Lumagen Video Processors? (1 Viewer)

[Paul_III]

I'm new to HT, and recently purchased a bigscreen HDTV. Right now my cable company offers a few HD channels for a couple of bucks extra a month, but I'd like more. I came across an ad for Lumagen Video processors, that supposedly can transform standard definition signals into high definition signals. Do they really work that well? If so I may consider buying one.

Thanks.

 

[Allan Jayne]

Nothing can make HDTV out of source material that isn't.

All currently made HDTV ready TV sets will convert (de-interlace and scale) a regular broadcast or VCR/DVD playback to view on the screen. Almost always the picture is displayed on the screen in HDTV format (1080i) although the resolution of the subject matter remains the same as it was before.

For a long time, both getting from 480i, the original input, to 480p (de-interlacing) and then to 1080i (scaling) has been weak links in TV electronics. The Lumagen does these two things very well. HDTV sets are getting better and better at displaying current ordinary video (standard definition TV; SDTV) but if you find fault (see undesirable artifacts) with yours, a Lumagen video processor will improve the picture. You do have the choice of HDTV format output but again the picture content is still the same as before, SDTV.

The Lumagen units give a better screen filling zoom of non-anamorphic (non-16:9 enhanced) widescreen letterbox programs than most 16:9 TV sets do. Almost no DVD players have this. The Lumagen units get around the problem of many TV sets' inability to display some 4:3 content properly not stretched to 16:9.

The Lumagen units are particularly suited for de-interlacing both NTSC and PAL and scaling for use with the same TV or display device, also well suited for data grade projectors that use SVGA (600p), XGA (768p), etc. displayable resolutions including choices of frame rates higher than the (approx.) 60 used by SDTV and HDTV.

I have used one and I judge that together with a standard (non-progressive) DVD player the picture comes close to the best progressive DVD players.

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

 

[Paul_III]

Thanks Allan, that cleared it up for me!