Prob. of anamorphic DVD-R with HD-A2 (1 Viewer)

[Dennis Nicholls]

My local PBS station sells videos of local productions. Their DVDs are actually produced in tiny quantities and sold on DVD-R media. A recent disc "Idaho: An Aerial Tapestry" is composed in 16:9 anamorphic NTSC video and distributed on DVD-R media.

This disc looks great when played back on my downstairs set with Philips DVD player and Samsung DLP RPTV.

However, I've had a problem playing back this disc - and ONLY this disc - using my newer Toshiba HD-A2 player connected via HDMI cable to an Optoma HD-72 front projector. Both the player and projector are configured for 16:9 video.

This setup plays back everything just right. HD-DVD looks stunning. Older 4:3 SD DVD comes up properly framed with black-bars on the sides. And 16:9 discs such as Battle of Brittain and The Wind and The Lion look just right.

But for some reason the I:AAT disc (DVD-R) doesn't play properly. It has the right vertical dimension. But it's squeezed sideways, into the frame of a 4:3 movie (i.e. the video is too tall and there are black-bars on the sides). This happened when I was using the as-shipped version 1.2 firmware. But when I upgraded to the version 2.5 firmware the problem remained.

Does anyone have any insight into why this disc and ONLY this disc has this framing problem?

 

[Jeff Gatie]

It's not tagged as anamorphic, it's tagged as 4:3. So the player outputs it as 4:3. Maybe PBS can replace it for a properly tagged recording.

 

[Dennis Nicholls]

But it plays back correctly on my Philips DVD 963SA and Samsung system, when both are configured for anamorphic 16:9 playback.

You don't understand. The local Idaho PBS station isn't going to exchange any discs. They are all the same. And they certainly won't remaster any discs just because I complain. I would guess that I've purchased 10% of all the discs they have sold of this program. I've sent copies to Cees Alons and Mike Frezon and neither of these worthies have mentioned any problems with 16:9 NTSC playback.

Besides, if it were a tagging problem, it wouldn't display with the proper vertical resolution.

 

[Jeff Gatie]

Your other DVD players probably do not automatically pillarbox DVD's tagged as 4:3. Most do not. Vertical resolution is the same for 16:9 and 4:3 DVD's. The only time vertical resolution is decreased is with anamorphic films on 4:3 TV's. You can stretch 4:3 films horizontally by changing a setting in the A2. Try that.