Dan Driscoll
Supporting Actor
- Joined
- Aug 1, 2000
- Messages
- 937
I received my new Pioneer SD-533 RPTV yesterday afternoon. The Viking Freight driver was helpful and took care to handle my new baby carefully. He helped me inspect the box and then to open it up and visually inspect the TV and he also took away all the packing material after the inspection showed no damage. A very professional job, for which I expressed my gratitude.
The TV itself is very attractive, with an Ash Black veneer and matte black screen frame. I prefer this to the high gloss finish of the Elite or Mits Diamond. It also rolled easily on the carpet and it was not difficult to get it into position. The jack panel is located in the lower right rear and is reasonably well laid out, although spacing between the connections could be a little more generous. Also, the 2 rear S-Video inputs are Input 1 and Input 3, which was initally a little confusing. After hooking everything up, I let the set sit for about an hour before turning it on. This is because it was a little cool outside and I wanted the set to warm-up to room temp before I turned it on.
The set powered up with TV/Ant-A input (standard cable TV), STD picture mode, with contrast set to maximun, every other picture setting centered and with the screen mode in Natural Wide. I turned the contrast way down and then played with the other settings, turned off RLS, Flesh Tone, SVM, etc. A nice feature of the Pioneer is that SVM is can be turn off from the menu in all picture modes and inputs. I let it run for about 30 minutes before doing anything, then checked the convergence, which was dead on. I played with it a little bit, but I doubt that I made any real improvement. After that I played around some with the picture settings and got the TV picture looking much better. There is no obvious red push and in fact, the picture seems just a touch green. Color and picture quality varied noticably with the channel selcted, but the standard network broadcast channels looked pretty good, as did cable networks like USA, History, etc. :bg QVC, Univision, Fox News and others looked pretty noisy, but were still viewable.
Next, I popped in some DVDs. An RP-91 is on the way, but right now all I have is a Pioneer DV-333 interlaced player, connected with an S-video cable. But I have to tell you, it was still very, very impressive! :sjd I started with the opening forest battle scene from Gladitator, because this seems to give some RPTVs fits. Common problems are jaggies on the arrows and spears and artifacting on the emperor's medallions and cloak chains. I am very happy to say that the SD-533 handled it all flawlessly.
Resolution was excellent and color was pretty good, but I expect that when I install component cables the color saturation will get even better. I can't wait!
We also watched parts of Titan A.E. and The 5th Element and they also looked superb.
I have not checked the set with Avia yet. So far I'm just enjoying the view and getting familar with the controls, seeing how each adjustment affects the picture, that sort of thing. Last night we watched the WS game in Natural Wide mode and my wife thought it looked great. I can see that it would probably benefit for a focus adjustment, but I'll wait at least 100 hours before I try that. I also plan to have the set calibrated, so I may just let the calibrator do it while I watch and learn so I can make any future adjustments.
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Dan
The TV itself is very attractive, with an Ash Black veneer and matte black screen frame. I prefer this to the high gloss finish of the Elite or Mits Diamond. It also rolled easily on the carpet and it was not difficult to get it into position. The jack panel is located in the lower right rear and is reasonably well laid out, although spacing between the connections could be a little more generous. Also, the 2 rear S-Video inputs are Input 1 and Input 3, which was initally a little confusing. After hooking everything up, I let the set sit for about an hour before turning it on. This is because it was a little cool outside and I wanted the set to warm-up to room temp before I turned it on.
The set powered up with TV/Ant-A input (standard cable TV), STD picture mode, with contrast set to maximun, every other picture setting centered and with the screen mode in Natural Wide. I turned the contrast way down and then played with the other settings, turned off RLS, Flesh Tone, SVM, etc. A nice feature of the Pioneer is that SVM is can be turn off from the menu in all picture modes and inputs. I let it run for about 30 minutes before doing anything, then checked the convergence, which was dead on. I played with it a little bit, but I doubt that I made any real improvement. After that I played around some with the picture settings and got the TV picture looking much better. There is no obvious red push and in fact, the picture seems just a touch green. Color and picture quality varied noticably with the channel selcted, but the standard network broadcast channels looked pretty good, as did cable networks like USA, History, etc. :bg QVC, Univision, Fox News and others looked pretty noisy, but were still viewable.
Next, I popped in some DVDs. An RP-91 is on the way, but right now all I have is a Pioneer DV-333 interlaced player, connected with an S-video cable. But I have to tell you, it was still very, very impressive! :sjd I started with the opening forest battle scene from Gladitator, because this seems to give some RPTVs fits. Common problems are jaggies on the arrows and spears and artifacting on the emperor's medallions and cloak chains. I am very happy to say that the SD-533 handled it all flawlessly.
I have not checked the set with Avia yet. So far I'm just enjoying the view and getting familar with the controls, seeing how each adjustment affects the picture, that sort of thing. Last night we watched the WS game in Natural Wide mode and my wife thought it looked great. I can see that it would probably benefit for a focus adjustment, but I'll wait at least 100 hours before I try that. I also plan to have the set calibrated, so I may just let the calibrator do it while I watch and learn so I can make any future adjustments.
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Dan
