HDMI and Component/HDTV not support captioning?

acevalentine

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Sorry if this is a repost. I have seen a few threads about DirecTV issues and HD broadcast issues and I discovered some hardware issues and closed captioning.

I just recently purchased a Samsung 50" 1080i DLP HDTV and was shocked to find out that the CC does not work via HDMI or Component connections (options on the TV are grayed out for CC using those connections).

I purchased an upconvert DVD player, hooked it up via HDMI and sure enough, no CC. Then I tried the crappy old composite (Y-R-W) cables and the captions work, but the picture is of course horrendous.

Apparently it seems that HDMI and Component video were never meant, or even made to transmit closed caption data. With all of the legal work that has been going on with pushing CC to be required, it seems technology has failed us again.

I also called my local cable provider (Time Warner Cable) inquiring about an HD package and their HD tuners use either component or HDMI hook ups... and they said their HD tuners to not have caption decoders!?

Ridiculous. So now, I'm not sure what the next step would be to enjoy anything in HD :pissed:
 
Sorry if this is a repost. I have seen a few threads about DirecTV issues and HD broadcast issues and I discovered some hardware issues and closed captioning.

I just recently purchased a Samsung 50" 1080i DLP HDTV and was shocked to find out that the CC does not work via HDMI or Component connections (options on the TV are grayed out for CC using those connections).

I purchased an upconvert DVD player, hooked it up via HDMI and sure enough, no CC. Then I tried the crappy old composite (Y-R-W) cables and the captions work, but the picture is of course horrendous.

Apparently it seems that HDMI and Component video were never meant, or even made to transmit closed caption data. With all of the legal work that has been going on with pushing CC to be required, it seems technology has failed us again.

I also called my local cable provider (Time Warner Cable) inquiring about an HD package and their HD tuners use either component or HDMI hook ups... and they said their HD tuners to not have caption decoders!?

Ridiculous. So now, I'm not sure what the next step would be to enjoy anything in HD :pissed:

That's strange, Sjones got same problem with HDMI but work with component cable.

How about report to FCC or other companies that need to address your issue.
 
cable tv

Sorry if this is a repost. I have seen a few threads about DirecTV issues and HD broadcast issues and I discovered some hardware issues and closed captioning.

I just recently purchased a Samsung 50" 1080i DLP HDTV and was shocked to find out that the CC does not work via HDMI or Component connections (options on the TV are grayed out for CC using those connections).

I purchased an upconvert DVD player, hooked it up via HDMI and sure enough, no CC. Then I tried the crappy old composite (Y-R-W) cables and the captions work, but the picture is of course horrendous.

Apparently it seems that HDMI and Component video were never meant, or even made to transmit closed caption data. With all of the legal work that has been going on with pushing CC to be required, it seems technology has failed us again.

I also called my local cable provider (Time Warner Cable) inquiring about an HD package and their HD tuners use either component or HDMI hook ups... and they said their HD tuners to not have caption decoders!?

Ridiculous. So now, I'm not sure what the next step would be to enjoy anything in HD :pissed:

Yes, my cable tv Hd tuner works with closed captioning HDTV program. Motorola cable tv hd tuner support CC. Must enable cc into it to work. You can ask time warner cable about Motorola HD tuner.
 
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Yes, my cable tv Hd tuner works with closed captioning HDTV program. Motorola cable tv hd tuner support CC. Must enable cc into it to work. You can ask time warner cable about Motorola HD tuner.

I will definitely ask Time Warner about a Motorola HD tuner.

I believe that the tuner's are currently "supposed" to decode the CC, actually adding the caption to the video data

It just surprises me that the HD televisions cannot decode CC via an HDMI or component hook-up, all processing must be done by the source. Which brings me back to DVDs, some do not have subtitles, only CC, which still leaves no way to view a DVD in high-def with CC... at least not that I have discovered. I'll try the component hook-up with my upconvert DVD player tonight, but I suspect it still will not pass the CC, only subtitles (if available).
 
I have a 36" Sony XBR CRT TV and I use the componant connection from my AV tuner and the HD Motorolla cable box 720 or 1080. No problems with selecting CC from my TV menu of the CD menu. No CC option on the box though...
 
I have a 32" LCD HDTV, closed caption doesn't display thru component, but works fine with composite via the VCR for analog cable. I tried playing a DVD that has CC support and it doesn't work on the PS2 or my Panasonic DVD player. They both use component cables and are run thru the splitter. I guess I have the similar issue that you have.
 
Well, I just found out DirecTV HTL-HD do have option for Digital Closed Caption.. But the problem is it doesn't have HDMI / DVI.. Only Component, Composite, Coax.
 
Also, Dish Network VIP622 do have digital closed caption even HDMI!
 
Thats right. :) But DVR is best in my IMHO. :D

I think about want switch from Directv into Dish because offers more HD channel and HDMI support, that would be perfect one, even better than component cable. That what I'm using HDMI on PS3 and gotta love it!!! :D
 
I was suprised like everyone here was. I checked the box as it had the bold CC, asked the salesman and he said it had it. At first I was really happy as I was watching HD cable & the captions were working. But when I tried DVD, I usually put the subtitles on as I assumed there was no CC. But with my xbox 360 & its upconverting I tried to use that, but it failed. I looked into it some more and it seems like component is not supported, nor VGA. From reading your post, it seems like it might not be the manufactor, but some kind of regulating body that oversees the requirement (i.e, HDMI rules, or some HD type rule). My TV: a samsung LCD.

I brought a HD-DVD, and it seems like every movie is at least subtitled, so I guess they're trying to go that route. The only problem is, what do we do with the older movies that has CC but no subtitles?
 
Well, I just found out DirecTV HTL-HD do have option for Digital Closed Caption.. But the problem is it doesn't have HDMI / DVI.. Only Component, Composite, Coax.

The DirecTV HD-DVR model HR20 does have closed captioning over all connections--including HDMI. It has its own closed captioning decoder which many of us at DBSTalk.com have worked very hard to get DirecTV to perfect.

I got an HR20 in October and told them closed captioning was TERRIBLE. The DirecTV engineers monitor DBSTalk.com so I knew they were reading my complaints. After a few months of seeing the receiver get software updates for many bugs NOT related to closed captioning, I complained loudly and they heard me, asking me to give them a little more time. I decided to give them a month more, and within 2 weeks they had made major captioning changes.

After a few more weeks, they listened to our further complaints and made more fixes. Every time they fixed something, I and others got more and more detailed about the little things that needed to be tweaked (I supplied many pictures so they could SEE the problems of which I wrote), and they kept coming back with changes to make it perfect. It's not often a company listens that closely to their users (especially a minority of the user base that uses closed captioning). Spread the word about them--people should know!

I'm not sure if you can see these, but here are some of the threads on the DBSTalk.com forums that transcribe the journey:

HR20 Closed Captioning issues - DBSTalk.Com

HR20 Closed Captioning -- how to make it better - DBSTalk.Com

HR20 Closed Captioning UPDATE (v0x120) - DBSTalk.Com

0x12a - Closed Captioning - DBSTalk.Com

DBSTalk.Com - View Single Post - HR20 - CE07051 - 0x132 Issues

ATTN D* people: Closed Captioning and the HR20 - DBSTalk.Com

An HR20 mini-review, 5 months in - DBSTalk.Com

CE 0x14B and closed captioning - DBSTalk.Com
 
I get 18 digital tv stations here. I do not pay for cable or satellite. They very very very rarely have closed captioning operating on the digital TV stations. My guess is that the FCC is not requiring it of the digital stations (ATSC) until the NTSC cutoff date in less than 2 years. I can scan through the 18 channels with CC on and almost never see it operating. So that is likely to be your problem.

If I am watching "Law and Order" in HD there is no closed captioning, but then I can switch over to the analogue TV station and watch the same "tv station" and the closed captioning is working. So presently the situation is that there just is not much closed captioning going on on ATSC stations. Even PBS, which is usually pretty advanced when it comes to features that benefit the public (I worked at PBS AM/FM & TV stations in the 70's) has never had closed captioning operating on any of the 3 public stations I get here (42, 17 and 2).

When you see the words "HD ready" or "HD compatible" that means the "tv" is nothing more than a display unit with connectors to hook up an ATSC tuner. It probably has a NTSC (the old standard) tuner built in.

HDMI input to your "hd television" is only using your television as a display. Nothing more or less. It does not decode anything at all. So if you want to see closed captioning when using the HDMI input, whatever you are watching MUST do the decoding. Think of it as being a very expensive computer display.

Depending what "component video" input you are using, with what model TV, it is the same situation as the HDMI connector. The tv is doing nothing more than being a display.

A few weeks ago was the deadline where importers had to stop importing "high def tv's" that did NOT have an ATSC tuner built in. (ATSC is the new standard for "digital tv") . So these problems will not be as prevalent. However it will not have any effect on the HDMI or component video inputs that I have described.
 
I get 18 digital tv stations here. I do not pay for cable or satellite. They very very very rarely have closed captioning operating on the digital TV stations. My guess is that the FCC is not requiring it of the digital stations (ATSC) until the NTSC cutoff date in less than 2 years. I can scan through the 18 channels with CC on and almost never see it operating. So that is likely to be your problem.

If I am watching "Law and Order" in HD there is no closed captioning, but then I can switch over to the analogue TV station and watch the same "tv station" and the closed captioning is working. So presently the situation is that there just is not much closed captioning going on on ATSC stations. Even PBS, which is usually pretty advanced when it comes to features that benefit the public (I worked at PBS AM/FM & TV stations in the 70's) has never had closed captioning operating on any of the 3 public stations I get here (42, 17 and 2).

When you see the words "HD ready" or "HD compatible" that means the "tv" is nothing more than a display unit with connectors to hook up an ATSC tuner. It probably has a NTSC (the old standard) tuner built in.

HDMI input to your "hd television" is only using your television as a display. Nothing more or less. It does not decode anything at all. So if you want to see closed captioning when using the HDMI input, whatever you are watching MUST do the decoding. Think of it as being a very expensive computer display.

Depending what "component video" input you are using, with what model TV, it is the same situation as the HDMI connector. The tv is doing nothing more than being a display.

A few weeks ago was the deadline where importers had to stop importing "high def tv's" that did NOT have an ATSC tuner built in. (ATSC is the new standard for "digital tv") . So these problems will not be as prevalent. However it will not have any effect on the HDMI or component video inputs that I have described.

I don't think that your TV support digital CC but digital and analog CC are separated on channels, that where analog CC will not work on ATSC based channel but must have digital CC to get CC on display.

You need buy HDTV that called "HDTV built-in" to get digital cable but some HDTV can be full of BS.
 
TVs with "HDTV built-in" means TV has built in HDTV (ATSC) tuner for use with Over the Air (OTA) antenna, NOT digital cable. In order to view HD cable programs, either get a HDTV with CableCard slot or HD cable box from your cable company. Make sure to ask if the cable box outputs CC for HD stations.

CableCard is available from your cable company and eliminates the need to use cable box. It's a small card that plugs into the back of the TV. Problem is not all local cable company provides them. My local cable company does not provide CableCard. I believe CC is inside the TV to work with CableCard, but find out first before buying the TV. Also find out if your local cable company provides CableCard before buying TV. Also CableCard is not free and you have to pay them monthly. I think it costs extra $5 a month.

Currently I use OTA antenna connecting to my HDTV with built-in ATSC tuner and all local stations (Reno, NV) provide HD and CC (including "Law and Order") and they work great. HD picture quality using OTA antenna is usually better to signaficantly better than cable or satellite because OTA uses less compression than others.

hulsw's post about CC using HDMI, components and other inputs is correct.

Pacman's first sentence is correct but partially correct in the second sentence. You cannot watch digital cable directly without a cable box or CableCard because the signals from cable company are encrypted. Cable box or CableCard decrypts the signals but you have to pay for it. But if the cable company provides "QAM" which is unencrypted digital signal and it's free, then your TV needs to have "QAM" tuner. Not many TVs come with QAM tuners. Also not every cable company uses QAM because they want you to pay them. Typical QAM channels are ABC, CBS, NBC, PBS, FOX, MyNetwork (sometimes), and CW (sometimes). You might be lucky to get premium QAM channels like Discovery but it's rare.

Peter
 
Digital Television (DTV) Captioning
Will DTV (a.k.a. HDTV or ATV) have captions?
Does DTV captioning still have XDS data?
Are there any DTV caption encoders available?
Are there any standards for DTV captioning?
Who's responsible for EIA-708?
Where can I get other technical info about DTV captions?

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Will DTV (a.k.a. HDTV or ATV) have captions?
Our new digital TV standard, known as DTV (digital TV), HDTV (high-definition TV), or ATV (advanced TV), will definitely be able to carry captioning information. The current plan is that DTV signals will be able to carry either the new EIA-708 captioning standard or digital programming, or traditional Line 21 broadcast captioning.


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Does DTV captioning still have XDS data?
DTV captioning under EIA-708 does not use XDS per se. There is another mechanism available in a separate data stream for carrying non-caption data such as program names, channel numbers, network IDs, "V-Chip parental content advisories, and so forth. This stream uses the Program and System Information Protocol (PSIP), which is defined by the ATSC A/65 standard.


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

Are there any DTV caption encoders available?
Yes. Lucent Digital Video, Ultech Corporation, and EEG Enterprises have all announced caption servers for DTV. Evertz Microsystems announced theirs (the Model 8075) in April 99, also.


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Are there any standards for DTV (a.k.a. HDTV or ATV) captioning?
Yes. The EIA-708 specification provides for dramatically improved captioning. These are a few of the improvements:

An enhanced character set with more accented letters and non-English letters, and more special symbols.
Viewer-adjustable text size, allowing individuals to adjust their TVs to display small, normal, or large captions.
More text and background colors, including translucent (see-through) backgrounds to optionally replace the big black block.
More text styles, including edged or drop-shadowed text rather than the letters on a solid background
More text fonts, including monospaced and proportional spaced, serif and sans-serif, and some playful cursive fonts.
Higher bandwidth, to allow more data per minute of video.
To get a copy of EIA-708, see "Where do I get the American standards documents?"

For more information about digital captioning and EIA-708, see:

Closed Captioning in a Digital Age
Article from Newswaves, Feb 1998
DTV: Closed Captioning in a Digital Age
Article from the Journal of Court Reporting, Jun 1998
Advantages & Pitfalls of Captioning for Advanced Television
Paper presented at the ICCE conference, Jun 1998

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

Who's responsible for EIA-708?
EIA-708 is produced and maintained by CEMA's EIA 4.3 (Television Data SubSystems) subcommittee, Working Group 1, which is chaired by your humble FAQ author. For more information, you can visit the EIA's Web site.


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Source : CapFAQ: Digital television (DTV) captioning
 
The DirecTV HD-DVR model HR20 does have closed captioning over all connections--including HDMI. It has its own closed captioning decoder which many of us at DBSTalk.com have worked very hard to get DirecTV to perfect.

I got an HR20 in October and told them closed captioning was TERRIBLE. The DirecTV engineers monitor DBSTalk.com so I knew they were reading my complaints. After a few months of seeing the receiver get software updates for many bugs NOT related to closed captioning, I complained loudly and they heard me, asking me to give them a little more time. I decided to give them a month more, and within 2 weeks they had made major captioning changes.

After a few more weeks, they listened to our further complaints and made more fixes. Every time they fixed something, I and others got more and more detailed about the little things that needed to be tweaked (I supplied many pictures so they could SEE the problems of which I wrote), and they kept coming back with changes to make it perfect. It's not often a company listens that closely to their users (especially a minority of the user base that uses closed captioning). Spread the word about them--people should know!

I'm not sure if you can see these, but here are some of the threads on the DBSTalk.com forums that transcribe the journey:

HR20 Closed Captioning issues - DBSTalk.Com

HR20 Closed Captioning -- how to make it better - DBSTalk.Com

HR20 Closed Captioning UPDATE (v0x120) - DBSTalk.Com

0x12a - Closed Captioning - DBSTalk.Com

DBSTalk.Com - View Single Post - HR20 - CE07051 - 0x132 Issues

ATTN D* people: Closed Captioning and the HR20 - DBSTalk.Com

An HR20 mini-review, 5 months in - DBSTalk.Com

CE 0x14B and closed captioning - DBSTalk.Com

Glad to know it worked now! :D

Edit: Wanted to tell you that I'm really impressed how much you have been dealing with DirecTV CC issues! Well done, man!
 
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