Very dissatisfied with UVERSE + Awful picture quality

[brandon_1]

We are new customers to Uverse (Austin, TX). Original install was on 12/20. Total install time: approx 6 hours

Previous provider: Time Warner = had excellent picture quality esp w/ HD channels

Reason we left TW: Uverse was cheaper, more HD channels and for the Total home DVR

TV: Sharp LCD 42" Aquos 1080i

We also had the wireless internet hooked up w/ ATT.

We are completely dissatisfied with our Uverse service. The picture is horrible. We knew it was bad but after visiting my 80 yr old grandmother who doesn't even have cable and seeing the amazing picture she is getting on her LCD via analog, we are further committed to switching back to Time Warner.

The first tech who installed our Uverse did nothing at the end of our install when we informed him we thought the picture looked bad. He shrugged his shoulders and left. He cut all of our orig connections w/ TW; eventually had to call another person out to switch out the cable outside that hooks from the elevated main box to our home. That's about all he did. Never offered to show us how to use the service. No instructions on the dvr or menu guides - nothing. Fine - we were happy to get him out after occupying our home for 5+ hrs - we're tech savvy - we'll figure it out. 

A week later, our picture still looks like s***.

Two days after initial install we called ATT and a rep talked us through some troubleshooting techniques - like resetting the DVR box and RG - no change. Rep suggested it might be a faulty DVR box and ordered a tech out to the house the next day to swap out the box for a new one.

Tech#2 showed up and without even looking at the DVR box immediately proclaimed our TV to be the culprit. As mentioned above we have a quality TV (Sharp Aquos LCD 42 which looked great w/ TW signal) so we really feel this can not be the problem. Tech seemed anxious to get home - it was late - and she agreed with us that the picture was "not good" and that she thought if we changed the setting on our TV that we could correct the problem. After spending a little time with our remote and our TV instruction manual, she said she didn't know what to do but knew that there was "a button" that would fix everything. She just didn't know which one since all TV's are different. She said she would keep our work order open and make sure that someone came back the next day who "knew these (sharp) TV's"  - suggested we go back to TW and she left. Again, did not change dvr box as originally ordered.

Tech#3 arrives the following morning and guess what he knew nothing about the need for a "Sharp TV expert" as nothing was mentioned in the notes on the work order. So much for tech 2 coming through for us. Tech 3 did say he wasn't sure if anything he wrote in notes was ever actually passed along or even "looked at" and that for a communications company "we aren't very good at communication". Awesome. Should be a fun day. While he was the nicest tech so far he was probably also the clueless. At least he was committed to help us.

My fear was confirmed when he looked at our TV and said he thought that the "picture looked fine" but he admitted that he wasn't the best to judge as he "doesn't have HD" - oh wait - he "doesn't even have cable" period. Floored that a guy whose job it is to install cable doesn't even have it was about all I could handle. He said he didn't really watch TV and only spent a few minutes after the install to flip thru a few channels for the new customer.

He turned to the HD Golf channel and the light bulb went off as he realized how terrible the picture looked. Apparently the golf channel is his go-to channel on installs. He says, "Wow you can't even follow the ball." So he calls up the guy behind the curtain (Tier 2) and gets walked through a variety of fixes. After checking the line (I guess that is what he was doing - spent a lot of time looking at the little laptop he brought in with him and confirming information to T2) they thought perhaps it was the DVR box. He also acknowledge we were within a safe distance from the VRAD (2000+ feet).

They took the regular STB from our 2nd TV (a tiny tube TV with a 15" screen - picture looks great on that TV likely b/c it is SO SMALL) so anyway - the STB plugged into our Sharp offered no change. T2 had our tech swap out for a new dvr box and check that all the cables were in properly and that the connections looked good. This did nothing to make the picture look better. After resetting the RG with no change, they swapped it out for a new one. Tried both HDMI and component cables with no real difference. Still nothing improved. Tech3 says he believes that what we are seeing is just their product has little hope it will improve.

Basically 5 hours later, our picture has no improvement - there is serious artifacting and the HD channels look SOFT and fuzzy. The colors are bad too - esp flesh tones - everybody looks red (yes, we tried adjusting tint, etc on our TV settings & I'll reiterate that no trouble previously w/ TW w/color). SD is really bad and all those extra HD channels you get are really just SD that has been up converted (blown up to fit screen). ESPN and CNN which always looked stellar w/ TW look positively sh**eous on Uverse. Also when program has fast moving objects (ie sports) or the camera pans quickly across a room, it is as if the signal can't keep up. It almost makes you dizzy to watch.

Tech3 told T2 that picture was same and T2 (on speaker phone) said we've tried everything and suggested it could possibly be the signal originating from the "superhub". There is nothing more that they could do so Tech3 called up customer retention to tell them I was dissatisfied and that he agreed picture looked awful and told rep everything he'd done to repair issue. Unbelievably the rep tried to upsell me on other services and give me more channels with the same crappy picture quality. No thanks, I said. Eventually got a $50 credit. Still not enough in my opinion considering we are still getting crappy picture. Now the sound is dropping out intermittently while watching playback of recorded show as well as live programming. 

After seeing the amazing picture on our family members TV set with analog signal and recalling how great the TW looked, we don't see a reason to stay a second longer with this Uverse. Today I tried retraining the RG by using instructions on another post here and changed the DSL into the Broadband Type box, then changed to other to RJ-11 which is what we have and still see no real change.

If anybody has ANY suggestions/tips, we are all ears. 

Message Edited by brandon on 12-28-2008 10:39 AM

Message Edited by brandon on 12-28-2008 10:43 AM

Message Edited by brandon on 12-28-2008 11:18 AM

[RCSMG ACE - Master]

Here are 2 suggestions.

1. Contact David.

http://www.uverseusers.com/component/option,com_smf/Itemid,2/topic,582.0/

2. Try calibrating your tvs

 http://utalk.att.com/utalk/board/message?board.id=DVR&message.id=6580&query.id=10575#M6580

 Hopefully one of these will get you the results you desire.

[brandon_1]

I will check those links out - thanks.

Quick question: after "retraining the RG" via the http://home/mdc link, do I need to do anything else? Reset the DVR box/RG by turning it off/reboot??

[RCSMG ACE - Master]

No, I don't think so.

[mibrnsurg ACE - Geek]

First have you gone to Menu>Options> Systems Settings>Aspect Ratio and chosen an HD aspect ratio.  If your TV is a 1920x1080 choose '1080', if a 1366x768 try '720', if that doesn't quite look right after the test choose '1080', then 'continue' then 'start test' then if it says you're viewing 1080i (or720p) on your set then choose 'keep settings'  and 'exit to TV' and things should look better.

This a very good tutorial to adjust your TV using the HDNet test pattern: http://utalk.att.com/utalk/board/message?board.id=Uverse_TV_Equipment&thread.id=18758

The next time HDNet 1105 broadcasts the test pattern is Sat. Jan 3, 09 7:30am EST.  It will come up in the guide as "off air" for 10 mins, just navigate to it in the guide and press 'record'.  Then you can use Somejoe's instructions, near the bottom he gives instructions for the HDMI cable if you are able to adjust the black level otherwise they apply to component connections.  These are the only two connections that are HD, all others (composite, s-video and RF coax) are SD.  To find out good info about Uverse go to http://www.uverseusers.com in the WIKI there is excellent info on Uverse and Troubleshooting tips (it's been very buggy lately-can't get to it right now-wish that info was here).  Your TV should not look as bad as you describe and actual "HD" programs should look very good.

Chris

---

I want Good weather w/radar & 6 day forecast -coming soon!
I want CBET Channel 9 Please NO SD stretch-o-vision HD Channels
1-800-983-2811 to avoid Mr. Voice Recognition

[RRK_1]

Sounds like calibration might help but I have never been able to adjust my television to look as good as Time Warner did.  Most of what you are describing is compression artifacts.  David's people are good at organizing the techs and eliminating install or line problems but they eventually just told me it was the compression.

[SomeJoe7777 ACE - Geek]

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brandon wrote:

After spending a little time with our remote and our TV instruction manual, she said she didn't know what to do but knew that there was "a button" that would fix everything. She just didn't know which one since all TV's are different.

---

Here's a picture of the side of my TV:

 

Try that last button. 

(J/K, of course.   Try the suggestions others have posted, but there may not be much that can be done if the problem is just the compression.)

[brandon_1]

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mibrnsurg wrote:

First have you gone to Menu>Options> Systems Settings>Aspect Ratio and chosen an HD aspect ratio.  If your TV is a 1920x1080 choose '1080', if a 1366x768 try '720', if that doesn't quite look right after the test choose '1080', then 'continue' then 'start test' then if it says you're viewing 1080i (or720p) on your set then choose 'keep settings'  and 'exit to TV' and things should look better.

Chris

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Chris,

Yes, we've adjusted the aspect ratio many times and we are getting a 1080i recognition on our Sharp Aquos so that is not the problem. We tried setting it at 720 to see if the picture improved but there is no real difference b/t the 720 and 1080 settings.

I did not mention in my orig post that we got a new TV as a Christmas gift (yeah) for our bedroom. We just tried hooking that TV (Sony Bravia LCD 32" 720p) up to the STB that the old tiny tube was hooked up to and it's not even registering an HD signal (not 720 or lower). Not sure if we are supposed to get HD on a second TV or not?? 

Thank you for the info on the upcoming HDNET test pattern. I've visited uverseusers and would visit more often if it wasn't painfully slow to navigate. We did send an email to David as suggested. Hoping that giving out our Acct # was not a bad decision. Yes, we agree this HD picture should look so much better/sharper.

[RCSMG ACE - Master]

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brandon wrote:

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mibrnsurg wrote:

First have you gone to Menu>Options> Systems Settings>Aspect Ratio and chosen an HD aspect ratio.  If your TV is a 1920x1080 choose '1080', if a 1366x768 try '720', if that doesn't quite look right after the test choose '1080', then 'continue' then 'start test' then if it says you're viewing 1080i (or720p) on your set then choose 'keep settings'  and 'exit to TV' and things should look better.

Chris

---

---

Chris,

Yes, we've adjusted the aspect ratio many times and we are getting a 1080i recognition on our Sharp Aquos so that is not the problem. We tried setting it at 720 to see if the picture improved but there is no real difference b/t the 720 and 1080 settings.

I did not mention in my orig postthat we got a new TV as a Christmas gift (yeah) for our bedroom. We just tried hooking that TV (Sony Bravia LCD 32" 720p) up to the STB that the old tiny tube was hooked up to and it's not even registering an HD signal (not 720 or lower). Not sure if we are supposed to get HD on a second TV or not?? 

You should be getting hd on all of your tvs.  Try doing a soft reboot of the stb.

Thank you for the info on the upcoming HDNET test pattern. I've visited uverseusers and would visit more often if it wasn't painfully slow to navigate. We did send an email to David as suggested. Hoping that giving out our Acct # was not a bad decision. Yes, we agree this HD picture should look so much better/sharper.

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Look at this thread regarding calibrating your tv.  I don't know if you have seen it yet.

[mibrnsurg ACE - Geek]

Don't worry about sending info to David, he works for ATT an has been around a long time on http://www.dslreports.com/

You should be getting 720p HD on the small set (has to be HDMI or componet connection and the blue HD light has to be on to get HD), I assume you set the STB aspect ratio to 720, CNN and ESPN look very good on HD programs here on my 42" Panasonic plasma.

SomeJoe, that's great!

Chris

---

I want Good weather w/radar & 6 day forecast -coming soon!
I want CBET Channel 9 Please NO SD stretch-o-vision HD Channels
1-800-983-2811 to avoid Mr. Voice Recognition

Message Edited by mibrnsurg on 12-28-2008 03:40 PM

[Pip_2]

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SomeJoe7777 wrote:

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brandon wrote:

After spending a little time with our remote and our TV instruction manual, she said she didn't know what to do but knew that there was "a button" that would fix everything. She just didn't know which one since all TV's are different.

---

Here's a picture of the side of my TV:

 

Try that last button. 

(J/K, of course.   Try the suggestions others have posted, but there may not be much that can be done if the problem is just the compression.)

---

So tell me Joe, where can we get one of those also!

[brandon_1]

Thanks guys. After reading your post, we realized that the blue light was NOT on - don't know when/how that happened but now we are getting an HD signal w/ the new Sony TV. We did a soft reboot on both the STB and the DVR and while we see a slight improvement in the picture, it still is not a sharp HD picture and no comparison to Time Warner but it is better.

On the Sony 32" 720p, there is no real difference in picture quality when setting the aspect ratio to 720p vs the lower options. Watching the Cowboy game (Boo) looks the same on either setting using HDMI cables. Managed to get a 1080i signal (via aspect ratio settings) somehow on our 720p TV and that made the picture look sharper. No idea how we are getting that but even the Sony confirmed the 1080i signal when we checked via the TV remote. Weird. 

Now my goal is to eliminate the sound drops. 

I find it absolutely insane that the only real change we've seen after all this time has come from our own doings (retraining the RG and then confirming the HD signal was coming through - blue light is a go). Before the 2nd/3rd techs came out I had done some research that said most picture quality issues were the result of an improperly trained RG. Do you know how many times I asked the question "Is our RG trained correctly?" only to get blank stares and nodding heads. I don't think they ever even tried it. Complete BS. I think AT&T owes me a paycheck!

[randyl]

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brandon wrote:

Thanks guys. After reading your post, we realized that the blue light was NOT on - don't know when/how that happened but now we are getting an HD signal w/ the new Sony TV. We did a soft reboot on both the STB and the DVR and while we see a slight improvement in the picture, it still is not a sharp HD picture and no comparison to Time Warner but it is better.

On the Sony 32" 720p, there is no real difference in picture quality when setting the aspect ratio to 720p vs the lower options. Watching the Cowboy game (Boo) looks the same on either setting using HDMI cables. Managed to get a 1080i signal (via aspect ratio settings) somehow on our 720p TV and that made the picture look sharper. No idea how we are getting that but even the Sony confirmed the 1080i signal when we checked via the TV remote. Weird. 

Now my goal is to eliminate the sound drops. 

I find it absolutely insane that the only real change we've seen after all this time has come from our own doings (retraining the RG and then confirming the HD signal was coming through - blue light is a go). Before the 2nd/3rd techs came out I had done some research that said most picture quality issues were the result of an improperly trained RG. Do you know how many times I asked the question "Is our RG trained correctly?" only to get blank stares and nodding heads. I don't think they ever even tried it. Complete BS. I think AT&T owes me a paycheck!

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       Horse punkie

[Pip_2]

It's my understanding that all a correctly trained RG will do is synch back faster after a power outage. Don't know who told you it had anything to do with PQ, but they handed you exactly what randy said.

We have a Dell Plasma, native resolution (I finally learned with some help from SomeJoe7777) was 720p, bit we could also set the AR at 1080i.

I did notice way back when we first had the service (over a year ago), a bit of a difference in PQ with the different AR's, but now, I see no difference at all, so we leave it on 720p.

As for the paycheck comment, get in line. I think there are many people, too many to even mention, that should be getting a rather large check from AT&T, with OT. Either that, or about a years worth of free service!!

Message Edited by Pip on 12-28-2008 07:27 PM

[brandon_1]

I can't say where it was I read that poor PQ was usually a result of the RG not being trained properly but it was a At&t tier2 tech (or at least he claimed to be one) who made this statement in a post on another forum.

Maybe the **bleep** blue light has been off the entire time and we just didn't realize it. Who the hell knows. I know the last two techs that were at my house didn't mention it to me.

We might be able to deal with this due to the savings. We'll see how long that lasts or if TW comes out with an offer we can't refuse to lure us back. I think there must be a lot of people out there who really have no idea what a good HD picture looks like as was with the case of our Tech #3 guy. How do you explain to someone who doesn't even have cable what HD is supposed to look like? You can't. You just have to see it for yourself. 

BTW, still having sound drop issues even after soft reboot. Is there any fix for this problem?

[ChoochMohony]

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brandon wrote:

I can't say where it was I read that poor PQ was usually a result of the RG not being trained properly but it was a At&t tier2 tech (or at least he claimed to be one) who made this statement in a post on another forum.

Maybe the **bleep** blue light has been off the entire time and we just didn't realize it. Who the hell knows. I know the last two techs that were at my house didn't mention it to me.

We might be able to deal with this due to the savings. We'll see how long that lasts or if TW comes out with an offer we can't refuse to lure us back. I think there must be a lot of people out there who really have no idea what a good HD picture looks like as was with the case of our Tech #3 guy. How do you explain to someone who doesn't even have cable what HD is supposed to look like? You can't. You just have to see it for yourself. 

BTW, still having sound drop issues even after soft reboot. Is there any fix for this problem?

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Hi Brandon,

Okay first off, PQ has nothing to do with with the lines...all of the lines on U-Verse are data signals NOT video signals, the equipment then takes the data turns it into what is produced on your TV

Tier 2 Tech doesn't know anything about this service if he thinks it has to do with the RG line

Cable sends video signals to all the lines in the home with a little bit of data for Internet and HD/VOD programming the boxes they use take the analog TV signal and upconverts it to digital then offers HD/VOD programming

We have MPEG-4 H.264 compression and that is handle by the AT&T Network team, Premise Technician's have nothing to offer you for correcting any "video signal" degradation because video only comes for the box not from the cable from the wall

We can swap the box but it mostly comes down to the compression used to display the programming that you see

Sound dropouts are due to the optical out port on the back of the boxes, Motorola/Cisco are working on fixes for these issues but using analog can correct this for the time being

Thanks

[lrdiver]

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The first tech who installed our Uverse did nothing at the end of our install when we informed him we thought the picture looked bad. He shrugged his shoulders and left. He cut all of our orig connections w/ TW; eventually had to call another person out to switch out the cable outside that hooks from the elevated main box to our home. That's about all he did. Never offered to show us how to use the service. No instructions on the dvr or menu guides - nothing. Fine - we were happy to get him out after occupying our home for 5+ hrs - we're tech savvy - we'll figure it out. 

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Hi Brandon,

The tech that installed mine left a pretty nice U-verse user manual on the STB. He also left a user guide for the remote. He even set up the remotes so that they would control the TV power and volume. If you did not get a user guide you should ask for one.

I don't agree with the knocks I have seen on the PQ. I just spent some time watching Dish and I don't see much difference. I checked out the HDNet test pattern and it looks identical or better on U-verse. If anything U-verse on my 1080P DLP looks better than on my brothers 1080P plasma as far as the resolution test pattern on HDNet.

I had TW for about 7 years and I was quite familiar with that. I did note that I had the video noise reduction turned on with the TW service. The TW component output was somewhat noisey. I also felt it was somewhat processed with some sharpening applied. The resolution on the HDNet test parttern was no different.

I seem to be seeing a much cleaner picture with fewer compresion artifacts with U-verse. The TW picture showed much more blocking artifacts during fast motion than U-verse on my DLP.

I needed to turn off the video noise reduction and adjust the brightness slightly when I switched to U-verse. I initially thought that the PQ was not as good until I realized that the few channels I was watching were not the best HD arround. One show that I was watching on Discovery HD Theater looked like it was done in HDV or some lesser format. Subsequently I saw other programming that was great.

I would first make sure that you are actually using HD settings on your STB's. Make sure that the blue light is on. Also check out the HDNet test pattern and set up your brightness and contrast. Unfortunatly the color bar test pattern is not too useful.

Larry

[lrdiver]

Hi Brandon,

You might make sure that the picture is not zoomed in. Press the Zoom buttom until the normal message is displayed. On several ocasions I have thought the PQ to be less than it should be only to find that someone had zoomed the picture in. This makes any artifacts much more visible.

Larry

[jay0k]

U-verse isn't very mature and definitely lacks in HD picture quality.  I noticed the same thing when switching from cable.  I have a 65" 1080p HDTV and noticed a severe degredation especially in football and problems with background colors like green grass.

Mix in the lackluster picture quality and constant split second audio dropouts and I was forced to cancel the service.  I actually came back today looking to see if the service has improved at all.  It seems like it has a lot of potential; it's just not there yet.

I think AT&T's problem is they just don't have the bandwidth to support IPTV for multiple high quality HD streams.  (Assuming they can get a hardware fix for audio issues). 

[callmeox ACE - Wizard]

Hey, thanks for stopping by.

[BeeBeeSA ACE - Wizard]

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brandon wrote:

We are new customers to Uverse (Austin, TX). Original install was on 12/20. Total install time: approx 6 hours

Previous provider: Time Warner = had excellent picture quality esp w/ HD channels

Reason we left TW: Uverse was cheaper, more HD channels and for the Total home DVR

TV: Sharp LCD 42" Aquos 1080i

We also had the wireless internet hooked up w/ ATT.

We are completely dissatisfied with our Uverse service. The picture is horrible. We knew it was bad but after visiting my 80 yr old grandmother who doesn't even have cable and seeing the amazing picture she is getting on her LCD via analog, we are further committed to switching back to Time Warner.

The first tech who installed our Uverse did nothing at the end of our install when we informed him we thought the picture looked bad. He shrugged his shoulders and left. He cut all of our orig connections w/ TW; eventually had to call another person out to switch out the cable outside that hooks from the elevated main box to our home. That's about all he did. Never offered to show us how to use the service. No instructions on the dvr or menu guides - nothing. Fine - we were happy to get him out after occupying our home for 5+ hrs - we're tech savvy - we'll figure it out. 

A week later, our picture still looks like s***.

Two days after initial install we called ATT and a rep talked us through some troubleshooting techniques - like resetting the DVR box and RG - no change. Rep suggested it might be a faulty DVR box and ordered a tech out to the house the next day to swap out the box for a new one.

Tech#2 showed up and without even looking at the DVR box immediately proclaimed our TV to be the culprit. As mentioned above we have a quality TV (Sharp Aquos LCD 42 which looked great w/ TW signal) so we really feel this can not be the problem. Tech seemed anxious to get home - it was late - and she agreed with us that the picture was "not good" and that she thought if we changed the setting on our TV that we could correct the problem. After spending a little time with our remote and our TV instruction manual, she said she didn't know what to do but knew that there was "a button" that would fix everything. She just didn't know which one since all TV's are different. She said she would keep our work order open and make sure that someone came back the next day who "knew these (sharp) TV's"  - suggested we go back to TW and she left. Again, did not change dvr box as originally ordered.

Tech#3 arrives the following morning and guess what he knew nothing about the need for a "Sharp TV expert" as nothing was mentioned in the notes on the work order. So much for tech 2 coming through for us. Tech 3 did say he wasn't sure if anything he wrote in notes was ever actually passed along or even "looked at" and that for a communications company "we aren't very good at communication". Awesome. Should be a fun day. While he was the nicest tech so far he was probably also the clueless. At least he was committed to help us.

My fear was confirmed when he looked at our TV and said he thought that the "picture looked fine" but he admitted that he wasn't the best to judge as he "doesn't have HD" - oh wait - he "doesn't even have cable" period. Floored that a guy whose job it is to install cable doesn't even have it was about all I could handle. He said he didn't really watch TV and only spent a few minutes after the install to flip thru a few channels for the new customer.

He turned to the HD Golf channel and the light bulb went off as he realized how terrible the picture looked. Apparently the golf channel is his go-to channel on installs. He says, "Wow you can't even follow the ball." So he calls up the guy behind the curtain (Tier 2) and gets walked through a variety of fixes. After checking the line (I guess that is what he was doing - spent a lot of time looking at the little laptop he brought in with him and confirming information to T2) they thought perhaps it was the DVR box. He also acknowledge we were within a safe distance from the VRAD (2000+ feet).

They took the regular STB from our 2nd TV (a tiny tube TV with a 15" screen - picture looks great on that TV likely b/c it is SO SMALL) so anyway - the STB plugged into our Sharp offered no change. T2 had our tech swap out for a new dvr box and check that all the cables were in properly and that the connections looked good. This did nothing to make the picture look better. After resetting the RG with no change, they swapped it out for a new one. Tried both HDMI and component cables with no real difference. Still nothing improved. Tech3 says he believes that what we are seeing is just their product has little hope it will improve.

Basically 5 hours later, our picture has no improvement - there is serious artifacting and the HD channels look SOFT and fuzzy. The colors are bad too - esp flesh tones - everybody looks red (yes, we tried adjusting tint, etc on our TV settings & I'll reiterate that no trouble previously w/ TW w/color). SD is really bad and all those extra HD channels you get are really just SD that has been up converted (blown up to fit screen). ESPN and CNN which always looked stellar w/ TW look positively sh**eous on Uverse. Also when program has fast moving objects (ie sports) or the camera pans quickly across a room, it is as if the signal can't keep up. It almost makes you dizzy to watch.

Tech3 told T2 that picture was same and T2 (on speaker phone) said we've tried everything and suggested it could possibly be the signal originating from the "superhub". There is nothing more that they could do so Tech3 called up customer retention to tell them I was dissatisfied and that he agreed picture looked awful and told rep everything he'd done to repair issue. Unbelievably the rep tried to upsell me on other services and give me more channels with the same crappy picture quality. No thanks, I said. Eventually got a $50 credit. Still not enough in my opinion considering we are still getting crappy picture. Now the sound is dropping out intermittently while watching playback of recorded show as well as live programming. 

After seeing the amazing picture on our family members TV set with analog signal and recalling how great the TW looked, we don't see a reason to stay a second longer with this Uverse. Today I tried retraining the RG by using instructions on another post here and changed the DSL into the Broadband Type box, then changed to other to RJ-11 which is what we have and still see no real change.

If anybody has ANY suggestions/tips, we are all ears. 

Message Edited by brandon on 12-28-2008 10:39 AM

Message Edited by brandon on 12-28-2008 10:43 AM

Message Edited by brandon on 12-28-2008 11:18 AM

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I have a suggestion...Cancel UV and go to TW, Dish, or whoever else you want to complain about.

[lrdiver]

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jay0k wrote:

U-verse isn't very mature and definitely lacks in HD picture quality.  I noticed the same thing when switching from cable.  I have a 65" 1080p HDTV and noticed a severe degradation especially in football and problems with background colors like green grass.

Mix in the lackluster picture quality and constant split second audio dropouts and I was forced to cancel the service.  I actually came back today looking to see if the service has improved at all.  It seems like it has a lot of potential; it's just not there yet.

I think AT&T's problem is they just don't have the bandwidth to support IPTV for multiple high quality HD streams.  (Assuming they can get a hardware fix for audio issues). 

---

I find the PQ comments somewhat perplexing. I too have a 1080P 65" HDTV and I am not really seeing anything much different than TW. I just spent about 5 days watching Dish and I don't see anything much different there either. I saw some rather strange artifacts on LMN over Dish but those same artifacts were present on U-verse too.

As for sound issues, I have seen these on TW also. It seems that from time to time the source has some surround channels swapped with the main channels. In addition, audio delays are a common issue in the source material. I have seen them both on TW and U-verse. I believe that it's the source not the service.

I have also notice more poor quality source material lately. Even on the "good channels" like HD Theater I sometimes see stuff that looks like SD analog material up-converted to 1080i. I mean digital HD material should not have ghosts that look very analog. When this sort of thing is compressed it really can look very bad. At other times it's the nearly flawless HD that I expect.

I am pretty picky and I have calibrated the set about as well as it can be calibrated. I have been watching HDTV for about 7 years now so I do know what it looks like. I have no complaints at all with u-verse PQ. However there are enough complaints that something must be going on. Of course without something more descriptive it's hard to tell what someone is complaining about.

I have found the STB at max zoom several times. I don't use that feature myself. I have not figured out how it's happening. I am beginning to wonder if the box switches itself at times.

Just my feedback

[htcpro]

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ChoochMohony wrote:

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Okay first off, PQ has nothing to do with with the lines...all of the lines on U-Verse are data signals NOT video signals, the equipment then takes the data turns it into what is produced on your TV - agreed

Tier 2 Tech doesn't know anything about this service if he thinks it has to do with the RG line - agreed

Cable sends video signals to all the lines in the home with a little bit of data for Internet and HD/VOD programming the boxes they use take the analog TV signal and upconverts it to digital then offers HD/VOD programming - Not exactly

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The cable TV box works just like any other DOCSIS modem. It does not receive video over coax but data for IPTV just like the U-Verse box which then converts to video. The content quality is source dependent. Analong line up is modulated at the head end for the regular TV's without a STB. With DOCSIS 3.0 rolling out (122 Mbit/s) cable looks promising in the years to come. 

[David]

Sent to my uverse team to check into, I see some signaling problems when I looked at your RG.

They should be in touch. 

happy new year, 

David

P.S. Also your wife I think has an e-mail from me as well that came in from my box. 

[jay0k]

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lrdiver wrote:

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jay0k wrote:

U-verse isn't very mature and definitely lacks in HD picture quality.  I noticed the same thing when switching from cable.  I have a 65" 1080p HDTV and noticed a severe degradation especially in football and problems with background colors like green grass.

Mix in the lackluster picture quality and constant split second audio dropouts and I was forced to cancel the service.  I actually came back today looking to see if the service has improved at all.  It seems like it has a lot of potential; it's just not there yet.

I think AT&T's problem is they just don't have the bandwidth to support IPTV for multiple high quality HD streams.  (Assuming they can get a hardware fix for audio issues). 

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I find the PQ comments somewhat perplexing. I too have a 1080P 65" HDTV and I am not really seeing anything much different than TW. I just spent about 5 days watching Dish and I don't see anything much different there either. I saw some rather strange artifacts on LMN over Dish but those same artifacts were present on U-verse too.

As for sound issues, I have seen these on TW also. It seems that from time to time the source has some surround channels swapped with the main channels. In addition, audio delays are a common issue in the source material. I have seen them both on TW and U-verse. I believe that it's the source not the service.

I have also notice more poor quality source material lately. Even on the "good channels" like HD Theater I sometimes see stuff that looks like SD analog material up-converted to 1080i. I mean digital HD material should not have ghosts that look very analog. When this sort of thing is compressed it really can look very bad. At other times it's the nearly flawless HD that I expect.

I am pretty picky and I have calibrated the set about as well as it can be calibrated. I have been watching HDTV for about 7 years now so I do know what it looks like. I have no complaints at all with u-verse PQ. However there are enough complaints that something must be going on. Of course without something more descriptive it's hard to tell what someone is complaining about.

I have found the STB at max zoom several times. I don't use that feature myself. I have not figured out how it's happening. I am beginning to wonder if the box switches itself at times.

Just my feedback

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It probably depends on what you're compare U-verse too.  I have Cox in our market and it could be that we happen to have exceptional HD quality in our market.  I kept Cox cable while I had U-verse and did switch back and forth several times to make sure my eyes weren't playing tricks on me.  The picture quality was decent and watchable with U-verse but it was the little things that bothered me like background colors.  A perfect example is football in HD.  With Cox I can make out the the surface type and actually see the "blades" of grass/turf.  With U-verse the green surface would move/shift with motion and seemed to kind of be flowing rather.

The whole home DVR is very nice though and makes up for a lot.  I have Tivo HD too that can share it's content with other tivo's, however, it's nowhere as seamless as U-verse is.  Tivo has to actually copy the video from the other box whereas U-verse will just stream it.

[RRK_1]

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lrdiver wrote: 

I find the PQ comments somewhat perplexing. I too have a 1080P 65" HDTV and I am not really seeing anything much different than TW.

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I think the generally accepted picture quality problems are the pixels jumping back and forth in the backgrounds, fog/clouds hopping across backgrounds, motion based blurring or macroblocking, general macroblocking in backgrounds, crushed blacks, slightly overblown colors ...

[gholmes1936]

What is RG, and how do I adjust it in the control panel.? Or is it user do-able?

George in Texas 

[randyl]

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gholmes1936 wrote:

What is RG, and how do I adjust it in the control panel.? Or is it user do-able?

George in Texas 

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      if u are referring to what david said ??

      he is talking about the stats (line errors ? ) he saw in the users residential gateway  (rg3800)

     my slant

     randy

     ps maybe this page or another one   dunno ?/    http://192.168.1.254/xslt?PAGE=B04&THISPAGE=B01&NEXTPAGE=B04

Message Edited by randyl on 01-01-2009 10:43 AM

[lrdiver]

Thanks for the your summary. I did not get the opportunity to do a direct comparison with TW. I have not had an antenna hooked to the set lately so until I do I cannot do a direct comparison to OTA.

As far as macro blocking, I don't find it particularly any different than TW. Maybe I'm just conditioned to it. The DLP TV I have is quite prone to revealing the macro blocking issues. I have to say that I seem to find it less of an issue with U-verse than TW. This comment is base more on situations where that is a lot of motion like explosions for example. With U-verse the macro blocking seems less visible.

The crushed blacks seem to be an issue with the HDMI connection. I don't see any issues with component. I have not tried HDMI since I always have had handshaking issues with my TV.

Overblown color I cannot comment on. I don't notice anything any different that TW or OTA. This is a real mixed bad on a bulb type set anyway. The Mits I have cannot be calibrated very well anyway. I did note that I had to touch up things a bit when changing from the TW STB to U-verse. Unfortunately it needs to be done by eye since if you try to set it up using standard color bars it's generally worse for program material.

I see the fine detail issues that you mention but I see these with TW and OTA too. It certainly could be a question of degree but I find it undesirable with all of them.

Of course a lot of this can be exacerbated with the way the TV is set up. DVDs look particularly bad on this set if you don't keep the color and tint controls pretty close to their detent values. Frankly I was not very happy with the way this set shows up artifacts. I also have an LCD front projector and it shows very little of this but I think that it's more a function of lower resolution and the slower response of the LCD. The image is not nearly as sharp on the LCD but neither are the artifacts.

I see a number of other issues with the TV. The up-conversion to 1080p adds a number of it's own issues. I was watching an old VHS tape the other day and I was quite surprised to see the background highlights floating around disconnected from the rest of the scene. This was certainly not mpeg compression in the source. LOL

I may just be conditioned to expect a lot of this. If I nit pick it too much, I don't enjoy it so I have decided to ignore it. It's so much better than SD but it's certainly not studio quality with any of it that I have seen. Maybe Blue Ray is an improvement.

Larry

[Gds_1]

OMG!! I had Uverse installed a week ago and am sooo unhappy with the recording quality. It's a joke. Red tint and night scenes too dark to enjoy. I have been wrestling with my tv's for a week now and finally I googled 'Uverse red tint'. Ugh!!!! I was pretty darn happy with 6 years of Directv service. I thought I would be a first on my block early adopted but screw it. I am sooo glad I haven't called Directv and was here for the install so it's a 3 min swap out for me! Thanks for this thread. Fwiw I am about 200 ft from the VRAD.