Busted! Comcast Down-Converts native 1080i Channels to 720P!!!

I think this deserves its own thread because it's such a severe violation to Comcast customers and the underhanded tactics of the always hated cable companies, in my humble opinion!

http://ift.tt/2ajXyO4

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Originally Posted by patrickthickey (Post 10949896) A COMCAST gentleman who regularly works with Tivo Engineering mostly dealing with cable card pairing for TIVO engineers working with all manner of testing and prototypes, and the encryption process at COMCAST. Anecdotally, he says as of today, you can use the web interface to your Xfinity account to perform cable card pairing. If true this is pretty cool. He happens to reside in California, and has multiple TIVO Roamio units. Bottom line: there is a TIVO test build which purports to fix this issue. The issue is NOT MPEG4 specifically, as COMCAST has MPEG4 channels, not down-rezzed, and they work fine on Roamio. The issue is the down-rezzing, and it is 100% a software-based issue for TIVO to sort out. He read me the engineering report and it clearly identifies the bits which must be changed. What else this might break is what is being tested, but the core issue has been identified. I am not claiming this is new intel, just sharing my 45 minute conversation with him. No time frame was shared for the TIVO release but this person validated it is being actively worked by Tivo and COMCAST. Hanging up I feel pretty good about this, and am optimistic without having anything tangible to share. Out of respect I cannot share his name or title, but he is a hands-on player at COMCAST in Northern California. patrick

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Originally Posted by HarperVision (Post 10949905) No, the real issue is.....why the hell are they down "rezzing" (converting) native 1080i channels into lower resolution 720p?!?!?! I think this is a MUCH bigger issue than breaking a few channels on one model line of a niche product like TiVo Roamio! I'm thankful that it didn't work on Roamio, so it exposes Comcast's disgusting disregard for their customers! If I had Comcast here I would drop them in a heartbeat, even going to directv and paying more if I had to. They didn't even tell any of their customers what they were going to do!!! To me that's low and despicable behavior! I certainly hope these channel owners knew and approved of what Comcast's plans were to ruin their channels on their system, or there's going to be some seriously explaining to do. Maybe some calls and emails to their corporate headquarters about what slimy Comcrap did is in order?

It comes from this post when I suspected something fishy going on after reading this thread:

http://ift.tt/2akQYKB

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Originally Posted by HarperVision (Post 10943669) ....... I just did some math and guess what, as soon as you get to 8 720p channels compared to 1080i, you can fit an additional 1280x720p60 channel in there! They think they're sneaky but they're just money grubbing weasels!!! 1280x720x60 = 55,296,000 pixels/second 1920x1080x30 = 62,208,000 pixels/second 62,208,000 - 55,296,000 = 6,912,000 6,912,000 x 8 = ....... You guessed it.... .......55,296,000, the same as 1280x720p60! Conclusion: They are down converting 1080i channels to 720p so that for every 8 1080i channels they can put on their system, they can put in 9 720p channels. Guilty as charged!!! :mad:

...and this:
http://ift.tt/2akQC6H

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Originally Posted by HarperVision (Post 10944190) ...... As stated by I believe Dan203, when they use h.264 compression they can get about 8-9 HD channels into one QAM (6MHz space with about 38Mbps payload capacity). If these 8 or so HD channels are 1080i, then converting them to 720p first will allow one extra 720p HD channel per QAM (6MHz). Therefore an 850MHz cable plant could (theoretically for this calculation, not including whatever they decide to use for Internet, etc.) could use about 140 QAM channels, each having 9 720p HD channels/QAM for a total of 1260 HD channels, as opposed to only 8 1080i HD channels/QAM for a total of 1120 HD channels. That's a difference of 140 HD channels, not only one per 90 as you're trying to say. Of course in real life there's a mix of 480, 720, 1080, plus internet, OOB, etc. on that 850MHz pipe, but you can see how they could theoretically put dozens more channels (or even using that extra space for more internet bandwidth) on the system by converting 1080i channels to 720p and then compressing using h.264

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Quote: Originally Posted by tivoyahoo (Post 10949983) ......But there is this post where nfl red zone would be delivered as 720p instead of native, since isn't that the only format that vue offers?......... ........So maybe the NFL did negotiate that away and allow comcast and vue to have that control if the price was right?? But those rights certainly don't sign things away as in "go ahead and break those channels on tivo - so be it if that happens"..... I am sure that Sony let them and all other networks know that their service was going to be 720p due to constraints of their streaming system, at least initially, when they were negotiating the rights to provide their channel on Vue. Quote: Originally Posted by tivoyahoo (Post 10949983) ......"I posted to BBC America's facebook page and let them know tivo users across the country are having problems viewing their channel on comcast. And BBC got back to me right away that it was unacceptable and that BBC going to pursue the issue and get some answers and work to correct that as soon as possible."........ Like I said, it's NOT that a few TiVo's can't tune and/or record a few channels that's the issue. It's the fact that Comcast made a conscious decision to down convert 1080i channels to 720p, WITHOUT LETTING ITS CUSTOMERS KNOW THIS FACT!!! To me that's like going to the store and buying a clearly marked 12oz soda, but there's really only 11oz in the can! That's what they're doing with their OWN STBs from what I recall reading....that those boxes still report the problem channels as "1080i"! :mad: Quote: Originally Posted by HarperVision (Post 10944104) .........How do we know that Comcast isn't changing the metadata within the broadcast stream to report that it's still 1080i, even though they've changed it to 720p in reality, and the TiVo just doesn't play that game, which could actually be the issue messing up the Roamio? They can cheat their own boxes to read whatever they tell them to via FW/SW, but not a TiVo. (Not saying this is what is happening, just a hypothetical)

I think this needs to be reported and widely spread to call out Comcast on this ridiculously egregious, slimy, underhanded move on their part, just to cram in a few more crap channels that show nothing but crap reality TV! Dave Zatz maybe?