HDTV's and DVD's

[pepegot1]

I have a 32" Samsung TV that plays my DVD's perfectly. They are upscaled and fit the entire screen-no vertical letter boxing. Upon close examination, the picture remains clear. I have a DVD player, in 480P mode, connected to the TV.
We have a 60" LG TV in the Clubhouse with a LG Blu-Ray player connected to it. The DVD's upon close examination look like s ---. From ten feet away the DVD's are somewhat acceptable. The DVD's are vertically letter boxed, unlike the 720P Samsung TV.
Is this because the Samsung has better upscaling or does the size of the LG (1080i) TV make the difference? Would a better DVD player connected to the LG help?

Your thoughts on this would be appreciated. Also, how can DVD performance be improved on large HDTV's like the LG?

[edDV]

I have a 32" Samsung TV that plays my DVD's perfectly. They are upscaled and fit the entire screen-no vertical letter boxing. Upon close examination, the picture remains clear. I have a DVD player, in 480P mode, connected to the TV.
We have a 60" LG TV in the Clubhouse with a LG Blu-Ray player connected to it. The DVD's upon close examination look like s ---. From ten feet away the DVD's are somewhat acceptable. The DVD's are vertically letter boxed, unlike the 720P Samsung TV.
Is this because the Samsung has better upscaling or does the size of the LG (1080i) TV make the difference? Would a better DVD player connected to the LG help?

Your thoughts on this would be appreciated. Also, how can DVD performance be improved on large HDTV's like the LG?

Are these (2.35 to 1) movie DVD discs or 16:9 (1.78 to 1) material? Movies are supposed to be letterbox on a 16:9 screen.

If the LG Blu-Ray player is connected 1080i or 1080p it may just be the screen size is revealing more flaws in the video, or the player is doing a poor DVD upscale. How do Blu-Ray discs look on the 60"?

You could always test your 480p DVD player on the LG and see how well the LG TV upscales.

[pepegot1]

These are 4:3 DVD's-home made. We have no Blu-ray discs. The player is connected by component cables.

[edDV]

4:3 DVD is supposed to show with black side pillars. Most TV sets give the option to stretch 4:3 horizontally to "fill the screen" but it distorts the image.



2.35 to 1 movies will show as letterbox

[pepegot1]

Samsung warns against using the 4:3 setting for a long time: "Do not watch 4:3 format for a long time. Traces of borders displayed on the left, right and center of the screen may cause image retention (screen burn) which are not covered by the warranty." However, their screen expansion is quite good-so I can live with that.
If I watch a DVD movie, I can switch to 4:3 temporarily.

[jman98]

Samsung warns against using the 4:3 setting for a long time: "Do not watch 4:3 format for a long time. Traces of borders displayed on the left, right and center of the screen may cause image retention (screen burn) which are not covered by the warranty." However, their screen expansion is quite good-so I can live with that.
If I watch a DVD movie, I can switch to 4:3 temporarily.

For what it's worth, I have a Samsung LCD TV that supports 1080p natively and is 40 inches. It contains no such warning in my manual. I just checked to confirm that. I know that their smaller TVs like yours are usually 720p so maybe that warning is specific to them. Just wanted to make the point that this warning is not typical.

[jman98]

I suppose I could also add that I think my brother has a Samsung the same size as yours and it supports some kind of zoom type feature that fills the screen for everything. It actually does a pretty good job and the image doesn't look distorted so I suspect that your TV may be set to do this.

[usually_quiet]

Whether or not there is a warning may depend on the age and model. My parents 26-inch Samsung 450 series 720p TV purchased in 2008 has such a warning. (I keep the manual on my computer in .PDF format in case they have a problem and call me for help.)

From the manual:

Important Warranty Information Regarding Television Format Viewing
Wide screen format LCD Displays (16:9, the aspect ratio of the screen width to height) are primarily designed to view wide screen format full-motion video. The images displayed on them should primarily be in the wide screen 16:9 ratio format, or expanded to fill the screen if your model offers this feature and the images are constantly moving. Displaying stationary graphics and images on screen, such as the dark side-bars on nonexpanded standard format television video and programming, should be limited to no more than 5% of the total television viewing per week.

Additionally, viewing other stationary images and text such as stock market reports, video game displays, station logos, web sites or computer graphics and patterns, should be limited as described above for all televisions. Displaying stationary images that exceed the above guidelines can cause uneven aging of LCD Displays that leave subtle, but permanent burned-in ghost images in the LCD picture. To avoid this, vary the programming and images, and primarily display full screen moving images, not stationary patterns or dark bars. On LCD models that offer picture sizing features, use these controls to view different formats as a full screen picture. Be careful in the selection and duration of television formats used for viewing. Uneven LCD aging as a result of format selection and use, as well as burned-in images, are not covered by your Samsung limited warranty.

[Gavino]

my brother has a Samsung the same size as yours and it supports some kind of zoom type feature that fills the screen for everything. It actually does a pretty good job and the image doesn't look distorted

It's impossible for 4:3 content to fill a 16:9 screen without either losing part of the picture or distorting it - you can't cheat the laws of geometry.

From the manual:

viewing other stationary images and text such as [...] station logos [...] should be limited as described above for all televisions.

Difficult to avoid nowadays when every goddam channel displays a distracting logo.
Fortunately, the latest displays are much less prone to burn-in.

[manono]

It's impossible for 4:3 content to fill a 16:9 screen without either losing part of the picture or distorting it - you can't cheat the laws of geometry.

Ever seen widescreen video encoded as 4:3? You can zoom that and keep all the picture and the correct AR. Looks like crap, though.

[pepegot1]

My 4:3's look pretty good so, I have no need to set the size to 4:3.