# LCD TV, Sky+ and poor picture quality..



## snapsnap (Jul 18, 2008)

All,

I am trying to (remotely!) diagnose poor picture quality for a friend. By poor I mean blurry, with poor colour definition (everything is a shade of orange) despite fiddling with colour settings.

I am trying to figure out if a new telly is needed or a new Sky box...

Setup is cheapish LCD TV connected to a Sky+ system (installed by sky) via SCART. Area has very poor freeview reception, hence the need for a sky dish. All plugs/leads are intact and sound

Question is simple – is this likely to be the sky box or the alignment of the dish in any way?

(I am inclined to say myself it’s not the dish as being digital, the signal is all-or nothing; the picture never actually drops so it is getting ‘all’ the signal it needs)

Comments appreciated


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## robj20 (Jan 20, 2009)

Check the signal quality on both LNBs through the menus.
Try a different scart cable even a different cable method if you can to rule that out then it just leaves the tv.


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## WRX_Paul (Apr 27, 2010)

It will be the cheap LCD and the scart connection, scart is next up from Aerial in quality, if he has to use scart get him to get an RGB Scart, Sky + has HDMI out so why would'nt he use that?
My TV had an awful picture from the sky box using scart, then i got sky+ and connected it HDMI and the picture is now awesome.


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## gally (May 25, 2008)

SKY+ didn't have hdmi connectors on their boxes. Or at least they didn't used to.


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## Ducky (Mar 19, 2007)

My SKY+ doesn't have hdmi on it, thought this was only found on the SKY HD boxes. Scart is just a connection type, it may be he is using the composite signal which is about aerial quality. If you pull the scart plug out are all the pins present, generally cheaper cables which do not support anything higher then composite will have most of the pins missing. You need a fully wired cable to support anything higher (Svid/RGB/HV), and also I think you probably need to tell the SKY+ box what you'd like to output in the menus, the default is usually the worst option (composite) :thumb:


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## Dixondmn (Oct 12, 2007)

try a gold scart cable.


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## David 1150 (Jun 6, 2009)

also, try typing the full model name of his TV and "settings" into Google, see if someone's done the trial-and-error and posted some optimum (or even calibrated) settings. I did this for my Dad's Sony, it made a big improvement to the stock settings.


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## silverback (Jun 18, 2008)

WRX_Paul said:


> It will be the cheap LCD and the scart connection, scart is next up from Aerial in quality,


surely rf would be the worst followed by composite,s-video,scart,component,then the best quality would be hdmi at the minute.



WRX_Paul said:


> if he has to use scart get him to get an RGB Scart, Sky + has HDMI out so why would'nt he use that?
> My TV had an awful picture from the sky box using scart, then i got sky+ and connected it HDMI and the picture is now awesome.


to the OP,if its the scart lead that came with the sky box then like you said he should swap that straight away as its usually a cheap **** one and possibly not even RGB,again agree with you on the scart picture via sky not being great from standard sky boxes.i had sky+ (now cancelled) but i was never impressed by the pic qiuality via scart (there is no hdmi output on my plus box) so even with a decent scart and a good tv sky is hardly cutting edge,infact i would go as far to say the pic from my freesat tuner is better for bbc and itv etc than watching the same channels on sky.i wouldnt put it past sky to lower the bitrate for non HD boxes just to get you to upgrade lol.

what i would do is use the same lead to connect a dvd player and see what that pic is like,if its the same change lead,then connect the new lead to the sky box,if its still the poor pic go back to connecting the new lead to the dvd player and see if its any better.also make sure you have RGB setting set to on on the menu system and i also believe only one scart output on the sky boxes is rgb anyway.i know its long winded but its a process of elimination mate,also a cheap lcd and a standard scart connection via sky is never going to give you razor sharp images anyway.


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## wookey (Jul 13, 2007)

tbh honest Sky/Sky+ picture quality is crap. It's a massively compressed signal. I'd set up the tv with a DVD or Blu-ray disc if you've got either.

If you've got Star Wars or a Lucas films DVD there is a set up facility on the disk, to get brightness, contrast etc settings right


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## silverback (Jun 18, 2008)

wookey said:


> tbh honest Sky/Sky+ picture quality is crap. It's a massively compressed signal. I'd set up the tv with a DVD or Blu-ray disc if you've got either.


agreed.



wookey said:


> If you've got Star Wars or a Lucas films DVD there is a set up facility on the disk, to get brightness, contrast etc settings right


the problem with those calibration discs is you always tweek with them once there set up lol.i did the whole dvd calibration disc thing when i first started out with dvds etc, and even though the disc told me to lower contrast,higher brightness etc i was never happy with what the disc told me to have and what my eyes liked.


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## wookey (Jul 13, 2007)

They're a good base point to start from though, especially if people aren't sure about what they're changing and how it effects other things.


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## snapsnap (Jul 18, 2008)

I checked last night and signal strength & quality are both good – 65%+. Have actually decided to drop sky now and are going to get a Humax Freesat box that can be connected via HDMI (no HDMI on this particular Sky box)

The telly I am still tempted to replace – its a small, cheap Bush model (I purposefully omitted the name to begin with!). 

Thanks


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## markonline1 (Jul 12, 2007)

There's bad pictures and then there's faulty equipment. From whats described in the op, sounds like faulty equipment to me.


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## robj20 (Jan 20, 2009)

I agree, I wouldnt say any of the pictures i get through sky is bad, just some are better than others. My sky box never drops below 80-90% on the signal strength and quality, you might want to try to realign the dish, and or upgrade the LNBs or dish.


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## PJS (Aug 18, 2007)

Any chance he can get the hold of a small TV - size is immaterial - and connect it up?
Straight away, that'll rule out the TV being the issue, and he can probably borrow their SCART cable too, which would be the next thing to check.
If the problem is still there, then he should contact Sky to see if they can remotely check the box for any error codes.
If they can't, then an engineer will be sent to measure the level, and figure out if it's dish alignment, the box itself, or the co-ax/LNB in between, which is creating the issue.


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