FIOS Sub-par picture quality

[Maestro]

I had FIOS TV installed today. Have had BHN HD DVR for about 18 months or so.

I had 2 HD DVR's, on SD Box, and a cable card. It must be my wiring or something, but the picture is awful. When I watch HD it is OK, but the rest of the channels are fuzzy and out of whack. They are sending the tech back to look. It is the same on the cable card TV so it can't be the boxes.

I am hesitant to return my BHN equipment because if this is the best FIOS can do, I need to go back to BH. Can anyone confirm equal picture quality between BHN and FIOS?

I am also a little disappointed by the FIOS Box. The BHN box was much more customizable...colors, bars, almost everything. Am I missing something with the FIOS? Here's hoping for a firmware upgrade!

Thanks in advance for the input.

M

[LonghornXP]

I had FIOS TV installed today. Have had BHN HD DVR for about 18 months or so.

I had 2 HD DVR's, on SD Box, and a cable card. It must be my wiring or something, but the picture is awful. When I watch HD it is OK, but the rest of the channels are fuzzy and out of whack. They are sending the tech back to look. It is the same on the cable card TV so it can't be the boxes.

I am hesitant to return my BHN equipment because if this is the best FIOS can do, I need to go back to BH. Can anyone confirm equal picture quality between BHN and FIOS?

I am also a little disappointed by the FIOS Box. The BHN box was much more customizable...colors, bars, almost everything. Am I missing something with the FIOS? Here's hoping for a firmware upgrade!

Thanks in advance for the input.

M

First the boxes to tend to tick some people off while others like them better so I'd suggest to give it time. Now onto your other issue I can say without a doubt that FIOS picture quality on SD channels should look no worse than BHN digital channels and from my experience they look much much better than BHN digital channels. So with that said I'd say your coax cables within the house need to be replaced and/or splitters. Either way you need a tech to come out and you tell them you have seen another house with FIOS TV and it looks way way better than mine does. This will pressure them to take things to the next level right away compared to waiting for a tech to decide that. Sometimes they set smaller windows so if cables need replacing they will schedule another day for that so by you saying what I suggest you say that will have them schedule a bigger window so the tech can replace the cables during that visit if it must be done.

Either way I can tell you that picture quality is very very very good with FIOS TV so something is wrong.

[Maestro]

Longhorn,

Thanks for the input. 4 Techs have spent the last 2 days at my house and cannot figure it out. They agree the picture is skewed. They cut a long coax cable and went straight from the junction box in the garage to the TV and still got an issue. They said something about the compression not being correct, but they did not know. I am supposed to be hearing from a supervisor on Monday night.

I really want to keep FIOS, but if they cannot fix it, I am going to have to return to BHN.

Let me ask you this: One of the techs said in some cases component cables are better than HDMI. I looked at him like he was nuts. Everyone has told me to go with HDMI. I used HDMI with BHN and never had an issue. Also, the BHN box did not have to change the 1080, 720, etc...The TV did it for me. Now they tell me I need to chose on the box? So for each show I watch I am supposed to change? Very odd...

Anyways, great website. Good place to exchange ideas and vent.

M

[JeffP]

Let me ask you this: One of the techs said in some cases component cables are better than HDMI. I looked at him like he was nuts. Everyone has told me to go with HDMI. I used HDMI with BHN and never had an issue. Also, the BHN box did not have to change the 1080, 720, etc...The TV did it for me. Now they tell me I need to chose on the box? So for each show I watch I am supposed to change? Very odd...

M

Absolutely false information. Using component your are converting from digital to analog then back to digital at the TV. Now it is true that the conversion process will slightly dull the image and may give the illusion of a better picture but that's only perception.

If I understand your second question correctly they are telling you to convert the image resolution at the box rather then the TV. It really depends on which unit has the better scaler. I wouldn't think the box would have a very good upscaler so I would use the TV. Trail and error will likely be your best bet here.

Jeff

[stubro]

I agree there is no way that Component cable would be better than HDMI unless as stated there is a problem with your picture and the component is masking that. HDMI would show all of the flaws if they exist.

Interesting point on the conversion. I am currently on BHN with HDMI and I let the box do the conversion without any problems but it would make sense if you have a better scaler in the TV to allow it to do the conversion. Sounds like the tech installer isnt that skilled in digital equipment. Not uncommon. Thought I have found the Verizon call center agents and techs to much more knowledgable then BHN.

[bdraw]

Some TV simply have terrible HDMI inputs and nothing looks good via it.

Theoretically HDMI should always look better than component, but unfortunately some companies can screw anything up.

You can check online to see if others have problems with your particular TV.

[JeffP]

Some TV simply have terrible HDMI inputs and nothing looks good via it.

I'm not sure I follow. HDMI is all digital. Passing 0's and 1's. Like all digital information either it gets there or it doesn't. There's no shades of grey. If you have pixelization or frozen images/frames now that would be a digital connection issue but degraded picture quality is a source issue.