More about Starhub HDCP - Starhub has good people!

We've reached a stage where ... sigh ... the slightest glimmer of brilliance elicits a big response. This does not belittle a staffer in Starhub called Justin Cheng though. He is VERY good. I don't know whether he's management level or just some grunt, but he's good. See this email:

----------------------------

From: Michael Tan
Mailed-By: gmail.com
To: customerservice@starhub.com
Date: May 23, 2006 1:43 PM
Subject: HD TV trial programme enquiry

Starhub and MDA definition of HD is different!

Please click on the links for details

Starhub has released HD trials. Great! BUT, Starhub does not mention HDCP at all, but MDA states that you must have HDCP in order to have HD-compliance. So how now? Well, I think Starhub will not broadcast HDCP content in the trials, but eventually they will do so. But once they implement HDCP, if our monitor do not have HDCP, the content will be degraded to 480P from 720P. Starhub should clarify! -- ____________________________________________
Michael Tan

----------------------------

And Justin Cheng answered:

----------------------------

From: customerservice@starhub.com
Mailed-By: starhub.com
To: michaeltanyk@gmail.com
Date: May 30, 2006 2:21 PM
Subject: Re: HD TV trial programme enquiry

Dear Michael

Thank you for your email.

We apologise for the late reply.

With regard to your enquiry, we would like to inform you that ourset-top box is HDMI/HDCP and it should be fully comply to TV withHDMI or DVI/HDCP.

At present, the HDCP is not triggered till there's a need, so most of the TV will not be affected. However, if it comes to a time that this is triggered, then those TV's without HDMI/HDCP should see the warning message below. Also, the viewer still can switch over to component or composite output for viewing, as they are analog transmission to the HDTV.

HDCP Warning
This material is copyrighted and your display is unable to handle its protection properly. Therefore, you will not be able to watch the program using HDMI. To watch this material, please use analternative type of video output connection from your set-top box, e.g. YPbPr

For other reference about HDMI/HDCP, please visit http://tv.about.com/od/hdtv/a/hdmidvihdcp.htm

If you have any questions on StarHub Digital Cable and MaxOnline services, please call us on our Customer Care hotline at 1633 (+656820 1633 from overseas), email to this address or fax in to 67251603.

Best regards
Justin Cheng
Customer Affairs

----------------------------

Don't you just love Justin, in an era where people reply you things which are so much bullshit? Justin, you're damn good. You may be a manager, but you probably can be king.

Anyway, let's calm down and see Justin's message content. It's shocking, right? So your S$4,000 to S$35,000 LCD TV which does not have HDCP will just display the wonderful message, rendering your digital port .... useless for HD.

One more point - I'm not sure that Justin's workaround on the analog port is accurate. Here's my additional query to Justin:

-----------------------------

From: Michael Tan
Mailed-By: gmail.com
To: "customerservice@starhub.com"
Date: May 31, 2006 4:17 PM
Subject: Re: HD TV trial programme enquiry


Justin, thank you for your excellent answer, MDA's reply paled very much in comparison.

One clarification - if one switches over to analog when you get the message, there has been talk about the HDCP scheme requiring analog output to be downgraded to 480P/576P from HD resolutions. Is this true?

This is summarized here:
http://miketan.blogspot.com/2006/05/less-discussed-complications-of-hdmi.html

with sources from here:
Matthew Torres of About.com thinks that the signal may be blocked

On a HD DVD or a Blu-ray disc, if the manufacturer or publisher of the disc has set the HDCP protection flag set as ON, if this player is connected to a non-HDCP compliant LCD TV, the player will output a downsampled signal of 540p .

This question I think is essential, because out of 300K people who have plasma/flatscreen, 90% of them have it without HDCP.

----------------------------------

Let's hope Justin replies my question and sheds more light on this situation.

MDA Starhub Mediacorp HD Press Conference

The Media Development Authority of Singapore (MDA), together with MediaCorp and StarHub, invited the press to a press briefing on the launch of High- Definition Television (HDTV) trials in Singapore. This briefing took place today.

From some feedback I heard, this was not terribly informative but some information was distilled from there. I think they intended this to be a Rah Rah affair but somehow, the Q&A pretty much drew a lot of blanks and difficult issues out. Kudos to whichever reporter sharp enough to ask the tough questions.

A hearsay distillate (I wasn't there):

1. HDCP would not be implemented during the HDTV trials
2. HDCP MAY be implemented during the commercial HDTV rollout pending evaluation (MT: wow. Who said that MDA, Starhub and Mediacorp had enough clout to determine the future of HDCP inclusion in today's bit-torrent enabled world?)
3. A full two hundred to three hundred sets of flat screen LCD/Plasma screens exist in Singapore today (MT: wow again. How many of these are really HD ready? 10%? We're in for a load of troubles once people start to receive HDCP feeds with the broadcast flag enabled to degrade picture quality on non-HDCP TVs! And pity those guys who have ... errr.... 1024x1024 plasmas.... )
4. One of the powers-that-be mentioned that, if HDCP were implemented, no problem, just get the analog component and all will be fine. A reporter queried him - hey, won't there be degradation if you pump a HDCP enabled signal through the analog? (He was referring to `plugging the analog hole' as mentioned here and referred to here - which in summary, that there are moves to make HDCP equipment degrade content if played through analog in an attempt to stop the bypass of HDCP content protection by recording HD through analog.) The speaker said - NO. Analog will not degrade the quality, you will still get very good quality content (MT - this betrays a total lack of understanding on the part of the speaker about the brewing battles between the content providers, broadcasters and the device manufacturers, where they are fiercely fighting the battle on how to plug the analog hole)
5. Starhub's flagship content for this trial starts with the World Cup, and Mediacorp's flagship content for this trial starts with the ... err... Lord of the Rings - The Two Towers .... OMFG! << (not particularly an exclamation of joy.)

Well, now we know that they know little more than us, and perhaps a lot less than some of the enthusiasts who have been watching the developments hawkeyed. We're in for a load of forum complaints, I'm certain.

HD Ready Logo INSUFFICIENT!

The official stand by most HD device marketeers when somebody asks them - which HDTV to buy? They'll say: "Simple! Look for the official HD Ready logo!"

NOT so simple!

The HD Ready logo was announced by the European Industry Association for Information Systems, Communication Technologies and Consumer Electronics (EICTA) in Jan 19, 2005 with regard to DISPLAY DEVICES ONLY. Who can display this logo? Simple. Anybody who pays a license fee to the EICTA and proves that their set meets the bare minimum of requirements set by the EICTA, can display the logo. So let's distil the requirements (see Annex A in this link):

1. Must be able to display HD sources at higher than PAL (576i resolutions)
2. At least 720 physical lines at a 16x9 picture aspect ratio (widescreen). Note: this is merely a requirement for physical lines. This does not mean that the device has to render to the maximum of 720 lines, and the mere fact that there are 720 lines already means that this requirement is complied with.
3. Device must accept HD content using Component, DVI or HDMI interfaces, and able to support 720p AND 1080i
4. HDCP content protection must be supported.

Problems:

1. A false sense of security - the introduction of a logo like this, gives buyers a false sense of security. It implies that `you're all set if you get one with the logo' but does not readily imply the caveats below.
2. Source-display incompatibility - well, if you get a transmission at 1080i, and you get a LCD TV with 768 physical lines, your picture may be downscaled to 576p, and you'd not get the 720 line display which you so dearly want. This is already happening in the Singapore Starhub HD trials with the Advanced Digital Broadcasting box.
3. Older models which are indeed HD Ready do not exhibit this logo - if the authorities or broadcasters spin that HD Ready is required for their transmissions, that'll spur a lot of unneccessary HDTV changes!
4. The HD-Ready specification does not care HOW MANY ACTUAL LINES ARE DISPLAYED, it merely states the physical requirement. It does not require the device to actually render the video on the screen in pixel perfect resolution. This is a real ass!
5. Broadcasters will not dare to advertise HD Ready as a requirement - they won't. It'll kill their HD sales! Everybody who bought a LCD panel before the EICTA announcement, before the existence of the logo, will have second thoughts about subscribing to the HD service simply because they don't know for sure whether their HDTV will support any HD service which is advertised to require the HD Ready logo. So they won't do it unless they're forced to.
6. Lack of publicity of the HD Ready logo - if the broadcasters won't advertise the requirement for the HD Ready logo, who will? A big part of the user education should come from the broadcasters, and what comes out from the broadcasters is authoritative. If the manufacturers advertise their HD Ready logo, and the broadcasters don't require it officially, makes it a pretty futile exercise, won't it?

I really think there is no alternative to the broadcasters publishing detailed technical requirements. The use of the HD-Ready logo is misleading, and anybody who passes the buck to the HD Ready logo scheme is irresponsible, and could do better than that. For the HD Ready logo scheme to be really relevant, they should have 2 versions: HD-Ready720 and HD-Ready1080 - at least, and these 2 versions should require PIXEL accurate reproduction to 720 or 1080 lines.

So those who think, don't leave it all to the logo. Demand an exact specification from your broadcaster, and try to understand the concepts, then buy your HDTV. Don't let them sweep it all under the carpet just with a mention of the logo scheme.