SciFi HD for Cable?

We Don't even get National Geographic in HD on our cable here.

I too would love Sci-Fi in HD....

I think Sci-Fi would be good to drop their SD version of SD. That would Force most cable companies to have them in HD because if the cable co's didn't they would have lots of irate customers!

TGC

 

Not really. I wouldn't like my cable company to cut corners and downrez HD like DirecTV has been notorious for doing in order to cram more of them into the already crowded pipeline. mpeg4 doesn't seem like such a good idea either, especially for channels originally broadcasting as mpeg2 and being transcoded to mpeg4 (any transcoding leads to significant degradation). I much prefer quality over quantity and I'm willing to wait for someone better than DirecTV to make it available to me... properly. That being said there are many people that value quantity over quality when making provider decisions which is why DirecTV can get away with it.

 

Expect USA HD first, and that might be in the short-term (next few weeks or months). Sci Fi HD will come later.

Satellite has to have some hook to get people to pay all that money up-front (kinda like TiVo). Having a few extra HD channels (that matter) is that hook, this year.

 

I would rather wait until there is an <i>actual</i> SDV fix before we go nuts demanding all these new channels myself (as if eithe r one is going to happen because of customer demand).
I can catch BSG 'delayed' on UHD and that works for me. They're also showing Atlantis but their schedule for that is a little sporadic to rely on.

Other than Eureka and those two, what else is actually watchable on Sci-Fi that would be shown in HD?

 

You pretty much got them all.

I'm new to Universal HD. How does their BSG schedule work? Is it delayed by weeks or months?

 

Is there a website that tells what every provider offers in HD?

As a consumer, I would like to know that, that way if I know a competitor offers X, then I could press my provider to provide me X.

Just wondering.

 

Check out avsforum for your area.

 

Heroes reruns and Dresden Files are both nice.

And BSG 'delayed' on UHD is terrible. It runs months behind. Of course, that probably means you haven't had to experience the suck that was most of last season.

 

Unfortunately, it's months.

 

If you guys are looking for more good Sci Fi in HD, there's always Firefly on Universal and Torchwood on HDNet.

 

Hey...those of you on Comcast should feel lucky. I'm caught in the stupid buy-out in southern Indiana of Comcast and Insight. I've had the same HD lineup for way too long...and they won't even deal with the Big Ten Network because "it's now Comcast's issue". Gotta love the customer support.

 

Wouldn't Dr. Who be in HD? I assume it's HD and downres'ed based on the letterbox format and the fact that Torchwood is in HD...

 

Torchwood looks weird to me. Am I the only one? It has that "soap opera" look to it.

 

I am sure I'll get it when it is available. My cable co is owned by the development company of my (and a few others) neighboorhood. It is fiber optic all the way and was designed that way before th first house was built. When I moved in here last year I was surprised there wasn't more HD channels as they apparently don't have bandwidthe issues, but since last fall, we have been getting about 1 new HD channel per month.
Funny thing is that other than the locals and a few other channels which are not available on D* (MOJO HD for example), it appears many of my channels are coming from DirecTV. I even see the Directicket and special events D* ads while watching channels sometimes. So, I wouldn't be surprised that we begin getting what D* is getting. Not bad really except that D* was compressing the H*LL out of stuff

 

Sounds like a clever way to keep people from putting dishes on their roofs.

 

I wrote my local cable company (Time Warner) asking what they were going to do to keep my business in the face of DirecTV's upcoming new HD stations. They never wrote back. I finally gave up on them and switched to DirecTV. The day the first batch of 20+ additional national HD stations went live, a buddy of mine got an email from Time Warner saying how they were adding three new HD stations by the end of October. I already had gotten all three of the new stations in the first HD rollout and now there's been a second smaller wave and a third, tiny wavelet (the MTV HD station) with more to come throughout the rest of the year. There are still some bugs (SciFi-HD, USA-HD and Bravo-HD are all coming in really badly for me so far and SciFi-HD seems to be showing only upconverted SD so far) but I'm sure it'll get worked out.

 

Just keep in mind that Torchwood is a "SPIN off" of Doctor Who. So Torchwood is mainly for those Doctor who type fans

TGC

 

Yes the same look as Dr. Who only in HD. I'm enjoying it so far.

 

As the BBC has said Torchwood is the adult version of Doctor Who. They don't expect the Doctor to ever make an appreance on the show since Doctor Who is family oriented. Though you do hear the Tardis landing in the last episode of the first season and Martha Jones is expected to appear in some of the next session episodes of Torchwood. I kind of think of Torchwood as the revamped version of the John Pertwee (3rd Doctor Who) era of Doctor Who where he had his memory wiped of how to fix and fly the Tardis through time and space so all the episodes took place on Earth. This how torchwood will work. Everything takes place on earth.