THE FRONT LINE: FEBRUARY 12, 2007
2007 Super Bowl HDTV Party
After a one-year absence, the Super Bowl HDTV Party returned in 2007 with a flourish and some very unusual displays.
CBS had the job of telecasting this year’s AFC-NFC championship in 1080i and put in a great deal of pre-game effort to make sure it came off perfectly, with single-truck origination of the HD and down-converted SD feeds. Unfortunately, the weather in Miami didn’t cooperate, with a “50 percent chance” of showers turning into a full-blown downpour by the second quarter.
Even so, it had to be a lot warmer in Florida than it was at my house, where outside temperatures had been settling in the low 20s and high teens each day. That made setting up for the event a bit problematic, as two outside displays were placed this year and all of their associated wiring was a stiff as petrified wood!
A record number of guests (60+) attended to cheer for the Colts and Bears and also to help out the local Carversville United Church of Christ raise money towards new carpeting. I expected a crowd (although not that big a crowd!) and planned my theaters accordingly, ultimately setting up ten different screens on which to see the game.
Figure 1. Panasonic’s TH-50PF9UK looked spiffy in the living room.
THE STARTING LINEUP
Theater One: Mitsubishi’s HC5000 1080p LCD projector (with Silicon Optix Reon processing) anchored the best seat(s) in the house. Driven by LG’s LST3410A STB/DVR, it illuminated a Stewart 82-inch mate screen with some amazingly sharp, colorful images, enhanced by 5.1 channels of sound from a Sony STR-DG500 AV receiver and Snell MK.2 speakers.
Theater Two: Sanyo’s PLV-Z5 720p LCD projector commanded my temporary workshop theater and lit up a Vutec 82-inch Silver Star front screen. LG’s LST4200A set-top receiver fed the signals and a Sony STR-DE625 receiver provided audio playback. Even though this theater could only seat four people, it was jammed the entire game with some guests sprawled out on the floor.
Figure 2. Samsung’s LNS-4695 fit right into the dining room.
Screen #3: Pioneer’s breathtaking PRO-FHD1 1080p plasma monitor was located in the rear of Theater #1, right at the bottom of the basement stairs, and had its own crowd of loyal viewers throughout the game. It took signals from a Radio Shack Accurian set-top receiver and a pair of compact Polk speakers provided stereo audio.
Screen #4: My Toshiba 34HF81 continues to provide yeoman service, although it was the most resolution-challenged of all the displays. The 1080i signal came courtesy of another LG LST3410A STB, and delighted a steady crowd of 7-8 viewers throughout the game. (This set was closest to the kitchen and the food, too!)
Screen #5: It originally started out as a joke, but HDTV (High Definition Toilet Video) remains popular with guests. Samsung’s LTM-1575W 15-inch 768p HD monitor did the honors this year, driven by Vizio’s Bravo HD-1 set-top receiver. The Samsung was positioned at an angle to viewers at the door, the sink, and on the throne all got a great view. One guest was elated that he didn’t miss a crucial Bears field goal in the second half, thanks to this setup.
Figure 3a-b. Even penguins enjoy watching the Super Bowl (check out the pennants)!
Screen #6: Samsung sent along their LNS-4695D integrated 1080p LCD HDTV, and it was assigned a coveted position in my dining room – right next to the dessert table. The piano black finish contrasted nicely with the antique wood side table it sat on and the internal speakers were more than adequate for the job. Terk’s HDTVa amplified log-periodic UHF antenna – sitting on the floor – grabbed the DTV signals from KYW-26.
Screen #7: Panasonic’s TH-50PF9UK 1080p plasma monitor was a real crowd favorite and served up the game in my living room to as many as ten viewers, sitting on the couch, the big comfy chair, and on the floor. The 1080i signals came through courtesy of an LG LST3100A set-top box, with audio provided by another Sony STR-DE625 receiver and stereo speakers.
Screen #8: The Super Bowl HDTV Party features at least one off-the-wall video screen every year, and that honor went to Mitsubishi’s PK20 LED-powered DLP “pocket” projector. Although it only has 800x600 resolution, we put it to work as the centerpiece of a “pocket” theater, built inside an antique dry sink by my front door. A 15-inch screen was made from matte board, and a crowd of penguin toys, armed with tiny Bears and Colts pennants, watched in rapt attention. Samsung’s new DTB-H260F set-top receiver provided the signals.
Figure 4. Sanyo’s PLV-Z5 projector and Humax’ HFA100 STB were exiled
to the Siberian-like conditions on my rear deck.
Screen #9: Despite the freezing cold temperatures and bone-chilling winds, I managed to get another Vutec PrismaTec 62-inch screen (rear projection) set up behind my deck doors and anchored it with several large cinder blocks. A Sanyo PLV-Z4 720p LCD projector was drafted for the job of sitting out in that cold night and giving us larger-than-life images behind a serving table. Humax’ HFA-100 terrestrial set-top receiver grabbed the signals from a Channel Master antenna/preamp combo, also on the deck.
Screen #10: This setup really surprised guests and also made it a lot easier for first-timers to find my house! Sanyo’s new CE42LM4WPN 42-inch 768p LCD monitor is IP56 certified (water-resistant) and was actually demonstrated at InfoComm 2006 and CES 2007 under a shower of water. It was joined in the cold, clear night by another DTB-H260F set-top receiver and Terrestrial Digital’s Lacrosse collinear UHF amplified antenna.
Figure 5. You know, hotels could learn a lesson from this…
Figure 6a-b. The living room and family room offered beaucoup comfortable seating.
SETUP FUN AND GAMES
Every one of these displays took a terrestrial (8VSB) DTV signal feed from Philadelphia CBS owned-and-operated (O&O) station KYW, broadcasting on UHF channel 26. That signal gets to my house over a 21-mile path, partially obstructed by a hill and lots of trees. My permanent antennas atop the roof and in my attic both use UHF preamps to kick the overall signal levels up for subsequent splitting and tapping to all of the different HDTVs throughout the house.
The obvious problem was those high gusts of wind and the super-low temperatures, which made assembling and stabilizing the rear-projection screen problematic as my deck is on the northwest side of the house, right smack in the teeth of the wind. I also wondered about the strain these temperatures would put on the PLV-Z4 and HFA-100, but neither exhibited any problems during their duty cycle (5 PM until 11 PM).
I had other concerns about the durability of the Sanyo 42-inch LCD monitor, which although it was on the southeast (lee) side of the house, still had to deal with super-cold temperatures. Not only that, moisture vapor appeared on the front of the protective glass cover, no doubt created as condensation during the CES shower tests. Would it freeze?
Fortunately, the vapor burned off as the day wound on, aided by a few hours of direct sunlight, and was completely gone by nighttime. The CE42LM4WPN provided some amazingly crisp, bright images after sundown, non-stop until I also pulled its plug at 11 PM. The DTB-H260F was also fine, although its power cord resembled petrified wood after sitting out in the cold.
Figure 7. Theater #2 just didn’t have enough chairs, so rug burns were in order.
Figure 8. The rear projection system made sure you wouldn’t miss a thing
while putting together a sandwich platter.
PICTURE QUALITY
KYW, as a CBS O&O, doesn’t multicast on its DTV channel. Rather, it allocates most of the available data bits to the single 1080i program to maximize image quality. In contrast, some CBS affiliates have two or three minor DTV channels and cut back the HD channel bit rate by as much as 30%.
The result is MPEG compression artifacts such as macroblocking and mosquito noise. Add in the 1080i signal and you wind up with a real mess at times, particularly on large, full-1080p displays. Even CBS’ playoff games have at times exhibited some of these “bugs”, particularly when going into and out of an instant replay with a full-screen animated logo wipe.
However, whatever the “secret sauce” was that CBS used during this Super Bowl, it certainly worked as I saw very little in the way of MPEG encoding artifacts, particularly with that spinning logo sequence. Some of the camera close-ups of players on the bench looked so real, it was as if you were viewing them through a window. Give a quality 1080p display the bits and a clean digital connection, and you will be amazed.
Ironically, the downpour that started late in the first quarter continued throughout the game, fogging up lenses, reducing image contrast, and de-saturating colors, particularly on long shots of the field. It resembled – why, standard-definition TV! (Although extremely detailed SDTV…)
Figure 9a-b. Theater 1, which also contained the Pioneer plasma,
had SRO crowds for most of the game.
ODDS AND ENDS
The game got off to a flying start with a kickoff returned for a touchdown by the Bears’ Devin Hester, whipping the few Chicago fans present into a frenzy. Turned out there were more Colts fans in the crowd, but the biggest contingent was Eagles fans, many still wondering what could have been…The halftime show was worth it just to see Prince and his coterie of female dancers performing in a downpour, protecting his famous pomaded hair with a do-rag and then yanking it off for a performance of “Purple Rain”.
Speaking of the halftime show, mixing a live performance in a football stadium to 5.1 surround-sound remains a formidable challenge for the halftime show producers (no, CBS doesn’t do the mix), although this year’s attempt was far better than the Rolling Stones’ performance last year… The commercials were, on the whole, pretty tame this year, but it was nice to see that a majority of them were in HD and not letterboxed SD…One first-time guest was thrilled that he caught Robbie Gould’s successful field goal attempt on the bathroom HDTV set while otherwise indisposed.
Figure 10a-b. Sanyo’s CE42LM4WPN, driven by the Lacrosse antenna and
Samsung STB, performed brilliantly in our “smoker’s lounge!”
The Penguin HD Theater, featuring the PK20 LED projector, was extremely popular with guests, who never did get a satisfactory explanation of what penguins had to do with the Super Bowl…In honor of the Bears, we had kielbasa, cabbage salad, and pasta, plus soft pretzels, pizza, a three-foot-long sub sandwich and numerous other Philly treats. Couldn’t quite come up with an Indianapolis-specific delicacy, though…I am amazed at how many people still don’t know that they can watch HDTV programs over-the-air for free. Some of my guests insisted the signal must have come from cable or satellite…
It took me a while to clean up the drool next to Pioneer’s PRO-FHD1, which is quite an impressive product. Can’t wait for their next-generation model…Intense bursts of wind kept spinning the Terrestrial Digital Lacrosse antenna on its temporary outdoors mount. Fortunately, Samsung’s 5th-gen 8VSB front end prevented the signal from dropping out as I repositioned the antenna…The outside 42-inch LCD display, meant to greet guests as they arrived, was quickly dubbed the “smoker’s lounge” by some witty guests!
