Sky sports poor picture quality

[Jackbrew4]

My sky sports picture is shocking, whether it’s on HD or not.

I have tried upgrading HDMI and upgraded coax in the house and it hasn’t helped. I’ve rebooted the box countless times and nothing changes.

I can’t see how it’s a cable/connection issue as the other HD channels work brilliantly.

I was given another box after 2/3 weeks and this has the same repeated issue.

please help

[jamesredfern]

Agree the Sky Sports HD picture quality has been poor for a long time. The picture on skys equipment is so much better. I've come to the conclusion that Sky are providing VM with a downgraded picture as BT sports is great in HD and even better in UHD  this doesn't fair well when we are seeing reports of VM testing Sky Sports UHD. I suspect these will be on a pat with Sky HD (on a Sky box) but at another addition cost to VM users. 

[Tom_W1]

Hi @Jackbrew4 thanks a lot for your reply.

It's hard to see exactly what you see based on the picture, obviously some quality is lost in the size of the photo provided here.

Have things been resolved since your post on this matter?

Many thanks

[Jackbrew4]

No,

Quality just isn’t good enough. Technical suggest it’s the fact I’m using Standard Sky sports, shocking excuse in my opinion, regular channels have never been this poor…

Also, if I was made aware it would be this bad from the start of my package, I would have chose a different one or gone elsewhere.

[Natalie_L]

Hi Jackbrew4.

Thank you for your reply. 

I am afraid the difference between SD and HD can become quite noticeable during a match.

If you do not wish to proceed with the Sky Sports channels on your account, please do let us know and we will be happy to review this for you. 

Thanks, 

[M_G]

Sky Sports Premier League in SD is horrendous for me, just finished watching a match and the quality was so bad that it's left me with eye strain and slight nausea. 

Switching over to Sky Sport Main Event SD and the quality is markedly better, so this clearly isn't a problem with my setup but rather a VM or Sky problem with Sky Sports Premier League channel in particular.

[andyshortw]

Can only echo everything said here.  The Sky Sports picture quality in SD is embarrassingly bad.  Fortunately for me, I'm in my cooling oof period and will be jumping ship to Sky Stream.  Frankly, I feel anyone even mid contract who bought their contract on the basis of sports coverage would have an argument for cancellation.  I literally see no attempt from Virgin to either acknowledge, explain, or remedy the issue.  Very poor.

[Ilyas_Y]

Hi @M_G, thanks for reaching out to us and a warm welcome to the Virgin Media forums. 👋🏼

I'm sorry to hear about the issues with the Sky Sports you're experiencing. 😞
I've checked on my end and the connection is not properly set up as the T box is not connected to the network, are you able to re-cable everything and connect it to the network?
Let us know how it goes after.

Kind regards,
Ilyas.

[M_G]

Hi Ilyas,

Surely if this was an internal connectivity problem then it would affect all Sky Sports channels and not just Sky Sports Premier League?  At the time, Sky Sports Main Event didn't have any problems for me whilst Sky Sports Premier League did.  And incidentally it seems a bit better as I write this message (not sure how long for)

In any case, the T box and the router are at opposite ends of the house, so the T box is connected using the WiFi signal from the VM router.  I don't have a network cable long enough to connect them via an ethernet cable, and wouldn't really want a cable running across the house.

The WiFi signal from the VM router can be a bit weak at the end of the house where the TV is so it sounds like I'm going to have to invest in some Access Points.

[japitts]

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@M_G wrote:

Surely if this was an internal connectivity problem then it would affect all Sky Sports channels and not just Sky Sports Premier League?

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Not necessarily - it depends where any potential issue was. D-TV platforms carry channels in clusters known as multiplexes - these bear no direct correlation to their EPG positions. You broadly want channels with high bitrate requirements mixed with ones with lower requirements.

For example, SS-PL-SD shares a mux with SS-Action SD but then non-sports channels. If you use the HD variant, then the only other SS channel to be co-TX'd is SS Football HD.

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@M_G wrote:

In any case, the T box and the router are at opposite ends of the house, so the T box is connected using the WiFi signal from the VM router.  I don't have a network cable long enough to connect them via an ethernet cable, and wouldn't really want a cable running across the house.

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Live TV doesn't use the internet. That's only relevant for OnDemand, streaming and various updates.

[jimboy56]

Have you considered upgrading to UHD?