HDTV & Aspect Ratio Dissatisfaction...

[Jim Frye]

OK, we have finally joined the digital TV environment and SWMBO is chafing at the many different programming views we have now. Last week, we purchased a new LCD HDTV with 1080p resolution and 120 Hrz capability. We also upgraded to the cable company's HD converter box with its attendant HD programming. Wow, what a difference in TV!!!!

I understand the different aspect ratios that are available (16:9, 15:9, 14:9, & 4:3) and how they appear on the display. The TV has the capability to switch between all of the ratios and zoom factors with a tap of a button the remote and we have experimented with all of this. I also understand that almost all of the programming coming into our setup is not up to the capability of our HDTV, even those stations that broadcast in HD. The upshot of this post is that SWMBO does not like the horizontal stretch that the TV does when displaying regular non-HD programming to fit the 16:9 format. The problem got worse when our daughter informed SWMBO that they don't have the stretch problem on their HDTV because of the satellite converter they use for their reception. They have a Sony DLP TV that is three years old, so I don't think the TV is doing any form of conversion to fit the 4:3 aspect ratio into 16:9 without the horizontal distortion.

Therefore my question to the assembled masses here is this: Do any of you know if any of the satellite converters or the satellite services do that conversion?

[JoeyGee]

Jim--former Buckeye Cable HDDVR and current DirectTV customer here. I don't think there is any difference btw cable and satellite companies as to how 16:9 and 4:3 pictures are displayed.

There should be a setting on your TV, with something about default 16:9 vs. 4:3. I personally don't like stretching 4:3. I like to leave it with the bars on the side, and just allow HD to swich to 16:9. I really have no control over it--SWMBO handles all the settings on the TV. I just say "That looks good, dear..."

[LCHIEN]

my wife doesn't like the bars on the side and i don't like fat actors. oh well.

unfortunately the TVs aren't smart enough to do the switching which would simplify matters.

on my home theater system, the sources are the OTA HD ASTC receiver and my DVD player. I never have to switch that one, I think he DVD identifies format correctly and the ASTC is all wide screen - even lo-def 4:3 program material is expanded to widescreen and hi-def scanning althouh its still blurry, before transmitting.
On my downstairs set, we have sources VHS, DVD, NTSC (analog cable) and ROKU so there's a mix so it really needs to be set all the time. It's never right. TO me aspect fidelity is just a critical as a sharp picture. In that respet, HD televisions fail.

[Jim Frye]

Aspect Settings...

Jim--former Buckeye Cable HDDVR and current DirectTV customer here. I don't think there is any difference btw cable and satellite companies as to how 16:9 and 4:3 pictures are displayed.

There should be a setting on your TV, with something about default 16:9 vs. 4:3. I personally don't like stretching 4:3. I like to leave it with the bars on the side, and just allow HD to swich to 16:9. I really have no control over it--SWMBO handles all the settings on the TV. I just say "That looks good, dear..."

Yes, I have the TV set to default to 16:9. In most cases, I am OK with the stretched view, but if it bothers me, I toggle to the Zoom1 setting, which is more like the 15:9 ratio to lose the stretch. We don't have the Buckeye HDDVR, just the HD converter. We have a Panasonic DVR, but it is not HD. It is for DVD playing and for VCR tape conversions to DVD. It is old enough to be only 480p resolution, but that will do until the industry figures out what to do with video (I am not going down the VHS/Beta path). The TV does a very nice job of interpolating the 480p and 720p broadcasts up to 1080p on its own.

Thanks for the comparison between the cable and satellite, that is what I was looking for. I will have a discussion with a Buckeye techie this week and see if I have missed something in the setup of the cable box or their services.

[thrytis]

I've recently upgraded to a Dish VIP222K receiver. I don't think i've had to switch the aspect/stretch/zoom mode between shows for it to display properly (no stretch or compression) when viewing. I have noticed that some shows do have the black at the sides, but that is obviously due to how they are broadcast because there is no stretching or compress going on. I do have some issues with the formatting when i'm recording via my computer over the SD connection, but i may just not have hit the right settings yet.

[gerti]

Having recently "upgraded" to HDTV myself, I am just amazed at the poor functionality and design of todays modern electronics...

[Sorry, this turned into a rant...]

All I want is a simple setting "scale to maximum picture size without modifying the aspect ratio". You'd think there would be a setting for that, but no, depending on the source material frequent changes are needed.

And HDMI: no support for Closed Captions! That is almost dumber than coming up with the CD format and not including artist, title etc on the medium. So for the occasional DVD that has no subtitles but does have CC, HDMI is out and we'll have to use component.

Oh, and then (again depending on the source material) HDTVs take more or less time to process the image before they display it (speak: it is delayed). So if you run your audio through a receiver, it ends up being out of sync. Now the modern receivers allow you to add a delay, but with all that modern technology you shouldn't have to!

And videogames... Here the delay becomes a real problem. My wife used to love her DDR, until the HDTV messed up the timing. And the game developers real poor excuse of an adjustment for that is just a joke.

I got to wonder what is wrong with todays breed of engineers. They just never seem to step back to look at the bigger picture. Very disappointing!

Times before HDTV were much easier. If it weren't for that great picture quality...

[TheChief]

I addressed the delay problem by feeding my HDMI sources to the TV and using the TV's digital audio output to feed the HT receiver, rather than using HDMI for video only and feeding the audio out from the source. Never had a sync problem this way.

[OpaDC]

Maybe I just got lucky, but I have no problem with the aspect ratio. Bought the TV about 3 months ago (first HDTV for us). It's a Toshiba and while it does have zoom features, as long as I leave it on "normal" setting all the black bars (ratios) set automatically. No bars, bars on sides, bars all around, no distortion on people that isn't done by camera work such as HGTV with wide angle lens. Maybe check with store you bought it from.

[Kristofor]

There are a few causes of these problems, but probably not a single easy answer.

On the question about Sat. boxes doing the conversion, at least on the DirecTV ones they can. If you leave it set to pillarbox you'll see full screen HD content and SD content will have the bars on the side.

But that still doesn't solve all of the issues. Often on SD channels the content will still be provided in what appears to be a widescreen format but what is really a 4:3 signal that just happens to have black bars on the top and bottom of the 4:3 picture. This ends up with a picture frame effect (black all around the picture). Zooming can fill the screen but the video quality suffers...

I have always preferred letterbox and pillarbox to keep the right aspect ration rather than pan & scan, stretch, or panoramic approaches. That was true back in the early 90's when I would go out of my way to rent from a store that carried laserdiscs in widescreen on a 27" TV. It was true when I was using an early 2nd gen (~$400) DVD player and a 32" CRT, and it's even more true today with HD content and large 50"+ display's today. But at the same time I still hear people complain about "those annoying black lines" all the time, and when I travel I would say 9 out of 10 hotels have their TVs set up to stretch or otherwise fill the frame.

The reason why the engineers can't "solve" the problem is that there isn't a single "right" answer. Normally I would zoom a letterboxed show on a SD channel, but if I need the subtitles or CC that content may then be off the screen. For me, changing the aspect ratio and zoom settings is easy enough not to be a problem. For my wife, extra fat people or fish-eye view doesn't seem to bother her, though she's fine with me "fixing" it if I'm around. In either case problem solved until they come up with a system that reads minds better...

[vaking]

unfortunately the TVs aren't smart enough to do the switching which would simplify matters.

I think some TVs are smart enough.
I have Verizon FIOS and I have 2 HDTV-capable TVs. One is several years old and all controls are manual. When I switch from regular channel to HD channel - I need to manually change the resolution. I was OK with it until I got a new TV, now I consider it annoying.
The other TV is 2 months old. When I swicth to a channel with standard resolution - the TV sets its ratio to 4:3 and displays side bars. When I switch to a high def channel - a message appears for a second "receiving synchronization signal" and then TV switches to 16:9 ratio and picture takes full screen.
The only time I need to control things manually is when I watch an old movie that was made in wide screen format shown on standard definition channel. In this case TV natively would set the screen with bars on all sides and I manually expand it to take full screen.
Please note that TV is capable of 1080P but most Hi-Def programming still uses 720p. The TV is programmed to show 1080p or 720p at full screen 1080 resolution, but to show standard resolution at 4:3 ratio without image distortion. There is an option to stretch 4:3 images to full screen resolution (fat actors) but we don't like it.

[LarryG]

I think some TVs are smart enough.

Yes; both of mine do (both Samsung LCDs, one a 550 series, the other a 650).

[HarmsWay]

All HD cable or satellite boxes should be capable sending a consistent signal to your TV. Presumably you'd always want HD content full screen and SD content either all stretched, all zoomed or all normal but YOUR choice. For those such Loring who like me prefer to preserve aspect but whose SO's prefer to fill the screen it may not be that simple. Regardless though, that should be a setting in the cable box and independent of the TV. It gets more difficult when you have different sources offering HD & SD and probably the worst for DVD players which have widescreen SD content in many different aspect ratios where it's not simply always zoomed or stretched to get the full width with the aspect preserved. The cable/satellite widescreen 4:3 programming is just annoying (especially on HD channels where they should be zooming at the source). I have one TV that tries to automatically zoom to fill the screen, but it quite often is not possible on those 4:3 widescreen programs because they stick a channel logo at the bottom of the screen or closed captions as Kroistofor says.

Bob

[Kristofor]

It gets more difficult when you have different sources offering HD & SD and probably the worst for DVD players which have widescreen SD content in many different aspect ratios where it's not simply always zoomed or stretched to get the full width with the aspect preserved.

For me DVD from disc or ripped is actually the easiest/most consistent. My players are all HDMI connected (PS3, PCH, XBMC, and a lonely Phillips stand-alone), and are set to the resolution of the TV. The %95+ of my movies which are in anamorphic widescreen format automatically fill the screen width with almost no letterboxing on 1.85:1 content, and the expected (minimal) letterboxing on 2.35:1 content.

There are a few oddball non-anamorphic widescreen DVDs that behave a lot like widescreen content on an SD station, for most of the hardware players, though software and one of the HW devices can be set to crop the pictureframe border.

[Jim Frye]

HDTV Aspect Ratio Screen Fit...

Yes; both of mine do (both Samsung LCDs, one a 550 series, the other a 650).

The TV we purchased is a Samsung LCD 650 series also. I went back and re-read the manual and it appears that I had the picture size set at 16:9 as the default as implied. This set also offers a "Screen Fit" option for picture size. In this mode, the set will offer up the image without any cutoff if the signal is via the HDMI (720p 1080i, or 1080p), component (1080i, or 1080p), or DTV (1080i) interfaces. I have the HD cable box connected to the TV via one of the four HDMI ports. So far, things look much better and I don't see the stretching like before. This means that not as many broadcasts are shown at 16:9, and you notice a lot more picture sizes as the broadcast shifts between the show and various commercials. You can still force the picture size to what you want with the remote.

It is amazing how many different formats are being broadcast these days. This TV shows you every time the format changes with a pop up window that lists the resolution and the scanning Hz numbers. I still want to discuss this situation with the cable system techies to see if there is something the HD cable box can/should do. I didn't receive a manual with the cable box as I did the swap myself at one of their customer service centers nearby and they don't have a .pdf file available online. I haven't mentioned this change to SWMBO to see if she notices any change.

BTW, this set also has an automatic volume leveling function. Commercials don't blare on this setting like they used to do on the old TV. Also, the volume stays the same from channel to channel. That has been a major aggravation with us for years.

I'm learning more and more about HDTV than I thought I would need to. I did a fair amount of homework prior to purchasing this thing, but there is a lot more to absorb. Old dog, new tricks time.