Rogers Cable to implement more compression on some HD signals
By Darren Murph 
posted Apr 4th 2008 8:43AM
posted Apr 4th 2008 8:43AM
Bad news for Rogers Cable customers -- word on the street has it that your HD feeds may begin to look a little less fantastic in the coming days. According to Digital Home Canada, the carrier has outlined a plan in a technical briefing sent out by Rogers Network Engineering and Operations that will compress part of its high-definition lineup in order to "deliver more HD channels without having to use more bandwidth." As it stands, 15 HD channels are facing the dreaded HD Lite treatment effective April 9th, but curiously, we're not told which HD networks are actually on the docket to be added. Granted, we've yet to see a definitive confirmation, but given that Comcast has recently caught loads of flack for its decision to shove three HD channels on a single 6MHz slot, we suppose an awful trend could be (re)emerging. Keep a critical eye out, Rogers customers -- let us know if anything changes.[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]
Rogers HD is already a joke. the quality is garbage. most notable on the TMN movie network hd channels. It rains artifacts with any motion in the picture. Most times
there doesn't even need to be motion for the screen to turn to blocks. Trying to watch an action movie is a joke, i'm not even getting into the other problems there are with the picture quality
I think that we should expect more of this. As the demand for HD increases, the bandwidth will get narrower, and the compression will get higher. As a result, we'd get more of this pseudo-HD.
good god I hate rogers. If I didn't have an apartment I would switch. They seriously can't do anything right. I paid to get out of my cell phone with them, I just cancelled my internet because they imposed caps on the slowest internet connection possible and their customer service is a joke. I would call to complain about this but there's no way anyone that mans the phones will know what I'm talking about. The canadian duopoly strikes again.
Depends what they're compressing. Many of these "HD" channels, like TNT, TBS and all the A&E stretch-o-vision crap could stand some compressing, if only sideways.
I will keep a close eye out. A lot of channels suffer now from poor compression. I have found that the west coast feeds have better quality, although, there are only 4 or 5 to choose from.
Rogers suck. I am going to try out an antenna and go the OTA route for what I can.
I am a rogers HD subscriber.
Not only do Rogers Internet management policies anger me, now they are once again "selling less service for more money" (typical rogers corporate behavior) with HD cable.
Sadly there is not a lot of choice where I live but I am for sure going to be looking for alternatives for current cable and internet offerings.
(BTW, the cable boxes Rogers uses are horrible. Some of the worst UI software I have ever seen)
News like this make me happy i moved to Bell Expressvu. This coming from a guys that was with Rogers for 2 years. Sure with Bell I get the 'rare' outtage due to weather, but the HD PRV receiver doesn't compare to Rogers. The Rogers receiver was brutal, requireing a hard bootup every few days.
My husband and I subscribe to Rogers HD. They already charge OUTRAGEOUS prices for these channels, and now they have the gall to COMPRESS them? I say, it's more FAIR to all Rogers paying customers if they LOWER THEIR PRICES for HD if they plan to further compress them! I'm close to convincing my husband to CANCEL our Rogers subscription entirely!