Rp91 -vs- RP56 (1 Viewer)

[WilliamB]

Forgive yet another request for information/advice. I'm still fairly new at this but thanks to the good folks at this forum am learing rapidly. My questions are:
How do you tell if a disk is film sourced? Is this analogous to anamorphic? My dvd library is primarily anamorphic disks.
My issue is this. It appears that the benefit of the Sage chip is relative to video sourced material. So, would the RP91 give me a better pic with anamorphic disks (enought so to justify the $$) RPTV is a Tosh 56x81.
I bought the RP56 and am happy with it but if the RP91 will give me that much "more" will gladly spend the $$. Soneone also mentioned that the Tosh SD5700 was better for film sourced DVD than the RP56. Any truth to that?
Many thanks for your enlightenment

 

[David X]

I don't think there's really a way to tell, but if you're happy with the RP56, which is a great player and don't need the scaling features of the RP91, you should stick with the RP56. I need the scaling features of the RP91 because my 16:9 Mitsu 65905 locks into "expand" or "full" mode with a progressive signal. Thus, in order to display native 4:3 material on my monitor, the dvd player has to scale or zoom the material for me, else the people will all look "fat" on the screen, and the 4:3 material won't be displayed in its original aspect ratio. If you have a widescreen monitor that allows you to change widescreen formats with a progressive scan signal, then you probably don't need the scaling features of the RP91.I don't know anything about your Toshiba tv, but I think I remember reading that most Toshiba owners don't have the progressive lock-up issue that many Mitsu owners have to deal with.

Film vs video is separate from anomorphic vs non-anomorphic. With film sources, the dvd player can almost always do a better job of detecting the 3:2 cadence of film frames from the source and converting them to a progressive scan video signal. Both the RP56 and RP91 do a very good job on this. Some have argued that Sage chip used in the RP56 is more capable than the (Genesis?) chip used in the RP91. However, to some extent that is a theoretical issue because there are many ways to wire up and use the features in these chips, and not all players wire them up the same way and provide all possible features of the chips. If you have the desire to do so, the only way to tell which one works best for you would be for you to do a head to head shoot out in your own home, using your own material.

Typically, but not always, a DVD created from a movie shown in theaters and shot on film, will be a "film" source and a DVD created from a TV show shot in video will be a non-film source. But there are many exceptions to this. With a dvd library consisting of primarily anomorphic titles, my guess would be that most of your titles were probably created from film sources.

-David

 

[Scott Merryfield]

I don't know anything about your Toshiba tv, but I think I remember reading that most Toshiba owners don't have the progressive lock-up issue that many Mitsu owners have to deal with.

While Toshiba 16x9 TV's do not "lock into FULL mode" when presented a 480p video signal, the RP-91's zoom/scaling function provides superior picture quality over the Toshiba's TheaterWide 2 zoom mode when viewing non-anamorphic widescreen material. Also, the zoom/scaling feature is a great convenience when viewing supplemental material, which can alternate between full frame, anamorphic and non-anamorphic widescreen. Simply leave your TV in FULL mode, and let the DVD player automatically change viewing formats. I find this much more convenient than constantly changing the viewing mode on the TV.

FYI, I have an RP-91 paired with a Toshiba 56H80. I leave the 56H80 in FULL mode for viewing all aspect ratios and formats on DVD -- full frame, anamorphic and non-anamorphic widescreen.