Mass Media & Technology

NOW TV

Now just er...NOW.

This site closed in March 2021 and is now a read-only archive
LL
London Lite Founding member
The standard black box pass packs with 3 months Ent, 2 months movies or 2 Sky Sports day passes are at £9.99 on Amazon until 8pm tonight. (Saturday)
RE
remlap
Back again at that price.
LL
London Lite Founding member
Back again at that price.


Back up to £14.99 after 8pm.
DV
dvboy
They're Lightning Deals they don't last long
RE
remlap
Noticed that ITV Hub is using the HD sources for their live ITV2-3-4 but I doubt they're actually 720p +. Wish the box had some sort of display information for resolution of current media.
LL
London Lite Founding member
Noticed that ITV Hub is using the HD sources for their live ITV2-3-4 but I doubt they're actually 720p +. Wish the box had some sort of display information for resolution of current media.


The live streams are 480p. Compared to the ITV2-4 picture on Freeview, they're a vast improvement.
NG
noggin Founding member
Noticed that ITV Hub is using the HD sources for their live ITV2-3-4 but I doubt they're actually 720p +. Wish the box had some sort of display information for resolution of current media.


The live streams are 480p. Compared to the ITV2-4 picture on Freeview, they're a vast improvement.


Are they full motion 50i/p or still 25p? If they're 25p displayed at 60p then although they may be sharper, I'm not sure I'd describe them as a 'huge improvement' with those frame-rate mangling results.

Or have they taken the iPlayer route and started delivering 50Hz motion?
LL
London Lite Founding member
Noticed that ITV Hub is using the HD sources for their live ITV2-3-4 but I doubt they're actually 720p +. Wish the box had some sort of display information for resolution of current media.


The live streams are 480p. Compared to the ITV2-4 picture on Freeview, they're a vast improvement.


Are they full motion 50i/p or still 25p? If they're 25p displayed at 60p then although they may be sharper, I'm not sure I'd describe them as a 'huge improvement' with those frame-rate mangling results.

Or have they taken the iPlayer route and started delivering 50Hz motion?


No 50Hz motion on those boxes and I doubt they'll ever will as long as Roku keep mass producing boxes with the same spec as North America for Sky's other businesses.

However I would say that despite ITV still using 25p, the actually PQ in comparison to the 544x576 picture used on ITV3 is an improvement. (ITV, +1., 2/+1 and 4 are at 720x576 576i on Freeview)
NG
noggin Founding member

No 50Hz motion on those boxes and I doubt they'll ever will as long as Roku keep mass producing boxes with the same spec as North America for Sky's other businesses.

However I would say that despite ITV still using 25p, the actually PQ in comparison to the 544x576 picture used on ITV3 is an improvement. (ITV, +1., 2/+1 and 4 are at 720x576 576i on Freeview)


Now that the Apple TV 4 is supporting (and promoting) 60Hz output from some streaming video applications (MLB i think), and the BBC is doing 50Hz rather than 25Hz for iPlayer, I think more and more streamers will start to support 60Hz or 50Hz full motion rather than the current 24/25/30Hz only stuff.

I'd hope ITV are aiming to match the BBC for picture quality on their online streams - and introduce a 720/50p stream at the highest tier as the BBC have. Makes a huge difference for sport and entertainment - avoiding halving the temporal resolution of online services compared to broadcast outlets.

The Roku Now TV boxes also have the bizarre situation that they only support a fixed 60Hz output (even Apple TV allows you to switch to 50Hz in the output settings option). This isn't a hardware limitation (some of the Roku boxes have the same SoC as the Raspberry Pi which allows 50 and 60Hz output - heck it even allows 24p Frame Packed 3D output...) I don't know of any current ARM SoC that doesn't allow for a 50/60Hz HDMI output.

The only reason the Now TV boxes are fixed at 60Hz for output is software... A simple menu setting to change the video format manually would be close to trivial to code.

Whilst the spatial resolution and compression artefacts of ITV 3 may be better on the Roku, if it's 25p at 60p, rather than 50i at 50p, it's still pretty unwatchably mangled for native 50i content like entertainment, sport etc. surely?
LL
London Lite Founding member
The latest retail promotion is with Pampers. A free 1 month Entertainment pass if bought with promotional packs at Sainsbury's.
DV
DVB Cornwall
Think I can resist that one!
Stuart, Brekkie and London Lite gave kudos
BA
bilky asko
The latest retail promotion is with Pampers. A free 1 month Entertainment pass if bought with promotional packs at Sainsbury's.


Aimed at a certain Mr Akinbola?
ETP1 Forever, rob and London Lite gave kudos

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