Loyal readers of The Wisdom are aware that I”ve given up (for now) trying to bring HDTV into the house while retaining my basic requirement of a dual-tuner DVR. The best solution seems to be the DirecTV HD DVR, but at $1,000 for hardware in addition to HD and TiVo fees, I”m sitting on the sidelines for a while.
But in reading the new CNet Review of the DirecTV unit, I was struck with a consideration I”ve never even thought of before:
Unlike standalone DVRs, the HD TiVo records the raw DirecTV signal feed, so there”s no signal degradation. As a result, recordings look exactly the same as live feeds. That means most standard channels, and even some high-def networks, exhibit softness or noticeable jaggies, at least on large displays, thanks to DirecTV”s aggressive compression techniques.
“Noticeable jaggies” on “most standard channels”? I”ve noticed a few jaggies on my 44″ DLP while watching really dark scenes (the black gets jaggy) through Dish Network, but everything else looks super.
So are jaggies an issue in general with DirecTV on a large screen? Is DirecTV more “aggressive” with their compression technique than Dish Network? And DirecTV users got thoughts on this?
God, it used to be so easy to pick TV service …
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