Video On Demand audio level issues with Quantum TV (VMS1100)

[JiveTurkey2]

I've rented/purchased several VOD titles (paid and free/subscription), and the audio levels are horirbly inconsistent.  For any quiet/dialogue scenes, I have to turn my TV up to about "40", while with regular TV "20" is perfectly fine (the set-top box volume is fixed at the maxium).  When there is any sort of action scene or where music comes on, it's EXTREMELY loud, practically blowing out my speakers.   So throughout the movie, I'm having to play with the volume pretty much every other scene.  It is extremely annoying.

I did the "Click-To-Chat" on my phone, the rep had me go through all the basic physical troubleshooting (reseating coax, rebooting router/STB), which of course made no difference.  All my MoCA signal levels are fine, and again, live TV doesn't have issues.  There must be a problem in the way that the On-Demand titles are either encoded/compressed or what codec is being used.  It's very frustrating, especially when I have to call customer service to get credit for the movie I rented, almost (but not quite) having to eat the cost of a rental of a sub-par quality on-demand title. 

Their solution is to send a technician (!), which I do not believe will fix anything.  I'm guessing the tech will shrug his shoulders and leave since all the signal levels are fine and live TV is not affected. 

Anyone else having similar issues?

[tns2]

Note many Dolby Digital channels often sound much lower (6db to be exact).

Double check what you think using Dynamic Range (none,light, heavy).  Personally I prefere none but the other settings may make the audio levels seem normal at lower volume settings.  In menu/settings/audio&video/audio.

[YTP]

I don't have Quantum but I haved the same problem but only with PPV movies, all 3 or 4 that I have rented over the years. I periodically forget how bad the sound is on PPV, not free and premium OD,  and order a movie only to be reminded of the crappy PPV sound.

It sounds like the audio is extremely compressed where quiet passages are brought up to level so, for example, in a night scene with no dialog the crickets and background noise become very loud and then when dialog comes back the crickets go to the background. Background music can be overbearing and as loud as the dialog too. I have played with the audio settings as described below but to no avail. Live TV and regular On Demand, no problem.

It's not right I tell ya!

[Ramsey1]

Very same issue with streaming MI5 last night. Listening through THX receiver via coax. Audio is pumping throughout the movie - made for a horrible experience - plus compression is so high that even picture quality is terrible. Always use Amazon but decided to try FIOS figuring that since it is their pipe, they would not compress as much. What a joke! Never again!

Spoke with service and they took me through the exercise of rebooting/reprogramming the box, acting like they had never heard of the issue before even though this thread was the first one that popped up when I selected poor audio/sound option.

[ZamboniSwandive]

Same problem here. Paid to watch Pan on demand and the audio was horribly compressed. I double checked the audio settings on both the stb and the tv. All possible compression settings were set to off/none yet the transmission received from fios sounded awfully compressed. Why? 

[elPrez]

Funny you explain it that way. I am experiencing the exact same issue, regrets and all. Rented something a few months ago and thought maybe someone messed with my reciever setting it sounded so bad. Last night we rented Spectre but watched on our other system in another room and it was almost unwatchable because of the horrible sound. Wasn't the best Bond movie but the audio made it worse. Thankfully I only wasted reward points and not any money. Can't believe in this era of technology they still have the same problem they apparently have had for year with PPV movies. Wonder why only PPV and not premium or network channels?

[jrfjay]

VERIZON EMPLOYEE WHO IS SUPPOSED TO BE MONITORING THE FORUMS, PLEASE PROVIDE SOME  HELP.

Same problem.  Not a single supervisor at tech support had any idea what i was talking about.  One decicded I needed a new media server.  The second said no and a sent a tech, who realized it the problem was not at my house.  He called someone and then the tech told me they "knew about the problem and that someone would call when it was resolved."

However when I checked my repair ticket had been closed and there were no notes in my file about the real problem. 

Which I'm guess is an improper audio setting in the PPV file from the studio, or when the file is transcoded into the fios system.  At least they are crediting me for the lousy movies.  But I want to watch them and not the silences jack themselves up to full level. 

[CRobGauth]

This is a peer to peer support forum.

[jrfjay]

Thanks for the background.  Understood.  However a tech supervisor told me that an employee monitors the forums, so that was the reason for my screaming appeal. I'm into it deep with them and will post any solution, though I suspect it is internal to Fios., not at our ends. 

[tns2]

The employees who monitor are Admin types and rarely will answer.  About the only time they will if you are having problems .

This problem doesn't sound like one they will ever comment about.