HD dvr's quality isn't as good as my old cable box! Why and how do I correct?

[matthewdhill]

I just purchased an HD series 3 Tivo having had a series 2 for years. I'd been running my HD through a cable box/dvr from Time Warner. When I first hooked the Tivo up one week ago it looked good. For the last 2 days the HD as been fuzzy. I honestly can't tell much differnece between it and the analog station. I've got the Tivo on 1080i fixed and I've got a Panasonic TV. Anybody have any experience with this or have any suggestions. When watching sports a wide view shows everything slightly fuzzy and the ticker bars are fuzzy not crisp.

Thanks in advance for you help.

[Worf]

You're not watching standard def chnanels are you? You've had the cablecards set up and all?

[bkdtv]

With the TWC box, you were receiving digital versions of all analog channels. To get those digital cable channels on a TiVo, then you need a CableCard installed. In some areas, you may also need TWC's SDV adapter (plugs into USB port on TiVo) to get all of the same digital channels you got with the TWC box.

Without a CableCard, the TiVo only receives the analog versions of those channels. The TiVo must convert those analog channels to digital in order to support DVR functionality, and there is some quality loss associated with that. With digital channels, there is no such quality loss, because the digital bitstream is buffered and recorded as is.

[matthewdhill]

Cable cards are installed. The channels are HD. I've got another TV in the house that displays them great through the cable box. However, through the Tivo they leave something to be desired. The Cable cards are installed correctly and diagnostics on the Tivo show that they are operating well.

[NJ_HB]

Describe how the TiVo is connected? HDMI/Component?

[bkdtv]

Cable cards are installed. The channels are HD. I've got another TV in the house that displays them great through the cable box. However, through the Tivo they leave something to be desired. The Cable cards are installed correctly and diagnostics on the Tivo show that they are operating well.Is the TiVo connected via HDMI?

And is the TiVo set to "fixed 1080i" under Settings -> Video -> Video Output Format?

[DeWitt]

Be sure that you are on the right channel. Some cable boxes will remap the HD channels to the main channel numbers. With a Tivo you may need to select the actual higher numbered HD versions of the channels.

For example in my area ABC is on Channel 7 which is an SD feed. The HD version is on 507

Some HD cable boxes will automatically display the HD feed from 507 when you select 7.

The Tivo would need to select 507.

-=DeWitt=-