Help me Explain Sony's Enhanced Mode to Someone... (1 Viewer)

[Matthew Furtek]

I was meeting some of my neighbors in my apartment complex, and noticed they had a 27 inch Wega (FS200) set up in their common area. Also noticing that there was a DVD player and A Beautiful Mind DVD (Widescreen), I asked them if they even used the 16:9 enhanced mode on their TV, to which the person who owned it said "Yeah, but I didn't like it...". To make a long story short, I put the DVD in and setup it into enhanced mode. After watching it for a minute, the person who owned it was complaining about how he loses 2 inches on the top of the screen because of all the scanlines being squeezed together, and "I didn't pay $600 to have the picture be smaller". I just shook my head, and one of my other friends who was with me was like... "Matt, don't get on this widescreen kick anymore".

To be honest, for some reason it looked like A Beautiful Mind was being displayed in 2.35:1 rather than 1.85:1 like it should be, and when I was watching it without the ehancement the AR looked more like 1.85:1 (actually it probably looked like 1.66:1). Now that I think about it, I bet the picture doesn't look better in enhanced mode if the DVD player is setup for a 4:3 tv, and in fact the picture will look smaller. Oh well, if it still doesn't look better I guess I might need some help convincing this guy that its worth it to watch DVDs in enhanced mode.

Matthew Furtek

 

[Michael St. Clair]

If you have a 4:3 TV with a 16:9 mode, you are supposed to set up the DVD player for a 16:9 TV. Then you don't lose any picture size at all, you only gain resolution!

 

[Matthew Furtek]

Yup. I kind've figured out what I was doing wrong as I was posting, and by using the HTF search function, verified what I had hypothesized. Now the "trick" is to get another chance to show them that enhanced mode gives better picture.

Matthew Furtek

 

[Jack Briggs]

Matthew:

Explain it simply. Tell your friend that his Sony's "enhanced" mode in effect turns his television into a 16:9 display. Which means he has to tell his DVD player that it's a 16:9 display. This means the DVD player's setup menu must be set to "16:9." And then the feature's benefits will be evident only when screening DVDs that have been 16:9-encoded. Your friend won't have the patience to listen to any speech about a DVD player's downconversion routine and the artifacting it introduces. Just say that the picture will look smoother and more filmlike when he is playing so-called "anamorphic" DVDs.

JB

 

[Jason_Els]

Matt,

I'd say the best thing to do is to tell the friend with the Wega, "Look, let me demonstrate for you exactly why widescreen is better on this TV. Let me setup your DVD player and TV for widescreen mode and we can do a comparison. If you don't like it I'll shut-up about widescreen and I'll never mention it again but I think you're missing the best possible picture you can get from your a/v system and so does every HT enthusiast I know. I'm not doing this to be a dick. I'm doing this because I want you to discover just why widescreen let's you see so much more of the picture."

YOU bring beer, bud, or whatever it is they like. Before coming to the house YOU decide exactly what DVD scenes best demonstrate widescreen's advantage. YOU show them P&S first and then follow-up with the same scenes in widescreen. YOU show them the lost resoultion. Then let them decide what they like. If they like the widescreen then great. If they do not then YOU don't bring it up again..... but at least you have the satisfaction you did the best you can.

Some people will not be swayed by what seem the most obvious conclusions. It's the way people work. You win some, you lose some.

Good luck!