MPEG4 Transition - What does it mean for BEV subscribers?

07-31-2010, 06:33 AM

I certainly feel "dicked around" by EV.

07-31-2010, 06:38 AM

Thank you, Rosenqui, for making that point.

Whether most consumers care or not, Bell ExpressVu DOES manipulate some signals delivered from suppliers to fit their business needs. In some cases, they bully/pressure/request a broadcaster deliver an HD signal in 720 via fibre when the same broadcaster delivers 1080 to a cable company or OTA.

In a digital world, the PQ on your screen at home ought to be identical to what the broadcaster has leaving his studio: this is the promise of a digital world, and why it is superior to analogue which degrades through every link in the chain. The digital PQ is 1s and 0s and, like Captain Picard, is beamed around to be reconstituted exactly as it started out. If a TV provider is downcoverting or at any point moving the single (heaven forbid) through some analogue process, then you are NOT getting what the provider claims to be selling.

07-31-2010, 07:51 AM

I think you may find they use the 72 slot + 82 for EASTERN and the 82 + 91 for WESTERN.

This way the same dishes with 9 degree spacing can be used with just a minor re-point for the Eastern boys.

No way in hell the 72 slot will work for many subs in the lower mainland of B.C.

This isn't much different than the mirroring that Dishnet used on 61.5 + 148

For the transition, they can send MPEG2 tagged as MPEG4 like Dish did in the transition.

By using 3 slots paired for regional coverage, they can transition 1/2 the country.
Looks like the Eastern boys are going to feel the pain first with a repoint + ironing out the inevitable MPEG4 bugs.

We must thank them for volunteering.

07-31-2010, 08:48 AM

Walter: a few clarifications.

Rogers is not in Windsor.

Rogers does not have "entirely different systems serving Windsor, London, Kitchener-Waterloo, Toronto, etc." Rogers, as a regional cableco, has CRTC rules ensuring it offers preference to local OTA broadcasters. That's why the CRTC, literally, tells each cableco what appears on channels 4, 5, 6, 7, etc in ever single neighbourhood served, and why these change by geography. But ALL the other channels -- 98% of them -- can be common across the cable network and this is exactly what Rogers has attempted to build out on its digital platform.

ExpressVu (and Star Choice), as a national provider, has CRTC rules ensuring it offers equal coverage to a national audience. In this regard, ExpressVu is "obligated" to offer CBC HD East and West where technology permits. I believe this means it must offer equal pay services in east and west where available (3 TMN HD = 3 MC HD).

There is a consistent rationale behind each regional/national construct and BOTH cable and satellite have been aware of/can build to these rules. If cable has executed more expertly than satellite, no one can blame cable.

07-31-2010, 08:55 AM

Maybe the truth is so bad that EV didn't want to to release it. Thanks to Hugh for bluffing EV and forcing EV's their hand. The truth is out and it is bad for EV. There are no receiver upgrades and very little HD will be added until 2009. As soon as Rogers comes out with an improved HD PVR, I am switching. Bye Bye EV. You screwed me for the last time. Good luck retaining those AIO customers once the contract is up. (It won't happen.) My equipment will be on eBay. (The hackers will love that but you screwed once too often with your bad, overpriced hardware.) Most of all, you will lose my $80+/mo with little investment (since I paid all the hardware costs up front.)

07-31-2010, 09:18 AM

MPEG-4 is, indeed, a great way to extend bandwidth over satellite (or cable, for that matter). Roughly speaking, it can double the effective bandwidth.

So: 40 MPEG-2 HD channels can become 80 MPEG-4 HD channels. 300 MPEG-2 SD channels can become 600 SD channels or, perhaps, 200 MPEG-4 SD channels and 100 MORE MPEG-4 HD channels.

But here's the problem: not only ALL of your HD customers, but also ALL of your SD customers, have to have their receivers replaced. With Bell, and 1.8 million customers and, for the sake of argument, 3.0 million receivers at $200 average each ... that's a pile of money someone has to invest just to stay standing. To say nothing of making 3 million receivers totally obsolete if the switch is 100% to MPEG-4. Bell does NOT have the capacity to offer the same signal in BOTH MPEG-4 and MPEG-2.

Meanwhile, this is a non-trivial transition at the head-ends, the affiliates and, not least, at each customer home. Or just launch a satellite into 72? What about having to re-point dishes across the country to get 91-82-72? Whatever bandwidth upgrade strategy Bell pursues, there are significant challenges.

07-31-2010, 10:34 AM

That makes total sense.

Saves on Hardware, use the same Dish just re-point.

I just hope they bring out a sticker for the "Y" yolks as they all say 82 / 91 that will baffle some of the installers I know if they have to point at 73 / 82.......lol

Nimiq 1

07-31-2010, 10:47 AM

Unless they hired a bunch of former *c execs!
Readers on the other side have long lamented to lack of communication and progress and badly missed timelines to the point of jumping ship, which I'm sure a percentage of BEV'ers will do.

Having been intimatly involved in this business and in the direct path of product releases, I can assure you that the path to new product introduction is frought with many diversions which the average subscriber has no familiarity with.

Of course it doesn't help that Engineering and Marketing are seldom on the same page.
Too many comminications that fall short on accuracy or expectations are later met with an abundance of skepticism, so while we don't much like it, there is really very little we can do about it.

With these companies, things happen when they bloody well happen.
It's probaly the same for the cable companies, at least the ones I'm familair with.

**Diablo** · 07-31-2010, 11:16 AM

Rather than swapping hardware to MPEG4, wouldn't it have been possible to design an MPEG4-to-MPEG2 converter for use on the old hardware?

Is there a technical limitation for not pursuing this remedy? It would have saved them a lot of money and headaches.

I am not talking about an internal modification to the receiver, but rather, something that plugs into RF-in, demodulates the incoming signal, converts the MPEG4 signal to MPEG2, then re-modulates the signal and passes it to the receiver. So, at the end of the day, the receiver still gets an MPEG2 signal it knows how to process, and, the provider manages to squeeze more bandwidth out of their transponders by using MPEG4 compression.

07-31-2010, 11:28 AM

Im confused
The article that Bell sent out, and Hugh posted, is inaccurate?
Why not yell at whoever sent the article out?
My understanding, is that the article was published here, with nothing changed, so what is inaccurate about it?
These Bell guys are looking more and more like a bunch of knuckleheads

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