HDTV and Progressive Scan Question ...

[Rez.]

Hello.

I've had my HDTV LCD Display for about six months now and up untill a few days ago, I also had the HDTV channel pack provided by my cable company. I was able (Through the HD Box) to display HDTV channels in 1080i, 720P, 480P and 480i.

My question however concerns DVD playback. After the switch to SDTV I found myself with a component cable free so I decided to hook my DVD player (Which has progressive scan capabilities) to my HDTV through it's Component inputs to watch my DVDs with better clarity.

The DVD player is a Phillips DVP5140 and the TV is a Magnavox 26MF605W/17. When I first tried to set the DVD player to Progressive mode, It informed me it was doing a test. It flickered for a few seconds then defaulted back to a standard display mode. I looked through the DVD player's manual and it said that I would need to first turn of Progressive mode on the TV, Enable it on the DVD and then turn progressive mode back on the TV. The problem is there is no such option on my TV. I have the right cables for progressive and I have verified that they are working. Could it be my TV doesn't support Progressive mode? I always thought Progressive mode was simply upconverting the DVD to 720P or was it 480P? I know my TV can display these resoloutions so I was wondering if anyone here might know what is going on.

Thank you for reading.

[edDV]

The 26MF605W/17 is a 1280x720 (720p) native display. It should accept 720x 480p over the YPbPr (Green-Blue Red) and upscale internally to 1280x720p. That should be it.

Most HDTV sets will auto adjust to progressive input but this one may need a menu setting. Check the manual. Progressive DVD players should be capable of menu selected 480p out. Many have an escape mode back to 480i because nonprogressive TV owners loose the menu when mistakenly switching to progressive. To make the setting stick, it needs to sense a progressive connection or there is some kind of response they expect you to make before it switches back.

Your player seems to have a DVI out and the TV has DVI in. You can try that connection as well.

[Rez.]

Hi and thank you for the response.

I took your advice and searched for a manual online and found much to my embarrasment that I had the Component cable hooked up to the wrong inputs. I assumed that the cables would hook into the Component inputs found on a sidepanel when they ought to have been connected to the HD inputs at the back. Apparently the Component video source only displays 480i and the HD inputs output to 480P and 720P. My mistake for not reading the maual more carefully.

My victory, However, was short lived. Changing to progressive mode on the DVD player went fine but upon playing a DVD in progressive mode I seem to have a dot that displays bright white on dark backgrounds and a deep black on bright backgrounds. When I switch back to normal mode the dot dissapears. Maybe I'll try and invest in some better quality cables later on down the road.

Thank you once again for the response, Appreciated.