Fuzzy Standard Picture, great HD

[anialw]

I just got FIOS TV yesterday and noticed immediately as it was installed that it looked terribly fuzzy and in fact I could hardly ready the text on any ad or on the CNN tickers, etc.  It was significantly worse than COX, which we just watched at 1pm, and then Fios at 2pm.  The technician said it was my tv and I should play with settings.  That made no sense to me as the HD channels were great, and when we hit "guide"  the small and medium picture also showed excellent.  Just the regular sized image was way too fuzzy, almost as if it was behind plexi glass.

Please help, this is really frustrating as all my HD tvs now look horrible unless it is HD channels.  I do not want to cancel this service but I will if it does not look better.  I got it with the idea that it would look better than cable.

Any help is appreciated.

[matcarl]

It's a known problem with the 6xxx series boxes, Verizon is working on a fix to be hopefully deployed within 2 months.

Message Edited by matcarl on 01-31-2009 09:59 PM

[lensam]

These are problems that only exist on standard definition channels? I only have a standard definition television. If I get this service my tv will look like this?

[matcarl]

Lensam: If you get a standard def box it will be OK, it only affects some of the HD boxes.

[lensam]

Thanks a lot, that's good to know. But, will I still get the allegedly crappy program guide with the SD box?

[matcarl]

The program guide is the same for all boxes.

[MJ_123]

My Verizon FIOS service was just installed today.  I am very disappointed with the picture quality of both SD and HD channels.  Some HD channels look okay, but others don't look good at all.  And the SD channels are very disappointing.  I had read such good reports about picture quality with FIOS, and now I am beginning to feel I've made a big mistake by switching from Comcast.

[lensam]

How are the SD channels disappointing? Are they blurry or fuzzy? What's the major difference between FIOS and Comcast in terms of picture quality and otherwise? Thanks!

[ksoza1]

The difference in pIcture quality betwen Comcast and FIOS is observable by virtually everyone whom I have shown it.  Even my wife, who does not know HD from FM remarked the day after install how much better the pciture looked.  The same caveats apply however when you deal with hundreds of stations - the source will ultimatley determine the end stream quality, regardless of how well the provider sends it.  I watch less and less SD content, so the preceived softness issue being related has not effcetd me.  PQ is a real advantage for FIOS over Comcast, as well as content, useability of the supplied hardware and internet speed.  There is much complaining over the Moto boxes and the DVR streaming issues but they still leave FIOS way ahead compated to the sluggish and poor QoS from Comcast.

[MJ_123]

Lensam,

The SD picture quality is fuzzier than it was with Comcast.  The difference between SD and HD is more noticeable with FIOS.  I just asked a neighbor who dogsits for me to look at the picture and she agreed that it wasn't as clear as previously.

In addition, the HD quality is not as good as with Comcast.  A few stations are as good, but others are not.  With Comcast I did not notice a variation in quality across HD channels.

I spent some time on the phone today with a very helpful support person, and he helped me experiment with changinf some settings, but the picture quality did not improve.

I have read elsewhere that when there was an upgrade last year the SD quality went down for some people, but that with an upcoming upgrade that may improve.  However, the support person had not heard about this being a benefit of the upgrade,

I am seriously considering going back to Comcast.

[Reaper]

I had the same experience with poor SD quality when I got FiOS about two months ago. However, I recently received the 1.6.1 software update (in Seattle) and now the SD channels look great, nearly DVD quality. This is a big change from Dish Network and DirecTV, their SD feeds look like crap. It's kind of wild to actually be able to watch SD channels again.

[anialw]

How do I go about requesting this upgrade in the DC area (falls church, VA)?  I really hate the way this looks and do not want to pay more money to get more channels in HD as that is not something I have to have.  In fact I got this so I can reduce my overall bill and not be forced into buying more stuff.>  Any help would be appreciated.

[fiostvman]

Poor SD picture quality (on an HDTV) has been my biggest dissappointment with FIOS TV since I signed up last September. Having just come from Comcast, it was obvious from day 1.

It was so bad compared to Comcast I had before, I almost cancelled. HD picture quality on FIOS is excellent.

I read a couple of posts on the internet and I changed the SD settings on my  DVR from 480i to 480p and it resulted in a dramatic improvement in picture

quality. SD picture on my HDTV  went from "unwatchable" to just "okay or watchable". It is still not great or as good as I had with Comcast. As a number of posters have

pointed out,the new IMG 1.6.1 fixes the issue. The release of the new IMG has been delay since it ended up causing audio problems for some folks in the two

or so markets it has been released to already.

SD picture on an SD TV looks very good.

[Reaper]

anialw: Verizon will push the update to your market when it's ready. The update caused some audio problems with Toslink out (which I fortunately don't use) so they're probably fixing that first before pushing an update to the entire country. The update is software version 1.6.1 so you can search for that keyword on this and other forums for additional information. HTH.

[MJ_123]

I am so glad to see the posts from reaper and fiostvman as well as anialw, for two reasons:

--I know I am not losing my mind, as I thought I was after saying that my picture quality wasn't good and having most people say "what, FIOS quality is much better!"

--it sounds like the upgrade to 1.6.1. will help this issue.

I have two more questions:

--do any of the three of you notice that HD quality is less consistent across channels, and within a given channel, with FIOS compared to Comcast?

--is there a comparable key to the "live" key on the Comcast remote? 

--how do you check to see which version of the software you have?

I am beginning to think I might be able to live with FIOS if change is coming 🙂

Thanks so much for the helpful posts.

[Reaper]

MJ_123:

I've never had HD with cable (only Dish Network and DIRECTV) so I can't answer your first question. I can speculate that perhaps because Verizon does not further compress their channels, inconsistencies from different content providers may be more apparent.

I believe that the FiOS TV button causes the DVR to switch to live TV. I use a Harmony universal remote so I'm not quite sure.

I'm not in front of my TV at the moment but I think to find your software version it's something like Menu > Setup > System Information.

I'm guessing at most of this but I hope that it is of some use to you. 

[MJ_123]

Thanks, Reaper!

Right after I last posted I watched the video about the DVR remote and saw that the FIOS TV button is the way to get to live TV.  Not very intuitive 😞

Thanks for the direction about how to see what version one has; I see that I have 1.6.0.  I think I have decided to stay with FIOS and hope the upgrade to 1.6.1 comes soon.  I have movie channels right now without ordering them, so I will take advantage of those.  Plus I can't stand the thought of switching my service back over.

[anialw]

First of all I want to thank to all of you who have confirmed my "fuzzy picture" issue was not in my mind or immagined.  I swear when the tech heard me say that he thought I was crazy and when I was seriously upset at him saying he does not see an issue and cannot compare as he did not see my previous service I asked him if he heard this complain before.  His answer was "yes, for the past 2 years I do at least 5 installs a day and have only heard it 4 times".

I am on vacation now and decided to see how I feel when I return home whether to wait this out for a fix release or cancel.. I am really tempted to cancel, although it will be a hassle I am really irritated that Verizon does not feel this is a significant issues, that the techs deny it, that when you call customer service they think I am crazy.

Thanks again, I will try some of the settings suggested and see how I like it.  Hopefully the release will be coming out in the next 2 weeks before my 30 day cancelation time 🙂

[DMZ]

You're not crazy anialw, my SD channel picture quality sucks too!  My TV is a 6 year old Sony 36" XBR (Sony's top end at the time) 4:3 tube that switches to 16:9 HD automatically when I go to an HD channel and the HD channels look great.  My mom has a low end 36" Sony that doesn't have HD capability driven by Time Warner through an S-Video cable.  Her picture quality makes my FiOS SD picture look sick!