Aspect ratio for stand-alone DivX/XviD players?

[Gew]

Hiya!

Just a bit curious. I have no experience whatsoever when it comes to hardware players. However, I've been thinking on getting something soon. Therefor, I'm curious on the aspect ratios on playback. I'm thinking on pulling backups on my DVD collection, DivX or such. In FairUse Wizard, there's this ticker-box "TV Display Mode". Having this enabled squeezes the output .avi horizontally, approx. in the same scale as PAL sets stretches pixels (5:4 -> 4:3 i.e).

However, it feels like a dumb move ripping with this enabled. I mean, the result would give me squeezed videos on PC playback. I know, it would be some sort of work-around to modify the aspect flag in the AVI header afterwards, and then making sure to play the video with ((some of the few)) media players that will actually respect these flags (i.e. VLC).

Anyways..
This feels like a wicked way of doing it. I mean. As of 2009, shouldn't most/some(? ,, please info me) external DivX players have some sort of "1:1 PAR simulation mode" as a standard, or even being able to act on .AVI's actual AR header flags, as a result displaying i.e. my "640x480movie.AVI" as proper 4:3 FS on the television set?

In fact, I have been thinking.. Could it even be that the Fairuse flag "TV display mode" is intended as a solution for ancient DivX players that act only on the television set's pixels; stretching the AVIs..

Finally..
Since I - like said - have no experience in external players whatsoever (havn't even touched one, actually), I don't know the real issues. If they are usually equipped with i.e. Options menus for generic AR settings. Take all these .. erhm.. pirate release groups.. for instance. As far as I know, they always drop their .AVI in proper "natural" dimensions. Would all these appear wack on DivX players? Feels like "not likely", but I need the truth, 'cuz you boys hold it!

Summary..
Say I go to my local store and get some cheap DivX players (i.e. Denver, Union) tomorrow.
Will it (most likely):

a) Display i.e. 720x576.AVI (5:4 in pixel-AR) as proper fullscreen on my PAL set? (performing PAL-like stretch over scan lines)
b) Display i.e. 640x480.AVI (4:3 in pixel-AR) as proper fullscreen on my PAL set? (thus acting SAR 1:1)
c) Have the possibility of both modes of operation.

Sorry if I'm asking obvious stuffs, but I'm really deep in the blue right now.

[jagabo]

Divx and Xvid support Pixel Aspect Ratio and Display Aspect Ratio flags. Using these, any frame size can be set to display at any aspect ratio. Not all players support PAR/DAR flags though. Check your prospective player.

If you want to be really sure, resize to 4:3 or 16:9 frame aspect ratios like 640x480 or 704x400 and use square pixel encoding. These will display with the proper aspect ratio on almost all Divx DVD players.

Good, inexpensive, Divx certified players are the Philips DVP 5990 and 5992. These aren't the greatest of DVD players (though they're acceptable) but their Divx/Xvid playback is pretty flexible. They do respect Divx/Xvid PAR/DAR flags.

If you want to go upscale look into the Oppo players: http://www.oppodigital.com/