Widescreen monitors and widescreen DVDs

[samijubal]

Why are 1.85:1 DVDs letterboxed on a widescreen monitor? 1:85:1 and 16:9 should be the same thing. I can make it fullscreen, but I lose the sides. When it's set to keep aspect ratio, it's letterboxed. I don't see the point to a widescreen monitor if everything is letterboxed anyway. I'm using a 19" Viewsonic monitor and the Power DVD that came with the PC.

[Noahtuck]

Why are 1.85:1 DVDs letterboxed on a widescreen monitor? 1:85:1 and 16:9 should be the same thing. I can make it fullscreen, but I lose the sides. When it's set to keep aspect ratio, it's letterboxed. I don't see the point to a widescreen monitor if everything is letterboxed anyway.

If 1:85:1 & 16:9 was the same thing why would they have two diff. aspect ratio's

I've checked before a long time ago on my big 54" because i could not really see a diff. but when i put a piece of tape on the side of the screen i could see the black bars on the top and bottom were a little wider on one than the other.
On a pc monitor i don't know because i still use 17" - 21" 4:3 CRT's.
But i would imagine even on a widscreen tv or monitor one is going to show a little of the top and bottom bar's if it's the aspect ratio that has the wider bars.

[samijubal]

The bars aren't tiny, they are at least as big as a 1.85:1 movie on a 4:3 TV.

[Steve Stepoway]

Are you sure the movie your are talking about is 1.85? Lots of (most) "widescreen" movies are 2.35. That's about 16x7, and would have fairly wide bars letterboxing it.

Steve

[Noahtuck]

Don't they make diff. aspect ratio widescreen monitors ?

I thought i have seen some that were wider than others being the same height ?
Which would change how the same aspect ratio WS movie would look on it.

I never really paid much attention to widescreen monitors as i still prefer the big 4:3 CRT's, but i am thinking the widescreen monitors are not the same aspect ratio as what movies are so you would see some of the black bars on the top and bottom.

Honestly, without ever owning one, i always wondered what the point of a widescreen monitor was ? I love WS movies on my big screen but always thought the WS TV's were kind of a waste.
Okay, everyone can beat me up now for that statement

Are you sure the movie your are talking about is 1.85? Lots of (most) "widescreen" movies are 2.35. That's about 16x7, and would have fairly wide bars letterboxing it.

Steve

Yep!! good point!! those baby's have a WAY skinny picture area!!
But i have a lot of all the diff. WS ratios. and the first two he mentioned have maybe a 1" diff. in the black bars on a 54". The 2.35 would be a lot more...

[edDV]

This summarizes the issue. Picture = 1k words.

[kingbe14]

It could be that the dvds he has are older dvds that are letterboxed and are not the newer ones which are anamorphic for widescreen tvs? That's what I'm thinking...

[samijubal]

Are you sure the movie your are talking about is 1.85? Lots of (most) "widescreen" movies are 2.35. That's about 16x7, and would have fairly wide bars letterboxing it.

Steve

The movies are definitely 1:85. In fact it was a Warner movie and most of their movies are matted and have smaller bars on a 4:3 TV.

[kingbe14]

http://www.smr-home-theatre.org/anamorphic/Anamorphic.html

[samijubal]

Honestly, without ever owning one, i always wondered what the point of a widescreen monitor was ?

The WS was $20 less, so I went with it. Good for TMPGEnc anyway.

[guns1inger]

As EdDV has pointed out, 16:9 is 1.78:1, not 1.85:1. Anything wider (1.85:1 -> 2.40:1 or more) will have black bars. Some cheap widescreen TVs have a wider bezel, which can hide some of the bars on 1.85:1 in the overscan area, but that is poor design, not clever.

[manono]

My Acer 19" widescreen LCD computer monitor is 1440x900=1.6:1. I believe that's true for the Viewsonic 19" models also. My (and your) monitor isn't 16:9 but 16:10. 1.85:1 movies have a significant amount of black bars above and below. So what?

[budz]

My Acer 19" widescreen LCD computer monitor is 1440x900=1.6:1. I believe that's true for the Viewsonic 19" models also. 1.85:1 movies have a significant amount of black bars above and below. So what?

I have the Viewsonic 19 inch widescreen LCD which is 1440x900 and if you don't install the correct driver (manufacturers cd) you won't get the correct pixel resolution in the properties settings.

[samijubal]

Maybe that's the problem. I haven't installed the drivers that came with the monitor, I've just been using whatever is in the video card.

[Conquest10]

Aren't computer monitors 16:10? I know mine is. So I still get small black bars on HD content.

[budz]

Maybe that's the problem. I haven't installed the drivers that came with the monitor, I've just been using whatever is in the video card.

I didn't install the drivers the first time I booted up the pc so I got a weird looking resolution. I uninstalled the video card first then let windows find the drivers. Then I installed the drivers from the Viewsonic 19 inch widescreen cd. Only then was I able to get the 1440x990 resolution.

[samijubal]

My video card had the 1440x900 before installing the drivers. I did the driver from the disc, didn't make any difference. It's no big deal, it's not like I'm going to watch DVDs on a PC anyway. I just don't see the advantage to a WS monitor when DVDs are still letterboxed. WS sure isn't better on the internet.

[edDV]

My video card had the 1440x900 before installing the drivers. I did the driver from the disc, didn't make any difference. It's no big deal, it's not like I'm going to watch DVDs on a PC anyway. I just don't see the advantage to a WS monitor when DVDs are still letterboxed. WS sure isn't better on the internet.

Its all about watching your 720x480 DVDs stretched out (upscaled) by the graphics card to the native resolution of your display (1440x900 in this case). DVD like HDTV supports only 4:3 and 16:9 (1.78:1). Aspect ratios of 1.85:1 or 2.35:1 are letterboxed on the DVD.

If you manually override aspect ratio in your graphics card settings, you can "make it fit the screen" if you like people to look slightly tall and thin. If you want 2.35:1 at correct aspect ratio, it will display on your monitor at 1440x613. 1.78:1 would show 1440x808.

[samijubal]

There's a quite a few ways to make it fit. 3 or 4 different settings in the video card, and different resolutions. Most of them do make it look funny, a couple take some from the sides.

[edDV]

There's a quite a few ways to make it fit. 3 or 4 different settings in the video card, and different resolutions. Most of them do make it look funny, a couple take some from the sides.

Generally you want the graphics chip to handle the upscale to the native resolution of the display rather than switch the display to a lower resolution to more closely match the 720x480 DVD. 800x600 may display 720x480 1:1 but the aspect ratio will be screwed up (1.5:1 outer frame) and you will have black edges all around..

Use the graphics chip to upscale.