The Natural Philosopher wrote in
news
On 18/09/17 09:48, DerbyBorn wrote:
"Jim GM4DHJ ..." wrote in
newspml99$334$1 @dont-email.me:



How the heck does a LCD TV work?

who cares? .....




I know what you mean. Full of tiny things that we don't understand as
well.

After the Apocolypse - we won't be able to recreate them! May manage
a Baird TV

I could probably manage to design a z80, given time.




But could you build the components?

Some old "Good Sound" was a bit lacking in treble as I recall.

On 18/09/17 12:34, Fredxxx wrote:
On 18/09/2017 10:40, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
On 18/09/17 09:48, DerbyBorn wrote:
"Jim GM4DHJ ..." wrote in newspml99$334$1
@dont-email.me:



How the heck does a LCD TV work?

who cares? .....




I know what you mean. Full of tiny things that we don't understand as
well.

After the Apocolypse - we won't be able to recreate them! May manage a
Baird TV

I could probably manage to design a z80, given time.

Making a Z80 from scratch in silicon might be problematic, even if we
did have your non-verified designs.

Well its all a question of how far back you go.

I am assuing maybe silicon transistors avialable.

--
If I had all the money I've spent on drink...
...I'd spend it on drink.

Sir Henry (at Rawlinson's End)

On 18/09/17 12:36, DerbyBorn wrote:
The Natural Philosopher wrote in
news
On 18/09/17 09:48, DerbyBorn wrote:
"Jim GM4DHJ ..." wrote in
newspml99$334$1 @dont-email.me:



How the heck does a LCD TV work?

who cares? .....




I know what you mean. Full of tiny things that we don't understand as
well.

After the Apocolypse - we won't be able to recreate them! May manage
a Baird TV

I could probably manage to design a z80, given time.




But could you build the components?


Well there is the rub. Civilisation as it actually is to an engineer is
an edifice erected on many varied foundations.

First, you need to build a pole lathe...

--
If I had all the money I've spent on drink...
...I'd spend it on drink.

Sir Henry (at Rawlinson's End)

On 18/09/2017 10:15, Dave Plowman (News) wrote:
In article ,
Tim Streater wrote:
In article , Davey
wrote:

On Sun, 17 Sep 2017 09:15:44 +0100
"Brian Gaff" wrote:

Oh and one tradition of tvs has not changed.
They all still have crap sounds speakers in them.

To me, the sound of modern TV sets is vastly inferior to what the old
ones had.

Don't use the TV's own sound system. Take the line out or optical and
feed into a decent sound system.

But why should you have to? It's rather like saying take video from it and
feed to a decent monitor.

The sound on our living room TV is certainly not perfect, but it is
acceptable for most things. I did take the trouble to listen to numerous
TVs that met our other requirements before choosing it on that basis.

SteveW

Andrew wrote:
On 18/09/2017 11:01, Dave Plowman (News) wrote:
I've never seen any domestic LCD set which gives the same detail etc on a
face as a decent analogue CRT.

When HD transmissions started, all the broadcasters had to revamp
their news and panel-show 'furniture' because the better quality
of the image revealed the flaws of the old studio furniture that
that analogue and SD digital masked out.

Most people stuck with their plasma TV's for that reason - the
picture was better.

Ultra HD on a TV or monitor that can resolve 1 billion colours
is a revelation compared to a 'normal' LCD tv showing an SD program.

Unless the picture is moving.

On Mon, 18 Sep 2017 10:13:28 +0100, "Dave Plowman (News)"
wrote:

In article ,
T i m wrote:
When our 8 year old Samsung packed in I took it apart looking for the
obvious.

Like bulging caps or short / open circuit diodes on the PSU board (I
did one yesterday). ;-)

I had a Samsung TV which died just out of warranty with an obvious PS
fault. But oddly, not a cap. With a lack of a schematic, I bought a used
PS board off Ebay which got it going again.

I got out of field-electronics repair because it started to become
just that, board swapping.

That's not to say you can't still fix stuff (like diodes and caps) but
it's often quicker / easier (for those without soldering facilities
and experience etc) to just replace a board.

Next door neighbour was about to throw away a fairly large TFT monitor
(he'd already bought a new one) that I found was known to have a weak
PSU (the main smoothing cap went and a random cascade of parts then
typically followed).

I managed to find an identical PSU new from China and when it arrived,
I replaced the cheapo caps with quality ones and it seems to be
working fine. ;-)

The 'shame' is so much stuff gets thrown away, often for the sake of a
few pence worth of components and not a lot of time (once you know
what you are doing etc).

Cheers, T i m

In article ,
Andrew wrote:
When HD transmissions started, all the broadcasters had to revamp
their news and panel-show 'furniture' because the better quality
of the image revealed the flaws of the old studio furniture that
that analogue and SD digital masked out.

Complete ********.

Any decent designer checks the condition of his set and has it touched up
(if necessary) before any transmission. And does that by eye - not on
camera.

And HD transmissions you see today are nothing like as good as the
original test HD transmissions in CRT days.

--
*Nostalgia isn't what is used to be.

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

In article 2,
DerbyBorn wrote:
Some old "Good Sound" was a bit lacking in treble as I recall.

'Treble' has rather gone out of fashion these days, judging by speech
quality on much TV output. Perhaps a reaction to 'digital' sound?

--
*If all is not lost, where the hell is it?

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

In article ,
Steve Walker wrote:
The sound on our living room TV is certainly not perfect, but it is
acceptable for most things. I did take the trouble to listen to numerous
TVs that met our other requirements before choosing it on that basis.

I wasn't that interested when I bought my current Panasonic a couple of
years ago, because I've used the main sound system for TV sound since
1970. But a quick audition of those on sale said there wasn't much
difference. None had forward facing speakers, so on a hiding to nothing
before even starting.

--
*Do infants enjoy infancy as much as adults enjoy adultery? *

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

Dave Plowman (News) wrote:

And HD transmissions you see today are nothing like as good as the
original test HD transmissions in CRT days.

Dave Plowman (News) wrote:

And HD transmissions you see today are nothing like as good as the
original test HD transmissions in CRT days.


Oops! They can't be there's not enough bandwidth.

On Mon, 18 Sep 2017 12:26:46 +0100, Steve wrote:

On Mon, 18 Sep 2017 11:49:59 +0100 Tim Streater
wrote:

In article ,
wrote:

On Monday, 18 September 2017 11:20:14 UTC+1, Davey wrote:
On Mon, 18 Sep 2017 08:44:34 +0100 wrote:

when in reality he had just bought a cheap stereo system in
Woolworths and some Val Doonican records.


I had forgotten all about Val Doonican. And you had to remind me
that they existed, didn't you? Not in my collection, I assure you!

Even that was better than Max Bygraves. What was it, I'm a blue
toothbrush you're a pink toothbrush lol.

Was his phrase not: "That's a good idea SON!"


"I wanna sell you a Tory!"

Neat! I see what you did there. :-)

--
Johnny B Good

On 18/09/2017 13:38, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
On 18/09/17 12:34, Fredxxx wrote:
On 18/09/2017 10:40, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
On 18/09/17 09:48, DerbyBorn wrote:
"Jim GM4DHJ ..." wrote in newspml99$334$1
@dont-email.me:



How the heck does a LCD TV work?

who cares? .....




I know what you mean. Full of tiny things that we don't understand
as well.

After the Apocolypse - we won't be able to recreate them! May manage a
Baird TV

I could probably manage to design a z80, given time.

Making a Z80 from scratch in silicon might be problematic, even if we
did have your non-verified designs.

Well its all a question of how far back you go.

I am assuing maybe silicon transistors avialable.

How many would you need?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transistor_count
suggests 8,500.

On Mon, 18 Sep 2017 12:19:50 +0100, Andrew wrote:

On 18/09/2017 10:15, Dave Plowman (News) wrote:
In article ,
Tim Streater wrote:
In article , Davey
wrote:

On Sun, 17 Sep 2017 09:15:44 +0100 "Brian Gaff"
wrote:

Oh and one tradition of tvs has not changed. They all still have
crap sounds speakers in them.

To me, the sound of modern TV sets is vastly inferior to what the old
ones had.

Don't use the TV's own sound system. Take the line out or optical and
feed into a decent sound system.

But why should you have to? It's rather like saying take video from it
and feed to a decent monitor.


The sound on the HD channels (to my ears) is noticably better than the
SD channels, so bypassing the TV mediocre speakers is a good idea.
Especially for things like the Proms concerts. Annoyingly, the Midhurst
xmitter only supplies BBC4 in SD, so that the kiddies can have CBBC in
HD instead !. Even more annoyingly, CBBC is only broadcast during the
day and BBC4 only at night, so why can't they revert to a generic BBC HD
channel and then share it.

I use an Amptastic amp and a pair of old phillips 320 PC speakers and it
sounds way better to me. I'll get some even better 'hifi' speakers one
day.

I don't know whether the model number, "320" is purely coincidental or
has some connection but I immediately recognised it as part of the model
number for a pair of amplified PC speakers I've been using with all of my
desktop PC builds since the turn of the century.

The speakers in question are branded "Target" with the model number "TRG-
S320". The quality is a definite cut above the more typical "PC Speaker"
setup in that it uses a 4 inch bass/mid driver with a separate tweeter
housed in each, relatively substantial (for plastic) reflex cabinet of
around 8 litres in volume (32 by 19 by 14 cms - h,d,w).

It does a passingly good enough job as a "HiFi" self amplified stereo
speaker setup as to save me feeling any need to utilise a more
traditional amplifier/speaker setup, hence its continued use for over a
decade and a half.

Aside from the obvious difference of seperate amp and speakers versus
active speakers, I wonder of those Philips 320 PC speakers of yours have
anything in common with my TRG-S320 speakers?

--
Johnny B Good

On Sunday, 17 September 2017 18:49:33 UTC+1, Dave Plowman (News) wrote:
In article ,
Tim Streater wrote:
Rubbish. Much better picture quality, especially in HD, no pincushion
or barrel distortion, no colour registration problems, no focus
problems.

I've yet to see any LCD which can match a really good CRT for flesh tones.

I noticed that flesh tones from a DVD look far better on my retina imac than they do on my LCD TV or LCD 2nd monitor.
Strangle enough my gig videos also look far better on my retina iMac than then do on my LG 43" TV as in lack of colour fringing I though or used to think that was down to yuotube and compression.


But don't know if a oLED can - I suspect not either.

Of course very few indeed have ever seen TV on a Grade 1 monitor.

what's a grade 1 monitor comparted to the ultra 4K HD or wide galmet type.



--
*All men are idiots, and I married their King.

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

On 18/09/17 15:07, Fredxxx wrote:
On 18/09/2017 13:38, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
On 18/09/17 12:34, Fredxxx wrote:
On 18/09/2017 10:40, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
On 18/09/17 09:48, DerbyBorn wrote:
"Jim GM4DHJ ..." wrote in
newspml99$334$1
@dont-email.me:



How the heck does a LCD TV work?

who cares? .....




I know what you mean. Full of tiny things that we don't understand
as well.

After the Apocolypse - we won't be able to recreate them! May manage a
Baird TV

I could probably manage to design a z80, given time.

Making a Z80 from scratch in silicon might be problematic, even if we
did have your non-verified designs.

Well its all a question of how far back you go.

I am assuing maybe silicon transistors avialable.

How many would you need?
Â* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transistor_count
suggests 8,500.

Yep. That sounds about right.
But you wouldt need to go that far. A RISC processor could be quite a
bit less.

6809 mebbe...



--
If I had all the money I've spent on drink...
...I'd spend it on drink.

Sir Henry (at Rawlinson's End)

On Mon, 18 Sep 2017 14:04:59 +0100, Capitol wrote:

Andrew wrote:
On 18/09/2017 11:01, Dave Plowman (News) wrote:
I've never seen any domestic LCD set which gives the same detail etc on a
face as a decent analogue CRT.

When HD transmissions started, all the broadcasters had to revamp
their news and panel-show 'furniture' because the better quality
of the image revealed the flaws of the old studio furniture that
that analogue and SD digital masked out.

Most people stuck with their plasma TV's for that reason - the
picture was better.

Ultra HD on a TV or monitor that can resolve 1 billion colours
is a revelation compared to a 'normal' LCD tv showing an SD program.

Unless the picture is moving.

Unusually you raise a good point. You never saw a panning picture
jerking as you now often do on many digital sets, that and lipsync
lag.

The thing is, 'most people' simply don't see such things and so can't
complain about it.

When I got my first Freeview set I couldn't stop seeing it but then
you just get used to it as 'they are all like that sir'.

Cheers, T i m

On Mon, 18 Sep 2017 12:32:48 +0100, Fredxxx wrote:

snip

Motion in a CRT with a very short phosphor persistence is/was far better
than any LCD.

Whilst I agree with the observation, is it the actual display method,
transmission bandwidth or the lack of (display processing) horsepower?


Cheers, T i m

On 18/09/2017 14:31, Dave Plowman (News) wrote:
In article 2,
DerbyBorn wrote:
Some old "Good Sound" was a bit lacking in treble as I recall.

'Treble' has rather gone out of fashion these days, judging by speech
quality on much TV output. Perhaps a reaction to 'digital' sound?


Also judging by the *noise* that a 7 channel AV amp produces.
Does all that base rumbling and vibrating really improve the film ?.

Since most people lose their ability to hear the higher frequencies
as they age I would have thought that a tone control knob was essential
for even the humblest of radios.

On Mon, 18 Sep 2017 07:30:47 -0700, whisky-dave wrote:

I noticed that flesh tones from a DVD look far better on my retina imac
than they do on my LCD TV or LCD 2nd monitor.

Watch a lot of flesh, do you?



--
My posts are my copyright and if @diy_forums or Home Owners' Hub
wish to copy them they can pay me £1 a message.
Use the BIG mirror service in the UK: http://www.mirrorservice.org
*lightning surge protection* - a w_tom conductor

In article ,
Capitol wrote:
Dave Plowman (News) wrote:

And HD transmissions you see today are nothing like as good as the
original test HD transmissions in CRT days.


Oops! They can't be there's not enough bandwidth.

That is rather like saying 'we can't afford it'

'They' choose not to make the necessary bandwidth available. So in later
years they can bring out super HD to sell more gear.

--
*Why are they called apartments, when they're all stuck together? *

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

In article ,
Johnny B Good wrote:
I don't know whether the model number, "320" is purely coincidental or
has some connection but I immediately recognised it as part of the model
number for a pair of amplified PC speakers I've been using with all of
my desktop PC builds since the turn of the century.

The speakers in question are branded "Target" with the model number
"TRG- S320". The quality is a definite cut above the more typical "PC
Speaker" setup in that it uses a 4 inch bass/mid driver with a separate
tweeter housed in each, relatively substantial (for plastic) reflex
cabinet of around 8 litres in volume (32 by 19 by 14 cms - h,d,w).

Oddly, Philips once made some rather fine (for the time) car speakers. A
long throw dual cone 4". Fitted as standard by Rolls Royce.

--
*Many people quit looking for work when they find a job *

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

In article ,
whisky-dave wrote:
I noticed that flesh tones from a DVD look far better on my retina imac
than they do on my LCD TV or LCD 2nd monitor.

What sort of display does it use? Think it may be LED rather than LCD. Not
had any experience of a full sized LED screen.

--
*I'm not being rude. You're just insignificant

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

On Mon, 18 Sep 2017 13:40:06 +0100, Steve Walker wrote:

On 18/09/2017 10:15, Dave Plowman (News) wrote:
In article ,
Tim Streater wrote:
In article , Davey
wrote:

On Sun, 17 Sep 2017 09:15:44 +0100 "Brian Gaff"
wrote:

Oh and one tradition of tvs has not changed. They all still have
crap sounds speakers in them.

To me, the sound of modern TV sets is vastly inferior to what the old
ones had.

Don't use the TV's own sound system. Take the line out or optical and
feed into a decent sound system.

But why should you have to? It's rather like saying take video from it
and feed to a decent monitor.

The sound on our living room TV is certainly not perfect, but it is
acceptable for most things. I did take the trouble to listen to numerous
TVs that met our other requirements before choosing it on that basis.


When looking for a 'cost effective' "Bedroom" TV set a few years ago, my
main consideration was that any "HD Ready" 1080p 22 to 24 inch TVs would
have to have sufficient cabinet depth to give its built in speakers a
fighting chance at producing intelligible speech, unlike the dinky LG set
we'd wasted our money on a few years earlier for use in the kitchen/diner
(I'd been forced to hitch up a couple of cheap PC speakers via the
headphone jack in order to be able to comprehend Jeremy Vine's questions
and banter on Eggheads).

My quest led me to choose an obsolescent Akai TV with built in DVD
player and, unlike the crappy LG, USB sockets that would allow playback
of video file formats as well as mp3 and jpg. I didn't need the DVD
optical disk function other than for its desired side effect of forcing
the manufacturer into almost unwittingly providing sufficient cabinet
volume to raise the audio quality standard to just short of what was once
considered sufficient for CRT TV sets.

The stinky crappy LG in the kitchen/dining area was eventually relegated
to the attic as a "poor man's spare PC monitor" by a slightly larger
Philips TV we'd inherited from my late father's estate. The charm of this
model was a similar 'cabinet volume' endowment to that of the Akai but
without the encumbrance of an unnecessary DVD optical disk player drive.

Thus I was able to return the PC speakers to stock (now destined never
to be sold to a customer as a "Shop Soiled" half priced bargain - no
matter, the 5 quid 'bargain price' is now merely 'chump change' these
days anyway) and I now merely need to crank the volume to 95% in order to
hear Jeremy Vine's voice clearly enough when watching Eggheads.

The high volume setting requirement is largely to compensate for the HD
audio standard that seems to be employed by the production crew, i.e.
dead quiet so the loud bits don't clip. WTF??? Loud bits on a studio
produced quiz show? Really? Must they???

Is it just me or does anyone else feel that such 'high fidelity'
treatment of the sound is, for once, totally counter-productive,
particularly in the absence of annoying audience participation that is
often cursed with very obvious compression induced pumping effects on
shows such as 'Mock the Week' and 'Pointless' et al? I can't believe I'm
the only viewer who feels that the sound engineers on 'Eggheads' are, and
continue, working to a totally inappropriate 'brief'.

--
Johnny B Good

In article ,
Andrew wrote:
On 18/09/2017 14:31, Dave Plowman (News) wrote:
In article 2,
DerbyBorn wrote:
Some old "Good Sound" was a bit lacking in treble as I recall.

'Treble' has rather gone out of fashion these days, judging by speech
quality on much TV output. Perhaps a reaction to 'digital' sound?


Also judging by the *noise* that a 7 channel AV amp produces.
Does all that base rumbling and vibrating really improve the film ?.

But that's the whole idea of multi-channel surround. To impress the
gullible.

Since most people lose their ability to hear the higher frequencies
as they age I would have thought that a tone control knob was essential
for even the humblest of radios.

Whilst that is true, I notice a big difference between the same presenter
on FreeView radio and FreeView TV, both fed through the same broadcast
quality sound system. TV seems no longer bothering to EQ a personal mic to
make it sound closer to a decent one.

--
*Letting a cat out of the bag is easier than putting it back in *

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

On Monday, 18 September 2017 15:46:14 UTC+1, Bob Eager wrote:
On Mon, 18 Sep 2017 07:30:47 -0700, whisky-dave wrote:

I noticed that flesh tones from a DVD look far better on my retina imac
than they do on my LCD TV or LCD 2nd monitor.

Watch a lot of flesh, do you?

Until I get the slap ;-)

But actuaklly a friend was buying a new monitor for his PC and he couldnl't undertsand why there was such a price range as he assumed all LCDs were the same and only the size dictated the cost.
He brought a firefly DVD over and I put it on my cheap 24" LCD monitor and he said it looked OK, then on teh TV again it looked OK, but when he saw the same image on my retina imac he could see the differnce as I pointed out that one of the things photogrphers did was look at skin tones for quality and not the typical amazon tree frog they show off in TV stores when showing how good the colour of thier TVs are. He didn't go for an expensive monitor as he said he just wanted it mainly for gaming and writing.

I do wonder what the newer 4k ultra HD would be like in a simialar comparision.

Anyway with all these brazians about there's less hair covering the skin ;-)

On Monday, 18 September 2017 16:01:41 UTC+1, Dave Plowman (News) wrote:
In article ,
whisky-dave wrote:
I noticed that flesh tones from a DVD look far better on my retina imac
than they do on my LCD TV or LCD 2nd monitor.

What sort of display does it use? Think it may be LED rather than LCD.

LED backlit I think.
But I'm trying to understand what the actual advantage would be of one of the new pro iMac screens something about overlaping pixels.



Not
had any experience of a full sized LED screen.

--
*I'm not being rude. You're just insignificant

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

In article ,
Johnny B Good wrote:
The high volume setting requirement is largely to compensate for the HD
audio standard that seems to be employed by the production crew, i.e.
dead quiet so the loud bits don't clip. WTF??? Loud bits on a studio
produced quiz show? Really? Must they???

I suppose you could blame it on the EU.

EBU (european broadcast union) set the specification for digital recording
levels such that the intended maximum would still have 10dB headroom - for
accidents. And this level is still nominally applied by the big TV
companies. But almost certainly not by other sound sources you may have
which will peak to 0dBFS. And 10dB is a very noticeable increase in level.

Then add in some of the 'minority' channels like UK Drama etc who show
mainly old repeats that seem to have been digitized by some work
experience type who wouldn't know a decibel from a phon and simply sets
the knob where it always is. So you get low levels - until the robotised
announcer at the end of the prog blast you out of your seat.

--
*Eschew obfuscation *

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

The Natural Philosopher wrote:
On 18/09/17 15:07, Fredxxx wrote:
On 18/09/2017 13:38, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
On 18/09/17 12:34, Fredxxx wrote:
On 18/09/2017 10:40, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
On 18/09/17 09:48, DerbyBorn wrote:
"Jim GM4DHJ ..." wrote in
newspml99$334$1
@dont-email.me:



How the heck does a LCD TV work?

who cares? .....




I know what you mean. Full of tiny things that we don't understand
as well.

After the Apocolypse - we won't be able to recreate them! May
manage a
Baird TV

I could probably manage to design a z80, given time.

Making a Z80 from scratch in silicon might be problematic, even if
we did have your non-verified designs.

Well its all a question of how far back you go.

I am assuing maybe silicon transistors avialable.

How many would you need?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transistor_count
suggests 8,500.

Yep. That sounds about right.
But you wouldt need to go that far. A RISC processor could be quite a
bit less.

6809 mebbe...




How about a PGA?

T i m wrote:
On Mon, 18 Sep 2017 12:32:48 +0100, Fredxxx wrote:

snip

Motion in a CRT with a very short phosphor persistence is/was far better
than any LCD.

Whilst I agree with the observation, is it the actual display method,
transmission bandwidth or the lack of (display processing) horsepower?


Cheers, T i m


Lack of bandwidth.

On 18/09/17 15:45, T i m wrote:
On Mon, 18 Sep 2017 12:32:48 +0100, Fredxxx wrote:

snip

Motion in a CRT with a very short phosphor persistence is/was far better
than any LCD.

Whilst I agree with the observation, is it the actual display method,
transmission bandwidth or the lack of (display processing) horsepower?


It's not intrinsic to the hardware in theory. cheap hardware may stutter..

It is probably simply lack of bandwith in the recieved signal. MP4
compressions is...compression.



Cheers, T i m



--
"Nature does not give up the winter because people dislike the cold."

ۥ Confucius

On Mon, 18 Sep 2017 17:17:24 +0100, Capitol wrote:

T i m wrote:
On Mon, 18 Sep 2017 12:32:48 +0100, Fredxxx wrote:

snip

Motion in a CRT with a very short phosphor persistence is/was far better
than any LCD.

Whilst I agree with the observation, is it the actual display method,
transmission bandwidth or the lack of (display processing) horsepower?



Lack of bandwidth.

Where ... and even from a local DVD / BD?

Cheers, T i m

On Mon, 18 Sep 2017 17:06:29 +0100, Dave Plowman (News) wrote:

In article ,
Johnny B Good wrote:
The high volume setting requirement is largely to compensate for the HD
audio standard that seems to be employed by the production crew, i.e.
dead quiet so the loud bits don't clip. WTF??? Loud bits on a studio
produced quiz show? Really? Must they???

I suppose you could blame it on the EU.

EBU (european broadcast union) set the specification for digital
recording levels such that the intended maximum would still have 10dB
headroom - for accidents. And this level is still nominally applied by
the big TV companies. But almost certainly not by other sound sources
you may have which will peak to 0dBFS. And 10dB is a very noticeable
increase in level.

Then add in some of the 'minority' channels like UK Drama etc who show
mainly old repeats that seem to have been digitized by some work
experience type who wouldn't know a decibel from a phon and simply sets
the knob where it always is. So you get low levels - until the robotised
announcer at the end of the prog blast you out of your seat.

Allowing an extra 10dB headroom on drama productions is legitimate
enough, if a little wasteful of the dynamic range available in most
domestic listening contexts and the inconsiderate shoutyness of the
continuity announcer imposing audible vandalism on the end credits can
usually be anticipated and adjusted for if you have the remote control in
your hand but it makes very little sense to apply such rules to studio
productions of pre-recorded game and quiz shows where the needs of
intelligibility trump those of sonic fidelity.

As a matter of interest, this quest for sonic fidelity in drama
productions has been pursued to the point where the general public (the
general public for Gawd's sake!) have been complaining about the lack of
intelligibility of the dialogue (normally an essential component of most
audiovisual productions) to poor beleaguered Jeremy Vine on Points of
View in recent years.

Very few viewers are prepared to wear headphones to reduce the ambisonics
down from the sum of the studio or location and the home listening
environment to just that of the studio or location alone in order to
recreate the sonic landscape as experienced by the producer whom, one is
left to presume, thought the sound quality of the production was
sufficient or worthy enough to be presented to its intended audience.

Sonic fidelity is all very fine provided it isn't achieved at the
expense of intelligibility of the dialogue which is normally the central
component to any video play that aims to entertain beyond the level of
'Slapstick' or Mime. It seems a lot of these producers in recent times
are unable to distinguish between Slapstick and Shakespeare.

--
Johnny B Good

In article ,
Johnny B Good wrote:
On Mon, 18 Sep 2017 17:06:29 +0100, Dave Plowman (News) wrote:

In article ,
Johnny B Good wrote:
The high volume setting requirement is largely to compensate for the
HD audio standard that seems to be employed by the production crew,
i.e. dead quiet so the loud bits don't clip. WTF??? Loud bits on a
studio produced quiz show? Really? Must they???

I suppose you could blame it on the EU.

EBU (european broadcast union) set the specification for digital
recording levels such that the intended maximum would still have 10dB
headroom - for accidents. And this level is still nominally applied by
the big TV companies. But almost certainly not by other sound sources
you may have which will peak to 0dBFS. And 10dB is a very noticeable
increase in level.

Then add in some of the 'minority' channels like UK Drama etc who show
mainly old repeats that seem to have been digitized by some work
experience type who wouldn't know a decibel from a phon and simply
sets the knob where it always is. So you get low levels - until the
robotised announcer at the end of the prog blast you out of your seat.

Allowing an extra 10dB headroom on drama productions is legitimate
enough, if a little wasteful of the dynamic range available in most
domestic listening contexts and the inconsiderate shoutyness of the
continuity announcer imposing audible vandalism on the end credits can
usually be anticipated and adjusted for if you have the remote control
in your hand but it makes very little sense to apply such rules to
studio productions of pre-recorded game and quiz shows where the needs
of intelligibility trump those of sonic fidelity.

There is FA dynamic range on any TV stuff. Very unlikely to exceed 20dB or
so - and well within the range of the system, even with that 10dB
headroom. Since every programme (in theory) has levels checked at all
points in its progress from original sound gathering through post
production to transmission it works just fine - provided you have people
who understand how to measure sound levels.
Pretty well all progs will be made to the same peak levels. It's what
happens to them during some automated transmission system which appears to
be the problem. If anything, worse than once was the case - although
commercials seem to have been tamed somewhat. With that bloody continuity
announcer being the main culprit these days.

As a matter of interest, this quest for sonic fidelity in drama
productions has been pursued to the point where the general public (the
general public for Gawd's sake!) have been complaining about the lack of
intelligibility of the dialogue (normally an essential component of
most audiovisual productions) to poor beleaguered Jeremy Vine on Points
of View in recent years.

Yes. But it is artistic. ;-) And cheaper to use personal mics buried under
layers of clothing than to use decent mics in a sensible position. Even
before the talent does the mumbling bit.

Very few viewers are prepared to wear headphones to reduce the ambisonics
down from the sum of the studio or location and the home listening
environment to just that of the studio or location alone in order to
recreate the sonic landscape as experienced by the producer whom, one is
left to presume, thought the sound quality of the production was
sufficient or worthy enough to be presented to its intended audience.

The big snag is most of the production team never watch TV. And are so
familiar with their own prog they know the words off by heart.

Sonic fidelity is all very fine provided it isn't achieved at the
expense of intelligibility of the dialogue which is normally the central
component to any video play that aims to entertain beyond the level of
'Slapstick' or Mime. It seems a lot of these producers in recent times
are unable to distinguish between Slapstick and Shakespeare.

Decent quality at the source would be a good start. Radio manage to make
panel games with perfectly good quality dialogue. So why can't TV?

--
*He who laughs last, thinks slowest.

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

T i m wrote:
On Mon, 18 Sep 2017 17:17:24 +0100, Capitol wrote:

T i m wrote:
On Mon, 18 Sep 2017 12:32:48 +0100, Fredxxx wrote:

snip

Motion in a CRT with a very short phosphor persistence is/was far better
than any LCD.

Whilst I agree with the observation, is it the actual display method,
transmission bandwidth or the lack of (display processing) horsepower?



Lack of bandwidth.

Where ... and even from a local DVD / BD?

Cheers, T i m



Yes, it's called compression. It always distorts the original source.
One of the best ways to understand it is to look up the detailed
analysis of HDMI systems. I'm sure there are other sources of data on
digital systems if you look closely. Having worked on digital phone
systems, I was always amazed that they worked as well as they do.

On Mon, 18 Sep 2017 20:31:47 +0100, Capitol wrote:


Lack of bandwidth.

Where ... and even from a local DVD / BD?

Yes, it's called compression.

'Data compression' usually reduces bandwidth as we used to sell a
'Datamizer' that made good use of that.

It always distorts the original source.

Yes, I can appreciate that some digitisation can cause distortion,
depending on how many bits are use for the process.

One of the best ways to understand it is to look up the detailed
analysis of HDMI systems. I'm sure there are other sources of data on
digital systems if you look closely. Having worked on digital phone
systems, I was always amazed that they worked as well as they do.

One of the modules on the courses I used to present were to do with
the sampling and digital encoding and decoding of analogue data,
typically as seen on CD's etc so I'm reasonably familiar with the
concepts.

My question was, when you see the jerking on a video when a scene is
being panned (the most typical scenario), what is it down to.

I understand it's down to insufficient bandwidth or maybe video
processing power (most stressed when the frame data is completely
changing and rapidly, as with a panned scene) and I tend to see it
when others (typically) can't.

But then I spent a lot of time playing FPS and tuning the settings to
minimise such issues. ;-)

Cheers, T i m

On 18/09/2017 16:05, Dave Plowman (News) wrote:
In article ,
Andrew wrote:
On 18/09/2017 14:31, Dave Plowman (News) wrote:
In article 2,
DerbyBorn wrote:
Some old "Good Sound" was a bit lacking in treble as I recall.

'Treble' has rather gone out of fashion these days, judging by speech
quality on much TV output. Perhaps a reaction to 'digital' sound?


Also judging by the *noise* that a 7 channel AV amp produces.
Does all that base rumbling and vibrating really improve the film ?.

But that's the whole idea of multi-channel surround. To impress the
gullible.

Since most people lose their ability to hear the higher frequencies
as they age I would have thought that a tone control knob was essential
for even the humblest of radios.

Whilst that is true, I notice a big difference between the same presenter
on FreeView radio and FreeView TV, both fed through the same broadcast
quality sound system. TV seems no longer bothering to EQ a personal mic to
make it sound closer to a decent one.

While radio don't seem to bother matching the levels of guest and
presenter mics - no problem when sitting listening to the radio at home,
but with all the wind, engine and road noise in a car, the quiet guest
can't be heard without cranking the volume up and then the presenter
ends up deafeningly loud.

SteveW

On 18/09/2017 18:54, Dave Plowman (News) wrote:
In article ,
Johnny B Good wrote:
On Mon, 18 Sep 2017 17:06:29 +0100, Dave Plowman (News) wrote:

In article ,
Johnny B Good wrote:
The high volume setting requirement is largely to compensate for the
HD audio standard that seems to be employed by the production crew,
i.e. dead quiet so the loud bits don't clip. WTF??? Loud bits on a
studio produced quiz show? Really? Must they???

I suppose you could blame it on the EU.

EBU (european broadcast union) set the specification for digital
recording levels such that the intended maximum would still have 10dB
headroom - for accidents. And this level is still nominally applied by
the big TV companies. But almost certainly not by other sound sources
you may have which will peak to 0dBFS. And 10dB is a very noticeable
increase in level.

Then add in some of the 'minority' channels like UK Drama etc who show
mainly old repeats that seem to have been digitized by some work
experience type who wouldn't know a decibel from a phon and simply
sets the knob where it always is. So you get low levels - until the
robotised announcer at the end of the prog blast you out of your seat.

Allowing an extra 10dB headroom on drama productions is legitimate
enough, if a little wasteful of the dynamic range available in most
domestic listening contexts and the inconsiderate shoutyness of the
continuity announcer imposing audible vandalism on the end credits can
usually be anticipated and adjusted for if you have the remote control
in your hand but it makes very little sense to apply such rules to
studio productions of pre-recorded game and quiz shows where the needs
of intelligibility trump those of sonic fidelity.

There is FA dynamic range on any TV stuff. Very unlikely to exceed 20dB or
so - and well within the range of the system, even with that 10dB
headroom. Since every programme (in theory) has levels checked at all
points in its progress from original sound gathering through post
production to transmission it works just fine - provided you have people
who understand how to measure sound levels.
Pretty well all progs will be made to the same peak levels. It's what
happens to them during some automated transmission system which appears to
be the problem. If anything, worse than once was the case - although
commercials seem to have been tamed somewhat. With that bloody continuity
announcer being the main culprit these days.

As a matter of interest, this quest for sonic fidelity in drama
productions has been pursued to the point where the general public (the
general public for Gawd's sake!) have been complaining about the lack of
intelligibility of the dialogue (normally an essential component of
most audiovisual productions) to poor beleaguered Jeremy Vine on Points
of View in recent years.

Yes. But it is artistic. ;-) And cheaper to use personal mics buried under
layers of clothing than to use decent mics in a sensible position. Even
before the talent does the mumbling bit.

Very few viewers are prepared to wear headphones to reduce the ambisonics
down from the sum of the studio or location and the home listening
environment to just that of the studio or location alone in order to
recreate the sonic landscape as experienced by the producer whom, one is
left to presume, thought the sound quality of the production was
sufficient or worthy enough to be presented to its intended audience.

I've often wondered if it would make sense to transmit the speech and
background/music as separate streams, allowing the viewers to decide how
loud they need the speech to be able to hear it, while not waking the
neighbours up with the sound effects! I often find myself watching films
and turning the sound up and down repeatedly as scenes change from say
two people talking in a room to someone bursting in and opening fire.

SteveW

On 18/09/2017 21:18, T i m wrote:
On Mon, 18 Sep 2017 20:31:47 +0100, Capitol wrote:


Lack of bandwidth.

Where ... and even from a local DVD / BD?

Yes, it's called compression.

'Data compression' usually reduces bandwidth as we used to sell a
'Datamizer' that made good use of that.

It always distorts the original source.

Yes, I can appreciate that some digitisation can cause distortion,
depending on how many bits are use for the process.

One of the best ways to understand it is to look up the detailed
analysis of HDMI systems. I'm sure there are other sources of data on
digital systems if you look closely. Having worked on digital phone
systems, I was always amazed that they worked as well as they do.

One of the modules on the courses I used to present were to do with
the sampling and digital encoding and decoding of analogue data,
typically as seen on CD's etc so I'm reasonably familiar with the
concepts.

My question was, when you see the jerking on a video when a scene is
being panned (the most typical scenario), what is it down to.

I understand it's down to insufficient bandwidth or maybe video
processing power (most stressed when the frame data is completely
changing and rapidly, as with a panned scene) and I tend to see it
when others (typically) can't.

But then I spent a lot of time playing FPS and tuning the settings to
minimise such issues. ;-)

Cheers, T i m

Years ago (when Reservoir Dogs was released) I used to spend a lot of
time programming as a hobby and had become used to spotting a line of
code as I scrolled through at speed. I along with one other (who was a
professional programmer) found the film unwatchable as it was jumping
about as if not properly on the sprockets - the two girls with us didn't
see any problem and, apparently, no-one else in the cinema complained.

SteveW