HD - 1080i input calibration? (1 Viewer)

[Rong Chen]

Just subscribed digital cable with 4 HD channels. (Comcast in NJ if you wonder) I found the HBOHD/ShowtimeHD are darker than ABCHD/NBCHD. All HD channels are darker than the films played from DVD. Is my perceiption correct?

Question: How do you guys calibrate the HDTV set on 1080i input? I have both AVIA and VE, but they are only good on feeding 480i/480p from DVD player to the TV.

Now if I use the 480p AVIA calibrated settings, the HD 1080i picture looks much worse than DVD's 480p because the contrast and darkness are off the mark greatly. But if I turn up the brightness and other settings, the 1080i contents are much better.

The TV set is Sony 61HS10, since 2000.
The box provided by Comcast is Motorola 5100.

Thanks in advance!!!

 

[Rong Chen]

Well, so quiet.

Either all of you are just like me, watching HDTV without proper calicbration or there is no such thing...

Try to bump it up to the top in hope someone with the knowledge may see it.

 

[Darrel McBane]

I have my Loewe HD set calibrated with Avia. I also have Comcast but only two HD channels. Showtime and HBO in HD. I'm not even sure if the two channels are in true HD 1080i. I'm not saying they look bad. Because they clearly don't. They look better than DVD. But, true HD? I'm not sure. I generally use my Avia settings and adjust if any from there. But, since I only have two channels in HD. I don't think I have even changed anything on my set.

I wonder if Avia is coming out with an updated disk anytime soon?

 

[Gregg Loewen]

Greetings!

As you have found out, HD via cable, satellite, or OTA is not a true reference source and EACH channel can vary widely. the best a full calibration can get you is dead accurate on a "theoritical" reference source. If the studio decides to nail the tweeking on its end your pic will be stunning, if not you will have to do some tweeking on your end (mainly adjusting the black level).

Regards

Gregg

 

[Patrick Sun]

I just eyeball the HDTV content on 1080i for now.

 

[Rong Chen]

Thanks for the replies.

I found this animal on web (AccuPel HDTV Analog Component VideoCalibration Generator)

http://www.accupel.com/HDG2000_functions_f.html
http://www.accupel.com/HDG2000_FAQ_f.html

Has anyone have experience with it? Will it do the trick?

 

[Rong Chen]

Darrel:

According to HBO, (http://www.hbo.com/apps/schedule/Sch...ON_TODAY=TODAY) most of their HD contents are in "True HDTV" format.

I don't think AVIA (or VE) would do DVD version of 1080i update since the hardware will only support 480i/480p output signals. It has to be something like HDVHS that does 1080i ouptput.

I once visited a high end store in NYC (forget the name, but it's on 46 St) and saw HDVHS demo on FPTV, it's amazing.