Weak signal, bad picture?

Robbiewright

Member of the Big Dish Club
Joined
Jan 1, 2000
Messages
273
Reaction score
0
Points
0
Age
61
My Satellite Setup
Sky plus V3 and a 50 inch plasma screen.
My Location
Cairo, Egypt
I have a 2.4 meter prime focus dish here in Egypt. Like most things here, it is all a bit wobbly and the L.N.B is held on with a great amount of gaffer tape which make fine adjustments almost impossible. Anyhow, my question is, will a weak signal give you a bad picture? Not breaking up and crackly noise, but a slight loss of picture quality, annoying bad but still watchable. I was led to believe with digital you either have it or you don't. I have all the channels I think I am going to get here with no break up and good sound but the quality isn't the best. Will more tweaking help?
 

Llew

cerca trova...
Staff member
Joined
Jan 1, 2000
Messages
16,226
Reaction score
4,197
Points
113
Age
81
My Satellite Setup
Triple Dragon, Dreambox 8000, Echostar AD3000ip, TBS6522,6925,6983 PCie cards.
Gibertini 1.25m motorised dish driven by the AD3000, with either Inverto BU Quad or Norsat / XMW Ka LNBs . SMW 1.05m + 3 other dishes. Speccy: Promax HD Ranger+
My Location
The Flatlands of East Anglia
No, the quality of the picture you are receiving depends on the standard of resolution the provider is transmitting.

Best for standard definition signals is 720X576, below that you begin to see a drop in quality of your picture (worst is 352X288, which some cheapo providers use).

Llew
 

Robbiewright

Member of the Big Dish Club
Joined
Jan 1, 2000
Messages
273
Reaction score
0
Points
0
Age
61
My Satellite Setup
Sky plus V3 and a 50 inch plasma screen.
My Location
Cairo, Egypt
Thanks Llew, That's what I thought, can you answer another question for me. Is Sky one provider or is it made up of lots of providers? U.K, Discovery, etc?
 

rolfw

Believe it when I see it Admin.
Staff member
Joined
May 1, 1999
Messages
38,292
Reaction score
1,615
Points
113
My Satellite Setup
Technomate 5402 HD M2 Ci, DM7000s, Transparent 80cm Dish, Moteck SG2100 DiseqC motor, lots of legacy gear. Meters: Satlook Digital NIT, Promax HD Ranger+ spectrum analyser.
My Location
Berkshire
It is lots of providers Robbie, all being broadcast under the sky package.

Bad picture quality could be to do with the scart leads you use, if a good quality lead and an RGB TV is used, then there should be a good picture on pretty much all of the channels, I certainly haven't noticed too much in the way poor picture quality.
 

dxsat

Regular Member
Joined
Jun 22, 2005
Messages
745
Reaction score
70
Points
28
Age
69
Website
skyinmadrid.com
My Satellite Setup
Snap's setup: (In Spain) Humax HDR, Prodelin 1.8m dish + Invacom QDF-031 + CM feed, (In UK) CallFlow VDSL + EE 4G, Sky Q, YouView HD, Mac OSX, iOS
My Location
UK: Tonbridge, Kent. Spain: Madrid.
Seeing as you have a 50" plasma, it would be worth getting a HD receiver. Standard definition is really crummy blown up to that size.
The answer to your original question is that provided there are no breakups of the signal, that is over threshold, there is no difference between that and the strongest signal. So long as you have 100% of data you'll see a perfect picture. The Pace V3 Sky+ box has a slightly better quality output via scart than standard boxes.
 

Likvid

ASBO Club Member - Persona non grata
Joined
Jul 30, 2003
Messages
1,752
Reaction score
5
Points
0
Age
53
My Location
Stockholm, Sweden
SD definition look great on a 50" plasma as i have one myself, problem being that you need to buy a expensive scaler/processor to get this kind of quality.

I own a Crystalio VPS2300 processor with builtin Faroudja processing and noise reduction features and the picture is incredible compared to without it.

Mine costed £2,500 but you can get other models that are cheaper that also will improve SD.
 

Zorba

Regular Member
Joined
Jun 13, 2003
Messages
2,201
Reaction score
7
Points
38
Age
63
My Satellite Setup
3m(28.2E),1.5m(19.2E.13E,10E),1m (4W ,7W)1m (?).diseqc 10,sky plus,VU+,telergy iptv.
Satlook nit colour + Horizon hdsm.
My Location
Limassol, Sunny Cyprus
If you are connected to the tv with a scart lead make sure you are on RGB not PAL in the picture settings menu.
I am not impressed with some lcd/plasma tvs with sky digiboxes.A lot of them give a grainy type picture and some are bad on fast moving scenes.Sometimes top quality cables help.
 

dxsat

Regular Member
Joined
Jun 22, 2005
Messages
745
Reaction score
70
Points
28
Age
69
Website
skyinmadrid.com
My Satellite Setup
Snap's setup: (In Spain) Humax HDR, Prodelin 1.8m dish + Invacom QDF-031 + CM feed, (In UK) CallFlow VDSL + EE 4G, Sky Q, YouView HD, Mac OSX, iOS
My Location
UK: Tonbridge, Kent. Spain: Madrid.
Likvid said:
SD definition look great on a 50" plasma as i have one myself, problem being that you need to buy a expensive scaler/processor to get this kind of quality.
It may be possible to improve SD quality using expensive interpolation hardware, but RobbieWright has a Sky box, and these always look terrible on large screens at normal viewing distances. His Pace Sky+ is better than most. If 10847 V is receivable, anyone with a 50" plasma would see a huge increase in quality with only £100 investment in a Pace 810XE, to receive the BBC HD channel. The picture quality (particularly on Planet Earth) is really stunning. It's not just the extra detail, colour fidelity is better as well, and the sound is 5.1 Dolby Digital.
 

Robbiewright

Member of the Big Dish Club
Joined
Jan 1, 2000
Messages
273
Reaction score
0
Points
0
Age
61
My Satellite Setup
Sky plus V3 and a 50 inch plasma screen.
My Location
Cairo, Egypt
At the moment I am using the Svideo out put, I will try and change to a scart lead, if not I will just have to wait until the next time I get ti the U.K and try and pick up a HD box.
 

PaulR

Dazed and Confused Admin
Staff member
Joined
Jun 28, 2003
Messages
18,023
Reaction score
4,046
Points
113
My Satellite Setup
-----------See sig-----------
My Location
Wirral, NW UK and Vaucluse, France.
If you have an S-video out then you must have either a Grundig Digibox or a $ly plus box. S-video is pretty good, nearly as good as RGB, and certainly noticeably better than ordinary composite video. Frankly, the quality of your SD picture at this point is down to your TV. Good ones will have pixel multiplication software and other clever things to get the best out of the signal.

I don't have HD yet, probably won't for quite a while, but I am still impresssed by the job my Philips TV does with its Pixelplus processing with a standard signal. Given the limited amount of HD material around I would say that, at the moment, how an HD TV treats an SD signal is still important.

As ever, being able to see a working example of a TV is a good idea.
 

PaulR

Dazed and Confused Admin
Staff member
Joined
Jun 28, 2003
Messages
18,023
Reaction score
4,046
Points
113
My Satellite Setup
-----------See sig-----------
My Location
Wirral, NW UK and Vaucluse, France.
D'ohhh

Just seen in your system details that you have a Sky plus V3, so this explains the S -video output. What TV do you have and does it have any video processing capabilities?
 

Robbiewright

Member of the Big Dish Club
Joined
Jan 1, 2000
Messages
273
Reaction score
0
Points
0
Age
61
My Satellite Setup
Sky plus V3 and a 50 inch plasma screen.
My Location
Cairo, Egypt
It's a Samsung and I can't find a model number on it or the book.
It has DNIe. It's all quite watch-able, just a bit disappointed with the quality on some of the channels.
 

Robbiewright

Member of the Big Dish Club
Joined
Jan 1, 2000
Messages
273
Reaction score
0
Points
0
Age
61
My Satellite Setup
Sky plus V3 and a 50 inch plasma screen.
My Location
Cairo, Egypt
Digital NR, it has that too. I really should read the book.
 

PaulR

Dazed and Confused Admin
Staff member
Joined
Jun 28, 2003
Messages
18,023
Reaction score
4,046
Points
113
My Satellite Setup
-----------See sig-----------
My Location
Wirral, NW UK and Vaucluse, France.
Robbiewright said:
I really should read the book.
That could be a mantra for a great many people - and I include myself there!
 
Top