How to improve Sky picture quality in MCE

[nigelbb]

There has been much discussion on this forum about how to get the best picture quality when connecting a Sky digibox to an MCE system. The general consensus is to use an RGB->s-video converter which is what I have been using (the Maplins cheapo one).

Last week my Panasonic TUDSB30 died & I decided to look around for a digibox with an s-video out so as to avoid using the converter. I could have opted for an old Grundig but in the end decided that I wanted something faster & more modern so have just taken delivery of a Pace 3100 Sky+ box. The PQ from the s-video out is noticeably better than with the Panasonic & Maplins converter. Sharper & with more detailed colour.

The Sky+ box cost me 75pounds plus shipping off Ebay or about the same price as an old Grundig plus a Maplins converter. So my recommendation if you want the absolute best PQ from a Sky digibox in MCE is to get yourslef a Sky+.

BTW I am just using the Sky+ box as a standard digibox not wwanting to pay Murdoch 10 pounds per month just for the privilege of using the equipment that I already own.

[boez]

Originally Posted by nigelbb

BTW I am just using the Sky+ box as a standard digibox not wwanting to pay Murdoch 10 pounds per month just for the privilege of using the equipment that I already own.

Really annoys me that I have to pay BT £12 per month to use the piece of equipment that I already own...

[triplea4uk]

I use ct100 cable from rf2 picture is perfect
Sky+ boxes arnt that great better of getting like a panasonic digibox
Sky+ and pace boxes are made by amstrad

[nigelbb]

Originally Posted by boez

Really annoys me that I have to pay BT £12 per month to use the piece of equipment that I already own...

You are paying BT to use the telephone line which they own not you.

[nigelbb]

Originally Posted by triplea4uk

I use ct100 cable from rf2 picture is perfect

If you are happy with picture quality captured in MCE via RF then OK but others have rather higher standards.

Originally Posted by triplea4uk

Sky+ boxes arnt that great better of getting like a panasonic digibox
Sky+ and pace boxes are made by amstrad

perhaps if you had read properly what I posted you would have noticed that I replaced my Panasonic with a Sky+ & now get much better picture quality from the s-video out of the Sky+ than from the RGB->s-video converter from the Panasonic.

Pace make Pace & all the Sky+ boxes. It has nothing whatsoever to do with Amstrad.

[Whitey1977]

Slightly off topic but I thought you might be interested.

I have a way (very crude mind) to get live sky in to MCE with ac3 where available (movie channels)

I have a second pc in my office (MCE in the living room) which i have a FireDTV-s with a dragon CAM. Using My Theatre, I broadcast a network UDP stream that a can play in MY MOVIES from MCE using a .asx file.

As I said its very crude but other people with more knowledge may know of a better way to implement this.

At the moment I can pause, rewind, and ff the stream. The main problems are the stream stops when changing channel and the elecard codec I use is not as good at de-interlacing (jaggys) as the nvidia decoder. For watching a movie from sky movies its great with ac3 sound (and no sky+ box required)


Whitey

[Dominic]

Originally Posted by Whitey1977

Slightly off topic but I thought you might be interested.

I have a way (very crude mind) to get live sky in to MCE with ac3 where available (movie channels)

I have a second pc in my office (MCE in the living room) which i have a FireDTV-s with a dragon CAM. Using My Theatre, I broadcast a network UDP stream that a can play in MY MOVIES from MCE using a .asx file.

As I said its very crude but other people with more knowledge may know of a better way to implement this.

At the moment I can pause, rewind, and ff the stream. The main problems are the stream stops when changing channel and the elecard codec I use is not as good at de-interlacing (jaggys) as the nvidia decoder. For watching a movie from sky movies its great with ac3 sound (and no sky+ box required)


Whitey

whitey

im interested in this one, can you explain a little more on this one, in particular the udp broadcast of the stream, is it specific software / codec function, presumalby some tweaking needed on the MCE end too. im new to the whole MCE side of things, but have sky plus thats about as welcome as fart in space suit, so need solution for watching either freeview or freesat broadcasts. i like the whole sky feed into a dedicated pc approach.
can you eloborate.
i have a 100mb switched network hardwired to my MCE machine, and a quad lmb with 2 spare feeds... just waiting to be utilised

[sanderton]

Originally Posted by nigelbb

You are paying BT to use the telephone line which they own not you.

You would be paying Sky to use the digital bitstream, which they own, not you.

[nigelbb]

Originally Posted by sanderton

You would be paying Sky to use the digital bitstream, which they own, not you.

BBC & ITV plus other are Free To Air. C4 & Five are Free To View. Their programming has nothing to do with Sky. They pay for the Electronic Programme Guide entries that control the Sky+ box yet still Sky expect me to pay 10 pounds per month to use what I already own & has been paid for. I really can't think of another instance of paying to use something that you have bought outright. It's like buying a washing machine & then having to pay a monthly charge to Ariston.