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    3 different blu-ray players and 3 different lcd tv, all discs that has closed captioning does not show anything if I played video via hdmi but if I used different connection such as component, closed captioning works fine.

    is there any reason closed caption can't be used via hdmi? captioning is like 50 or 60 letters per second at best, nowhere near the bandwidth of video signal or audio signal on hdmi 1.3a If I use component, there is noticeable quality loss vs 1080 hdmi connection.

    cheap companies? Or committee for hdmi standard discriminating against deaf and hard of hearing who depends on closed captioning? Some discs do not offer English subtitle, only closed captioning in English.
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    I agree there may be some difficulty using older DVDs that only have line 21 closed captioning and no English subtitles with new equipment, but nobody is discriminating against the deaf or people with hearing loss. Line 21 closed captioning, like my VCR, analog TVs and analog tuner DVD recorder, is obsolete technology that is being replaced by other things.

    Line-21 closed captioning is not part of the Blu-Ray standard and HDMI cannot transmit the part of the video signal that carries line-21 closed captioning. Using progressive output with an analog connection on a DVD player or STB will also exclude that part of the signal. Line 21 closed captioning requires interlaced video.

    Line 21 closed captioning is being supplanted by other captioning methods that are compatible with HDMI. Blu-Ray movies have English subtitles, often with sound effects. Digital cable TV and satellite TV have digital closed captioning that can be turned on by changing a setting in one of the HD set top box menus. They become part of the picture that the STB sends to your TV, so they are not affected by the connection used.
    Last edited by usually_quiet; 27th Jun 2010 at 00:21. Reason: punctuation
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    Originally Posted by impmon2 View Post
    3 different blu-ray players and 3 different lcd tv, all discs that has closed captioning does not show anything if I played video via hdmi but if I used different connection such as component, closed captioning works fine.

    is there any reason closed caption can't be used via hdmi? captioning is like 50 or 60 letters per second at best, nowhere near the bandwidth of video signal or audio signal on hdmi 1.3a If I use component, there is noticeable quality loss vs 1080 hdmi connection.

    cheap companies? Or committee for hdmi standard discriminating against deaf and hard of hearing who depends on closed captioning? Some discs do not offer English subtitle, only closed captioning in English.
    DRM? Subs & captions are (C), & that's part of the scheme of thing now days. HDMI/component don't carry anything but the picture. I'm sure it could be designed for CC, but the will has to be there in the 1st place... A DVD player **might** pass CC embedded in the DVD's video to a TV to render [via analog connection], but there were/are only a few DVD players made that will -- good luck finding which ones because it isn't advertised. I had to go to BestBuy down the street & buy 1, try it, take it back, try the next one, take it back & so on! For CC display on HDTV, I have to use a PC with all the DVDs I recorded.

    At any rate, instead of CC, with HDMI or component you have to use/display subtitles with DVD/BD, which the player renders & sends as part of the picture. And yes, even companies like Disney make DVD/BD discs without subs. With cable the box renders a separate caption stream & sends it overlaid on the picture to the TV over HDMI/component the same way. Only signals the TV reads/decodes, like OTA or QAM still have the CC embedded that the TV itself can display. By doing it that way, it makes sure that if you manage to record HD, you won't get switchable captions that you can turn on/off, use separately as a transcript etc... I've actually read that in some of the industry docs, or I'd think it was purely a technical issue.
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  4. The FCC law that went into effect in 1993 said all tv's have to be able to decode CC, of course back then everything was interlaced and there was only S-Video and composite. DVI, HDMI and component cannot carry CC in a progressive signal, the good news is many DVD's and BD's have descriptive subtitles now(ie sounds).
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    I agree there may be some difficulty using older DVDs that only have line 21 closed captioning and no English subtitles with new equipment,
    Politely as possible, I couldn't disagree more strongly. As in my earlier post, display of CC embedded in DVD mpg2 has ALWAYS been an issue, & I assure you CC support was never advertised by DVD player manufacturers -- after searching for days I found 1 mention of CC buried in a tech doc for a discontinued player on 1 manufacturer's site. OTOH out of hundreds [maybe thousands?] of DVDs, 99.9 % of those I've watched contained embedded CC -- it's really a trivial matter for them to take subs & embed them.


    Line 21 closed captioning, like my VCR, analog TVs and analog tuner DVD recorder, is obsolete technology that is being replaced by other things.
    Putting the CC data in the blanking signal worked/works with std broadcast, & it still works with std cable signals, & it works with signals over coax, composite, svid. Storing that data in the video stream itself works with digital broadcast, digital cable, DVDs. It's part of all the digital & HD specs. Component was/is a somewhat incomplete spec -- it lacks a universal std for what video via component should look like, so 3 TVs might show the same signal but look very different. HDMI was/is designed/sold around DRM, & to make $ -- many got rich selling cables at 10 - 20 X [or more] over fair value/pricing, & the connectors are the worst thing anyone's ever encountered with this level of std. No one can say with a straight face that it was impossible to carry a digital CC signal at the same time as the video -- after all, how/where does my digital/HD cable box get it? And don't say it's from the analog signal, because the captions are different [by that I mean the actual words used/displayed].

    Line 21 closed captioning is being supplanted by other captioning methods that are compatible with HDMI. Blu-Ray movies have English subtitles, often with sound effects. Digital cable TV and satellite TV have digital closed captioning that can be turned on by changing a setting in one of the HD set top box menus. They become part of the picture that the STB sends to your TV, so they are not affected by the connection used.
    Please don't fixate on line 21... Line 21 is like comparing a letter from a laser printer vs. an ink jet. Line 21 is not any sort of issue. Captioning is provided by cable companies because the law says they have to. Captioning on DVDs was/is done because it's smart marketing & trivial expense -- the Hollywood studios were never any knights in shining armor. Captioning is broadcast with digital programming because by law they have to, though some local broadcasters really do care. Blu Ray could incorporate captioning in a heartbeat if they wanted to -- the tech is already there & the standard is still evolving [e.g. 3D] -- but Blu Ray has never been about anything but $, & with Hollywood demanding more DRM, including re: transcripts/captioning, those in charge of the spec, like those behind HDMI/HDCP rolled over most willingly.

    I'm not going to say everyone connected with video is bigoted against the hearing impaired or anything, but with the exception of Google & YouTube, just how much captioning is there with on-line video? One or two Google execs are hearing impaired, & behind a LOT of efforts like the captioning tech at YouTube, but otherwise, who's bothered. Microsoft built captioning into Windows Media -- it's been there from the start -- yet how often [if ever] have you seen it done, even though it may be the easiest to implement of any on-line format. For quite a while I had a running argument with one news station web site, till I gave up... Despite having transcripts right there, they will not caption their on-line video. I did get them to keep publishing written transcripts when they started offering video segments, but that was sadly it.

    Here's what it boils down to... it would be technically easy to add captioning to most all video. It's time consuming but easy to create a transcript, & it's becoming easier [huge thanks to Google]. In many countries the population is aging, & an increase in hearing impairment comes with age. At some point it's likely that more video will be captioned, if for no other reason than not having it hurts sales/profits to the point someone in charge actually notices. People like myself are increasingly *voting with their wallets*, meaning I prefer not to spend any money or time on companies/organizations that I perceive as un-friendly. Some people will always feel that there's bigotry involved -- I don't worry if there is/isn't, as I feel it's the $ that will change things, & not anything I could say or do that's going to turn anyone instantly into nice people.
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    Originally Posted by MOVIEGEEK View Post
    ... DVI, HDMI and component cannot carry CC in a progressive signal, the good news is many DVD's and BD's have descriptive subtitles now(ie sounds).
    DVI wasn't intended AFAIK for TV, so no reason for CC. That doesn't mean it could not be added, much the same way they added CC to a regular broadcast signal. The justification for them not including it in HDMI was $, the same as incorporating HDCP, &/or the do not record flags in HD cable signals [i.e. clear vs. unclear QAM].

    Far as DVD/BD having subs, they sure wouldn't sell as many if they didn't. If the Blu Ray players had a way to send it as a stream for the TV to decode, Hollywood would probably use it, just like with DVDs, because including it is so very trivial, & it might make them a few $ extra. I don't think Hollywood studios are populated with that many nice people -- they could have pushed for HDCP to pass-through captioning -- but they rarely pass up an opportunity to earn an easy $. You *might* also be able to argue that the absence of captioning kept/keeps some minor players out of the competition, based on the fact that a lot of lesser known labels/DVDs had CC but not subs -- not sure why, or how that figures into the cost to produce a DVD [once you have a timed transcript both are easy], so it's just an observation.
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  7. Being deaf, I ran into this recently. Component & hdmi don't do closed captions per se. However, your blu-ray player should have a setting to turn on closed captions & then you can see them just fine. Your cable box should too. You must turn them on at the originating source & then they are fed embedded in your image.

    My new plasma has options that let me change CC size, font, Etc. It's really cool feature.
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    @mikiem I'm fixated on line 21 closed captions because they are what DVDs provide, but they are a definitely a relic of analog era tech.

    The VBI is present in analog video only, and interlaced analog video at that. HDMI uses a uncompressed digital video format, not analog, so there is no way to send any analog line 21 data for your TV to decode. So, to do what you want, line 21 closed caption decoders would need to be added to Blu-Ray players to overlay the line-21 closed captions on the video before it is sent to the TV. According to handyguy, at least some Blu-Ray players have one.

    There is also no way to send digital closed captions over HDMI, because they require an MPEG-2 transport stream, not the uncompressed digital format used by HDMI. A digital CC decoder would have to be added to a Blu-Ray player to overlay them on the picture. ...but the BD video standard doesn't support digital CC's so it is a moot point.

    People with hearing loss living in other parts of the world are apparently fine with just subtitles for the hearing impaired. If all the N. Americans who won't use subtitles and who insist that all CCs must be decoded by their TV alone take their money elsewhere because of the way Blu-Ray and HDMI are designed to work, "they"** will barely notice it is gone

    [Edit] **By "they" I mean content providers and the consumer electronics industry.

    It took some time for me to find it in the (Philips DVP3962) manual, but it appears some upconverting DVD players have a CC on/off feature too, which means they have a line-21 CC decoder that converts DVD closed captions to open captions.
    Last edited by usually_quiet; 27th Jun 2010 at 15:43. Reason: clarity & punctuation
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    "Being deaf, I ran into this recently. Component & hdmi don't do closed captions per se. However, your blu-ray player should have a setting to turn on closed captions & then you can see them just fine. Your cable box should too. You must turn them on at the originating source & then they are fed embedded in your image.
    My new plasma has options that let me change CC size, font, Etc. It's really cool feature. "
    FWIW... What I believe you're seeing is the subs with BD, captions with cable, & embedded captions with your TV. If you can adjust the captions on your TV, that means your TV is rendering them, which means they're embedded in the digital or analog signal your TV's tuner is picking up.
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    I'm really only trying to say that the only reason CC hasn't been implemented over HDMI is a lack of will... I get CC via cable, QAM, & broadcast (OTA & analog cable), plus I won't watch any DVD/BD discs without subs. Adding CC to BD would help some I imagine -- maybe not. Looking at the PC/laptop/netbook/whatever tech you're using to read this, you can't seriously say it was impossible to include provisions for CC in HDMI/HDCP, *Had Anyone Wanted To*.

    "@mikiem I'm fixated on line 21 closed captions, because they are what DVDs provide"
    It depends on what you mean by line21. If you mean analog, then no, that's wrong, & you can prove it to yourself simply by extracting the CC stream from a DVD mpg2 file. If you mean it uses line 21 compatible tech, then you're correct. To be clear, an mpg2 is a *digital* video file, & can easily have CC embedded without re-encoding, just like that stream can be extracted. This travels with that file, or stream as it travels via airwaves or cable. There is no analog component to it, any more than there is an analog component to the ones & zeros making up the digital file or stream

    Digital CC is a separate, yet embedded stream in mpg2 for example as used on DVDs, OTA digital broadcast, QAM etc. There are 2 kinds - old style *analog compatible*, & newer HD. The newer HD CC is AFAIK not fully established in standards, & there is little to no decoding support, so the US gov said use both for X number of years until you get your act together. When you use something like Win Media Center with QAM or OTA digital you see the *compatible* CC [if/when CC is turned on], because that's all you can see at the moment with that software & most if not all PC TV hardware. The software used to decode & display it is the same as if you were watching an analog channel, *because it is designed to be compatible*, not because you're somehow getting an analog signal out of a digital stream.

    "...to do what you want, line 21 closed caption decoders would need to be added to Blu-Ray players to overlay the line-21 closed captions on the video before it is sent to the TV. According to handyguy at least some of them have one."
    Yes & no... If you wanted to send it via HDMI, without altering the current standards, then Yes, that is exactly what a digital HD cable box does, with a separate cable stream BTW -- it doesn't use the analog or analog compatible CC that are also present for the same channels. IF a CC stream is embedded in the digital video file on a particular BD, I'm not sure anyone has ever spotted it -- no one's ever spotted a CC stream in the m2ts that I'm aware of -- or likely looked for it since there is no standard way to pass CC via HDMI/HDCP. It would be like putting text somewhere on/in a BD that you hid so no one could ever read it -- Why Bother?

    OTOH to send CC a BD player just needs to send the CC stream along with the video signal, just like those [few] DVD players & recorders, to the TV. Remember that a TV by law already has a CC decoder built in, & that a TV with digital tuner can already strip that CC from the digital signal & display it. No DVD player actually decoded CC off a DVD, because to do so made no sense. The old-fashioned DVD player instead took that embedded digital stream, sending it to the TV the only way it knew how, indeed the only way possible, as a std analog TV wouldn't accept a digital signal by definition. Right now we have a digital video file on BD, accompanied by separate graphics based sub streams. CC could easily be stored as a separate stream, or embedded like with QAM/OTA digital. Digital TV tuners can decode those CC streams -- they do it all day long. What's missing is a way to get it from the BD to the Tuner. If there was sufficient will, a standard could be developed around transferring those CC streams via HDMI or some new standard hookup/cable. Once there's such a std. BD players & TVs could add the minimal circuitry to use it. Without that standard method of transferring CC, the only choice is to not support it.

    Again, the methods they use to get around it are most often sufficient, though you can have an expensive HDTV & get really crappy looking captions/subs because the HD cablebox your provider supplies is a piece of dog... (you get the idea), & CC is often much more descriptive than the average subs -- Subs are used to overcome language barriers more often than for hearing impairment, so it's the fairly rare sub that has more than dialog... saying that this movie or that disc had descriptive subs means absolutely nothing if that's not the movie I Want to watch -- does it?

    "People in the rest of the world with hearing loss are apparently fine with just subtitles for the hearing impaired. If N. Americans who won't use subtitles and who insist that all CCs must be decoded by their TV alone take their money elsewhere because of the way Blu-Ray and HDMI are designed to work, "they" will barely notice it is gone. "
    Hmmmm... In an earlier post I mentioned I did go through more trouble, & pay more because of my hearing impairment when I bought my DVD player & again with my recorder. I go through more to record & watch TV, spend more for software & hardware for the same reason. If I didn't, I wouldn't be able to watch, appreciate, or enjoy most video. I *had* to learn about CC & subs. I frankly don't expect most people with normal hearing to care 'bout that, except to realize sometimes that they might make more $ if they did -- my $ spends just like anyone else's. OTOH I'm not going to nominate anyone for person of the year if/when they're only concerned by what effects the face in the mirror. And I'm not going to just go along happily pretending people with hearing impairment [or any other health prob] don't get shafted from time to time because of "me 1st, me only" attitudes from those without such problems -- they might leave us out of design plans, when they work in that capacity, or they may just quietly go with the flow as designs are made & implemented.


    It took some time for me to find it in the (Philips DVP3962) manual, but it appears some upconverting DVD players have a CC on/off feature too, which means they have a line-21 CC decoder that converts DVD closed captions to open captions.
    I don't know... it connects to a TV via coax, composite, component, or HDMI. The manual doesn't state anything besides there's the CC on/off setting. Does it work over HDMI or component, or just composite & coax? No one can say unless they've tried it with that player. There's a bit of talk about switching the TV & player separately to/from progressive mode too. Maybe it mods the CC signal along with the video for progressive display? I've no idea.
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    Originally Posted by impmon2 View Post
    3 different blu-ray players and 3 different lcd tv, all discs that has closed captioning does not show anything if I played video via hdmi but if I used different connection such as component, closed captioning works fine.

    is there any reason closed caption can't be used via hdmi? captioning is like 50 or 60 letters per second at best, nowhere near the bandwidth of video signal or audio signal on hdmi 1.3a If I use component, there is noticeable quality loss vs 1080 hdmi connection.

    cheap companies? Or committee for hdmi standard discriminating against deaf and hard of hearing who depends on closed captioning? Some discs do not offer English subtitle, only closed captioning in English.
    Hi,
    Just saw your post and I have the same problem.
    I have just bought an LG bd -550 bluray player and no cc, even though it plays on on computer and other dvd players.
    I tried to follow your advice and connected the bluray player via red, white and yellow directly to the tv and my tv said cc on, but no cc showing.
    Can you tell me exactly how you hooked yours up? I currently have a surround-sound system also connected to the player via hdmi.
    Thanks,
    Paul
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  12. Originally Posted by mikiem View Post
    FWIW... What I believe you're seeing is the subs with BD, captions with cable, & embedded captions with your TV. If you can adjust the captions on your TV, that means your TV is rendering them, which means they're embedded in the digital or analog signal your TV's tuner is picking up.
    My User Adjustable closed captions only work during Digital feeds

    All of my dvd players, except for my Panny, has a closed caption option where you turn them on.
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    @mikiem You are splitting hairs. CCs on a DVD are intended to be used by TVs as line 21 CCs. They have always gone to the TV as line 21 data in the VBI of an interlaced NTSC analog signal, or not at all. The only exception would be when a DVD or Blu-Ray player includes a line-21 CC decoder that overlays them on the picture as open captions.

    I have extracted CCs from DVDs (using CCExtractor) a few times to add them back as .SUP subtitiles and I am doing the same thing with line 21 CCs embedded in ATSC transport streams. I have also read a little about how the DVD, CEA 608 and CEA 708 standards handle closed caption data, so I consider myself better informed on the subject than average.

    If closed captions must be sent to TVs over HDMI for decoding, then they would have to be sent in an entirely different form than anything TVs can use directly now. It would require the development of a new HDMI standard, and a new type of CC decoder. There would be three different CC decoders inside every new TV sold in N. America, one for NTSC, one for ATSC/QAM, and one for video over HDMI.

    Nobody in the consumer electronics industry is going to see things your way voluntarily. DVD video is moving towards obsolescence as a distribution format for movies and TV shows, so there not much financial incentive to add more features for supporting it. It would require legal intervention to get what you want done, and even though I use closed captions frequently, I wouldn't support it. Mandatory subtitles for the hard of hearing are a much better answer to the problem. They are format independent, and would be useful to far more people. Nobody would even need new equipment to use them.

    I had dinner with my parents tonight, and tried their DVP3962's CC setting. It doesn't do what I thought it did, at least not using HDMI. I didn't try it for progressive output over S-Video or composite. It is too hard to switch connections around. My parents use subtitles if they have trouble hearing dialog. It is easier to turn them on, so they have never actually tried the DVD player's CC setting before.
    Last edited by usually_quiet; 27th Jun 2010 at 19:42.
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  14. CC's do work fine on composite or RF connections though.

    CC's are better than subtitles as they give you sound effects (door opening) Etc.

    I guess my Xbox 360 doesn't have an option to turn on CC's.
    Last edited by handyguy; 28th Jun 2010 at 11:55.
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  15. Originally Posted by handyguy View Post

    CC's are better than subtitles as they give you sound effects (door opening) Etc.
    That's true with older DVD's but I've noticed newer releases have descriptive subtitles that contain sounds.

    Side note: ATSC tuners on HDTV's still decode CC from OTA broadcasts.
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    RESET...
    Why doesn't HDMI carry CC? It's ignored by the spec.

    Why then doesn't my player connected via HDMI overlay CC like my cable box? Your player would need 2 things: a source with captioning, & circuitry to overlay the captioning -- Blu Ray as a source doesn't include captioning, & the circuitry would add costs, being a bit technically difficult to implement. From a [skewed?] marketing perspective, consumers who need CC should use subs, & if that doesn't work for you, take it up with the company that sold the DVD/BD. If you recorded the DVD with CC [& obviously no subs] 1) hold onto your old player/recorder & make sure you buy a TV you can connect to via analog, or 2) use a PC for playback, or 3) re-do the DVD adding subs. It's possible CC overlays from DVD/BD players will become common someday, if/when conditions change, i.e. manufacturers decide there's a big enough market, &/or the gov says to, &/or it's added to a chipset manufacturer's buy, but today overlays, even from the cable box tend to be problematic.

    Is the lack of CC support discriminatory? Depends on your personal views & definitions. By *strict* definition, I think yes. IMHO it's more telling that CC was shrugged off as not worth bothering with during HDMI & Blu Ray design.

    What difference does it make using CC vs. subtitles? Captioning is from the start designed for the hearing impaired. Subs in the US are [most?] commonly used to provide alternate language translations, may lack English, often lack non-verbal hints [i,e, "[rain pounding]" ], & lack the display options common with captioning [background, shading etc] that make it easier for many to read. Up-scaling a DVD picture to HD, subs are going to look nasty, while CC rendered by the TV does not have that distortion.

    If it helps:
    [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Closed_captioning]
    [http://webaim.org/teitac/mailarchives/mail_message.php?id=2834&listid=]
    [http://www.hdmi.org/learningcenter/faq.aspx#117]

    * * *
    A quick/easy [rephrased] summary of CC & HDTV...
    There are already HD video specs for captioning, but outside broadcast streams [cable, sat, OTA etc] nothing widely implemented in the US. It would have been technically & cost-wise trivial to add CC to the original BD specs, to the US specs/regs etc. Ironically perhaps [while we're used to thinking of co-ax as poor quality, most all analog issues don't exist with digital], BD players & other sources could have used simple co-ax cable, giving an HDTV the same sort of QAM stream it get's now [in very limited supply] from the cable providers. HDTV doesn't use a simpler method of connecting because a scheme like HDMI/HDCP is superior, but because it provides more DRM while forcing consumers to spend more if they want HDTV. The gov addressed CC for broadcast TV signals only [whether sat, cable, OTA etc]. Those behind HDMI/HDCP left it up to the Blu Ray committee, & the Blu Ray folks left it up to those designing HDMI/HDCP, even though some of the same people were officially involved with both. As it is, HDMI/HDCP simply ignores CC, as does most any device without a tuner, since it's left out of US gov regs. Since 1) those behind setting up HDTV chose to partly or completely ignore CC, 2) including CC would have been trivial at that time, & 3) what we wound up with is more concerned about profit than quality, I can't see any other explanation than those involved didn't care enough about the issue [being much more consumed by their quest for big $], or as I put it originally, there was a definite lack of will. If/when you use something like Blu Ray &/or after wrangling HDMI cables etc, another possibility can seem tempting, but with the technical heavy lifting already taken care of by those who designed QAM, personally I rule out utter incompetence.

    * * *

    A breakdown FWIW,,,
    A) HDMI, Blu Ray, & HDTV are all about making more money off you, the consumer, rather than quality &/or service.

    1) HDMI as a design is very poor -- it lacks the simplicity & durability of USB, Firewire etc, & damage to hardware sockets is somewhat common. It was adopted over other proposals partly because of HDCP -- I don't know if there were any under-the-table deals involved, but after the way BD won the format war, if such things happened few would be surprised.

    2) HDCP is a poor design in practice, whether you agree/disagree with DRM. It limits device connectivity, it often causes problems connecting PCs & HDTVs, it adds expense to PC graphics hardware [added audio chip etc], it causes more driver problems [multiple audio chips/cards], you cannot use often expensive PC audio hardware without separate cabling, & the way that the content stream has to be *sealed* makes output jacks at the front of PC cases less practical to implement. Prior to HDMI/HDCP proposed HDTV solutions were often centered on Theater PCs.

    3) HDMI made/makes some people &/or companies lots & lots of money -- like DVD players when they were new to the marketplace, HDMI cable were hugely expensive [close to $100 here], yet Asian imports are currently priced as low as <$2 shipped. Unlike DVD players, that price difference cannot be attributed to R & D. Granted there may be some quality differences, but no where near $100 worth.

    4) BD did not win on technical merit alone, & the format is at least as much about DRM as providing the space necessary for HD content -- that point should be more than evident here in the videohelp forums.

    5) 99%+ of HD via cable is not clear QAM, & is un-recordable *as HD*, even by most {all?) DVRs supplied by cable providers.

    B) There are/were no significant cost &/or technical hurtles to implementing CC across more HD capable devices.

    1) CC was originally implemented for broadcast when there were *much* tighter technical restrictions, like analog signal bandwidth carried over extremely long distances, i.e. between cities across the nation. And then compared to adding color it was trivial. RE: band width, including CC in current HD streams is *really* trivial -- we're talking 1 or 2MB per a 10 - 20GB file. Further, both Color & CC were added to existing data streams, albeit analog. A single 2-wire cable carries over 300 stations, plus Internet access, plus phone service. It would not mean adding another wire or pin to HDMI to carry CC signals, though that would have been easy originally, & could still be done with a spec revision.

    2) Simple text decoding/display is common on everything from $10 MP3 players to cell phones to kitchen appliances to... For CC display the highest cost is the electronics to overlay the captioning on the picture -- something already built-in to every US TV. If a $10 player can read/display MP3 file names, the actual cost of any added electronics to *read* an incoming CC signal is very trivial.

    3) Current standards call for BD players to handle Java, along with firmware updating via the Internet [something seldom used to fix things, but to add DRM & potentially render a player useless intentionally], & they're now up to what, BD Live version 6? There's no reason a new player [or existing player after an update], couldn't send an CC stream to the TV, provided there was a connection to send it over.
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    "I tried to follow your advice and connected the bluray player via red, white and yellow directly to the tv and my tv said cc on, but no cc showing."
    Some connection types = coax [RF Mod], Composite [RCA cable ends with *usually* Red/White (stereo) & Yellow (video)], Svid [separates different parts of the signal over separate wires], Component [forerunner to HDMI with 4 separate video cables using RCA cable ends], DVI, & HDMI. There is no requirement that TVs have to show CC from any signal other than their own tuner as I understand it. Likewise there is no requirement for any DVD or BD player to output CC, &/or pass the CC through the cables to the TV -- I tried over a dozen that will not, or on some cheaper players, CC will die during the movie. I'd suggest 1st off Google/Bing to see if anyone reported your player passes CC.

    "My User Adjustable closed captions only work during Digital feeds"
    RE: your HDTV, the US gov says basically if it's got a tuner, it has to decode/display captioning. Old style analog CC can be be scrolling etc, but usually there's only an on/off/CC channel setting. As originally implemented it may be all caps on black background, or your set may be able to use
    nicer format CC, usually found only on movies, & I suspect derived from the DVD's sub track [similar or identical content to what's on a DVD only shown by broadcast/cable channel]. Digital tuners working with QAM or OTA digital have different decoding/display circuitry, with more display options -- you can see this for example with the digital -> analog tuners/converters the gov was subsidizing. The CC is embedded in the digital video stream, & if mpg2, usually in an otherwise unassigned area of the file's headers.

    "All of my dvd players, except for my Panny, has a closed caption option where you turn them on"
    Hmmm. Got me curious -- I'll have to check players here. One advantage of CC analog was you could easily turn it on/off at the set, so to be honest I never saw the need/purpose of turning it off on the players so never looked. Personally when I recorded a DVD most of the time I converted CC to added subs because most DVD players don't pass CC through, as a sort of future proofing, not knowing if it would be possible to find such a player in the future. And/or I can play them on the PC & output HDMI with decent looking CC. I was going to look last night/this AM but the living room's full of plants as they're power-washing the patios -- I'll definitely have to look later.


    "That's true with older DVD's but I've noticed newer releases have descriptive subtitles that contain sounds."
    Some, not all.
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    I brought my own composite and S-Video cables to try with my parents' Philips DVP3962 when I dropped off a DVD for them to watch tonight.

    [Edit]To make ccs play,[End edit] I had to use interlaced output and as well as composite or S-Video connection. I also needed to turn on CCs in the player's internal menus as well as the TV.

    The integrated DVD player on my parents' Toshiba TV passes along DVD closed capioning automatically. My Panasonic DVD recorder does too, as long as I use interlaced output and either composite or S-Video to connect it to a TV.
    Last edited by usually_quiet; 29th Jun 2010 at 13:21.
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  19. PSCO2007
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    Originally Posted by mikiem View Post
    "I tried to follow your advice and connected the bluray player via red, white and yellow directly to the tv and my tv said cc on, but no cc showing."
    Some connection types = coax [RF Mod], Composite [RCA cable ends with *usually* Red/White (stereo) & Yellow (video)], Svid [separates different parts of the signal over separate wires], Component [forerunner to HDMI with 4 separate video cables using RCA cable ends], DVI, & HDMI. There is no requirement that TVs have to show CC from any signal other than their own tuner as I understand it. Likewise there is no requirement for any DVD or BD player to output CC, &/or pass the CC through the cables to the TV -- I tried over a dozen that will not, or on some cheaper players, CC will die during the movie. I'd suggest 1st off Google/Bing to see if anyone reported your player passes CC.

    "My User Adjustable closed captions only work during Digital feeds"
    RE: your HDTV, the US gov says basically if it's got a tuner, it has to decode/display captioning. Old style analog CC can be be scrolling etc, but usually there's only an on/off/CC channel setting. As originally implemented it may be all caps on black background, or your set may be able to use
    nicer format CC, usually found only on movies, & I suspect derived from the DVD's sub track [similar or identical content to what's on a DVD only shown by broadcast/cable channel]. Digital tuners working with QAM or OTA digital have different decoding/display circuitry, with more display options -- you can see this for example with the digital -> analog tuners/converters the gov was subsidizing. The CC is embedded in the digital video stream, & if mpg2, usually in an otherwise unassigned area of the file's headers.

    "All of my dvd players, except for my Panny, has a closed caption option where you turn them on"
    Hmmm. Got me curious -- I'll have to check players here. One advantage of CC analog was you could easily turn it on/off at the set, so to be honest I never saw the need/purpose of turning it off on the players so never looked. Personally when I recorded a DVD most of the time I converted CC to added subs because most DVD players don't pass CC through, as a sort of future proofing, not knowing if it would be possible to find such a player in the future. And/or I can play them on the PC & output HDMI with decent looking CC. I was going to look last night/this AM but the living room's full of plants as they're power-washing the patios -- I'll definitely have to look later.


    "That's true with older DVD's but I've noticed newer releases have descriptive subtitles that contain sounds."
    Some, not all.
    Thanks for reply Mikem,
    Here's what I found out after some experimentation,
    When connected via HDMI and playing a store-bought DVDm if I access the menu and select cc, it works.
    The DVDs that I recorded from TV, when the DVD player is connected via re, white and yellow, allow my TV (Panasonic) to access cc on or off, but the actual cc do not show on the screen
    If I play the same DVD through another LG player - non- bluray), the cc does show.
    It is kind of confusing, but I appreciate your input and courtesy.
    Thanks,
    Paul
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    @mikiem CCs support for Blu-Ray and DVD is an entirely N. America-centric problem. Look at Wikipedia for the list of companies responsible for the development of Blu-Ray and HDMI. The majority are headquartered in countries that don't use CCs. They use other captioning methods for TV, which Blu-Ray and HDMI don't support either, and mostly subtitles for DVD.

    Both subtitles and closed captions can be very good or very poor for timing, accuracy, or sound effects. Shame on you for trying to claim otherwise.

    I absolutely think taking up the Blu-ray and HDMI problem with media companies and getting them to provide better subtitle support makes good sense. Certainly more sense than badgering consumer electronics makers to add CC support when Blu-ray and HDMI already suport something that works just as well, and doesn't require any hardware changes to use.

    There is also no reason to expect that we should get to use our old media forever, or will want to. Something better always comes along, and within 10 years almost nobody wants to use the old media again. In only a few years people will want to watch DVDs about as much as most people now want to watch VHS. Some older DVD releases are already unpleasant to watch on an HDTV.

    MPEG-2 ATSC and QAM transport streams don't support 1080p yet and MPEG-4 ATSC and QAM transport streams haven't been implemented yet. Blu-Ray uses both 1080p and MPEG-4 codecs to produce a superior result. So how exactly would a 1080p H.264 movie be re-encoded to a MPEG-2 transport stream, and in real time? So much for the idea of sending an HD MPEG transport stream with embedded captions over coax to utilize existing ATSC/QAM CC technology...
    Last edited by usually_quiet; 28th Jun 2010 at 20:54.
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  21. PSCO2007
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    Thanks to all that replied,
    After calling LG, and being told to use red,yellow and white and change the BD player to 480i, I still cannot access the cc.
    They do show if I play the dvd in the LGd898 ( standard dvd player.)
    The store-bought dvds do show cc in the BD player with HDMI, so I'll just watch the recorded dvds in the standard player.
    Thanks all for taking the time to reply,
    Paul
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    Originally Posted by Psco2007 View Post
    Thanks to all that replied,
    After calling LG, and being told to use red,yellow and white and change the BD player to 480i, I still cannot access the cc.
    They do show if I play the dvd in the LGd898 ( standard dvd player.)
    The store-bought dvds do show cc in the BD player with HDMI, so I'll just watch the recorded dvds in the standard player.
    Thanks all for taking the time to reply,
    Paul
    The VBI in an analog cable TV signal can include additional information in proximity to the CCs, which some DVD recorders also capture along with the CCs. It confuses some players because they were designed to work with store-bought DVDs, which don't contain the extraneous data. In my case, when using Power DVD 5, I could read some of the other information recorded. It was intermixed with the CCs, producing a garbled mess.
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  23. Originally Posted by mikiem View Post
    Hmmm. Got me curious -- I'll have to check players here. One advantage of CC analog was you could easily turn it on/off at the set, so to be honest I never saw the need/purpose of turning it off on the players so never looked.
    My Panny should have a setting to turn on captions when I use HDMI but I can't find it. My old Apex dvd player does.
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