1080i the pixel matching in the Panel gets me pretty close to BD if the broadcast station is sending out the absolute best picture with a lot of bandwidth.

Running native on the TiVo 100% matches what the older Sony DHG would do, no complaints here.


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## Bigg (Oct 31, 2003)

lessd said:


> Just takes more time for no difference !!!!


The time difference doesn't really affect anything, and the quality is much better. I don't want 720i-ish basketball! I want real 720p from ESPN!



HerronScott said:


> And no reason to believe that the scalar in the TV is any better than the one in the TiVo most people (at least enough to make a visible difference) and that would only be on 720p channels assuming you have a 1080i/p TV (or I guess it could be the other way as well but would you care as much in that direction).
> 
> Scott


You're assuming you could do 1080p/60 fixed output from the TiVo, which is not the case. If you could, then your assertion could have merit.


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## lessd (Jan 23, 2005)

Bigg said:


> The time difference doesn't really affect anything, and the quality is much better. I don't want 720i-ish basketball! I want real 720p from ESPN!


I does affect my wife, but if you can see the big difference as you say, I think that something is not correct with your setup or you have some unusual setup. I have a new (5 days old) 80" Sharp HDTV and tried a network channel at 720P direct from the cable (The TV will tune Comcast network channels without a cable box) then switched to the TiVo on the same channel but set for 1080i fixed, no difference. I than set the TiVo for 720P (on the same 720P channel) again no difference I could see.
If you believe you have much better quality with the TiVo set to native output and a non complaining wife, than set things up that way, as we on this forum have no ax to grind whatever way you set your TiVo up.
Now if your cable co. put out the 720P ESPN at a much higher bit rate than my cable co does I guess there could be a difference. My TV tells my the input of 720P or 1080i but not the bit rate so we can't compare bit rates.

The best I can do on bit rates is from the TiVo record space; ABC at 720P takes 4.1GB for a 1/2 hour ABC nightly network news; CBS at 1080I takes 3.93GB for their 1/2 hour nightly network news; and NBC at 1080I takes 3.98GB for their 1/2 hour nightly network news.


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## Bigg (Oct 31, 2003)

lessd said:


> I does affect my wife, but if you can see the big difference as you say, I think that something is not correct with your setup or you have some unusual setup. I have a new (5 days old) 80" Sharp HDTV and tried a network channel at 720P direct from the cable (The TV will tune Comcast network channels without a cable box) then switched to the TiVo on the same channel but set for 1080i fixed, no difference. I than set the TiVo for 720P (on the same 720P channel) again no difference I could see.
> If you believe you have much better quality with the TiVo set to native output and a non complaining wife, than set things up that way, as we on this forum have no ax to grind whatever way you set your TiVo up.
> Now if your cable co. put out the 720P ESPN at a much higher bit rate than my cable co does I guess there could be a difference. My TV tells my the input of 720P or 1080i but not the bit rate so we can't compare bit rates.
> 
> The best I can do on bit rates is from the TiVo record space; ABC at 720P takes 4.1GB for a 1/2 hour ABC nightly network news; CBS at 1080I takes 3.93GB for their 1/2 hour nightly network news; and NBC at 1080I takes 3.98GB for their 1/2 hour nightly network news.


That is a massively made-up affect. A couple seconds of negotiation between the TV, AVR, and DVR doesn't have any negative affect on the TV viewing experience.

You're not comparing apples to apples, as there is another device in the chain there.

There's a right way and a wrong way to set a TiVo Premiere up with a 1080p TV, and anything other than native output is wrong. The only exception would be the 1080/24p, which would be right, except for the fact that it freaks out on some people, so it's not usable.

Bitrates have little to do with it. 720p is generally slightly lower, but as your numbers show, there can be wide variation, depending on who's compressing what and how much. This has little, if anything, however, to do with how you are handling signals at your TV. The 720p>1080i>1080p is a lossy process, that's all there is to it. If you go from 720p right to 1080p, then you don't lose anything. Where you convert it is another topic altogether, but kind of irrelevant here, as TiVo doesn't have a 1080/60p mode to do the conversion, so native is the only option for a 1080p TV. For a 720p or 1080i TV, then it's up for debate, as it brings you back to the question of where to do the conversion.


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## Worf (Sep 15, 2000)

Well, I think that's why TiVo left it as an option to the user.

Some users hate how long it takes to change channels - a couple of seconds is an eternity. And depending on equipment, it can easily take 10 seconds or more to fully re-establish the link. And sometimes, link-re-establishment fails - it might try again, taking more time, or fail completely, necessitating a power cycle of something (perhaps they weren't stress tested).

TiVo realizes it's going to cause arguments, which is why they made the output selectable between native and fixed because everyone's set up is different. Perhaps the loss going from 720p>1080i>1080p isn't that much for some people versus waiting 2-10 seconds per channel flip, so they'd prefer that. Other people mind, so they leave it as native.

Just like the people who did the original HD standards - 1080i and 720p consume roughly the same bandwidth, so they're both in the standard - stations could use resolution over framerate and use 1080i, or they could sacrifice resolution for framerate, and use 720p (especially for sports and other fast action where you need the framerate). For news, sometimes fine details are important, and talking heads don't move too much, so 1080i it is.


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## slowbiscuit (Sep 19, 2006)

Bigg said:


> There's a right way and a wrong way to set a TiVo Premiere up with a 1080p TV, and anything other than native output is wrong. The only exception would be the 1080/24p, which would be right, except for the fact that it freaks out on some people, so it's not usable.


No, anything other than native on a 1080p set is not wrong. It might be wrong for you, but it's not wrong for me. As I said, I can see NO difference with any source with my Tivo either set to 1080i or native, and more importantly I don't have the annoying screen flicker/lag with 1080i. And I have a 1080p set.


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## aaronwt (Jan 31, 2002)

If the TiVo is interlacing the 720P signal properly to 1080i and your device is deinterlacing the 1080i signal properly to 1080P, then there will be no discernible difference. I have no idea if the Tivo interlaces the 720P signal properly to 1080i or not, but there are certainly TVs that sometimes can still have issues with deinterlacing 1080i properly.


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## Bigg (Oct 31, 2003)

Worf said:


> Well, I think that's why TiVo left it as an option to the user.
> 
> Some users hate how long it takes to change channels - a couple of seconds is an eternity. And depending on equipment, it can easily take 10 seconds or more to fully re-establish the link. And sometimes, link-re-establishment fails - it might try again, taking more time, or fail completely, necessitating a power cycle of something (perhaps they weren't stress tested).
> 
> ...


They left it because some older TVs can only handle one format, or they are 1080i or 720p, so you'd want fixed output if the TiVo can scale the signal better than the TV.

If you have a 1080p TV, the correct way to set it up is native. Not using native is just wrong. It's a milder form of the sin of connection HD equipment with non-HD cables like the technologically impaired used to do a lot.

1080i vs. 720p is a totally different debate, but it went by network with a clear split between the NBC/CBS crowd and the FOX/ABC crowd, and most channels are owned by one of those four companies, so they use the format that the parent network uses. There's a lot of cross conversion from 1080/60i and 1080/24p camera equipment as well. And a lot depends on production value. Even though 1080i looks better than 720p, ESPN has some of the best looking broadcasts, because they put incredibly high production value into them, while CBS's look average, because they don't do a great job (Women's Basketball is better anyways!).



slowbiscuit said:


> No, anything other than native on a 1080p set is not wrong. It might be wrong for you, but it's not wrong for me. As I said, I can see NO difference with any source with my Tivo either set to 1080i or native, and more importantly I don't have the annoying screen flicker/lag with 1080i. And I have a 1080p set.


It is technically and objectively wrong to use fixed output on a 1080p TV.


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## lessd (Jan 23, 2005)

Bigg said:


> They left it because some older TVs can only handle one format, or they are 1080i or 720p, so you'd want fixed output if the TiVo can scale the signal better than the TV.
> 
> If you have a 1080p TV, the correct way to set it up is native. Not using native is just wrong. It's a milder form of the sin of connection HD equipment with non-HD cables like the technologically impaired used to do a lot.
> 
> ...


*WOW* one might think someone calling someone's daughter a s**t, 90% or more of HDTVs are not calibrated correctly, and your concerned about something that few people could ever see, the 720p to 1080i to 1080P conversions (and if set correctly upsets the wife), as someone said TiVo gives you an option for this setting so you set what you want and others will set what they want, what the big deal with this, if the correct way has more disadvantages in my household than yours why would you care so much ? I and the rest of us 1080i fixed people are not degrading your experience, are we??.


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## slowbiscuit (Sep 19, 2006)

Bigg said:


> It is technically and objectively wrong to use fixed output on a 1080p TV.


You're welcome to come over to my house and show that there's a diff between native and 1080i fixed (good luck with that, I've never found one on my 46" Panny plasma).

All I care is that there is no diff and no lag with fixed so whether it's technically wrong is irrelevant, all that matters is the end result.


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## lessd (Jan 23, 2005)

slowbiscuit said:


> You're welcome to come over to my house and show that there's a diff between native and 1080i fixed (good luck with that, I've never found one on my 46" Panny plasma).
> 
> All I care is that there is no diff and no lag with fixed so whether it's technically wrong is irrelevant, all that matters is the end result.


+1


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## Bigg (Oct 31, 2003)

lessd said:


> *WOW* one might think someone calling someone's daughter a s**t, 90% or more of HDTVs are not calibrated correctly, and your concerned about something that few people could ever see, the 720p to 1080i to 1080P conversions (and if set correctly upsets the wife), as someone said TiVo gives you an option for this setting so you set what you want and others will set what they want, what the big deal with this, if the correct way has more disadvantages in my household than yours why would you care so much ? I and the rest of us 1080i fixed people are not degrading your experience, are we??.


Yes, that's correct, most TVs aren't calibrated at all. Most people do a lot of things wrong with HT gear. Fixed output mode is one of them. It is objectively the wrong way to set something up with a 1080p display. There's just no way to debate that. You are losing something by going from 720p>1080i>1080p, and gaining nothing.


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## lessd (Jan 23, 2005)

Bigg said:


> Yes, that's correct, most TVs aren't calibrated at all. Most people do a lot of things wrong with HT gear. Fixed output mode is one of them. It is objectively the wrong way to set something up with a 1080p display. There's just no way to debate that. You are losing something by going from 720p>1080i>1080p, and gaining nothing.


*"gaining nothing"* you say, how about gaining channel changing time and a wife that does not complain.


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## slowbiscuit (Sep 19, 2006)

Bigg said:


> and gaining nothing.


This is factually incorrect and you know it.


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## aaronwt (Jan 31, 2002)

Bigg said:


> Yes, that's correct, most TVs aren't calibrated at all. Most people do a lot of things wrong with HT gear. Fixed output mode is one of them. It is objectively the wrong way to set something up with a 1080p display. There's just no way to debate that. You are losing something by going from 720p>1080i>1080p, and gaining nothing.


You are losing absolutely nothing if the 720P content is interlaced to 1080i properly and the 1080i content is deinterlaced to 1080P properly. The result will not lose anything if this is done properly. This is nothing new. It has always been the case. The problem is that all devices don't do the interlacing or deinterlacing properly. Although more devices do it properly now than seven or eight years ago.

It's just like 1080i has the capability to show just as much detail as 1080P and long as the content was interlaced properly and then deinterlaced properly to 1080P. Done properly there will be no difference on a resolution test screen.


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## Bigg (Oct 31, 2003)

lessd said:


> *"gaining nothing"* you say, how about gaining channel changing time and a wife that does not complain.


Even on really slow TVs, the channel changing time is still negligible. Maybe 5-10 seconds at worst. Still in line with normal channel changing times in the digital age, so it's irrelevant, and thus not a factor.



aaronwt said:


> You are losing absolutely nothing if the 720P content is interlaced to 1080i properly and the 1080i content is deinterlaced to 1080P properly. The result will not lose anything if this is done properly. This is nothing new. It has always been the case. The problem is that all devices don't do the interlacing or deinterlacing properly. Although more devices do it properly now than seven or eight years ago.
> 
> It's just like 1080i has the capability to show just as much detail as 1080P and long as the content was interlaced properly and then deinterlaced properly to 1080P. Done properly there will be no difference on a resolution test screen.


You're creating a bottleneck, and additional conversions, both of which degrade the quality. It's like recompressing, sort of.


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## Arcady (Oct 14, 2004)

Bigg said:


> the channel changing time is still negligible. Maybe 5-10 seconds


You've got to be kidding me.

You can keep your "technically correct" setup, and the rest of us can be happy with a setup that actually functions in the real world.


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## Bigg (Oct 31, 2003)

Arcady said:


> You've got to be kidding me.
> 
> You can keep your "technically correct" setup, and the rest of us can be happy with a setup that actually functions in the real world.


I'm not kidding you.

Some MSO systems take north of 6 seconds to change channels just on the box, it's not a big deal. TiVo is pretty fast, even with native mode switching. I'm glad that the days of super fast channel changes on analog are gone. DVRs with guides, giant hard drives, and yes, native mode are a lot better.

I'm certainly not to going to compromise the quality of my system after I invested in it just to make channel changes smoother, that's just stupid. And I will reap the benefits on Sunday when I watch NCAA basketball on ESPN in 720p HD.


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## Bigg (Oct 31, 2003)

I just timed MSNBC to ESPN in 5.7 seconds, and the other way in 7.1. Not totally accurate/scientific, but it shows how little of an impact native mode switches have. Also, my AVR took longer to switch than my TV. Of course it will vary from TV to TV and AVR to AVR, but even if it was a bit longer, it still wouldn't have any materially adverse affect on anything.


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## lessd (Jan 23, 2005)

Set up at fixed 1080i my TiVo changes channels (as seen on my HDTV) in less than 1 second, for HBO a little longer but still under 1 second, if your system has a problem in that it takes over 5 seconds to change channels using a TiVo set to fixed 1080i we are in different playing fields, in fact my one cable box (in another room) is under one second, I have been at friends homes and never saw channel change of over 5 seconds and I and everybody would notice that, if your system was going from 5.7 sec to 7.1 sec, I see your point, in my home my family would kill me if any TV worked that way, but if you can put up with 5.7 sec than what is another 1.4 killer sec. When I go to native (on my series 4 I don't have the native option so I check each resolution) it than takes about 2 to 3 seconds to change channels and resolution say going from CBS (1080i) to ABC (720P), and that time is a wife killer.


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## Bigg (Oct 31, 2003)

DirecTV's best boxes were doing 6 seconds, but I think that was before the HR24, 34, and 44, they may be a bit faster now, although improvements would only be seen when going between two channels of the same format because of the format switching. Anything under about 10 seconds is pretty much irrelevant, and even if it took 15, well, then it takes 15 seconds. It is what it is. There is a right way to do things, and I'm not so impatient and angry that the occasional channel change upsets me because it takes a few extra seconds. It just doesn't matter, it's inconsequential to the TV viewing experience. Anyone who has a problem with a 7 second channel change needs to grow up. We live in a split world of 720p and 1080i, and sometimes, the equipment needs to switch to deal with it. That's just the way it is. The time it can get a bit annoying is that it loses sync when going to TiVo Central, although that's just the way it is.

The bottom line is that it is what it is, and people need to not nitpick irrelevant things, as there's nothing that can be done about them without a blatantly wrong and degraded setup. Anyone who pays for good A/V equipment and then does something stupid like not using native mode is just a fool, plain and simple.


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## aaronwt (Jan 31, 2002)

I've never even seen a seven second channel change. Four to five seconds is the longest I've seen it take in native mode.


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## lessd (Jan 23, 2005)

Bigg said:


> The bottom line is that it is what it is, and people need to not nitpick irrelevant things, as there's nothing that can be done about them without a blatantly wrong and degraded setup. Anyone who pays for good A/V equipment and then does something stupid like not using native mode is just a fool, plain and simple.


I guess I should divorce my wife and move into my own home then I can do as you say about channel changing.
Degradation is still in the eye of the person, if I don't see any it not there, just because some commercial grade HDTV calibration equipment may be able to see this difference does not mean that I do, but I can see the channel time change time and I (and my wife) find it annoying.

I do understand your point of pure excellence as I have a friend with about $80,000 worth of AV equipment, they use only records on a turntable mounted on a concrete column that goes through a hole in their AV room down to bed rock so no vibrations will effect the LP playback, their new blue ray player is $2500, I have heard music in their home and to my ears the difference is very small, not worth $80,000 to me, but they don't berate me on my $175 blue ray player, or my lack of any turntable as all my audio is MP3 -192bit, or my surround sound speakers system that cost 1/10 the cost of their speakers. When they come back from vacation they bring their speaker wires to a place that get them back in shape using some type of speaker wire exerciser. (their speaker wire is like over $20/foot) People put their effort in what they care about. My home is worth about 3 to 4 times their home, their AV system is 8 times more than mine, I like a big automated home and they could care less about their home so their money goes into AV stuff, and my money went into my home, each to their own, what a great country we have.


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## Bigg (Oct 31, 2003)

Or she could just not get annoyed by an issue that's completely irrelevant to actually using the equipment. I'm not totally nuts about buying equipment, mine isn't anything high-end, in fact my whole HT setup is only maybe 5-6 grand, including all the sources and game consoles and whatnot, however, I want the best performance out of the equipment I have, from settings, to calibration, etc. I wouldn't berate someone for not spending XYZ dollar on HT, only for setting it up stupidly, like not using native mode or the highest quality connections available, etc, etc. Not using native mode on any component that has it is like using composite video for the Wii- it's just wrong. If you want to not use it on a Blu-ray player because you don't want to buy the $500 Oppo that has it, then fine (plus it's 1080p, so it's only where the video is scaled, not a lossy back and forth like with TiVo), but if you want to buy the Oppo then you most certainly should be using native mode.

Ok, your friend is just stupid in the other direction. That speaker wire does not do a darn thing differently than my 12 gauge Monoprice wire. I am an elistist for heavy gauge wire, but once you have Monoprice 12 gauge, nothing at the same gauge will do you any better. Mine is about $.30/foot, which is based on the price of copper, since it's so thick. That kind of money is just wasting money on stuff, as the $80k gear is beyond the ability of human hearing to discern the quality, and that speaker wire is objectively completely and totally useless.


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## aaronwt (Jan 31, 2002)

All this talk over 720P and 1080i from broadcast TV. Broadcast TV is crap compared to what you get from Blu-ray Disc since broadcast is usually overly compressed and bit starved. For me, my main concern is to clean up the picture from Broadcast sources. So I use an Algolith Flea in my main setup to clean up the picture some. That makes a much bigger difference in what the picture looks like than whether the native resolution in being sent. Then add a Darbee Darblet in the mix and the resulting picture is much better than anything you will get from just sending the native resolution directly to the TV.


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## astrohip (Jan 7, 2003)

Bigg said:


> Even on really slow TVs, the channel changing time is still negligible. Maybe 5-10 seconds at worst. Still in line with normal channel changing times in the digital age, so it's irrelevant, and thus not a factor.
> 
> 
> Arcady said:
> ...


5-10 seconds in a digital world is a lifetime. This was probably the first thing I changed when I first set up S3/TiVo/HDTV many years ago. And I'm sure it was from info gleaned from this site.:up:

+1 to what everyone but you says. You do what makes you happy, and we'll do the same.


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## slowbiscuit (Sep 19, 2006)

He would have a point (and people agreeing with him) if there was a noticeable diff in pic between native and fixed. But there's not for anyone posting here that I've seen, so he doesn't. 

Theoretical arguments are great until you run up against reality's truth. But this is the same person that couldn't get WMC to work reliably on an HTPC (not rocket science, people do it everyday) and then used that and other dubious reasons to claim that WMC sucks.


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## Bigg (Oct 31, 2003)

slowbiscuit said:


> He would have a point (and people agreeing with him) if there was a noticeable diff in pic between native and fixed. But there's not for anyone posting here that I've seen, so he doesn't.
> 
> Theoretical arguments are great until you run up against reality's truth. But this is the same person that couldn't get WMC to work reliably on an HTPC (not rocket science, people do it everyday) and then used that and other dubious reasons to claim that WMC sucks.


I base my statements on experience. WMC is a mess. I'm pretty good with computers and troubleshooting, and having random errors popping up and stopping me from watching TV is not an acceptable UX for most users. Yes, WMC allows more tinkering, but it's not reliable enough for most normal users. It also has a poor UX in general compared to TiVo. C'mon, this is supposed to be the home turf of the TiVo fanboys! I'll trash TiVo too, but bottom line is that I've chosen TiVo now as my DVR, as it's the least bad thing out there on the market.

Even if the quality difference between native and fixed is slight, there is no material difference in usability, so native is thus the one and only correct way to set the system up.


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## lessd (Jan 23, 2005)

Bigg said:


> Even if the quality difference between native and fixed is slight, there is no material difference in usability, so native is thus the one and only correct way to set the system up.


*there is no material difference in usability* So you think going from less than one second to more than 3 seconds to change channels in not a material difference*!!!*, I give up, as I believe it is a material difference to all people on this forum, except for one person that will go unnamed.


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## Bigg (Oct 31, 2003)

lessd said:


> So you think going from less than one second to more than 3 seconds to change channels in not a material difference*!!!*, I give up, as I believe it is a material difference to all people on this forum, except for one person that will go unnamed.


Correct, it is not a material difference. When you're going to watch even a 30 minute show an extra 7 seconds is a big deal?!? You've got to be crazy. It's irrelevant and inconsequential.


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## astrohip (Jan 7, 2003)

Bigg said:


> Correct, it is not a material difference. When you're going to watch even a 30 minute show an extra 7 seconds is a big deal?!? You've got to be crazy. It's irrelevant and inconsequential.


You understand nothing about human psychology. It's not percents, it's the waiting. And the appearance of waiting. That's what drives {most} people nuts.

People aren't as robotic as you think. People would rather wait in a single queue than multiple lines, even if the wait is actually longer, as long as they think everyone else is being treated the same. People will drive 5 miles to save $10 on gas, but won't drive the same distance to save $10 on a TV purchase.

People don't think the way you think they do. And for most, waiting and waiting and waiting for something to happen, that could (and should) happen instantly... drives them nuts and they want it fixed. When the wife says fix it, you fix it.

Unless you're Bigg.


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## steve614 (May 1, 2006)

This debate is amusing. It has caused me to switch my Tivo to native mode to see if I could tell the difference. 
Result? I can't tell the difference and the delay created when my TV switches resolutions is annoying. 

I'd be willing to bet that Bigg can't tell the difference either. He just likes to argue. Makes me think of mdougie for some reason.


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## lessd (Jan 23, 2005)

steve614 said:


> This debate is amusing. It has caused me to switch my Tivo to native mode to see if I could tell the difference.
> Result? I can't tell the difference and the delay created when my TV switches resolutions is annoying.
> 
> I'd be willing to bet that Bigg can't tell the difference either. He just likes to argue. Makes me think of mdougie for some reason.


On another (*more important*) subject for the moment, I have only TP-4s and I don't have a native video mode tag, for me I have to check each video output to get what your calling native, can others with a TP-4 confirm that a tag for native does not exist on the TP-4 ?


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## Bigg (Oct 31, 2003)

lessd said:


> On another (*more important*) subject for the moment, I have only TP-4s and I don't have a native video mode tag, for me I have to check each video output to get what your calling native, can others with a TP-4 confirm that a tag for native does not exist on the TP-4 ?


Checking off more than one format is the "native" mode, as it will switch to those modes. I have all of them checked off. A lot of people uncheck 1080/24p, as apparently it's really flaky, but I haven't had the occasion to use that yet. I may not be able to use it, due to those issues.



astrohip said:


> You understand nothing about human psychology. It's not percents, it's the waiting. And the appearance of waiting. That's what drives {most} people nuts.


Most people don't get hung up one insignificant things, and also like to get the best value for their money, which means getting the best performance out of their A/V equipment. The reason native mode is used so infrequently is that the general public is stupid and doesn't understand the whole 720p vs. 1080i vs. 1080/60p vs. 1080/24p thing.


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## slowbiscuit (Sep 19, 2006)

Yep, we're all stupid for using fixed mode. Troll alert!


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## jrtroo (Feb 4, 2008)

Bigg said:


> Most people don't get hung up one insignificant things


Totally not true. Most people get hung up on insignificant things all the time.

Like this thread.


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## atmuscarella (Oct 11, 2005)

jrtroo said:


> Totally not true. Most people get hung up on insignificant things all the time.
> 
> Like this thread.


:up:


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## Bigg (Oct 31, 2003)

jrtroo said:


> Totally not true. Most people get hung up on insignificant things all the time.
> 
> Like this thread.


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