Best Way to Watch 4:3 Broadcasts on a 16:9 RPTV? (1 Viewer)

[Len Simons]

Hey all you 16:9 TV owners, when you watch regular 4:3 TV broadcasts on your widescreen sets, what screen setting do you use?

I've just made the move to a Pioneer SD643HD5 16:9 RPTV. It's great when watching DVDs from a Panasonic RP-91 using progressive scan and component cables, but I can't say I'm at all happy with the video reproduction from my Dish Network PVR501, connected via S-Video cable. The picture quality leaves MUCH to be desired. I should mention that my previous TV was a Sony 53" KP53V45 RPTV, which delivered, for the most part, a stunning picture from the Dish PVR501.

Of course watching TV in standard 4:3 mode involves those nasty grey side panels, but any other mode is visibly distorted by stretching the picture to fill the screen.
The RP-91 solves the problem with 4:3 DVDs by letterboxing them with vertical black bars - I love my Panny! - but I fear I'm out of luck for TV broadcasts (except of course HDTV channels, but I can count those on a few fingers). In addition, the picture is not clean, even in the 4:3 mode. It's, for lack of a better description, fuzzy. I've calibrated the set using Video Essentials, and as stated, it looks great with DVD source material.

Anyone have any ideas/suggestions?

Len

 

[Lew Crippen]

I don’t that model or really all that much about RPTV. But as far as settings for 4:3 TV on 16:9 sets, I always use the normal setting. I don’t mind the side black bars at all and find that any distortion very annoying. Also any mode that crops some of the picture in order to satisfy expansion does not meet my desire to see what the telecasters (or filmmakers for classic movies) intended.

My wife professes not to even notice the side black bars.