Forum Discussion

charlestsa's avatar
charlestsa
Tuning in
3 months ago

Streaming Quality /Vs 360 Recordings

Streaming is the modern way to view TV but is it the best? In my opinion definitely no!

I have a Samsung 77" OLED TV and a Virgin 360 box. Set up identical recordings vs stream on BBC1,2 ITV CH 4,CH5. On A/B switching ALL the streamed programmes looked somewhat flat and lacking in fine detail with visible noise often noticeable especially on bright outdoor scenes.

Obviously if you have a small screen or a non premium TV then these issues will not be as noticeable.

For the ultimate picture quality when you cannot view when transmitted the "old fashioned" way of recording on a V360 to a hard disc is by far the superior way.

Hopefully Virgin will continue with this method and not go down the Sky route of streaming only!

 

 

 

 

  • nodrogd's avatar
    nodrogd
    Very Insightful Person

    Unfortunately, broadcast methods of distributing TV are in sharp decline. They are also expensive to maintain. Virgin are currently building a new Full Fibre network alongside their existing traditional fibre hybrid CATV/DOCSIS networks. The intention is to switch these older networks off in the coming years & migrate customers to XGS-PON, which cannot carry the broadcast TV that 360 boxes use. All the current new network build areas only offer the Flex TV products (streaming non recording boxes), & those leaving the traditional networks in future will also move to this.

    Bear in mind that both V360 & Flex was designed for cloud recording, & Liberty Global's other European operations (apart from Ireland) has had no hard disks in their boxes for several years now. The only reason we still use hard disks is due to UK/Irish broadcast agreements not allowing cloud recording. This in itself has caused many issues with the modified firmware that has to manage the hard disks remotely from a central server, like for instance not being able to play recordings on your own hard drive if you lose your Broadband connection to the server.

    • 1701-e's avatar
      1701-e
      Fibre optic

      FYI you CAN watch individual recordings if your internet is down but not if they are part of a series link.  

  • Mr_K's avatar
    Mr_K
    Knows their stuff

    Hard drive recordings are always better quality , and they don't buffer or are reliant on the interweb. A streaming future is a backward step. 

      • Tavis75's avatar
        Tavis75
        Super solver

        charlestsa wrote:

        Convenience  takes priority, not quality!


        Streaming isn't even more convenient, you have to navigate multiple apps, sit through unskippable ads and usually have a far more limited time frame in which to watch stuff. Profit takes priority over convenience!

  • Roger_Gooner's avatar
    Roger_Gooner
    Alessandro Volta

    If the same programme was both broadcast and streamed by VM, I'd expect quality to be better for streaming. As VM's STBs get streams from the BBC’s CDN network via VM's direct peering agreements, then I'd expect top video and audio quality. Furthermore the use of adaptive bitrate streaming enables a better user experience during adverse network conditions as ABR can switch to a lower bitrate or resolution whereas broadcasting is done at a fixed bitrate and resolution and is more prone to problems such as buffering or freezing.

    • Mr_K's avatar
      Mr_K
      Knows their stuff

      Try ITVX live streaming. The quality is appalling. Live terrestial broadcasts or hard drive recording are superior.

      Whether its the 360 'upgrade' or  streaming, these changes aren't always for your benefit.  They are saving money and increasing profits for the provider. 

    • japitts's avatar
      japitts
      Very Insightful Person

      Roger_Gooner wrote:

      Furthermore the use of adaptive bitrate streaming enables a better user experience during adverse network conditions as ABR can switch to a lower bitrate or resolution whereas broadcasting is done at a fixed bitrate and resolution and is more prone to problems such as buffering or freezing.


      I'm not entirely sure that's true. I'm certain VM's headends alter the bitrate on broadcast TX to cope with varying requirements in real-time.

      And insufficient bitrate would tend to exhibit in poor detail during fast-moving sequences, rather than buffering.

      • Roger_Gooner's avatar
        Roger_Gooner
        Alessandro Volta

        VM's central headend knows nothing of downstream network reliability, its job is to process the TV content received and to rebroadcast it. Output resolution is always 576i, 1080i and 2160p50 for SD, HD and UHD respectively (with fields per second of 50 for SD and HD and frames per second of 50 for UHD), and VM has standards for minimum levels of bitrates. So, some re-encoding is always done to achieve these standards before multicasting over the core IP network to the regional headends and onto the STBs.

  • Did you compare using the streaming apps on your TV and the 360 to see if there was a difference.

  • japitts's avatar
    japitts
    Very Insightful Person

    I've picked a multiplex which carries a sport channel and thus particularly variable bitrate requirements.. it does alter quite substantially.

    Taken from the same page, with the bitrate in graphical format..

     

  • Roger_Gooner's avatar
    Roger_Gooner
    Alessandro Volta

    Yes, bitrates do vary as Sky adjusts the bitrates dynamically to meet their quality standards or to deal with networking or satellite transmission issues. If those bitrates are within VM's parameters then VM can rebroadcast as received, otherwise VM can re-encode to meet its own standards. As a fixed line operator VM isn't bothered about its networking constraints as its content providers might be about theirs.