EE TV Pro box 1080p question.

[merlot62]

Hi All. I have just cancelled SKY Q for EE TV and 500mb Broadband due to only really watching freeview and sports channels and EE being much cheaper. Upon installing the EE Pro box I found the picture nowhere near as clear or vivid as SKY. I had both boxes side by side to compare. I was pretty disappointed and considered cancelling, however upon researching I dropped the picture quality from UHD 8 bit to 1080p and that improved the picture immensely. I then tweaked my LG OLED settings from standard to picture wizard clear and crisp and it is now virtually indistinguishable from SKY. My question is with the EE box set at Full HD would i not receive native UHD  content on my TV ? I did some trials with TNT Ultimate and BBC IPlayer and the picture looked better than 1080p but is that just my TV upscaling the signal from the EE box ? Why is the higher UHD settings on the EE box a worse picture than 1080p ? It is also the same issue on my mini box with a JVC Fire TV.  Thanks

[merlot62]

Also can anyone at EE tell me why the boxes don’t just work well without having to google and mess around with settings ? Nothing odd with my setup of ee tv pro box and LG oled tv

[Richardr66]

I think you are right in terms of the 1080 picture being better than the 2160p one on 1080 sourced material, and I suspect it is due to the EE Pro box being somewhat worse than your TV (and mine) in upscaling.

Unfortunately as you suspect setting it as 1080 loses the ability to show 2160 from a source such as TNT Sport Ultimate [465] or from an app [certainly UHD from the Discovery+ app which I checked]. Such content will however have higher bandwidth than HD channels, so the box downscaling and then the TV upscaling in theory could be better than straight HD, and HDR will still work.

On your LG TV almost certainly pressing the info button [on the TV remote] will show the resolution.

[stereohaven]

@merlot62 I don’t have the Pro Box any longer, but as my LG OLED upscales everything thrown at it whether I like it or not, I always thought the best picture to be when I left the box set at 1080p, otherwise I found the picture “soft”.

Interestingly, TNT Sports Ultimate in the TV Guide still delivered 4K HDR and BBC iPlayer HLG HDR when set to 1080p, it was the other apps that had their output degraded (like Netflix will only play 4K UHD HDR if the box is in 10bit 2160p).

But for me, if you have bought a top quality OLED, the best app picture will always be found via the built in apps or next best is by using a dedicated streamer like an Apple TV 4K.

For that reason, I left the box in 1080p and just used it for live TV or recordings, with app viewing via the LG TV direct or via an Apple TV 4K. It depends on your priorities and viewing preferences really, some prefer just to use one device, but that has a trade off.

I have Sky Q currently and use the EE supplied Apple TV 4K for TNT Sports and all app viewing, Q is just a PVR.

[merlot62]

Thanks guys, i guess leaving the ee box at 1080p is the best solution. Seems mad to me though that ee supply a box with UHD settings that ruin a full HD picture. If i watch 4k content i will use the apps on my tv. Bit of a clunky solution though as would of been nice to control everything from ee box. 

[stereohaven]

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@merlot62 wrote:

Thanks guys, i guess leaving the ee box at 1080p is the best solution. Seems mad to me though that ee supply a box with UHD settings that ruin a full HD picture. If i watch 4k content i will use the apps on my tv. Bit of a clunky solution though as would have been nice to control everything from ee box. 

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Sadly I have discovered that caring about the best picture and sound experience is a minority sport.

[Midnight_Voice]

@stereohaven 

But one of the few sports I participate in 😛 As per:-

@merlot62 

LG TVs are tricky beasts. You optimise the picture on 1080p to your satisfaction, switch to UHD, and find that if you go back to the picture settings, it’s set itself to different, UHD, settings, which you need to optimise all over again.

But fortunately, just the once, not every time, though it will then need reoptimising for Dolby Vision, to get rid of the nasty yellow cast.

You also want to make sure that each HDMI port is set for Enhanced, which you have to do individually.

But once you have been through these things, the Box Pro won’t give anything away to Sky, except that we still impatiently await UHD on Now.