Comments on: DirectTV is on the way

By: Sugar Plum

Sugar Plum — Mon, 26 Jan 2009 20:07:42 +0000

Peaches I just discovered your blog.
You are twisted. But in a good way.

By: Jenny

Jenny — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 04:37:48 +0000

Rusty, thanks for the blog love…yeah I cannot believe how fast the past two years have gone! Ben & Amy’s wedding was a lot of fun…

By: Brad

Brad — Fri, 16 Jan 2009 21:48:50 +0000

HDNet only transmits 1080i. In fact, what you’ll find on all HD signals (be it broadcast, satellite, cable, FIOS, etc) is either 720p or 1080i. Basically, it’s a matter of bandwidth and the method of encoding & decoding of the digital signal. Technically, they *can* transmit 1080p, but only in a framerate that is significantly worse than it would be if interlaced or at 720p. So, they don’t.

Blu-Ray Disc is currently the ONLY way to watch in pure, native 1080p.

I don’t know how DirecTV’s current HD-DVR is. Their first try at a DVR was pretty crappy…we still have one. It couldn’t decide what to record last night since the Presidential Address threw everything off my 15 minutes. Hopefully they’ve learned their lesson, as we too will be receiving an HD-DVR before too long.

By: Tim

Tim — Wed, 14 Jan 2009 17:15:30 +0000

I have been a DirecTV customer for about 8 years now. Basically, their customer support sucks. They are generally clueless and I think they like to bait-n-switch. Write everything down the sales guys say, and be sure to get their employee number so you can back it up.

But, once you get settled with them, the service is pretty stable, and I am happy with it. A year ago I upgraded to High Def and their second generation DVR. The DVR interface sucks and it needs rebooting much more often than it should. Tivo rules in this regard! But it’s tolerable. I recently read that DirecTV and Tivo signed an agreement that the third generation DirecTV DVRs will again be based on Tivo. Awesome.

With the exception of the few times per year that we get a strong enough thunderstorm to knock out reception of the satellite signal for ten minutes, my reception has been solid. The number of HD channels is significant compared to what I would have received by switching to Time Warner. Some channels such as HDNet look spectacular in 1080P.