Has anyone heard of progresive processing twice ? (1 Viewer)

[anthony_b]

I called tech support and ask them why my DVD player was flickering a bit on certain DVD menus in progressive mode. I was told to disable the progressive mode on my TV since the signal is being processed twice ?!?!..I've never heard of that, I know my TV upconverts everything to 1080i and there's no way for me to disable or switch modes anywhere.

I know people are going to say that my player has a poor de-interlacer, but that is not the case, it's great !..also, there is never anything noticeable during movie playback, it only happens with certain dvd menus.

 

[greg_t]

First, what dvd player and TV do you have? All HDTV's have built in line doublers to convert 480i to usually 540p or 1080i. Depedning on what TV you have, you might be using the dvd player to convert 480i to 480p, then the TV might be converting 480i to either 480p, 540p, or 1080i depending on which TV you have. There usually is no way on TV's to turn off the deinterlacer. You might try setting your dvd player to interlaced mode and just let the TV do the conversion. Again, this recommendation is based on not knowing what equipment you have.

 

[Don_Berg]

No thats BS - all TVs bypass interlaced processing with a progressive input signal. Some newer HDTVs like Toshibas reportedly convert 480p to 540p, I don't know if that would cause such artificats. However I have seen some flickering artifacts on menus with some model DVD players like the new Panasonics. Also on a Faroudja-based model with CSS=on like the Mitsubishi DD-8040, so I suspect its your DVD player. What model do you have now?

 

[anthony_b]

I think Greg is right, I have a 2003 JVC 48WP74 that upconverts everything to 1080i. What I think is happening is this in progressive mode : dvd player 480i=>480p to HDTV=> 1080i...but the odd thing is that I've never noticed it during playback of a movie.

But then again I think now a days the term "tech support" is being used very loosely. The person I spoke to didn't know what PLUGE was...so, on the other hand I'm thinking it's BS too !!

 

[greg_t]

There are few TV's that allow native 480p signal to bypass the sets internal line doubler. Toshiba has been upconverting 480p to 540p since their 81 series sets, Hitachi does it also. The only ones that I'm aware of that allow a native 480p signal to pass through untouched are Pioneer, Panasonic, and Mitsubishi. Its' one of the main reasons I bought a Pioneer Elite.

 

[Steve Griswold]

It's almost certainly your DVD player. It just sounds like line jitter. You don't mention which player you have, though.

I had an Onkyo DV-CP500 which was decent but when I switched to progressive mode the wavering lines in menus drove me mad. I upgraded to a Denon DVD-1600 and everything is great now.

 

[Don_Berg]

I think he got an Onkyo DVD player, if so then its the Onkyo's fault as Steve says. Yes the "fix" is to upgrade to a Faroudja-based player like the Panasonic RP82,XP30,XP50 or Denon DVD-1600.

 

[anthony_b]

Yes, I have an Onkyo dvsp-301. I'm not sure what chip it uses, I read somewhere that they use cirrus logic ?...I think I've read reviews on DVD players where in lab test these things appear but there not apparent during movie playback. I really like the playback of this unit in progressive mode, but it's those blooming menus that get me a little crazy. I think it's the player but I'm sticking with it.

 

[Allan Jayne]

If all you are seeing is a little flickering, it is not a situation of progressive processing happening twice. For consumer video, an attempt to do progressive processing twice would result in a picture that is essentially unintelligible, looking like a scrambled pay per view picture or at best like two squished side by side fuzzy duplicate pictures suggestive of a stereoscope slide.

Can you describe the flickering in more detail, for example do fragments of letters and words flash elsewhere on the screen?

A process called line quadrupling is best done as progressive processing twice, and is normally seen only with commercial or professional equipment. The regular 480i NTSC should first be de-interlaced to 480p and as a second step doubled (perhaps with some line blending but not needing the complexities of de-interlacing) to 960p. Modern video processors with scalers may also output 960p using a different second stage processing.

Video hints:
http://members.aol.com/ajaynejr/video.htm

 

[Steve Griswold]

Allan, Anthony's DVD player is essentially the single disc version of mine (albeit newer). What happens is that on static menus, horizontal lines with high contrast (i.e. white lines on dark background) tend to look as though they're vibrating constantly. This problem disappears in interlaced mode. Also, it IS present at all times but because movies rarely have static horizontal lines, this problem isnt noticed except in menus.

 

[Shawn Solar]

Anthony, Steve,

I have a Onkyo dv-SP300 that is just unwatchable in progressive mode. Dark lettering on light backgrounds gitters and so does the menu of the player when in progressive mode. and the picture was unusaully bright and soft. It may seem that your player is not as severe as it is a newer model but still not perfect. I borrowed a samsung HD931(DVI model) to try the progressive mode(don't have DVI on my widesceen) and to see if it was my tv or the player. It was for sure the player. The audio from the onkyo would also click and slow down(like setting the speed on a record player to slow) or the audio was out of sync altogether. I am glad I didn't sell my older pioneer. Its only interlaced but at least it works.

 

[Don_Berg]

I'd get rid of that Onkyo with its terrible flashing artifacts and upgrade to a top-quality Faroudja-based player. I went thru several DVD player models until I finally got a great one (a used Panasonic XP30) and I am finally satisfied with its top-rated picture and no weird artifacts that I saw on all other models I tested.

 

[anthony_b]

I'm leaning towards the fact that it's the player, but it's something that I could live with. The player in progressive mode is very sharp/detailed. The colors look great, and although not as good as the Denon 1600, I would say it's better than most of the players out there for less than $180 (I tested them all).



Who has mentioned terrible flashing and artifacts ?...Come on man, you must cut and paste your line about the faroudja chips quite a lot, do you work for them ?

I judge things with my eyes...all the BS about which processors are better is all secondary to me. You read so much hype about things, that you're forced to believe everything that's posted....I've been in this game for a while, and one thing that I've learned is not to believe the hype...it's cost me too much money..peace

 

[Shawn Solar]

I doubt its anything fixable. But if thats all thats wrong then at least all the problems of my player have been fixed with the newer model.

 

[Steve Griswold]

Anthony,

I will be first in line to rave about the picture quality of my Denon DVD-1600 with the Faroudja deinterlacer.

You say it's "BS" about which processor is better, which shows to me that you obviously haven't seen what the Faroudja can do. And no, I don't work for them either. I sell insurance.

 

[greg_t]

It's not BS. The faroudja chip hasn't won Emmy awards for nothing. No other manufacturer has anything like DCDI, which basically attempts to minimize the resolution lose and loss of detail that occurs when a deinterlacer has switched from film to video mode deinterlacing even when deinterlacing film sourced material. Here is a link to a great article about DCDI if you're interested:

http://www.dcdi-video.com/technology...-overview.html

Don recommends the XP30 because they are known to have both reference quality basic video output via the MEI MN677531KA MPEG decoder, which some have called the best consumer MPEG decoder made, and top quality deinterlacing with the faroudja. Put this at a price tag of ~$200 when new, and it was an incredible deal.

But I do agree with you in that I also believe that people put too much emphasis on deinterlacing chips. There are several other factors that make a player right for someone other than deinterlacing, such as quality of the MPEG decoder, certain features such as non-anamaphoric scaling, remote, ease of menu navigation,etc. Just because a player has faroudja doesn't mean that it's always the right answer for everyone. And just having Faroudja is no gurantee that the player while have reference quality video output. When all is said, if you're happy with your current player, then just enjoy it.

 

[anthony_b]

Steve and Greg, I also know that Faroudja processors are the best, I've seen them first hand and had the Denon 910 for a while. The last thing I'm going to argue about is the quality of those de-interlacers THEY'RE GREAT !!!...All I'm saying is,do not expect to be blown away by all the things you read here. People tend to exagerate things too much. A good example is when someone is jumping from interlaced to progressive and think things are going to be like 3-D or boderline HDTV.

You need to take things with a grain of salt and make your own judgements based on what YOU see not what others want to force upon you....So, there's no need to start flaming me about this, it's just my opinion, the same way I respect all of yours.

 

[Enrique Bonifax]

Hi guys:
I also have the subtitle issue with a DV-SP301, but in my case, with certain movies (StarWars Episode II, fifth element),the subtitles just disapear sudenly and then after a few minutes the movie pauses, all this only in progressive scan mode, because with progressive turned off, It doesnt have any problem, and I would like to know if my TV (LG HDTV 56in) could have anything to do with it because it upconverts everything to 540p or 1080i, so should I use the player without progressive mode and my TV in 540p?