ericdbs

i have had recently cable.... and now i looking into getting sat tv.... i need and advice would be better and what brand... dish network - direct tv... and soo on... not sure what to get.... thanks... ericd

UUronL

What's important to you? Movies? Sports? Will you be doing High Definition? DVR?

my530i

Cable is cheaper than Sat TV but comes with low quality picture. Especially, if you hook-up HDTV module to your TV and analog channel will be grainny.
Sat TV is 50% to 100% more expensive, but what you pay is what you get. Clearer picture in all channel. However, if you live in windy/stormy area, Sat TV is not recommended since strong wind can blow sat dish off course and you'd lose signal. Some adjustment would be needed.

Centurion

All these things you can do with both formats, by the way.

If your HDTV already has a cablecard slot built in, I would go for digital cable. In this case you wouldn't need a set-top box which means less hardware cluttering your entertainment rack/center. However, if you intend on recording material, you will then of course need the set-top box for it's DVR functions.

Cable is quickly growing in the number of digital channels offered, although satellites still offer more. You must ask yourself, which channels are the most important for you? All my friends with digital satellite have hundreds of channels but realistically watch less than 25% of that on a regular basis.

Rough weather can cause a mal-alignment between your dish and the satellite itself, although I don't know how problematic that has been.

Personally, I would suggest going digital cable as long as it offers the Food channel, errr....I mean ESPN.

Centurion

I think this is more dependent on the quality of the output device, but analog material in 480 lines (old NTSC standard) will look best on an analog TV.

High definition material (standard is 720P and 1080I) will of course look best on a HDTV but you have to consider the resolution of your source and the native resolution of your monitor (HDTV). For example, material on ESPN is broadcast at 720-lines progressively, so naturally it will look best on a monitor with a native resolution of 720 pixels. A monitor with 1080 pixels will have to use it's internal scaler to "fill-in" the rest of the pixels to make the picture fill its screen. This results in a picture that is less sharp with blurry edges.

cobradav

Dish offers a lot of international channels, first one at ~$20 a month , 2nd and beyond at ~$10 a month. I had to go Dish to get Brazilian TV per "instructions" (read direction) from wife. Other than that Direct versus Dish probably not too different.

To get PiP and/or be able to watch one channel while record another u must get dual tuner Sat box and be sure to route two signals to that Box/TV set up. ANd you need a tuner box for each TV you want Sat TV on. Cable usually avoids all this issue at the tradeoff of quality/options.

UUronL

Dish offers a lot of international channels, first one at ~$20 a month , 2nd and beyond at ~$10 a month. I had to go Dish to get Brazilian TV per "instructions" (read direction) from wife. Other than that Direct versus Dish probably not too different.

To get PiP and/or be able to watch one channel while record another u must get dual tuner Sat box and be sure to route two signals to that Box/TV set up. ANd you need a tuner box for each TV you want Sat TV on. Cable usually avoids all this issue at the tradeoff of quality/options.
[/quote]


Geez - so many experts


Actually, satellite is quite a bit cheaper these days. It is slightly lower quality for HD - and most people complain incessantly about wretched SD picture quality - overly compressed. New capacity is being launched by Hughes and others, so HD quality should improve in the next year or so when DirecTV no longer has to downrez HD to keep within its available capacity. As part of the new birds, DirecTV is nearing the completion of an HDTV conversion to MPEG4 - this will bring HD locals to the entire US shortly as well as a plethora of new channels. So no more terrestrial antennas. Sunday Ticket and Superfan (the Ticket in HD) - an exclusive football package is exclusive to DirecTV. Comcast has SportsNet in HD, which gives you good hockey, NBA, and MLB - but then only in certain markets.

Verizon is deploying FIOS TV which uses an RF overlay on top of the fiber - 180 channels for $39.99/mo. Their plans are to grow it to 300 channels and eventually make it IP based. SBC is toying in the same space.

Comcast is the 800lb gorilla of multichannel and currently has a great mix. The HD picture quality is second to none, with none of the down-rezzing of HD that the satellite operators are doing. They have more pay channels in HD than DirecTV. Also, you can get an HD DVR for $10 a month (these will have TIVO software on them by spring 06). BTW, DirecTV is going their own way for DVR, abandoning TIVO, which is troubling. Also, an HD DVR for them is $1000. Comcast also has video on-demand which is free - all your pay channels plus a smattering of content from all the other channels. Any of the content can be watched at any time. Satellite is going to have a tough time with the interactive TV - the fiber based IP services will be even more interactive.


Internal QAM tuners are wacky - really awful subcarriers and stuff - things that a normal cable box would hide from you with a nice 'channel 4' designation might possibly be something like 120.6. Also, these don't always tune all the stations. Adding the cable card doesn't always correct this - plus, if you have interactive services like PPV or OnDemand, you can't send - so these services aren't available to you.


If you're definitely going the route of Satellite, I'd say to opt for DirecTV - the new upgrades will ease the transition to HD and give you locals in HD. DirecTV will swap all the old MPEG2 gear for MPEG4 gear, but there is some question surrounding the $1000 HD DVRs, so I'd suggest holding off on purchasing one of those for now.


This place is pretty much the definitive source for everything:

http://www.avsforum.com/

Centurion

Heh, the same place I go to. I post there under the same screen name, although it's been a while since I've contributed to those forums especially after I purchased my HDTV and e60.

Avsforum is the best place one can peruse to make an informed decision about anything that has to do with home theaters.

ericdbs

thanks guys.... soo much info... here in long beach cali... i compared cable with sat.... and the price i got was alot more cheaper on sat... with more channels... i have spoken with a few movie editors and they so go with sat..... still hunting around and doing research just like i did with the e60...but again cant thank you guys enough with the info.... eric d... i will let you know what i came u with soon...

Rudy

AVSForum is to audio/video as E60.net is to the E60...