Desperately Looking for a DVD Player with Overscan Compensation Feature

[Cottontree]

Hi folks. I've been looking (in vain) for a Region 2 DVD player which has the ability to shrink the picture just enough to bring the entire image within the visible region on my television screen (thereby undoing the effect of overscanning by the TV set).

My current (old and dying) Toshiba DVD player has such a "Shrink" feature (sometimes alternatively referred to as "Reduce" or "Inverse Zoom") and I have become incredibly attached to this way of watching films - so much so that I have, thus far, resisted the pressure to buy a new player despite the fact that fewer and fewer discs will load successfully on the one I've got.

I gather (from this site and elsewhere on the internet) that a considerable number of other people have encountered this problem, but so far the only promising solutions I've discovered seem to date from several years ago and to be no longer relevant.

If anyone here knows of a currently available (Region 2) player which has this feature, I would be extremely grateful to hear about it.

(Alternatively, if anybody knows of any other way to surmount this problem - other than simply surrendering to the iniquities of overscan - please let me know.)

[edDV]

All TV sets overscan. Older CRT sets increase overscan as the set ages. Newer LCD/plasma sets also overscan for all the known reasons.

Any video production class makes it the first issue that the shooter allow for overscan in any video acquisition or production. When broadcasters or DVD authors are presented with tightly cropped video frames, they must shrink and border the video to compensate for overscan.

Most modern TV sets and DVD players have some aspect ratio compensation modes but quality variable zoom is cost prohibitive.

Today the burden falls to the producer of video material to get this right.

Alternative is to buy a fixed pixel TV (LCD or Plasma) with "PC port" usually over a VGA for connection to a PC display card. These ports usually don't overscan. As such they will display the full PC desktop.

Then you connect this to a later model AVIVO or Pure Video display card that offers variable sizing for video file playback.

[jagabo]

Someone linked to this the other day:

http://www.hkflix.com/hardware/xq/asp/pid.1/qx/details.htm

Jaton has found a few more of its PSD-7611K players that have XY scaling and infinite zoom. These features are useful for eliminating overscan...

It's no longer available from that seller but you might be able to find one somewhere.