Freesat 4K SD looks awful on 1080p tv.

[alexsharm]

So I have a Sony Bravia KDL43 from 2017 which is a 1080p tv and I have up until recently been watching Sky +HD on it which looks great on both HD and SD channels. I was really surprised how great SD channels looked on it when compared with freeview SD channels. I was enjoying my viewing but I didn’t want to spend money to access the + features so I went out and bought a freesat 4K recordable box for £200 and the HD channels on it look the same as they do on sky but the SD just look a blurry mess. I am wondering could the box be upscaling to 4K and then compressing down to 1080p and showing it on my tv instead of just upscaling to 1080p from 576i,

Thanks.

 

[Rodders53]

What different picture settings do you have? | Freesat

Help page covering the subject What different picture settings do you have?

www.freesat.co.uk

and

What different picture settings do you have? | Freesat

Help page covering the subject What different picture settings do you have?

www.freesat.co.uk

You should be able to see what the box is sending.

Check if the Sony's per input picture settings need tweaking to improve pictures, also...

Google tells me your TV supports High Dynamic Range --- disable it on the freesat 4k box input !!!

That'll be the cause. The 4k box (aka Aura Arris freesat box) has a 'fault' that freesat have so far not fixed whereby it erroneously signals and outputs as HDR all SD and HD broadcast signals to HDR-capable TVs. The result is (apparently) awful pictures.

 

[alexsharm]

Ive got it set in the freesat box settings as 1080p but I am concerned that with it being a 4K box it automatically no matter what upscales everything to 4K then back down to 1080p but the HD channels look perfect just certain SD channels such as Blaze and the channel called great movies look terrible. I can’t see anything in the freesat box setting to do with HDR.

 

[millfield]

The Aura is the Freeview box, Arris is the Freesat box.

 

[Rodders53]

The Aura is the Freeview box, Arris is the Freesat box.

Mea Culpa.

Stupid of Humax to have similar name to the maker of the freesat 4k. I blame waning powers.

Ive got it set in the freesat box settings as 1080p but I am concerned that with it being a 4K box it automatically no matter what upscales everything to 4K then back down to 1080p but the HD channels look perfect just certain SD channels such as Blaze and the channel called great movies look terrible. I can’t see anything in the freesat box setting to do with HDR.

Not very likely any maker would attempt that stupidity (too much processing required to do both up and down).

If you set it to output the 'as transmitted/received resolution' - which is 1080i for HD and 576i for SD it would allow your TV to do the scaling rather than the box for comparison purposes.
My Foxsat-HDR allows the PVR to output 'original' 576i for SD and 1080i for HD, or I can set it to upscale to SD to 1080i. MY TV does a better deinterlace/upscale of SD than the PVR.

Have you checked for HDR settings on the input of the TV? That is the most likely issue and one of the big complaints from freesat 4k owners.

Blaze DVBS DVBS2 DVBS2X Bitrate Monitoring BLAZE - 11081 H - Astra 28.2East is 544x576i (full SD is 720x576i) so stretchy wide pixels.
Great! Movies is better at 720x576i and the resolution used by BBC SD programmes.

I watch neither channel so won't comment on the material - but if it's been acquired from poor quality originals...