[CornellAlum]

This has been bugging the living %$#% out of me for over a year, and I am determined to do something about it.  I have a directv dvr, non-hd at the moment (anyone know how to get one from them for free? ), and the sound just sucks.  One channel will be louder than the other on one station, then it will mysteriously be fine on another, while switching which channel is louder on another.  The audio quality I get from them is hit or miss.  One network will give me great sound, while the next is so hollow, flat and lifeless that it drives me nuts.  I have thought about taking the dvr apart and modding the heck out of it, but that seems like a waste of money with the new technology coming out.  Does anyone have any idea how to improve the sound of directv in general, and more specifically, the unit itself?  Fwiw, I am running the optical out of the dvr to a behringer deq2496 (which helps), then optical out of the deq to the digital in of a modified panasonic xr-45 from Bolder.  I know it is the directv unit and directv causing this and not me, since my music setup sounds phenomenal through pretty much the exact same chain minus the cable signal and the dvr box.  I would really appreciate some help.  I couldn't care less what it costs (external dac, reclacker, etc), as it would be the best money I have spent in years. 

I also get the feeling the sound is extremely compressed, am I nuts?

Thanks in advance for any and all help. 

Regards

Daryan

[jqp]

Yes, probably the sound and video is compressed by your provider, possibly further up the stream by the channels.

I doubt very seriously it is the directv unit assuming it is connected correctly/no loose connections. The fact that you get good quality on one channel (at least) suggests to me that you are wasting your time worrying about the unit - it works just fine as is evidenced by the one channel with great audio and video quality.

You could have a bad connection to the house, at the telephone pole/sattelite dish. More likely is that the provider is just not providing quality broadcasts for the channels.

Remember that they decide how much bandwidth to allocate for each channel, and they also have to receive the signals themselves first.

So its most likely a case of garbage in=garbage out.

I have a really nice TV, but if the analog cable signal I get has snow, or was recorded poorly, in low resolution, to begin with, there is nothing any mods can do to help me. Sounds to me like that is your scenario.

[dsa220]

As stated above, I doubt that it is your dvr. I have a Hughes HDVR2 (Series 2) DirecTV TiVo unit that has this same issue. About 1 year ago TNT suddenly went hard right channel with the left channel being much lower in overall volume. There was also some compression (pumping) noises. This was whether I was watching something 'live' or something from the hard drive, yet other channels do not exhibit this problem.

I have contacted D* about this, but the problem still persists, so I am wondering if it is just a bad feed from TNT.

DSA

[rklein]

Hi Daryan:

I feel your pain .  I have Dish Network.  I had the 942 High Def DVR receiver (free BTW) for about a year and have since changed to a 622 High Def DVR (free upgrade again).  With both receivers, I have experienced the same as you.

rklein

[rklein]

Daryan:

You might go tho below website and do a search.

www.satelliteguys.us

Cheers,

rklein

[CornellAlum]

Well, I guess I am not alone.  You would think my 125 a month with all of my sports subscriptions would get me equal sound from every channel.  Ugh!  Thanks for the comments fellas.

D~

[mgalusha]

Not related to the digital output but similar...

We have a DirecTV DVR as well and I'm currently only using the analog outputs. Until recently it was feeding an older Zenith 27" TV, about as basic as you could get. I was getting really bad distortion on loud sounds like explosions and such. Finally figured out that the TV's audio input section was overloading. I built a 6dB attenuator to put between the DVR and the TV and the problem went away.

We finally purchased a new TV (61" JVC 1080p) and the problem went away. Now, I just have to convince the wife that I need a new HT receiver and speakers. The downside of selling my HT with our old house is having start over again. 'Course that could be the upside as well.

[jqp]

Well, I guess I am not alone.  You would think my 125 a month with all of my sports subscriptions would get me equal sound from every channel.  Ugh!  Thanks for the comments fellas.

D~

Don't get me started...you would think cable would be commercial free - after all its not network TV, but pay TV. You would think the weather chanel would have weather information instead of 90% non-weather information. You would think MTV would broadcast music videos...and while I'm at it you would think that listener-supported public radio would not have commercials...Ahh, the promise of new media  

[WEEZ]

zillions of channels, and still nothing to watch....

[rklein]

Daryan:

I looked up on the above mentioned site and found this thread.  It seems that there is not much we can do about this volume problem.

http://www.satelliteguys.us/showthread.php?t=59043&highlight=volume

Cheers,
rklein