What you are seeing is called "macroblocking". It happens when the bit rate of an mpeg stream is not sufficient to fully describe the information contained in the picture. MPEG counts on the fact that adjacent pixels and frames are (more often than not) very similar. When you have a complex scene where adjacent pixels and frames are very different you need more bits. If the bit rate on the MPEG encoder is not set high enough you will run out of bits and you will see artifacts like you describe. The short answer is DirecTv lowered the bit rate on their encoders to accomadate a lot of local channels and there is nothing you can do. Sadly, your equipment is functioning properly and so is mine. Sorry for the longwinded, and yet over simplified explaination. my bad.