With "3:2 pulldown detection and compensation", are ProgScan players neccessary now? (1 Viewer)

[NickSo]

Before when TVs just had Line Doublers, it was said the only way to get a good image was from a true Progressive Scan DVD player, because they do 3:2 pulldown.
Now i see TVs with 3:2 pulldown of some sort, i wonder, do we need Progressive Scan players anymore?
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[JohnHN]

Take a look at
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which rates one of the best internal doublers on any TV on the market (the Pioneer Elite) against those on DVD players.
My personal experience, with a Panasonic RP56 and a Toshiba 50HX81, is that the Toshiba's line doubler, while very good, occasionally introduces artifacts (moire) on closely spaced lines. I could live with these problems but they are real. Potentially, internal line doublers on TVs also reduce resolution, but at least on my setup, I don't see a resolution change on test patterns when I switch out of progressive.
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[Mike I]

Progressive scan will always give you a superior picture to a hd ready sets internal line doubler evan if the internal line doubler does a 3.2 pull down..
With progressive scan the 3.2 pulldown is accomplished in the digital domain using the frame flags encoded in the dvd's mpeg bitstream..
Advantages of progressive conversion
Line doublers are used in other high-end home entertainment systems to provide progressive scanning. These may be stand-alone devices or incorporated into a digital TV. Impressive as they may be, DVD in-player progressive conversion has three big advantages over line doublers:
1) High precision and stability
A DVD-Video disc mastered from a film holds all the data necessary to produce an accurate progressive image, whereas an external line doubler must take hints from the video source to determine the source material and frame allocation.
2) All-digital conversion minimizes signal degradation
Since the signal from the DVD-Video disc is digital, progressive conversion can be performed digitally inside the player. Signal quality is protected until it leaves the player's analog output. In contrast, a stand-alone or in-TV doubler first receives information from the analog output of the source device then converts this analog signal back to digital for processing. Finally, it must translate the signal back to analog before outputting it. All this back-and-forth translation is much more likely to degrade the signal.
3) Processing is optimized to DVD-Video's high image quality
Line doublers built into digital TV sets are designed to work with a variety of video sources, so their settings are not necessarily ideal for DVD-Video. Progressive conversion is optimized for the high resolution and low noise of the DVD-Video format. This enables the unit to preserve DVD-Video picture quality for display on all screen sizes, from direct-view CRT to projectors.
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[Allan Jayne]

We are talking about the difference between very very good (the best built in or stand alone doubler with 3-2 detection) versus excellent (progressive scan DVD player). Visually it is hard to see the difference until you really start looking for it.
The built in or stand alone doubler, if it has 3-2 detection, locks right onto the 3-2 pulldown cadence and the result is inferior only because the video was converted to analog to exit the DVD player and is converted to digital which all doublers need upon entering the doubler.
It must be noted that even the progressive DVD player needs backup circuitry that takes hints from the video, in the event the flags are incorrect or the source is not 24 fps film. In the "shootout" article mentioned earlier, there are some players whose backup circuitry is inferior to some of the stand alone doublers currently available.
More on doublers: http://members.aol.com/ajaynejr/viddoubl.htm
[Edited last by Allan Jayne on October 08, 2001 at 09:41 AM]

 

[PS Nystrom]

What about my scenario... I have a Pioneer 434 which I've heard is an inferior prog-scan player, and will be taking delivery of the Pana 47" this week. Should I set the player to interlaced and let the TV do the doubling? Or would the DVD player's prog-scanning still be preferable? Thanks for any thoughts because I am quite confused,
Pieter
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BoomRoom's pics as of Oct 7.

 

[JohnHN]

I don't know the 47" Panasonic first hand so I can only speculate but my guess is that feeding the Panasonic the interlaced signal, and using its internal doubler, may do a better job. The 434 is that bad. But you can always experiment yourself. An even better solution would be to banish the Pioneer 434 to the bedroom and get one of the new, cheap, progressive players that are coming out for the main TV.
There are many places on DVDs that cause deinterlacing problems.
Link Removed
lists a few.
I'm not fully in agreement with Mike. I used to be, but my current feeling is that many of the theoretical advantages listed just don't materialize in practice. One example is flag reading. When progressive players first came out there was a lot of discussion of the fact that progressive players could just read the flags and everything would be perfect. The problem is that flags get screwed up and this throws flag reading players off. Hence the lower scores for the flag reading, Genesis-based players in the shootout linked in my earlier post above. The top scores are for players that use the Sage or Silicon Image deinterlacers, and these are cadence readers (sophisticated versions of the deinterlacers in TVs) rather than flag readers. Whatever the advantages of progressive DVD players are, they aren't from reading flags.
The "part 5" link immediately above has a passage on "Why are Progressive Players Better" that is worth reading.
All of this debate is rendered moot by the fact that quality progressive players, like the Panasonic RP56, are appearing at prices that a year ago would have looked agressive for interlaced.
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[Edited last by JohnHN on October 09, 2001 at 07:44 AM]

 

[DustinDavis]

Visually it is hard to see the difference until you really start looking for it.

Allan is correct in many cases, but once you do see it and you know what to look for, you will see more and more of the artifacts, until they drive you insane and force you to stop using your internal doubler for DVDs.
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Dustin A. Davis '94
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[Mark Zimmer]

So to clarify, will a progressive player get rid of jaggies and moire effects?
Will 3:2 pulldown?
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[Dwight Amato]

Well, to let you know I just got my Panny 47" 3 days ago and bought the Rp56 today. At first I did not like progressive because it does have a smoother, but less sharp picture. I hated it!
But after switching back and forth on the fly MANY times tonight over several movies, I have to admit I think I like the progessive scan output more. There is MUCH less digital noise in the background, colors are more accurate (especially dark scenes) and things are definately smoother.
I agree that this may not be noticable on a small screen, but on my 47" sitting 7' away, it is a huge improvement.

 

[JohnnyG]

If you've got an interlaced DVD player now that you're happy with, keep it. If you plan on purchasing a new one, make sure it's interlaced. The difference in price between interlaced players the newer pro-scan players like the Panasonic RP56 and Toshiba SD3750 is so small, it's almost pointless not to go with one - even if you have a regular TV today.

 

[JohnHN]

>> If you plan on purchasing a new one, make sure it's interlaced.
Johnny, did you mean "progressive?"
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