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I have read a bit about the Silicon Image I-Scan, both the V2 and the Pro. I recently got a Panasonic 42" Plasma (this week) and I am on a waiting list for the Pan RP91 (spse to be Feb 28)....oh and I have digital cable as my building won't allow satellites. I find the beautiful picture and resolution of the plasma to be a double edge sword. The analog channels are pretty bad. I was considering getting the V2 (@$455) for use with my digital cable box. My cable technician is suppose to come out next Saturday to replace my box with one that has both digital out and S-vid out, the s-vid out I would use into the V2. The composite input on the V2 I would occasionally use for playing Tony Hawks PSII on PSX.My questions are these. Do you think the V2 will make a significant improvement to normal cable channels in order to justify the modest price? Would anyone venture to speculate whether the internal deinterlacing of the RP91 or the Pro's deinterlacer, using the RP91 interlaced component out, would make the better picture, or am I splitting hairs?
If I understand correctly, the pro adds three things, component in, PAL and SECAM capatability and color/picture adjustment. I don't think I would need the color/picture adj feature with the plasma, since the plasma can do all that well enough. I have no clue about the PAL and SECAM, but I live in the US, so do I need this? If the RP91 and I-Scan are comparable on deinterlacing then I don't need the third so spending the extra $200 ($649) would be pointless.
Anything else I missed in my logic?
Thanks,
Josh
Follow Ups:
The Iscan's de-interlacing capability is much superior to most of the DVD's internal de-interlacer. For film, it auto-detects pretty well, taking care of subtitles on DVD which are not at 3:2 rate.It will also help in video based source, especially on things that has alot of motion like sports.
But, since you have a plasma that has fixed pixels. You might be better off with a doubler/scaler combo like the Quadscan. But the Quadscan is not as good on doubling as Iscan, so most of the time, you would have to manually set it to film or motion based source. Plus Quadscan does not work on parts of an image like Iscan, so if one part of the screen is in motion, it will use the same algorithm on the whole screen.
I guess I need to read up some more, I really don't know very much about video processors. So if price weren't the major issue which processor would you recommend that does all/most things well for a plasma?
Processors does de-interlacing (doubling,) scaling to your panel's native resolution, various filtering, noise reduction and picture cleanup.Probably the hardest part is de-interlacing, and that is where the native display's build-in unit are at its worst. With a doubler like the DVDO, it will do the de-interlacing, and the display will do the scaling. With a scaler, it will do de-interlacing and scaling. The misc stuff like noise reduction depends on the individual unit.
A good bet for fixed resolution device is a Faroudja NR. It only has 1 resolution, but you only need 1. It has excellent de-interlacing and scaling capability. It goes for $3-$4k. Price no object would be the Teranex, which goes for > $30k, but has 1000x the computing capability of something like the NR, so it could do video de-interlacing on a pixel by pixel basis, applying different algorithm to each pixel, depending on what that pixel's temporal properties are. Whereas the NR would apply different algorithms to different region based on a field of info, the Iscan would do a region based on a frame of info, and the Quadscan would apply the same algorithm to the whole frame.
Great info, I am just learning about video. Spent the last few years learning about audio and just started video recently. Your explanation I find very leyman and what I was looking for. The Faroudja is a bit out of my range currently. I think I will deal with it for now, wait till I buy a place and see if I can't get HDTV sat broadcast. I find a good DVD player has a great picture on the plasma and I have not yet seen a need for improvement on this front, however, cable leaves something to be desired.
A local high end retailer told me that a sales rep for this brand reported that the build quality is weak, similar to the old Audio Alchemy stuff, and the power supplies are particularly prone to failure. While there are no doubt many of these units delivering good performance and certainly excellent value for the money, keep in mind the old saying that you generally get what you pay for. OTOH, you could buy several of these for the cost of one Faroudja unit. I would still go for the Faroudja, but it's your money.The reports I've heard on digital cable is that it can be pretty bad. I hope it's not as bad as my parents' Dish Network satellite system, which I think has an okay picture at best and unfortunately, a frequently horrible one (on a regular analog TV). I would hate to think what it would look like on a digital TV with the fairly mediocre line doubler one typically finds in these units. Bleh!
Todd
Faroudja $4k, plasma $5....hmm....don't think so.....maybe the SI isn't the best but still, I can replace the power supply in the SI for a heck of a lot less than the difference in price.
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