Re: OT: HDTV Help(Fritz!!!), was "opinions"

Bel , I just spent about an hour answering some of your questions and
all my hard work has dissapeared into parts unknown.

Argh...I am so sorry about that. :( I know how you feel, back when I
only had the Sega Saturn Netlink as my gateway to the internet, I lost
many an email(and lots of time) when it'd crash, or screw up, or
something. Again, I'm sorry about that. Whenever I do a particularly
long email or post(like I am doing now, or just pretty much anytime I
post anything here;), I will either copy what I'm doing and put it into
a Word doc, or just start from a Word doc all together. This way, even
if the browser crashes, or whatever, you'll have your secondary Word(or
whichever text formatting app you prefer) doc to back you up. It has
saved me quite a bit in the past.

Email me any
questions you may have and I'll try again tommorow night. I put you on
my safe list so that your emails won't accidentally dissapear like all
that typing/replying that I lost tonight. If you want we can discuss it
via the phone but I work second shift 2-12 pm eastern time.

Ok, I'll shoot you an email. :)

I'll check
what settings my dashboards are set at and such and what gives me the
best picture quality etc.,and write them down this time so that i'm
not jumping from my tv to the computer .

Solid, much appreciated.

I believe one of my four
legged "children " may have been doing a dance on my keyboard during
one of these excursions from my tv to the computer and sent my reply to
parts unknown.

I know I've had JD, Baraka, Sister, etc. running across the keyboard
many a time, and have been responsible for many an error. Those damn
cats! ;)

I'll give you a quick summary of what I wrote. 1) my
xbox dashboard is set at (Video mode) widescreen,
480p(yes)720p(yes)1080i(yes)

Ok, cool, this is what I have mine currently set to as well.

2) 360 dashbord is set at 720p
widescreen .

Wish I had one...;)

3) I have found no reason at all to change these
settings as a 720p picture and a 1080i picture seem about the same to
my eyes

Yeah, I'm starting to lean that way as well. I've looked at Enter the
Matrix in 1080i and then something like Total Overdose in 720p and I
just can't see any difference. Now, I *can* tell the difference between
480i and 480p though. 480p stuff, in widescreen(or Full) mode is
awesome. Man, I *love* playing these games in widescreen!

4) Geta dedicated dvd player (a progressive scan one for
watching movies and save the wear and tear on your game machines).

Yeah, I'm actually thinking of picking up one of those DVD players that
can actually upscale 480i stuff to 720p/1080i. Wish the damn
Xbox(original) allowed for progressive scan DVD playback...but you have
to mod it to enable it(unlike the 360 which does it out of the box).

5)
your dvd's may be looking grainy because they aren't the widescreen
version of the movie. From now on when you purchase dvd's buy the
widescreen version.

I think I actually figured this one out. I was reading something about
that "Super Fine Pitch" screen that the TV has, and how you need to be
artound 6 to 7 feet away from it to get the effect. I had been watching
stuff from, like, maybe 2 feet away from the screen(I know, I know, I'm
gonna kill my eyes) that first few hours I had with the TV...which is
bad, real bad. When you move back to the 6 or 7 foot length, it really
does help kill the grainy look of the DVDs in 480i. It's incredible. I
was watching Blade II this morning, and I'd get real close to the
screen, see how grainy it was....back up, and it looked awesome. I am
much impressed with the SFP thing they've got going.

6) dvd's are filmed in different aspect ratios so
that even some widescreen movies have different bar widths on them.

Yeah, I'm actually kind of disappointed with that. I mean, you watch
something like Blade II and whatever ratio it's in, it takes up the
*full* screen, all 34 inches, no letterboxing. Nothing is cropped, it's
all there. Now, you take something like Star Wars Episode II or
something, and you get letterboxing on the top and bottom! I don't
understand, I thought that the whole point of 16X9 displays was so that
these movies could be displayed exactly like they were intended...not
letterboxed. :(

7)
contact sony about getting the right remote for your tv as you may not
be able to get your tv menues to the factory defaults without it

I have found the model I need, but I've yet to find it for less than
$30. Looking over the printed out manual, about the only thing I could
see that I'd loose if I got an universal remote would be the "reset"
key, which, like you mentioned, resets the TV back to factory defaults.

8) you
saved a bundle on that tv and it was a floor model the odds are your
settings for your picture quality are out of whack as every saleperson
probably got bored at work and messed with them ( brightness and
contrast are often messed with at the stores to make a tv look better
than other tv's that where on display next to it)

You got that right. I was looking through the onscreen menus and
noticed that they have these little transparent dots on the
sliders...which I'm guessing represent factory defaults. Some of the
stuff was *way* off, and once I started messing with it I started
seeing much better color and clarity.

9) look in the
yellow pages under televisions and look for a shop/technician that is
ISF certified. These technicians will have codes available to them for
fine tuning and adjusting your tv that the manufacturer doesn't include
in the menues. This will run you a few hundred dollars.

Oy, I don't know that I'd be able to swing this. Right now I don't even
have a stand for the TV(it's just on the floor), and with those things
going for insane prices of $100+, that'd have to be my first goal in
accessories for it. I have heard of these "Calibration" discs that one
can buy. I've heard that can really help you get the TV into great
viewing shape, but I've also heard that you have to change the settings
quite a bit depending on what you're doing. Not sure how much of any of
that is true, but the discs are only around $30 I think, so I may give
it a shot. I wonder how much better they'd be than, say, the THX
Optimizer some DVDs come with...

10) get some
decent cables and not the spagetti thin ones that came with your hd
packs. There's no need to pay for "Monster" cables. Best Buy has good
AR brand cables and Radio Shack carries good cables as well. I didn't
think it would make a difference but it does.

As I got my HD AV Pack used(for the Xbox) I'm not sure if it came with
the original MS-provided cables or not. They don't seem overly thin,
and they're gold plated, so I'm guessing they are alright(for now).

11) your input numbers in
your tv matchup to the jacks in back of your tv 1-3 are probably
s-video,4 is probably composite,5/6 are probably hdtv and 7 is your
hdmi/dvi jack. You can disable these in the video menu of your tv menu
so that unused ones don't come up and send a blast of white noise to
your amp/tv speakers when you change them with the tv/video button on
your tv or remote.

Good call. I *cannot* believe how many damn inputs this thing has! Does
the Xbox 360 have an HDMI port?

12) I think that there's a button combo for the xbox
to set the display at 480p , it should be available online possibly at
gamesages.com.(for the dashboard display)

Yeah, I've got that down. It's weird the way they make you do it...but
I guess they do that so you don't accidentally set it when you should
not have.

13) This was pretty much what
I had replied to you before and it's getting late for me. Email me any
questions you may have, such as what settings your tv menus should be
at default etc. and i'll email you back. Fritz

Thanks again so much for the help, and again I'm sorry about your
original reply getting lost and you loosing all that time. I hate it
when that happens...it's almost like you've been robbed or something,
you know? Speaking of, I still need to call the police on damn Monolith
for Blood II...;)

Bel

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