I've noticed that too. Everyone's eyes are different. If you have great vision and pay attention to detail and compare Bell with Shaw, you'll see that Shaw's HD is far from spectacular.

I guess my eyes must be really different. I have both Shaw and Bell HD, and Shaw has a sharper image with more detail, while Bell's HD is soft on CBS, Fox, ABC and NBC. Other channels like TSN and SN look good. Both providers suffer from macroblocking with fast motion with Shaw having more macroblocking--partially due to the fact that the Shaw picture is sharper and shows the macroblocking more. Unfortunately, no provider is perfect.

I prefer Bell HD for sports because of the more modern PVR, and Shaw HD for everything else.

I guess my eyes must be really different. I have both Shaw and Bell HD, and Shaw has a sharper image with more detail, while Bell's HD is soft on CBS, Fox, ABC and NBC. Other channels like TSN and SN look good.
Your eyes are probably not that different. Unlike most of us, you have the advantage of seeing both providers' channels on a day to day basis. If you have the tv's side by side, you can likely pick out even more discrepancies. I've noticed some days Shaw is really good while at other times their PQ sucks. It's hardly consistent, imo.

I hope the moderator allows this new thread, as I think it is important that we look at this new and emerging problem on its own and see if we can track frequency and solutions.
I am located in Winnipeg, and for the past 2-3 weeks have noticed at least once per evening an occurance of the screen going completely black. We mostly watch and record on HD channels. And given we watch mostly recorded, I cannot say with any certainty if it has happened when watching live versus recorded.
My situation has remained the same, no splitters, no new cables, etc.
I guess I am interested in how many others have this is happening to and if this is simply a new reality of the signal we receive from Shaw.

Thanks

I started experiencing the video drop offs on HD channels in the last week of so in Winnipeg. Usually once or twice per hour. Fortunately I am switching to MTS in a couple of weeks!

^ I am in Winnipeg and have experienced (only recently) the video dropouts as well.

Ditto in Winnipeg, a couple of black-screen dropouts per hour where audio continues, mostly just noticed this in the past week or so; and also, continued same-old-same-old periodic audio dropouts where video continues; and periodic complete dropouts where the picture pixellates and then freezes along with the audio dropping for a second or 2 until it resumes normally.

Honestly, if this is considered the 'norm' I'm also going to switch providers and try something else. Imagine how pissed you'd be if you bought a BluRay only to have 2 dropouts per hour, 4 in total throughout the movie, and be told that this is considered normal. I don't think you'd accept that for even one BluRay or DVD, let alone every one that you buy!

Your average Joe might buy up to one movie per month and would not consider this acceptable, but yet we're expected pay 3x as much each month for "Superior Picture"+"Superior Sound" (Shaw's own words from their website) and live with that as 'the norm'? I don't get it...

Does anyone from Shaw read this page, and if so, can you please comment on whether you think this is acceptable and if so, why?

Cheers,
The REAL Joe

Ditto in Vancouver. I am experiencing a couple of black screens with no sound for a second or two, per hour. Just got my SHAW PVR Expander yesterday, and noticed a new type of pixelation and sound distortion on my recordings on the external drive. Has anyone else with the PVR Expander experienced this? My recordings on the internal drive don't seem to have this issue.

Include me in the "split second video drop outs" group please.

I wonder how long it will take them to get this issue fixed.

Ditto in Vancouver. I am experiencing a couple of black screens with no sound for a second or two, per hour. Just got my SHAW PVR Expander yesterday, and noticed a new type of pixelation and sound distortion on my recordings on the external drive. Has anyone else with the PVR Expander experienced this? My recordings on the internal drive don't seem to have this issue.
Before I installed a 1 terrabyte drive to the primary on my 6412 111...I used a western digital green as an external for a while to make sure it would work well with the pvr. It worked flawlessly. However when I tried a seagate 500 gig refurb it had the problems that you mentioned so it could be that there is something going on with the PVR expander harddrive that you just bought. If I were you I would find someone else that has a pvr and try it out on it. I know this means losing all your recorded stuff but it will tell you if there is a problem with the expander. Either way I would take it back to the store if the problem persists.

I am glad to see the split second blackouts are not a problem with my HDMI connections....I also suspect that the latest firmware update has a glitch! At least it is not that frequent a problem. Not like last year and the persistent audio dropsy.

Just as an after thought if it is a handshake problem then it should not happen with a component hookup. Perhaps the audio part will still drop as you would need to use optical or spdif. But if the problem is still there with a stereo analogue hook up and composite video then the problem has nothing to do with HDMI connection. I will try the different connection to see. ...Maybe Shaw could pay me for doing their tech support testing:rolleyes:

I'm getting 3-4 video blackouts per hour, usually lasting about 2 or 3 seconds.

A Shaw rep told me it is a problem with the Motorolla boxes, and Shaw is working on a firmware fix.

This has been going on for a few months for me.

I thought I may only be mildly interested in the Shaw HD Movies, because of commercials. Now that I have the service, I noticed the picture quality is so poor ,with the grain, softness, and the change from the original colour.
I noticed last night POTC:At World's End was very green.
A top quality DVD upconversion, like my Samsung BD-P1200 is better.

I am also getting 1-5 audio/ video black outs in a 4 hour viewing period, last 2-3 seconds.
This has been occuring since at least last November. I am monitoring it closely now to try to understand what is happening.
Usually use HDMI cable to TV and spdif to amp for surround sound. There is no audio drop from the surround sound, but when I rely on the audio from the TV via the HDMI the sound and audio drop at the same time. If I change to component cable there are no video drops.

Have been using expander for 3 weeks. This problem did not change when it was added and no new problems developed.

Shaw pvr DCT 3416 I, Shaw 1T expander, Panasonic 720p Plasma

I believe Motorola is currently working on an issue with their DCTs using an HDMI cable causing randon handshakes to occur which causes audio and video drops (lasting 2-5 seconds). Once Motorola corrects this new challenge (as you mentioned it seemed to have started in November) it should be better for audio and video drops.

The only temp workaround that was suggested was running component cables and optical audio (or left and right stereo cables) until a fix is in place. Unfortunately there is no eta for a fix.

Shaw Techs have rewired my entire house, even ran a new cable from the distribution box in the front yard just to fix the audio/video dropouts.

I was running HDMI but I've switched that out for composite video with Toslink (optical) audio cables through my receiver and I've disabled my TV speakers. No difference at all.

Has the quality become worse recently, or am I just noticing it more after watching so many BDs? The blocking artifacts during Lost on ABC HD East last Tuesday seemed worse than usual.

Not sure where you are located by I recorded Lost from WXYZ and when playing back the picture quality was perfect. The first time in a long time I could run 3 hours of material without even 1 drop out. I'm located in Calgary. I don't usually have a macroblocking problem but I do get the audio/video drops about once every hour or so. Not as often as when I first went to HD last year but then even once is still more than I expect.

Here is a quick question. Why is ti that when watching Shaw HD channels, there is "noise" or "pixelation" around edges on some objects when this never shows up when source is DVD, Blu-Ray or even PC? Anyone else see this on a 50+ inch screen? Is this considered normal or is the feed bad?

Its due to compression. I can really notice it on my 96". Using PC as a source for HD is WAY better than Shaw. Its a sham that they can even call it HD. Sure, it is 720p, but they compress the streams so much that it doesn't matter.

You mean everyone, even those with high end screens, see this type of "noise" from HD broadcasts?

I think so. Unless I have a really bad feed from Shaw.