Saturday, December 3, 2005
Installed the DirecTV H20 last night
I got my new H20 DirecTV HD receiver yesterday. So after getting home from work, I braved the rat's nest of cables behind my equipment rack to remove my Hughes HIRD-E86 HD receiver (which I am retiring) and install the H20.
The H20 has an HDMI port and my TV uses DVI, so I had to pick up an HDMI-to-DVI cable from Buy.com. My last receiver only had component video connections, so I was eager to see if there was a noticeable picture quality improvement.
Although I have only used the H20 for a couple of hours, here are some of my first impressions:
- Default picture is a little too bright and contrasty. I will need to adjust the settings on the TV to correct.
- When you switch from a channel that is using one resolution (like 480i) to a channel using another resolution (like 1080i), the screen and audio blanks out for a couple of seconds while the switch is made. This is already annoying.
- Standard definition content looks better than with the Hughes HIRD-E86.
I'll post more impressions after I've spent more time with it. For those of you who are as dorky about consumer electronics as I am, I have created a set of photos on Flickr.
I got my new H20 DirecTV HD receiver yesterday. So after getting home from work, I braved the rat's nest of cables behind my equipment rack to remove my Hughes HIRD-E86 HD receiver (which I am retiring) and install the H20.
The H20 has an HDMI port and my TV uses DVI, so I had to pick up an HDMI-to-DVI cable from Buy.com. My last receiver only had component video connections, so I was eager to see if there was a noticeable picture quality improvement.Although I have only used the H20 for a couple of hours, here are some of my first impressions:
- Default picture is a little too bright and contrasty. I will need to adjust the settings on the TV to correct.
- When you switch from a channel that is using one resolution (like 480i) to a channel using another resolution (like 1080i), the screen and audio blanks out for a couple of seconds while the switch is made. This is already annoying.
- Standard definition content looks better than with the Hughes HIRD-E86.
I'll post more impressions after I've spent more time with it. For those of you who are as dorky about consumer electronics as I am, I have created a set of photos on Flickr.
¶ 9:06 AM 
About Shawn Morton
Married father of 4, social media strategist at Nationwide, consumer electronics enthusiast, hair metal aficionado.
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