51WS510... How to get best out of SD? (1 Viewer)

[PeterN]

Just got done watching Bad Boys 2. DVD's look great! However, SD looks worse than my old 15 year old RPTV. Right now, I'm running Directv runing through s-video. I've done some minor tweaks but am still wondering if I can get a bettter picture. I'm waiting to borrow my friends DVE disc. Until then, does anybody have any sugguestions on what mode and setting I should be using for SD?

Thanks
-peter

 

[Jason Charlton]

Try setting the picture mode to "Movie" or "Pro". Pro mode completely disables the SVM, while Movie mode sets it to its lowest level. Any other artificial image enhancements will also be disabled. Reduce the contrast, or "Picture" setting to around 30-40%. If this is too dark for you, compensate by bumping up the brightness a bit. If you're not used to a properly calibrated set, don't worry - it should look darker than what you're used to.

I have regular, non-digital cable and the picture on my 57" Sony varies from acceptable to pretty good. It can vary from channel to channel. Properly calibrating your set using DVE or Avia will do wonders in reducing grain and will help mask (though not remove) the flaws inherent in SD material. As is often pointed out in the forum, blowing up SD material to 50+ inches WILL show the flaws that are otherwise unnoticeable on smaller displays.

-Jason

 

[PeterN]

Jason, thanks for the reply. I'm gonna try to play with those settings tonight. I turned my contrast/brightness down quite a bit. The image is darker, but it seems to be a little more clear. How about Color and Hue? Is it that bad to have those over 50%?

 

[Jason Charlton]

Color and hue are usually fine left at their factory settings/midpoint levels. It's the contrast that is typically set to dangerous levels out of the box. The sharpness is also usually set unnecessarily high, but it's effects are not as damaging to the set or detrimental to the picture as contrast. If the set has a color temperature setting, "Normal" or "Warm" is probably closest to the 6500K standard. "Cool" will give your set a very "Cameron-esque" blueish tint, but it's not very good for the set. I haven't used DVE (I have Avia) but I'm sure it does a fine job of explaining the reasoning behind the proper picture settings.

-Jason