Posts Tagged ‘DirecTV’

DirecTV H21 high-definition HD Receiver

July 24th, 2010 zou

The DirecTV H21 high-definition HD receiver is a step up from the company’s previous model, the H20. This unit makes it easy to search for your favorite television show by person, title, keyword or channel, and you can search for shows up to 14 days in advance, which is fantastic. You can also customize the guide to show only your favorite channels.

The rear panel additions of Ethernet and USB ports give this receiver the ability to upgrade when new technologies will require these connections. In addition, the digital HDMI cable input now works seamlessly. The somewhat large size of the unit assists with internal cooling, thereby maximizing performance; the unit’s size is not excessive, however, and it should blend nicely into a home entertainment setup.

We enjoy taking full advantage of the ability to customize the on-screen features of the H21 unit. You can choose between multiple screen formats  full screen, stretched, letterbox, pillar-box, or crop mode  and resolutions, as well. In addition, parents will be thankful for the ability to dictate what content their children are watching by locking out inappropriate programming.

What this unit is lacking is a built-in DVR function. The H20 also came in recorder and non-recorder versions, but including this feature as a part of the standard package would make it far easier to recommend.

We also find some slight annoyances with this system. For example, when using the search function, any show starting with “The” will be listed under “T” rather than the first non-article letter, i.e. “The Office” instead of “Office, The”. The learning curve on this will vary from user to user. Also, pressing the Format button on the remote displays the presently selected setting rather than immediately changing to a new format; to do this, you have to push the button twice. These are minor quibbles, however.

The DirecTV H21 HD receiver gives the owner access to HD, standard-definition and local DirecTV programming. An additional benefit of this model is the ability to pick up off-air digital (ATSC) broadcasts (where available). This versatility earns the H21 a strong recommendation.

Pros: Additional ports allow owners to make the most of HD quality programming, every on-screen menu is customizable to ease interactions
Cons: The unit’s somewhat large size takes up component space, many features require additional equipment or paid services, does not have ATSC tuner

Warranty
90 days, limited, parts

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Panasonic HDTV DIRECTV Systems

April 9th, 2010 zou

Panasonic, the first consumer electronics company to introduce HDTV in the United States, and DIRECTV, Inc., the nation’s leading digital television conference call service providers, have entered into an agreement to incorporate DIRECTV PLUS Consolidation ™ high definition television receivers into Panasonic-brand digital television-certified set-top boxes. The announcement was made at the 2000 International conference call Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas.The new products will be manufactured by Matsushita Television and computer network security system and will be marketed and sold in the United States later this year by Panasonic Consumer Electronics Company (PCEC). Product development of the new set-top box is being carried out jointly by MTNC and Burlington, NJ-based Panasonic AVC American Laboratories, Inc. (PAVCAL), together with their parent labs computer forensics.

Panasonic has demonstrated its leadership by becoming the first consumer electronics manufacturer to make high definition television available to consumers,” said Bill Casamo, executive vice president for Directv. “We’re very excited about our new plan to develop DIrectv HDTV satellite receivers, as they will complement the already growing number of HDTV sets sold in the marketplace.”

Panasonic was the first to introduce a high definition digital television monitor in the United States in August 1998, followed by its first all-format digital television set-top box in October 1998.

This agreement with DIRECTV is another dynamic step in Panasonic’s commitment to provide consumers with the greatest choice and convenience to enjoy the full breadth of digital television programming,” said Bill Mannion, PCEC’s general manager, Television and Network Systems Division.

DIRECTV began broadcasting its first national high definition consumer channel to customers of its high-power satellite television service on Aug. 1. The channel, Home Box Office’s high definition “HBO HDTV,” features blockbuster Hollywood films and original movies from HBO in high definition format and airs on DIRECTV(r) 24 hours daily. A second DIRECTV high-definition channels, featuring pay-per-view movies and other select programming was launched for consumers Nov. 1.

With Panasonic’s DIRECTV-enabled set-top receiver, consumers will have an expanded number of viewing choices, including access to DIRECTV’s satellite broadcasts in both standard and high definition, as well as terrestrial broadcasts available in the local  area via a rooftop antenna. The Panasonic receiver is also the first to feature the Advanced Programming Guide, which seamlessly displays program information from all available sources.

We believe DIRECTV can play a pivotal role in the acceptance of HDTV technologies, added Mannion. With HBO and other program sources already broadcasting high definition via DIRECTV, the addition of DIRECTV-enabled set-top boxes to our comprehensive line of digital television products allows us to bring the excitement and benefits of high definition television to a much broader audience.”

DIRECTV is the only satellite TV service whose receiving system is being built into HDTV sets and DIRECTV/ATSC* set-top converter boxes, thus providing consumers with virtually instant access to DIRECTV programming and local digital terrestrial channels via a rooftop antenna, where available.

The Panasonic DIRECTV PLUS(tm) set-top box will be displayed at the 2000 International Consumer Electronics Show in DIRECTV Booth 5611 and Panasonic Booth 2001.

DIRECTV is the nation’s leading digital television entertainment service with more than 8 million customers, including customers subscribing to PRIMESTAR By DIRECTV. DIRECTV and DIRECTV PLUS are registered trademarks of DIRECTV, Inc., a unit of Hughes Electronics Corporation. Hughes Electronics is the world’s leading provider of satellite and wireless conference calling system and conference calling service . The earnings of Hughes Electronics, a unit of General Motors Corporation, are used to calculate the earnings per share attributable to the General Motors Class H common stock (NYSE:GMH). Visit DIRECTV on the World Wide Web at www.directv.com.

Located in San Diego, California, Matsushita Television and Network Systems conference call companies manufactures a wide range of television products, which are marketed and sold in the United States by Secaucus, New Jersey-based Panasonic Consumer Electronics Company (PCEC) or are exported to other countries. Both house insurance companies are divisions of Matsushita Electric Corporation of America (MECA), the principal North American subsidiary of Matsushita Electric Industrial Company, Ltd. (NYSE: MC), one of the world’s largest producers of electronic and electric products for consumer, business and industrial use.

Consumers seeking more information on the company’s products may contact Panasonic’s Customer Call Center at 800-211-PANA or access Panasonic’s home loans page at www.panasonic.com. Journalists interested in Panasonic press releases can gain information via the Panasonic Web site or through our toll free conference calls fax-back system, 888-734-7490.

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HDTV Satellite DirecTV or Dish Network

March 22nd, 2010 zou

A satellite company such as DirecTV or Dish Network will allow you to get high definition programming from them. If you go this route, you will have to pay a little extra to receive local channels if you wish to watch your local network broadcasts. Even if your local network security solutions are broadcasting in High Definition, you will only get standard definition signals as DTV and HDTV take up too much bandwidth. Your HDTV channels will most likely include an east or west cost feed of CBS, HBO, Showtime, Pay Per View, HD Net and so forth. Look at the corresponding pages on this site to see which high definition channels each expert satellite company provides. If you decide to get HDTV programming from a satellite company you will have to:

* Get a subscription from the specific satellite company that includes HDTV programming.
* Buy a satellite dish that is capable of receiving HDTV signals from the satellite company you wish to receive high definition broadcasts from.
* Buy a Set-Top-Box that is capable of decoding High Definition channels and is compatible with the specific satellite provider you choose.
* Buy a High Definition TV to view the signals.

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HD Satellite DVR Digeo Moxi

November 5th, 2009 zou

DISH Network and DirecTV have poached a lot of cable customers using the allure of their premium HD DVR. Bigger storage, more robust features, a slick user interface, no cable company to deal with—it’s an easy sell most of the time. But what if you can’t or won’t do the dish and still want an enlightened HD DVR experience from digital cable? Digeo’s answer is the Moxi HD DVR. At its core, the Moxi is a high-end HD DVR that has a 500-gigabyte hard drive with a 75-hour HD capacity and the ability to add a ton of additional storage. On paper, the Moxi would be a compelling device even if this was all there was to it. But its DVR functionality is only the beginning. The Moxi is also a media hub that aggregates content from your home network and the Internet without bringing a full-blown media PC into your living room. Yep. Those newfangled widgets are inside. Let’s take a look.

The Moxi Model
As a sign of the times, Amazon.com is Moxi’s exclusive e-tailer.When you buy the Moxi directly through www.moxi.com, the Buy link hits Amazon. The Moxi HD DVR costs $799 up front, with no additional or recurring fees, ever. The only hidden cost is the fee for the Multistream Cable CARD, which is about $5 per month. The Moxi works only with Multistream Cable CARD, which allows you to record two HD programs simultaneously while watching HD content you’ve already recorded. You must be a digital cable subscriber, but you wouldn’t buy this if you weren’t. A “broadband Internet connection” that’s hard-wired to the Moxi’s Ethernet port is also required, and you need to hit Moxi’s Website from your PC to activate the HD DVR and your account.

By way of comparison,Comcast is charging me $16 per month for DVR service and an HD DVR. So my stock HD DVR has already cost me $382 over the two years I’ve had it. The other game in town for a premium cable HD DVR is the TiVo HD XL. It sells for $599. You still have the Cable CARD charge, and you have to pay TiVo for DVR service. Annual service is $129, and a lifetime service contract is $399. It does include 1 terabyte of storage for 150 hours of HD, and it also has an eSATA port for expanding storage. So a TiVo HD XL with a lifetime of service is $998 up front.

There are a couple of drags in being tied to Cable CARD, as both the TiVo and the Moxi are. You can get all of your premium cable programming (HBO, Showtime, etc.), but when you use Cable CARD, it currently excludes you from consuming any On-Demand content that your cable provider provides. It also eliminates Pay-Per-View (PPV) programming. No PPV is the biggest drawback for me. I never miss a big PPV boxing event, so this Moxi would not fit the bill to be the sole cable box in my house. Tru2way might change this down the road, and Digeo is already making plans in that area. But supporting Tru2way would require you to invest in a new Moxi hardware platform, so bear that in mind.

A final, temporary buzz kill is the Moxi’s incompatibility with switched digital video (SDV), which some cable systems use to conserve precious bandwidth. Digeo is in testing now and promises a summer rollout for SDV support. Check with your provider if your system uses SDV, your number of accessible channels could be limited until the Moxi update arrives.

Speaking of updates, Digeo rigorously tests and then pushes firmware updates silently to its boxes. Unlike a growing legion of CE devices, users don’t have to go through a process to check for updates and install them.

Scaling Storage
Comcast rents me an HD DVR with 30 hours of  HD recording capability, which is the best they had two years ago. While the box I rent from them has an eSATA port, Comcast won’t activate it. So to make space for new recordings, I constantly have to dump HD content I’ve recorded but haven’t gotten around to watching. If Comcast  has a newer and better DVR with expanded storage, they haven’t told me about it.

The Moxi ships with a 500-GB hard drive that’s good for 75 hours of HD (or 300 hours of SD material, however unworthy it may be). Better still, the eSATA port is active and fully supported. You can hang an additional 2 TB of storage off this port. Any additional storage adds to the 500 GB on board; it doesn’t replace it.Moxi  specs demand a hard drive “marketed or certified for DVR use” that spins at a minimum of 7,200 RPM and is at least 160 GB. Checking on Amazon, you can buy a DVR-compatible 500-GB drive for as low as $128, and a 1-TB drive is just under $200 (at this moment). If you’re keeping score at home, a Moxi that’s expanded to 1.5 TB is about the same price as a TiVo XL HD with a lifetime contract. When you connect storage, the Moxi formats it quickly, and you’re up and running with the increased storage seamlessly integrated into the scheduling and storage interface.

The Quick Start Is the Only Start
The box is a simple glossy black rectangle kind of like the monolith from 2001: A Space Odyssey laid on its side, with a lit, smoky-gray Moxi logo on the front. (Thoughtfully, the logo lighting is easy to defeat in the Settings menu for a darkened theater environment.) The only other buttons on the front panel are a nearly invisible black Reset button and a set of simple menu navigation buttons that I never used. The back panel has component video and HDMI outputs, as well as coaxial and TosLink digital audio outputs. I only used the HDMI output. In addition to the CableCARD and e-SATA ports, it also has a USB 2.0 connection.

Your mileage with your cable provider will undoubtedly vary, and we’ve all heard the horror stories. But Comcast was easy on me. They offered me a service call to install the multistream CableCARD at the earliest opening (10 days or so, around the impacted holidays) or said that I could pick one up at one of their offices. No guff whatsoever. My wife picked it up for me the next day while she was running errands.

The Start Up guide indicates a 45-minute setup, but it didn’t take me that long. The Moxi gives an ID number for your box, and then you need to go to your PC and hit the Moxi Website to register and activate it. The site e-mails you an eight-digit registration key that you then enter into the Moxi. Then you’re back on the phone with the cable company to activate the CableCARD, and you’re good to go. Again, Comcast was swift with this and offered no resistance.

The only other pertinent setup issues are choosing the video resolutions that your display supports and setting up the audio output. On the audio front, it’s simple: mono, stereo, or Dolby Digital (I chose the latter, obviously). On the video side, all the usual suspects are here: 480i/p, 720p, 1080i, etc. For my 1080p display, I selected 1080i and 1080p 24 (just in case; I don’t know of any native 1080p/24 coming over cable), which resulted in 1080i signals output at their native rate with proper timing. Further, when I checked 480i/p, 720p, and 1080i, the Moxi output all of the signals at their native resolutions. This allows anyone with high-end video processing in their surround processor, AVR, or display to engage it.

Born in HD
Digeo makes much of the fact that there is nothing legacy about the Moxi HD DVR platform. On the hardware side, at its core, it’s a graphics-grade multimedia PC that’s built on a Linux operating system. And this makes sense. The Moxi is all about processing and crunching HD video streams. All of the Moxi’s graphics are rendered in HD, and it shows. I (almost) hate to keep beating the crap out of my Comcast box, but its graphics look like they were drawn on an Etch-a-Sketch compared with this.

And you’re never bored. A crisp live TV image or a recording that you’re playing back remains in the upper right corner no matter what you’re doing in the menus until you change channels or access different content. If you’re looking for greener grass on another channel or digging through your recordings, you’re not in a TV black hole while you do it. When Moxi info graphics occupy the bottom of the screen, the image scales back just enough to accommodate them. It doesn’t recede to anything that resembles standard def. The HD image gets a smidge softer, but not by much.

Perhaps another facet of having all this processing power is the Moxi’s HD image quality in general. It wasn’t possible to A/B this box with my Comcast box playing the same content, but my subjective impression when I viewed the Moxi on my front-projection system was that it had better clarity and pop with native HD programs. We’ve seen in DVD and even BD players that improvements in core video decoding and processing can improve HD image quality. And that could be happening here, FWIW.

If you’ve used Sony’s now renowned Xross Media Bar interface, it will be especially simple to understand the basic architecture of the interface. The menu lays out horizontally across the screen and expands vertically as you highlight different functions and filters. The power this wields in organizing your content and accessing your content is extraordinary.

The Moxi includes easy-to-find filters for Channels and Recorded TV (programs you’ve recorded). But when you drill down further, there are filters that show only Music, Kids, News, Sports, and Movie Channels. For in sufferables like myself, there’s an HDTV filter that excludes all standard-def un worhiness. Plus, it has a smart, dynamic Favorites filter that automatically populates with the 15 most-watched channels. The menu is extraordinarily clean and uncluttered. As a result, it’s fast. It takes just a few quick keystrokes to locate and use the Find and Record search function. It’s a snap to find shows and set up series recordings. You can base searches on Title, Keyword, or Category, and the Keyword searching is surprisingly shrewd. For instance, when I typed in “Eastwood,” Moxi not only found me a bunch of Clint’s flicks, it sifted metadata info and found an episode of The Late Show with David Letterman featuring an interview with Clint. My Comcast box doesn’t even offer a keyword search. The following is an example of the issues you can have when you search only by title. When I typed “David Letterman” into a title search on the Comcast box, it returned nothing. Zip. Nada. When I typed the same into Moxi’s keyword search, it found every scheduled episode of The Late Show with David Letterman.

Also impressive to me is the way Moxi displays Recorded TV. It groups series recordings together very logically, and you can even access them from the other filters. For example, all of my episodes of 30 Rock and Battlestar Galactica are sorted into folders that bear the shows’ titles, not simply by recording date. So it’s really easy to catch up on several episodes of one show, and you don’t have to bounce back out to a menu and peck through your recorded shows by date to find the next episode.

There are several other smallish refinements that sum and add to the grander Moxi experience. The Change Time Slot, which is accessible from any of the channel filters, lets you quickly look at what’s on, say, your HDTV channels or your Favorites three days from now at 3:00 a.m. The commercial-killing 30-second skip might be banished from some DVRs, but it’s alive and well here. When you press the OK key or any of the direction keys, the Flip Bar comes up and shows you current channel information and the next three upcoming programs on that channel. If you highlight the channel, you can scroll up or down and show the current and next three upcoming programs on other channels.

Navigating with the Moxi’s remote is fastest and cleanest in the shallower depths of the menus when the nav/direction keys and enter buttons suffice. Deeper in the menus and when other buttons are required, it’s a little clumsy to find the right one at times. The Live TV button is one I use a lot, and it was marooned up at the top right, away from easy thumb reach. By feel, the recorded TV playback commands are so similar to the nav/direction keys that I sometimes confused them. None of this was enough to mar the overall experience by a long shot, but the remote could still be improved.

Of Web and Widgets
Moxi’s Website lets you access your cable system’s program guide and schedule recordings from any PC with a browser. Real-time conflict management means you can see right away if any of your new recordings conflict with older ones. It kind of puts a hammer in your hand. No one at home knows that you’re scheduling new recordings, so you can sucker-punch your significant other’s favorite show (at your peril, of course).

The Super Ticker is accessible by one button push on the remote. Once the image scales to show the ticker on the bottom of the screen, you can scroll through sports scores, watch your stocks plummet, or catch the weather and all kinds of other breaking news. The cool thing is that it’s interactive. If you want the NBA, you can navigate directly to its scores—there’s no loop to wait for if you just missed your team’s score. What’s more, if your team’s game is in progress, you can lock the ticker on that game and stay updated, which I found very cool (and also crushing when I saw my Golden State Warriors tank games night after night). Moxi Net aggregates more Internet news content, like a larger-scale version of the Super Ticker. Digeo doesn’t supply the interface and graphics here, and it shows. It’s clunky compared with the homegrown features.

The Jukebox lets you store and access your music on the Moxi, and it also accesses fine tune Internet radio. The Photos feature lets you access your Flickr photos and any photo albums you are permitted to view. In a nice touch of consolidation, Moxi will manage your finetune and Flickr account info through its Website, a model that Digeo tells me will continue. As content sources expand, users won’t need to manage Moxi-related accounts all over the Web. By the time you read this, the Moxi will be updated to DLNA compatibility, which will enhance its ability to access music and photos over a home network.

I know what you’re thinking. Decent widgets, but what about a killer app for accessing movies and TV shows from the Net? TiVo’s got Netflix HD streaming and Amazon Unbox, so what’s the Moxi got? Right now, zip, and Digeo knows it. While nothing is finalized as of this writing, this is at the top of Digeo’s to-do list. And since it has a huge hard drive to work with, the Moxi won’t be limited to streaming. It can obviously store downloads, which are higher quality more often than not. But for now, it’s a black eye for the box in black.

Wish List
While the Moxi is loaded by any sane standard, I did jot down a few more to-dos for the home team. The first is Wi-Fi. Ethernet is required, so an optional accessory that eliminates the need for a hard-wired connection would probably be welcome. While another useful tool in this Swiss Army knife of a DVR is the Storage Info settings, it would be nicer if you could see how much recording space is left from the Recorded TV filter. Also, the smart Favorites filter is good, but why not get a little smarter and avoid displaying channels that you don’t subscribe to? How about iTunes compatibility? Now that the iTunes Store’s music is DRM free, there are 100 million iPod users who might like to access their iTunes library. Also, I’d like to see a traffic widget hit the Super Ticker or Moxi Net. My iPhone has that, so why can’t a guy dream? I can’t bring myself to say that I wish I could order Domino’s pizza over the Moxi, but it’s too damned funny to not note for those who care that “TiVo offers” the ability to order really crappy pizza through its box.

Conclusion
It’s frustrating to know that I probably haven’t done the feature set here justice. I focused on the areas in which the Moxi differs from the “DVR” I use and on the features I gravitated to most in a relatively short review period. While the Moxi can’t access On-Demand or PPV content, virtually everything else about it is superior, including its already massive and scalable storage and a user interface that’s light-years beyond. As premium as the Moxi’s feature set is now, I have no doubt that it will continue to evolve. If it sounds like I’m enthusiastic about the Moxi, I am. This was like being on vacation from the cable company DVR I use daily. Highly recommended.

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HD Receiver DirecTV Tuner

November 3rd, 2009 zou

Connect to the future of digital TV,Whether we like it or not, digital video connection is the way of the future. Consensus of the producers to grow shows that consumers who have HD-capable displays that only have analog (Y/Pb/Pr or RGB) high-definition connections won’t be left out in the cold, which is good news.

However, while Hollywood may allow legacy equipment to remain in service, they prefer the potential copyright protection that’s available through digital signals. We enthusiasts like the opportunity to pass digital signals directly to the display without stopping along the way for an unnecessary conversion back to an analog signal.

Finally, several manufacturers have come out with new HD-capable DirecTV tuner to accommodate the growing number of displays with digital connections.

Sony, Zenith, and Samsung are a few of the first manufacturers to introduce HD DBS receiver that are outfitted with a DVI connection that has HDCP (high-bandwidth digital content protection).

These tuners can connect to the new crop of HD-capable displays that have the same input. The DVI interface allows the tuner to uncompress the compressed high-def signal and send it, along with the tuner’s interactive onscreen graphic, to the digital display while it’s still in digital form.

The only drawback is that the signal’s wide bandwidth makes it impossible for you to use any known consumer or professional recording device to make even an authorized recording. None of these tuners offers an IEEE 1394 connection, which would pass along a compressed digital signal that you can then record on a video hard drive, a D-VHS player, or an HD-DVD-like device.

All three tuners offer a complete suite of the necessary inputs and outputs. The Sony SAT-HD200 and Zenith HD-SAT520 are nearly identical; both are built around the same LG (Lucky Goldstar, Zenith’s parent company) chassis and therefore have the same connections.

I’ll refer to them as one unit, except where there are noted differences. Although it has similar outputs, the Samsung SIR-TS160 tuner, sourced from Hughes, has a different back-panel arrangement. We didn’t have a Hughes unit on hand for direct comparison.

All three tuners offer two basic A/V outputs, an S-video connection, component (Y/Pb/Pr) and RGB connections, a DVI jack, an RF-modulated output, digital audio, and other typical satellite connections. Sony and Zenith use an optical digital audio output, while Samsung offers a coaxial digital connection.

All three tuners include a switch that activates either the Y/Pb/Pr output or both the RGB and DVI outputs, but not all three outputs at once. Like many HD DBS receiver, the Sony and Zenith tuners force you to choose either the standard (composite or S-video) or high-def (Y/Pb/Pr or RGB and DVI) output.

You can’t send the DVI signal to your home theater  HD monitor and the composite signal to the NTSC set in your bedroom at the same time. The Samsung receiver, however, does and will always output a 480i signal from the composite and S-video outputs, which makes it extremely flexible for multiroom viewing (make sure that the displays all have the same aspect ratio) or for use with a standalone TiVo or ReplayTV hard-drive recorder.

The process of selecting the type of output is considerably different between boxes. With the Sony and Zenith models, you use a button on the front panel to select your output options. Sony adds this function to the remote for convenience.

The Samsung tuner’s only option is another back-panel switch that offers 1080i, 720p, or 480p/480i options. The switch’s location makes any kind of native output impossible but also keeps curious fingers from changing the setting.

Depending on which mode you pick, the receiver up- or down converts all signals to that output rate and activates the appropriate connectors. While this is simple and entirely appropriate for the vast majority of displays, the Sony and Zenith models add four additional output options, including native, hybrid 1, hybrid 2, and EZ DVI.

The native setting converts 480i signals to 480p and passes along 720p and 1080i signals directly to the display without conversion. The hybrid 1 and 2 settings are similar, but hybrid 1 converts all HD signals to 1080i, and hybrid 2 converts them to 720p. EZ DVI automatically detects the monitor type and converts all signals accordingly. Enthusiasts with multiscan displays (read: CRT projectors) may appreciate these tuner’ added flexibility.

All three units’ ergonomics are effective and intuitive, but the Sony and Zenith units have a slight edge. All of the remote controls are reasonably well laid out and provide proper controls within single-digit reach. Menu structures are attractive and reasonably intuitive.All three tuners eliminate my pet peeve about first-generation set-top boxes: They list analog and digital off-air broadcasts and satellite channel in the same channel list. No more switching inputs.

The Sony and Zenith models benefit from a front-panel display that indicates the current format setting and channel number, which is extremely handy. Samsung’s front panel has nothing more than a hard-to-see red light to let you know that it’s on. The latter tuner does add features like a Biorhythm chart and simple video games for kids.

I’m not sure why you’d need a Biorhythm chart, but the games are mildly amusing when there’s nothing worth watching on TV, which is a common occurrence. All three tuner allow you to select your display’s aspect ratio and modify formats that don’t otherwise fit. However, while each tuner strips gray bars into the unused space beside 4:3 images on a 16:9 screen (to prevent uneven phosphor wear on CRT or plasma displays), only the Sony and Zenith units provide a setting that eliminates the bars permanently.

These two tuners also offer an on screen feature that indicates when a particular satellite program is broadcast in true high definition. This indicator didn’t light up when I watched Joe Somebody on HBO’s HDTV channel.Presumably,HBO upconverted the program before they broadcasted it, but you could have fooled me.

The major differences between the Zenith and Sony tuners lie with the remote controls, although Sony does include a free DVI cable (worth $20). Sony’s remote, as I mentioned, can change the output-format option on the fly. You may not need this function beyond initial setup, though. You can also code the remote for a particular receiver, if you have more than one.

Unfortunately, none of the remotes provides discrete power-on and -off commands or aspect-ratio settings, which might make it difficult to program a macro-based remote control like the Philips Pronto or an automation system from Crestron or AMX.

I connected each box’s component high-def output to an Extron switcher, which was connected to our reference Runco DTV-991 CRT projector. According to signals from our HD test generator, the DTV-991 is capable of a full 1,920:1080i resolution. I made direct comparisons of the tuners’ signals by switching inputs and comparing the image quality. All three tuners looked excellent.

The Samsung’s picture was slightly more flushed than that of the other two tuners and seemed to make colors bloom somewhat. The Sony and Zenith tuners, which created identical pictures, provided a slightly sharper picture than the Samsung. This perceived detail may be due to the fact that these tuners have less color. Unfortunately, we have no way to know which box is accurate, although I’d venture to guess that all three tuners hover on either side of the line. In most cases, you can adjust the color level to some extent through your display.

When I used each tuner’s DVI connection with the Sharp XV-Z10000U projector, I noticed a slight increase in detail and clarity over the analog connection. Differences between tuners were even more difficult to see.

Comparing analog audio levels is considerably more difficult without a reference level, and comparing digital outputs is harder still. If you use an HDTV tuner, you should use the digital output, in which case your external audio processor will mostly determine the audio quality. If you’re using the analog audio outputs (get with the times), all I can say is that the Sony and Zenith models are a hair louder.

Tired of my current, first-generation RCA DTC-100 and its particular ergonomic hang-ups, I’m eager to get a new HD-capable tuner. I’m torn, however, between the options presented here. Samsung’s dual-output capability, which will feed both my main system’s HD-capable projector and its peripheral devices (VCR, PVR, etc.) and a second display, is enticing. For those people who don’t have a CRT projector, this is a good fit. For those who do, the Sony or Zenith tuner native outputs might be more useful, and these tuners’ ergonomic features are an excellent bonus.As the tuners’ street prices are likely to be very similar, choosing one over the other will depend on availability and brand preference.

Highlights

Sony and Zenith:
• Front-panel channel readout
• Native output rate

Samsung:
• Concurrent HD and SD outputs allows for extremely flexible installation
• Includes video games!

SIR-TS160 HD DirecTV Tuner $700
Samsung Electronics America

(800) SAMSUNG

www.samsungusa.com
Dealer Locator Code SAM

SAT-HD200 HD DirecTV Tuner $799
Sony Electronics
(800) 222-SONY
www.sony.com
Dealer Locator Code SNY

HD-SAT520 HD DirecTV Tuner $700
Zenith Electronics
(877) 9-ZENITH
www.zenith.com
Dealer Locator Code ZEN

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Samsung SIR-S4120R DirecTV Receiver/Digital Video Recorder with TiVo

November 2nd, 2009 zou

Where’s the DVR? Come to think of it, where isn’t the DVR?
Amazing but true, many TiVo and ReplayTV owners out there just see the devices as neat, little living-room boxes that record their television programs, and they simply don’t care about the technology inside. Thanks to steady improvements in digital video recorder technology, consumers don’t have to care if they don’t want to. Not to be like that weirdo in the mask and spoil the magic trick, but there’s a simple hard disk drive inside—in many cases, the same exact brand and model you have inside your PC. However, while computer-based “video capture” applications seem to have plateaued in terms of features and convenience (at least for now), the more user-friendly dedicated DVR hardware has undergone some interesting transformations, in and out of the home theater.

DirecTV Receiver/Digital Video Recorder with TiVo

Late to the game, Samsung has finally released their first DVR, an impressive DirecTV receiver with integrated TiVo recording ,a 100-hour (120gigabyte) hard drive, and an exceptionally sleek, slim form factor for a combination unit. After the initial run of 20,000 units was built in Mexico,the SIR-S4120R is now made in Korea, the Samsung motherland.

Connections are ample, if not stunning: one S-video out, twin sets of composite video/analog stereo outs, one digital optical audio out for any Dolby Digital signal that might accompany a movie, and a pair of USB 1.1 ports. All of the analog cabling is included—RCA, S-video, telephone, even a handy splitter for your phone line to accommodate the TiVo dial-up. The $4.99 monthly TiVo service fee applies but is automatically waived for subscribers to DirecTV’s top-end Total Choice Premiere package.

Chief among the SIR-S4120R’s features are its vast recording capacity—unique in the still-elite world of DirecTiVos, as some fans refer to them—and the two DirecTV tuner that allow you to watch/record or record/record two different programs at the same time. Why would I ever want to do that? Well now, this is the most access I’ve ever had to DirecTV here at Rancho Chiarella. I hope I don’t come off like one of those gushing “actual customer letters” read by Laurence, Danny, or Andy in the commercials, but I’m still reeling from the sheer quantity of channels available, many of which I’d never personally seen before. It’s a thrill I haven’t experienced since my first cable forays a quarter-century ago. My only not-really-a-complaint is in reference to the time it takes to surf them all.

Best of all, this abundant selection is a perfect complement to the super-sized hard drive and the pair of tuners. I invariably find myself drawn to VH1 Classic, recording on impulse a music video that I haven’t seen since college, confident in the knowledge that I can still record any other program that strikes my or my wife’s fancy. Deciding what to watch has become a happy challenge, but double the streams (two separate DirecTV feeds are required for full benefit) makes our choice half as difficult. Perceptible signal hiccups are rare, and the digital compression is modest and even forgivable in the DVD age.

The unobtrusive silver box offers more on its front panel than at first meets the eye, with a door to hide the access card and a subtle up/down/left/right disc surrounded by guide, DirecTV, live TV, info, and select buttons. There are also indicator lights for power and record, plus a standby button. (The unit never completely shuts off, but the soft, omnipresent fan noise isn’t a real problem.) These on-unit buttons provide a generous measure of control, should the remote ever go missing, but this particular unified, ergonomic remote is colorful and remarkably uncluttered, a breeze to set up, and a real pleasure to use. The DirecTV and TiVo screens are standard fare, which (for those folks who are unfamiliar with these popular technologies) are largely icon-driven, distinctly stylized, and yet always clear and concise.

As far as the SIR-S4120R’s timing is concerned, if Samsung’s strategy was to hang back, observe, and apply what they learned in order to create an ideal television-watching companion, then I can only say that they’ve succeeded wonderfully.

SIR-S4120R DirecTV Receiver/DVR with TiVo $499
Samsung Electronics America
(800) SAMSUNG
www.samsungusa.com

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DirecTV Dish Antenna System

May 20th, 2009 zou

One of the biggest names in the industry when it comes to multiswitches would undoubtedly have to be SPAUN. The conference call companies was founded back in October of 1969 and began by manufacturing OEM terrestrial antenna products. In 1991 they began distributing products under their own name and shortly after that introduced the first multiswitchwith an integrated power supply. Since then they have continuously added to their product conference call line such that today their product range consists of more than 300 products.

Recently, SPAUN ventured into a new arena by beginning to offer amplifier and multiswitch products for use exclusively with the DirecTV satellite Pay TV system in the USA. DirecTV it self came into existence back in 1990 and launched their satellite TV service in June of 1994. The idea of watching TV via satellite instead of through a cable TV service provider became so popular that in just a little over a year, they reached one million subscribers.

Just ten years later in 2005 they had 15 million subscribers! In 2007 DirecTV began offering 70 HD channels and today that number has risen to over 130 HD channels.When you talk to most people about DirecTV, they think of DirecTV as merely a conference call service providers of  TV services to individual end users such as LNBs those in private homes. But the truth is DirecTV also provides service to commercial end users such as hotels and larger apartment buildings

Here the commercial end users want to provide independent satellite TV signals to each hotel room or apartment with all of this being accomplished using a single satellite antenna. Obviously, a standard DirecTV satellite system can’t handle this all by itself. That’s where SPAUN comes in.

SPAUN has developed an array of products exclusively for the DirecTV SlimLine dish antenna system that allows the incoming satellite signals from five different satellites to be distributed to multiple receivers using only the one satellite dish.

The SlimLine LNB (Fig.2) comes with four independent outputs that when used normally allow the end user to connect up to four satel-lite receivers. But when used with the SPAUN components, 16 and more receivers can be connected.If you take a close look at the SlimLine LNB, you might say to yourself: “I only see three LNB’s”. And, yes, that’s exactly what it looks like from the outside. On the inside however, much more is going on.

The LNB on the right is actually three LNB’s in one that together with the other two add up to five.Then you might be asking yourself how it can be possible to switch between five different satellites and at the same time give all the connected receivers access to these satellites independent of each other.

The answer again lies in the SlimLine LNB. A typical LNB converts the incoming satellite signals to the 950 to 2150 MHz range and sends these signals via the coax cable to the receiver.The SlimLine LNB does this and more. A portion of the incoming satellite signals are converted to the 250 to 750 MHz range. Through a variety of switching functions within the LNB, the 250 to 750 MHz range and the 950 to 2150 MHz range are both made available at each of the four outputs on the SlimLine LNB. The receiver chooses which band and polarization it wants simply by switching between 14 or 18 volts and also whether or not to include a 22 KHz signal along with the proper voltage.

We found the idea of using SPAUN switches in this application very intriguing so we decided to taker a closer look at how all of this works. SPAUN was kind enough to provide us with a number of their components so that we could put them to the test.

The number of receivers that need to be serviced will dic-tate what SPAUN components will be used and how many of them will be needed. The most basic set up will provide outputs for as many as 16 receivers. For example, the four LNB outputs can be connected directly to a SPAUN SMS 41609 WBP switch (Fig.3) without the need for any amplifier components.

This switch already comes with the 16 outputs needed for 16 different receivers. Just plug the included power supply into a wall outlet, con-nect the other end into the proper jack on the switch and it’s ready to go (Fig.4). All of the receivers connected to this switch can independently access all of the satellite signals from the DirecTV antenna as if each receiver were connected to its own antenna.

How does this work? The concept is actually quite simple. The receiver has the ability to send four different control signals (14V, 18V, 14V + 22 KHz and 18V + 22 KHz) via the coax cable to the LNB so that the proper band/ polarization is selected. But when the SPAUN compo-nents are used in between the receiver and the SlimLine LNB, the sequence of events unfolds with a slight difference. The receiver still sends out the proper control signal depending on the band/polar-ization it wants to receive but, instead of this finding its way to the receiver, it ends up sent to a SPAUN multi-switch. As far as the receiver is concerned, it thinks it’s connected to an LNB.

The SPAUN SMS 41609 WBP multiswitch comes with four satellite signal inputs. Each of these inputs sends its own unique control signal to the SlimLine LNB:Input 1 – 14VInput 2 – 18VInput 3 – 14V + 22 KHzInput 4 – 18V + 22 KHzIn KHzIn this way, all of the avail-able satellite IF bands from the SlimLine LNB are delivered to the SMS 41609 WBP multiswitch at the same time. The switch then routes the desired band/polarization to the connected receivers based on the control signals received by the switch from each of the receivers.

As mentioned earlier, one of these bands is the 250 to 750 MHz frequency band. Depending on the DirecTV receiver model, an internal or external BBC (base band converter) module is used to upconvert this frequency band to the standard satellite IF band so that the receiver can access these signals.If the satellite system to be installed involves the use of more than 16 receivers, then additional multiswitches need to be used.

In some cases, this conference call system must also be capable of han-dling terrestrial TV signals as well. The SPAUN SMS 41609 WBP multiswitch does not have a terrestrial input so for applications like this the GMS 51609 WBP can be used. Also, now that we are deal-ing with more than one multiswitch, it becomes necessary to include signal amplifiers Broadband and signal taps to the SPAUN set up as well.

For the first part of our test we wanted to set a baseline measurement from which a comparison could be made when the SPAUN components were added. So, before any SPAUN components were put in place, we measured and recorded all the active transponders on the five satellites using the signal strength display that is included in the DirecTV receiver setup menu.

test we used the following SPAUN components:1xGBK 5500 WBP Wide-band Launch Amplifier1xGTS 525 WB Penta Split-ter1xGZR 5550/15 WB Penta Tap with Directional Coupler2xGMS 51609 WBP Compact 16-Output Multiswitch These components were connected to each other as shown in the diagram in Fig.5. The actual connected components can be seen in Fig.6. In the normal setup, the four cables from the SlimLine LNB were routed to a ground-ing block (Fig.7) at a location outside of the house just before the cables went into the house. This was a convenient point to connect the SPAUN components.

The four IF cables were removed from the grounding block and connected to the four inputs on the SPAUN Launch Amplifier. This particular setup has the capability to provide independent satellite signal outputs for up to 32 receivers.

For the purpose of our tests we opted to measure the outputs at the eight Measuring Points (MP) highlighted in Fig.5. The unused outputs were terminated with 75 Ohm terminations. The MP’s were also terminated with 75-Ohm terminations when they were not connected to a receiver.

As with the first part of the test, all the active transponders for the five satellites were measured and recorded for each of the MP’s (MP05 to MP12) using the same DirecTV receiver menu display. All of the collected data was organized and tabulated in seven different tables (one for each satellite) so that each MP output could easily be com-pared with the other outputs as well as with the results of the first part of the test.These results can be seen in Fig.8 thru 14.

Looking closely at each of the tables you can see that the measured signal strengths at MP05 to MP08 compared very nicely to the normal setup. In fact there was very little difference between any of the measurements and in some cases there was no difference at all. And as far as watch-ing TV goes, all of the channels available with the normal setup (SD and HD) were also available at the four MP outputs.

There was, however, some differences between the measured signal strengths at MP09 to MP12 and the normal setup. In this case the measured signal strengths were somewhat lower at these four MP’s than those of the normal setup. Although the signal strengths were lower, it did not interfere with any of the available TV channels. All of the available TV channels (SD and HD) could be viewed through any of the four MP outputs.

Conclusion
So, is the number of receiver outputs using these SPAUN components limited to 32? Absolutely not. If you need more than 32 outputs for your specific DirecTV setup,simply add additional SPAUN components! The possibilities are endless. In the end all of the SPAUN components functioned exactly as they should. Does this surprise you?

It shouldn’t. SPAUN has been around since 1969 and in that time has built up quite a bit of experience when it comes to manufacturing satellite components. They make quality products that fully live up to expectations.

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