agreed thats been done in melbourne when i was there i think. 7 mate was in sd and was fine to watch and 7 was in hd so i agree with what your saying so why cant it be done??? thats what i cant understand . Just turn down what ever it is that 7 mate are using to get 7mate hd and turn up whatever it is to make prime7/gwn7 hd sshouldnt be that hard . since thats what they did by the looks when 7 mate came in to play and they got rid of primehd to make 7mate hd or do people just prefure 7mate in hd i hardly watch it anyways
I agree, but…
It’s not. They launched a whole new 7HD alongside 7SD and reduced 7mate down to SD. My hypothetical solution wouldn’t involve having to launch a new HD channel, just a straight swap. The reason they didn’t do it this way is because a small amount of people with equipment that doesn’t pick up MPEG-2 HD channels would miss out on their most popular channel. Keep in mind these people also missed out on 7mate HD for years while it was the ‘home of AFL’ so they can’t be that important. I reckon that number is smaller than ever and regional stations could probably get away with doing this to save costs and speed the process up.
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but you can pick up a set top box for like $30 or$40 which picks up all the hd channels my father has got a flat screen tv but it was one when the tv digital first came in so it couldnt pick up all the hd channels so i got a set top box and its fixed i fully agree with ur hypothetical solution
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Exactly! If anything it would force these last few people to buy an el cheapo device and get with the times! Lol
Also, I think a straight swap would work well for areas like regional WA and remote Central as they were the last places to get digital television, so there would be less older equipment than other areas of Australia.
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Thanks for your videos @WAtvVideos, now I can see it properly.
So it looks almost like MediaHub have photoshopped 7HD (metro) sport olympics watermark!
As I mentioned and most would know, the “HD” add-on (in metro) is seperate to the watermark. Fading in a split second before and after an ad.
Whereas in the video, the “7 Olympics HD” on GWN flashes in suddenly altogether.
Weird eh.
NFL is showing on 7mate right now and Prime aren’t using their own watermark again. They’ve gone with the horizontal one with the small “mate”
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Since there’s probably not overly many people in regional Australia that have SD-only Digital TV equipment, I agree that swapping the positions of Prime7/GWN7 and 7mate as the MPEG2-HD channel seems to be be the easiest thing to do from a technical perspective. Coinciding that with a short “Retune your TV” promotional campaign with the local newsreaders and an info/FAQ section about the change on the website would likely work quite well IMO.
MPEG4 probably had to happen for the launch/return of HD main channels in the metro markets though, because it’s likely that the Foxtel satellite retransmission(s) of the commercial network main channels for the three biggest East Coast markets are reliant on the terrestrial MPEG2 SD broadcasts for Seven, Nine and Ten.
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Really? I’m not sure whether their existence on Foxtel Satellite plays any part in the matter to be honest. I thought the change from offering Seven and 7TWO to Seven and 7mate recently was a decision based on both AFL coverage and limited satellite space - if that’s the point of reference you’re using.
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If this were to happen what would be the scenario for Foxtel viewers who don’t subscribe to a HD plan? Would Prime expect Foxtel to downconvert their main channel to SD for these people?
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I agree with doing this.
WOuld also be good to see 7QLD do the same.
Keep the same LCNs, with 7/70/71 being 7HD in MPEG2-HD, and LCN 73 being 7mate in MPEG2-SD
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[quote=“WAtvVideos, post:630, topic:153”]
I’m not sure whether their existence on Foxtel Satellite plays any part in the matter to be honest. i agree i dont think it does either not for prime7 to be prime7hd foxtel dont carry prime 7 win or 9 on the foxtel 1q3s for regional vic
How does Foxtel do it now with 7mate HD? Do they block access to it if you don’t have an HD plan?
I think it is a bit complicated and depends on the area but currently 7Mate via satellite is SD so to get HD you would have to use a terrestrial antenna and a box with a FTA tuner built in.
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Yeah it’s complicated now that there are so many set-top box variants.
From what I understand, Foxtel subscribers in Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane receive their commercial FTA either by satellite (original Foxtel Digital box, iQ1, iQ1.5 and iQ2) or by terrestrial (iQ3). Subscribers in other Foxtel areas only get their commercial FTA through the iQ3 terrestrially. Regional ex-Austar subscribers only receive FTA through terrestrial (MyStar, MyStar HD or iQ3).
In any case, if the box isn’t HD then you miss out just like any non-Foxtel viewer would in my hypothetical where Prime7 switches with 7mate.
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People in regional areas of the eastern states can access some FTA via satellite including 7Mate in SD (but not 7Two) but could upgrade to IQ3 to get FTA via an antenna.
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I never knew that. Weird that the networks would be allowed to offer their channels outside of their licence area. I thought the commercial FTA satellite channels were only for subscribers with a metro address.
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Unlike GWN, on the horse racing yesterday Prime used their regular Prime7 Live and Free Bug and not the 7 + HD one:
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They wouldn’t even need to do that. They just need to switch the video stream of the main channel to HD and the video stream of 7mate to SD and reallocate the bitrate of the two channels. No Retune needed.
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Someone at Prime must be reading this forum, because this morning they quietly switched Prime7 to HD and 7mate to SD:
On 60 is the HD and 6, 61 is SD.
LCN 60 is Prime7 HD [Region]:
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