# Series 3 has better Picture than Bolt



## mswlogo (Mar 18, 2009)

I recently bought a 1TB Roamio OTA (with a Stream Box) with lifetime to replace my aging 1TB Series 3 with lifetime.

It installed like clock work, but in the end all I got was Commercial Skip.
The Stream Box was almost useless, since it never allows streaming out of home.

For $500 I figured I'd rather hold out for an affordable (and more current) Bolt so I returned it. But Roamio OTA worked fine.

Finally a few deals started showing up on Bolt's (I refuse to pay $849 for lifetime 1TB) with the new Bolt+ announcement.

So I picked up a brand new 1TB bolt with lifetime for $650.

After a bumpy start I noticed something wasn't right about the picture.

I have a 65" 2016 LG OLED 4K TV (C6). I've been very happy how it handles the Tivo (Series 3) 1080i (typically).

Not trusting my memory I hooked both (Series 3 and Bolt) up and A/B back and forth.

Bolt is just a little bit softer. On a 65" OLED a "little bit softer" is really exaggerated. I noticed it as "pasty cheeks and foreheads".

I tried to enabled all Video Formats in the Bolt (so it would transmit Native) as well as Only enabling 1080i to make sure it didn't upsample 1080i.

I had my wife blind test it and she could clearly see it.

I also have a very high end home theater and the Fan in the Bolt is much noisier than the Series 3. Bolt runs uncomfortably hot in a very cool room with a dedicate shelf with no electronics below it. Series 3 always ran pretty cool.

I didn't notice either issue with the Roamio OTA. The Series 3 and Roamio look the same as the Native tuner in the TV.

The fact that the "4K Bolt" does NOTHING 4K, if and when it ever does, I just don't see how it possibly could do 4k properly since it can't even match an 8 year old Tivo at 1080i.

It's pretty depressing because this is Tivo's "Top tier" platform now.

Unfortunately Bolt is going back. Luckily I can return it.


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## jrtroo (Feb 4, 2008)

It's probably just a setting on the TV. Did you check the cables, use the same hdmi port? If the picture was worse by design, you would find this board up in arms.


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## V7Goose (May 28, 2005)

I have not seen this in my comparisons - it is always possible that you have a defective Bolt.

I have had two different Bolts (warranty replacement) connected to the same Plasma TV with my THD box, and the displays were identical from all three boxes so far as I could tell. I also have an original S3, and while I did not do a side-by-side comparison with the S3 and Bolt, I have done that in the past with the THD and S3, and they have also been identical on the same signal source

I would also venture to suggest that since the Bolt is capable of 4K HD output, compared to just 1080i on the S3, it seems most unlikely that the Bolt display could be worse unless you have not set it up correctly or it is defective.


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## mswlogo (Mar 18, 2009)

It's set up correctly.

Swapped HDMI ports on TV to rule out TV setting or input port. Inferior picture followed bolt.

I've googled around and saw a couple other folks having the same exact complaint.
Some were complaining about RoamIO vs Bolt and another Series 3 vs Bolt.

I highly doubt it would be this subtly broken and defective.

I'm just sharing my experience in case others notice it.


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## Steve (Apr 24, 2003)

mswlogo said:


> It's set up correctly.
> 
> Swapped HDMI ports on TV to rule out TV setting or input port. Inferior picture followed bolt.
> 
> ...


Bolt PQ is as good as any box I've seen.

If you swapped TV inputs and the problem followed, it's either the Bolt or the cable, IMHO.


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## WildBill136 (Apr 29, 2016)

I have a three month old Bolt with a LG OLED G6 and the PQ is great. Blows away the WOW cable Ultravision. Do have very slow response to fast forward and rewind. Occasional hand shake issues, to.


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## abovethesink (Aug 26, 2013)

My wife and I both think the PQ looks a lot better on our Bolt than it did on our Roamio, but we also allow that we may be crazy. If it does it is probably that we are now using HDMI 3, our only HDMI 2.0 port, versus just the first HDMI port that I we always had the Roamio plugged into.


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## series5orpremier (Jul 6, 2013)

Series 3 definitely had the best OTA picture quality tuners of any TiVo ever. I don't know why - maybe it displayed the picture at a higher bitrate than OTA tuners since. I had the same experience as the OP years ago when I compared my old Series 3 OTA picture quality to my new Premiere XL, and when I got a new Roamio Basic a few years ago it's OTA picture quality was better than the Premiere XL but not all the way back as good as Series 3.


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## Puppy76 (Oct 7, 2004)

series5orpremier said:


> Series 3 definitely had the best OTA picture quality tuners of any TiVo ever. I don't know why - maybe it displayed the picture at a higher bitrate than OTA tuners since. I had the same experience as the OP years ago when I compared my old Series 3 OTA picture quality to my new Premiere XL, and when I got a new Roamio Basic a few years ago it's OTA picture quality was better than the Premiere XL but not all the way back as good as Series 3.


I've not used an S4 nor S5, but my Bolt's tuners seem to pull in a channel better than anything else I've used.

As for picture quality, I don't see anything like the OP describes. I'd bet it's a setting somewhere, assuming the exact same input source.

Of course, cable won't look as good as ATSC/OTA (let alone Blu Ray).


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## mswlogo (Mar 18, 2009)

I bought another Tivo, this time a Roamio OTA. Same issue.

TV was professionally calibrated by a very respected Calibrator.
When he checked my Series 3 he said some Tivo's he needs a SLIGHT adjustment to brightness to get blacks at the right level.
My Series 3 didn't need any adjustment.

When I plugged in the Roamio I noticed the image was quite a bit brighter. So I had to lower it 10% ( a ton ). It helped a tiny bit.
Still not correct.

I tried to capture it with my iPhone 7 camera. It barely shows it, but it does show it.

Notice the wrinkles in here forehead. They are better defined in the bottom picture.

Sorry the distance was not exact match nor the frame exact same frame. But this "blur" is what I notice on the newer Tivo's.
Could be a color depth issue.

This has nothing to do with signal quality. I get very strong signal on all the Tivo's.


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