Aspect ratios between players? (1 Viewer)

[Ryan Wright]

I posted this in the hardware section & didn't get a response; maybe someone here will know the answer?
I borrowed my buddy's Playstation 2 over the weekend to see how it performed on a 65" 16:9 display. (It was amazing - but that's not the point of my post) Anyway, Saturday evening, my wife wanted to watch a movie with me. Having yet to see a "regular" DVD player's output to my TV (I bought a progressive scan player right off the bat), and since the PS2 supports DVD playback, I decided to do a quick comparison. I wanted to see if progressive scanning was all that it was cracked up to be. (It was, by the way)
We threw "The Wedding Planner" into the PS2 and hit play. The first thing I noticed (besides the reduced clarity) was a huge amount of black space above & below the picture. I'm talking a good foot of lost screen real estate.
Me: "That's odd. I don't recall this movie being at 2.35:1."
Her: "Yeah, and it's really wide, too."
So I pulled it out, popped it into my real DVD player, and whadda ya know, it filled the whole screen. We flipped back and forth a few times and couldn't see any cropping taking place. It also "looked" fine on the PS2 - the people didn't look squished or stretched, it just didn't take up nearly as much of the screen as it should have.
So what's the deal?
Quick info: TV: Tosh TW65X81; DVD: Tosh SD-5109 component input 1; PS2: Composite into input 3. DVD player is set to output to a 16:9 screen. Didn't see any options for the PS2's DVD player.
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-Ryan (http://www.ryanwright.com )
Ok, I admit it: I set you up the bomb.

 

[Tim Markley]

I've never tried playing a DVD movie with my PS2 but from what I've read, the PS2 is a very poor DVD player. One of the big problems with it is that it doesn't always play the DVD in the proper aspect ratio. I hooked up my PS2 to my Panasonic Tau to check out SSX and GT3 in 16:9 mode only to find out that it won't work. The Tau only has an Auto 16:9 mode and is dependant on the DVD player to tell it the proper mode. Unfortunately the PS2 player doesn't properly set the 'flag' for this mode so it only displays in 4:3. From what I've read, this could be the cause of the problem that you're seeing also.
I don't know if this is a problem that will be fixed with the new DVD driver update that's coming or not. I hope that it will.
[Edited last by Tim Markley on July 31, 2001 at 10:57 AM]

 

[Kevin P]

It seems to me that the PS2 is set up for a 4:3 TV, and is downconverting the image. On a 16:9 set, this will make the movie look short and fat, and a 1.85:1 movie will look more like 2.35:1.
There should be a menu setting to tell the PS2 that it's connected to a 16:9 TV, which will turn off the downconversion.
KJP

 

[Ryan Wright]

Ah ha. That makes sense. Thank you for the replies.
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-Ryan (http://www.ryanwright.com )
Ok, I admit it: I set you up the bomb.