I’ve heard about 720p, 1080i and 1080p resolution; do I
need to have a TV that matches what Max is broadcasting at
in order to view the programming?
No. HDTV formats are compatible. It means that irrespective of
what resolution that programming has been filmed in or broadcast
as, your TV, regardless of its resolution, will be able to display the
program.
I’ve heard about 480i, 480p, 720p, 1080i and 1080p. What
do all the numbers and letters mean?
The numbers indicate the number of horizontal lines of resolution
on your TV screen. The bigger the number, the more lines of
resolution and the clearer the picture.
The letters stand for interlaced and progressive.
Interlaced means that only ½ the picture is on the screen at one
time; so, first the odd numbered horizontal lines are painted onto
the screen and the even numbered lines are painted on. This all
happens very quickly; ½ the picture is sent in 1/60
th
of a second,
so the TV receives 30 full screen images every second. This is so
quick that the human eye cannot detect that it is seeing only ½ the
image on the screen at one time.
Progressive means that the entire picture is sent to the screen at
one time, so the TV receives the full image 60 times per second,
creating a crisper picture on the screen.
I’ve heard the term EDTV. Is that a type of HDTV?
EDTV stands for Enhanced Definition Television. The picture clarity
with EDTV is not as good as with HDTV, but it is better than SDTV.
EDTV has a 480p picture, so it has the same number of horizontal
line of resolution as an SDTV, but instead of broadcasting ½ the
picture 60 times per second, in an interlacing manner, it displays
the whole picture every 1/60 of a second, creating a visibly clearer
picture.
INTERNET
Can I block internet web sites on my TV?
Unfortunately, you cannot block web sites when accessing the
Internet on your TV using the Max service. You can block web
sites using your computer (PC).
Will my TV go down when the internet goes down?
Although Max and high speed both run over your phone line, the
Max broadcast television portion runs on a separate part of the line
and will not be affected by outages that are typically associated
with the internet. Max service has been extremely reliable and our
customers have been very happy with the quality of their service.
When I am on the TV, looking at the Internet or my Max
Mail, why do things look different than on the computer?
The TV standard has a fixed vertical resolution of 525 horizontal
lines stacked on top of each other, with varying amounts of "lines"
making up the horizontal resolution, depending on the electronics
and formats involved. The important point here is that it’s a
constant. You can’t change it.
A PC, on the other hand, is very flexible with what you can do
resolution wise. Usually a PC will default the screen resolution at
640 x 480 but goes up to resolutions such as 800 x 600 and 1024
x 768. However, the TV remains at a constant resolution
somewhere much lower than the computer screen resolution of 640
x 480.
Therefore, you can display the content usually found on a PC
screen onto a TV, but sometimes it might not look quite the same.
