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Digital delays

will they ever improve? (July 2006)

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PE
Pete Founding member
Hearing my brother talk about something unrelated today got me thinking about those games on kids TV where you use your touchtone™ phone and/or shout commands. Will these become obsolete in 2008?

I presume realtime encoding will improve with time, but how much quicker is it now than in 1998? Will we ever come back down to the sort of delay we have with analogue?
SP
Steve in Pudsey
I think I heard, possibly on here, that the ITV50 remake of the Golden Shot was a bit of a cockup for that reason
MA
marksi
The delays in MP4 coding for HD result in delays about twice as long as with MP2/SD.
SP
Steve in Pudsey
can't find it now but there was a newspaper article recently bemoaning the fact that the writer, watching in HD, knew that a goal had been scored during the world cup some time before he saw it going in from the cheering at a nearby pub.
JA
james2001 Founding member
Steve in Pudsey posted:
I think I heard, possibly on here, that the ITV50 remake of the Golden Shot was a bit of a cockup for that reason


It was, absolutly terrible. It's almost certinally the reason why we don't see these sort of games often any more. Shame really, as they were the staple of Saturday Morning telly in the 90s.
DA
Dave Founding member
Steve in Pudsey posted:
can't find it now but there was a newspaper article recently bemoaning the fact that the writer, watching in HD, knew that a goal had been scored during the world cup some time before he saw it going in from the cheering at a nearby pub.


BBC News | Pitfalls of HD
HA
harshy Founding member
well I was watching tonights WC match on 19.2E Digital with BBC Commentry it was 2 seconds ahead of the BBC transmission on 28.2E, so it must mean the delay is worser on 28.2E, or it's the Sky hardware.
GM
nodnirG kraM
Hymagumba posted:
those games on kids TV where you use your touchtone™ phone and/or shout commands.

I hear these games are only as good as the bods behind the scenes operating them, eh Aston?
JA
james2001 Founding member
harshy posted:
well I was watching tonights WC match on 19.2E Digital with BBC Commentry it was 2 seconds ahead of the BBC transmission on 28.2E, so it must mean the delay is worser on 28.2E, or it's the Sky hardware.


Or maybe something to do with getting the feed over from Germany, routing it through the broadcast centre, beaming it back up to 28.2E and then back down again.
SP
Steve in Pudsey
Well it would also include a round trip to the regional centre for whichever region's BBC One you're watching.

Plus on DSat, the BBC add a bit of delay to each region's feed - not much but enough so that the versions of BBC One on each transponder aren't showing the same thing, so that the statmuxing has some hope of being able to do a reasonable job.
CC
CrusadeforCentral
There will always be a delay on Sky digital because of the distance the signals have to travel.

Engage Science teacher mode! Digital signals are transmitted at 300000 metres per second. It takes the suns light travelling at the same speed 8 minutes to reach Earth. Digital Satellite signals have to travel from Earth to the Astra Satellite and back again so this is why there is a 2 second delay!

Sorry to disappoint but it ain't ever gonna get any better unless the laws of Physics are broken!
PE
Pete Founding member
I'm not bothered about Sky, I don't have that crap. I'm wondering about freeview

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