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questions on audio and video

post #1 of 3
2/27/09 at 2:10pm
Thread Starter 
Newbie here. This forum looks like a good place to gain knowledge. I'm awaiting delivery of a Panasonic TH46PZ85U. The reviews I've read say the audio is pretty good but my guess is that running it thru my A/V receiver(Pioneer VSX-D914 [no HDMI]) will improve it. I'll also have a Sylvania NB501SL9 blu ray player connected via HDMI. My question #1 is whether its best to run the audio, via component cables, from the monitor to the A/V receiver OR run the audio from the blu ray player, via coax, to the A/V receiver, or maybe use both methods? Question #2 is about video.... I'm on DISH SD and they say to upgrade to HD requires replacement of the dish and both receivers, incurring a 1 time fee in excess of $75 plus $10 per month and a lock-in for 2 years. Don't want that much jail time. I'm considering over-the-air local HD and using DISH for SD. What is the general quality of SD programming on a HD TV? Would a upconvert box ahead of the TV do any good or does the TV do all the signal crunching necessary?
Thanks.
Bill M.
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post #2 of 3
2/27/09 at 6:38pm

Re: questions on audio and video

Quote:
Originally Posted by jaycity3
My question #1 is whether its best to run the audio, via component cables, from the monitor to the A/V receiver OR run the audio from the blu ray player, via coax, to the A/V receiver, or maybe use both methods?
Component cables are for video only. Since the BD player doesn't have 5.1/7.1 analog outputs, I'd just use the digital coax or optical, out to the A/V receiver.

Quote:
Originally Posted by jaycity3
What is the general quality of SD programming on a HD TV? Would a upconvert box ahead of the TV do any good or does the TV do all the signal crunching necessary?
The tv will probably do the upconverting, but SD channels on HD tvs, don't usually look that great. The bigger the tv, the worse they look. If the tv has a built-in ATSC tuner, you'll still need a good antenna, to get the local HD channels. If I were you, I'd look at DirecTv. For first time customers, they'll give you the HD equipment free (upfront), but has a small monthly rental charge, and of course, HD package price. See here: Good TV. Better TV. DIRECTV. Not sure if it's one or two yr. committment though. I think this is the way I'm gonna go, when I get my new tv........
Good luck!
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post #3 of 3
2/27/09 at 8:14pm

Re: questions on audio and video

Depending on your exact situation, OTA digital reception via the built-in tuner can be all over the map although more recent tuners have become much better at it than older ones. And fortunately, it also really doesn't require much cost to at least give it a reasonable try. You can start w/ any old basic UHF antenna you may already own -- most current OTA digital broadcasts use UHF band, but some will switch over to VHF later this year (as part of the mandated complete switch from analog to digital). If you can already receive a reasonable looking picture from various analog broadcasts, then chances are good that you can receive the digital ones.

Check out the following site as a good starter for figuring out how to get OTA reception in your area:

AntennaWeb


As for the upconversion quality of SD content, it depends a lot on the quality of the SD content itself. With a good quality DVD, the picture can look quite good though not quite as good as HD of course -- and the apparent visual quality also depends on exactly how close you sit to the display. If you plan to sit some 15ft from the 46" (like some people do), then don't worry about it at all. If you plan to sit more like 10ft away, then you'll probably start to see more clearly the difference in resolution between SD and HD -- there are other PQ diffs besides pixel resolution between DVD and BD (for instance), eg. color fidelity, compression quality, and those diffs can be noticeable from farther distances.

_Man_
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