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Opinions on Replacing Toshiba SD4800 With RP91 (1 Viewer)

Calvin S

Agent
Joined
Feb 25, 2002
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40
I have the Philips 34PW9818 television (which does not have a DVI input). This TV includes a scaler called PixelPlus, and DVDs can either come in through a 480P-only component input that bypasses PixelPlus, or through a 480I-only input that allows the use of PixelPlus. After some fairly extensive A/B'ing with my wife, I decided that 480I with PixelPlus looked better than 480P from the Toshiba.

After looking around to see what's available, it seems that good quality DVD players, particularly ones without DVI outputs are getting hard to find. Thus, I'm thinking of snatching this up from Crutchfield's Scratch-n-Dent section while it's still around. The RP91 is said to excel in interlaced output, and since I'm already using the Toshiba in interlaced mode, it seems a good fit.

The other other obvious competitors (LiteOn 2001 or Denon DVD1600) are getting very hard/impossible to find. Can I have some opinions on this purchase? Any other models I should really be looking at? My main criteria is Widescreen Anamorphic DVD picture quality -- no SACD/DVD-A for me.
 

greg_t

Screenwriter
Joined
Jan 18, 2001
Messages
1,654
The RP91 has reference quality video and interlaced output. It is a fantastic player that is highly tweakable. It's weak area is the deinterlacer, and your PixelPlus would likely be better. You could then use the 91's progressive mode to take advantage of it's anamaphoric scaling when watching non-anamaphoric dvd's. If you decide to give the 91 a shot, I suggest you do it soon as it has been discontinued.

The denon 1600 has near equal video quality with the Faroudja deinterlacer, which is likely better than PixelPlus. The disadvantage is you lose non-anamaphoric scaling that you would have with the 91. It is also not very tweakable like the 91. I believe it has similar layer change times.
 

Kwang Suh

Supporting Actor
Joined
Sep 4, 1999
Messages
849
By scaling, do you mean 4:3 aspect ratio adjustment, or do you mean zooming? The Toshibas have quite good zooming, and only okay 4:3 aspect ratio control.
 

Jose T

Stunt Coordinator
Joined
Sep 22, 2002
Messages
63
I would grab one of the RP-91 as they are going down in price since its discontinued. I've had no problems with mine and it has many options to twaek if you chose to. Try pricegrabber.com for other and cheaper option on this model.
 

Calvin S

Agent
Joined
Feb 25, 2002
Messages
40
Could one of you elaborate on what you mean by the tweakability of this player? I'm somewhat familiar with tweaking TVs (service menu), but I've never heard of tweaking a DVD player.

As far as my scaling comment, I could have more accurately described it as a de-interlacer/line-doubler. PixelPlus scales a 480I image to 1080I, but also increases the horizontal resolution (through interpolation) to attempt to make SD images look as close to HD as possible. After seeing how good it makes the Toshiba's interlaced content look, I decided the combination of a really good interlaced DVD player (as the RP91 is often described) and PixelPlus should give a killer image.
 

David Judah

Screenwriter
Joined
Feb 11, 1999
Messages
1,479
In addition to the standard adjustments like color, tint, sharpness, brightness, etc..., there are also several digital noise reductions, mosquito noise reduction, high & vertical sharpness, edge reduction etc... that make it very tweakable for discs of varying quality.

It also has memory, so the next time you put in a disc, it will automatically use the adjustments you made on that disc previously. I think it's memory stores adjustments for around 200 discs.

DJ
 

greg_t

Screenwriter
Joined
Jan 18, 2001
Messages
1,654
The 91's scaling is not upconversion to 1080i. The 91 converts 480i to 480p only. The scaling function is only available when the 91 is in progressive mode. Basically, as you probably know, you have two types of dvd, anamaphoric and non-anamaphoric. Playing non-anamaphoric requires you to switch from your TV's 16x9 mode to a zoom mode to display the image properly. You lose resolution when you leave the 16x9 mode, and the stretch modes on most sets are not good. This is why you hear so many people on here complain about non-anamaphoric.

The 91 will recognize if a dvd is anamphoric or not. If anamamphoric, it allows it to pass through normally. If non-anamaphoric, the 91 scales the image to 16x9 so that you can leave your TV in it's 16x9 mode and you don't lose resolution. It will display widescreen non-anamaphoric in it's proper aspect ratio and will scale 1.33 aspect ratio films such as Citizen Kane to still display in it's correct aspect ratio and adds black bars to the sides. All the while you can keep your TV in it's 16x9 mode. The 91 will automatically scale non-anamaphoric dvd's that are flagged correctly, and will let you force scaling on improperly flagged ones.
 

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