Anybody disapointed with the quality of cable on their HDTV? (1 Viewer)

[Kevin Beck]

Just a newbie question. I don't have a lot of buddies with big screen Tv's and theater systems. Actually, I only know one guy that has a theater, and its been so long since I have been over to his place I just don't remember.
I just purchased a Mits WS65819, don't have it set up yet with any system discs or the like, but have only hooked up regular old cable to it, and run the chanel memory. Should have the rest of the system running shortly, but as fpr plain old cable viewing goes,...boy, talk about funny colors, and some chanels are blurrrry,....is this just cable on a big set?
Thanks guys,...>>>--->

 

[Ted Ross]

I thought analog cable looked pretty good on my Toshiba 36hfx71(36 inch direct view)-then I exchanged it for a Hitachi 43uwx10b 43 inch RPTV & the cable looks like crap-digital cable looks fine, though.

 

[SteveA]

Regular cable looks great on my Tosh 50H81. Of course, I wired my house with RG6 quad shield cable, so my signal is absolutely pristine.

 

[Michael Silla]

Cable looks just fine on my Hitachi 53UWX10BA. I don't subscribe to the "so called" digital cable in my area so I cannot vouch for it's picture - good or bad.

Ted,

In general, I would expect a direct view set to have a better cable picture. That said, the Hitachi's seemed to do better than most sets that I've recently looked at.

Michael.

 

[Chris Vargas]

For me, yes, regular cable looks awful through my Toshiba 42H81. I do have the option of getting digital cable and may end up going that route if I have to.

 

[Jack Briggs]

I wouldn't bother with "digital" cable--a rip-off marketing ploy in my opinion.

Generally, standard-issue cable signals will tend to look less than impressive blown up large on an RPTV. Even with line-doubling employed, the adage "garbage in, garbage out" applies big time with cable signals. The better the set, the more revealing of cable's many, many flaws it is.

So, don't judge your purchase by how cable looks on it. Get a calibration disc--either one of The Big Two should suffice--tweak the picture, and enjoy your DVDs. HD, of course, will look better.

 

[John Royster]

I have a 65819. The picture tends to bloom a lot in the first 100 hours of use because the CRTs are still so new. Take care of that new set and turn your contrast down to about 30 percent during this critical time.

Calibration with Avia or Video essentials is an absolute must. As it stands now cable on my set looks pretty good considering the input. Some channels look VERY good, some channels are hideous.

FWIW - I use 960i instead of 480p for cable. Reduces some artifacts and is a little smoother.

 

[Roger DW]

I run my analog cable signals through my DTV receiver (RCA DTC100) with HD mode on, so all content is upconverted to 1080i. My set is the Pioneer SD-532HD5, 7" CRTs, so the realization of the 1920x1080 2 megapixels is somewhere between 70 and 80 percent, or ~1.5 megapixels. It makes my local analog cable programming look as good, if not better, than digital cable. Very smooth, line-free.

 

[Dan Kolacz]

If you are running standard analog cable you MUST invest in some sort of in/out device that offers conditioning of the cable signal. It makes a WORLD of difference.

I had standard analog cable plugged into my 61". I thought it looked good until I plugged it into a Monster HT1000 power strip. It also has the in/out for coax cabling.

What a major difference. I would even go so far as to say that some channels are almost on par with some of the digital cable signals I have seen. Colors are nice and vibrant. Before, my cable signal looked like a box of 8 crayons. Now it looks like a box of 64! Noise in the signal reduced dramatically as well.

Well worth it.

 

[Kevin Beck]

Wow guys,..
Thanks for the info. I'm going to get the set up discs. I just haven't had the time. Its killing me, but first things first. I have used them on my old sets. Made a huge difference in picture quality. I was amazed. Figured it was a most on a big set. I did not know of "break in" so to speak. Thats a good point. As well as the filters. I don't watch much actuall broadcast tv at all, so my main interest is movies. I was just set back a bit by the poor cable picture.
By the way,..John,..I was trying to set the 960i for cable, and couldn't seem to find it,..in the short amount of time I was in front of the thing this weekend,.."about 1/2 hour actually. Just where is the set up for this?
Thanks guys,...>>>--->
Ps,..I have a post in the amps and such forum,..anybody have a Crown CE?

 

[GregoryM]

I have "digital" cable running through an HD decoder box. HBO and Showtime HDTV (1080i) are the only HD channels, but they look fantastic. Shrek and Final Fantasy looked better than in theaters, and material originally from film is pretty close.

Standard channels vary greatly, I assume depending upon the degree of compression used to feed them, when running through the antenna input (which allows the use of stretch modes, POP, recording one program while watching another, etc. on the tv). When using the component inputs for standard def. signals, the box upconverts everything to 1080i, and it looks very smooth, if a bit soft, but unfortunately locks out stretch modes, forcing all 4 x 3 material to be displayed 4 x 3 with black bars.

I got the HD decoder box for HD material anyway, so that's where it counts. As I said, anything digital to start with (Shrek, Final Fantasy) looks better than in the theater. A Perfect Storm looked wonderful, and sounded fantastic. I've actually watched some wretched movies just because the 1080i looks so great. Valentine, Loverboy, and Saving Silverman look and sound wonderful, but even the best HT couldn't save them.

HBO's series (Six Feet Under, The Sopranos, Band of Brothers) all look and sound great.

 

[Roberto Carlo]

I have a Toshiba 43H71 and when I first got it, I was appalled by how bad my digital cable looked. Then I had an ISF calibration done and the difference was amazing. Some of my premium channels -- HBO and STARZ -- are between Laserdisc and DVD quality. (Add the DD 5.1 sound and it's a pretty good experience.) I agree with many of the other folks: proper setup and calibration is the key.

 

[Brian Shannon]

I was disappointed with cable over 5 years ago and switched to Direct TV.

I have never regretted it!

 

[John Royster]

Kevin,

In your setup menu, under advanced settings there will be a "disply mode" or something like that. You can select between 480p and 960i. Choose the one you like best.

Just to reiterate, your TV will change with time. I've heard this from all my buddies (they too were disappointed with cable on sonys, hitachis, toshibas) and countless posts on other video boards. After the CRTs get settled in all look better.

Oh, "garbage in, garbage out" definately applies as well.

 

[Kevin Beck]

Thanks guys,...>>>--->

 

[Brent Joye]

Has anyone switched from digital cable to DTV or Dish? People tell me the satellite is much better. When I switched with my 36" direct view, I didn't notice a real difference. Any experience with a big RPTV out there?

 

[Michael St. Clair]

Some digital cable is better than DBS Satellite. Around here, Warner Digital looks notably better than DirecTV, and a lot better than DISH. DBS satellite is a good deal more compressed than it used to be, unfortunately.
My main reference is a 53" HDTV, and I'd love to put DBS on it but I can't stand the poor picture quality. Digital cable, no problem.

 

[Brent Joye]

Michael,
What area are you in. I have TW digital cable in Greensboro, NC. I don't know if it varies by system or not.

 

[Michael St. Clair]

Southwestern Ohio.

 

[Artis Hall]

How are you calibrating your cable picture? Of course my Avia disc works to calibrate my 480i/p input to the DVD player but how are you using that on the other input the HD box is on? Are you just copying the settings over to the 1080i input? Seems that this is using your DVD settings for your HD box and would be incorrect.