Help me decide between rp56 and rp91 for a Toshiba 50H81 (1 Viewer)

[Kwang Suh]

They are not the same thing. The 'Zoom' feature on Toshiba DVD players does not accomplish the same thing that the Panasonic RP91 can do. The RP91 scales the image to be properly proportioned on a 16:9 display. Though the terms seem to be used interchangeably, they are not the same.

There was a huge discussion over at AVS Forum about this. Semantically, the two words refer to the same end process. It's just that most DVD players that scale do it a hell of a lot better than TVs do.

 

[Chris PC]

But some TV's DO NOT SCALE, they spread the scan lines out more. Thats not necessarily very good.

 

[muskie]

From an A&B flyer on March 20th

Panasonic DVDRP56 $377 dollars.

I ripped it out and circled it myself from the Georgia Straight I think

Muskie

 

[Kwang Suh]

But some TV's DO NOT SCALE, they spread the scan lines out more. Thats not necessarily very good

Correct. But it's still a form of scaling - just a very crappy kind.

 

[Dave Cukina]

I just saw on futureshops website the panny rp56 for 329.99, not a bad price if you ask me.

Dave

 

[rodney wiley]

Are those April fools prices?

 

[Robert McDonald]

Probably Canadian dollar prices if you look where the posters reside

 

[JohnnyG]

I believe it's the Toshiba SD3750 that's on-sale at Future Shop. Not really a killer price either.
The RP56 is, most likely, no longer available from Panasonic Canada, to be replaced by the RP62 in May (Link Removed)

 

[Richard Travale]

John, when will you guys be getting the RP-82?

 

[Gordon Ripley]

I just picked up the RP56 for $309.00 at Future Shop over the weekend, this included a $20 scan and save discount.

Seems like a great player so far for the price. Video is great, sound is amazing IMHO, plays MP3's with ease including CD-RW, build quality seems good.

Very happy with the purchase, indeed no autoscaling is kind of a pain...but I can live without it!

Gord

 

[Don Munsil]

A few comments on the thread in general:

Zooming is the same thing as scaling, from a terminology perspective. On older players, the "zoom" function was generally implemented with a really simple (and ugly) algorithm, whereas newer players tend to use proper multi-tap filters, such as the ones used in the Mediamatics chipsets and in the Genesis chipset used on the RP-91.

The reason that zooming with the TV by expanding the raster tends not to look as good as using a good digital filter in the DVD player is not that resolution is lost, it's that the scan lines tend to become more visible, because the black space between them opens up and gets distracting. Any kind of raster expansion or compression is potentially harmful to the picture, because the CRT must be optimized for a specific raster pattern. Any other raster pattern, whether squeezed or expanded, will be suboptimal. However, both the raster-expanded picture and the digitally scaled picture have the same effective resolution.

(As an aside, this is why 4x3 televisions with a "squeeze mode" don't produce as good a 16x9 picture in general as a dedicated 16x9 TV -- the raster on the 4x3 models has been optimized for the 4x3 mode, and in 16x9 mode, the scan lines overlap and reduce the effective resolution.)

The newest Toshiba models, and all digital displays (LCD, DLP, DILA, Plasma), implement the scaling with digital filters, so the scaling should be just as good in the TV as in the DVD player, assuming the TV uses scaling chips at least as good as the player (which is a reasonable assumption, these days).

Personally, having lived with an older Toshiba that did raster expansion in the Zoom mode, I think it's not that bad. I'd rather do the scaling digitally, but I wouldn't sacrifice other important features to get it. But that's just me -- everyone has a different list of priorities.

Best,

Don

 

[JohnnyG]

Rickard, the RP82 is not on the price list yet, so no price and no ETA are available. I'm hearing August, but I have no idea how accurate that is.

 

[ace peterson]

Thanks for all the feedback. After days of deliberation, and a few days of being unable to log onto HTF (long story for another day) I have decided to go with the RP56 over the RP91. I would've really really liked the rp91 however the autoscaling feature is the only reason I would buy this player. I will try my hand at the rp56 for the time being (which I picked up for a measly $229 at Best Buy yesterday). I will have to report back when I get the new 50H81 and let people know if I'm satisfied or disappointed.

I can tell you that I think the rp56 is noisey. I have it hooked up to my 27" Sony right now and just by a composite connection *shiver* I had a Sony DVP530 before this one. It was OK. I think that player was quieter than the rp56. Also someone mentioned how light-weight the rp56 was. Wow is it ever! Like only 5&1/2 pounds! I'm sure if I dropped the thing it would not be fixable!

Also, I think the rp56's icon menu is a bit confusing. So is the manual for that matter. I don't know how the rp91's icon menu is, but it can't be worse. I also am not a big fan of the remote control. I think it is flimsy and every button except for the arrows/enter keys are too small. I can't read them in the dim theater light either. Oh well, all the more reason to buy a Pronto!

I'm not sure what the bit about PCM downconversion means. Anyone enlighten me about this? The manual says to turn PCM downconversion to 'YES' if connected via a digital optical cable in order to protect the producers copyrights. Or something like that. I am just leaving it at 'NO' and it plays just fine. Anyone?

I am hoping that the benefits of progressive scan and picture quality of the rp56 are so great that it overshadows these minor flaws that I've mentioned. I'm hoping that the lack of autoscaling is not a huge deal. Time will tell. It's too bad that rp82 that is being talked about is not out yet. Maybe I'd check into that.

Otherwise, a rp91 might be under the Christmas tree this year and my friend gets a rp56 for a decent price!

 

[Tom Held]

Since the new Toshibas upconvert all SD material to 540p, there may be no benefit of a progressive scan DVD player. You may be better served to purchase an Interlaced DVD player with DVD-Audio or SACD.

 

[CameronS]

Since the new Toshibas upconvert all SD material to 540p, there may be no benefit of a progressive scan DVD player. You may be better served to purchase an Interlaced DVD player with DVD-Audio or SACD.

I'm sure someone else here can explain it much better than I ever could, but your statement is not accurate. There is a substantial improvement going with a progressive scan DVD player even if your TV upconverts.

 

[Don Munsil]

I'm sure someone else here can explain it much better than I ever could, but your statement is not accurate. There is a substantial improvement going with a progressive scan DVD player even if your TV upconverts.

Well, actually, I'm going to have to agree with Tom on this. The major advantage to doing the deinterlacing in the player is that it avoids an extra A/D and D/A conversion in the TV. If the TV is going to do the A/D and D/A conversion even on 480p inputs, like the new Toshibas do, then that benefit evaporates.
Now, the other major issue would be the quality of the deinterlacers. Toshiba advertises that they use a deinterlacer that has a film mode (they actually say it has "3:2 pulldown," which makes my teeth hurt), but I doubt it's as good as the Sage/Faroudja chip. I haven't personally tested it, so I'm just guessing.
But in general, I agree with the statement that there "may be no benefit to using a progressive player." I wouldn't say that there couldn't be a benefit, but I wouldn't expect to see a radical difference on most material, unless the Toshiba's internal deinterlacer is really poor.
I really like, in theory, Toshiba's approach. It means that they can optimize the picture tubes for 1080i (which is essentially equivalent to 540p for most purposes), so the picture is always smooth, and they're not having to compromise the settings for all the different scan rates. It's a neat solution. The question is, how good is it in practice. The quality of the A/D converters is key - if they skimped on those, the signal will be degraded, even the cleanest 480p signal. I'd really like to spend some quality time with one of the new TVs and run some tests on them.
Don

 

[CameronS]

Don, are you saying is that even though the progressive scan DVD player will handle everything in the digital domain, it's irrelevant due to the Toshiba doing a conversion itself?

 

[Don Munsil]

That's right. The whole point is to avoid an extra set of conversions, and with the new Toshiba, you don't avoid them by feeding it 480p. The only input rate that isn't subject to redigitizing is 1080i (its native scan rate).

Again, if the DVD player has a better deinterlacer, it could still be worthwhile to get a progressive DVD player. Also, most manufacturers are putting progressive scan in all their models above the very basic ones, so you kinda get progressive scan for free if you buy a higher-end player.

There's a similar issue with digital projectors and displays. They always do an A/D conversion on the input signal, and never convert it back to analog - it stays digital all the way to the display circuitry. So there's no extra advantage to doing the deinterlacing in the player if your display device is a fixed-panel device like an LCD or DLP, assuming that the deinterlacers are equivalent.

The question immediately arises: how do you know which deinterlacer is better? Really, you'd have to just compare them with known difficult material. Making-of documentaries that switch back and forth between film footage and video footage are great for this. If one device does a better job with the tough material, stick with that device. They'll probably both be fine for most Hollywood movies.

Don

 

[JohnnyG]

I can assure you that the picture quality improvements from a progressive scan DVD player affects a Toshiba set just as much as they affect a true 480p display. You still see a sharper image and the line doubling from the progressive player is passed through - the TV does not interfere with it.

If you look for it, you might see some artifacting caused by this conversion, but I consider it very subtle and pretty hard to detect.

 

[JohnnyG]

Ace, make sure your Dolby Digital and DTS settings are set to 'Bitstream'. The PCM downconversion option is for those pretty rare 24/96 audio DVDs. It would convert them to the standard CD-Audio rate of 16/44.1.