Video Asylum

Posted by Steve W (A) on October 19, 2001 at 04:00:50

In Reply to: OK, bigger is better, but I have a question for you RPT folks... posted by Harmonia on October 18, 2001 at 18:04:49:

Since the HS30s have line quadruplers, those VHS tapes will look pretty good. The 240i VHS signals will be upconverted to 1080i. Cable should be the same way. Of course, the set will only display what you give it, so crap in, crap out. However to minimize noise and artifacting from bad signals, you should set brightness and contrast to below 50%, and set sharpness to below 25%. Use the Pro mode or set UVML/SVM/VSM (whatever its called for artifical edge enhancement) to low or off. Most of the time if you see a bad picture on the showroom floor, it's because the sets are fed bad signals and are set in torchmode (Vivid) with sharpness all the way up, which takes what noise there is already in the signal, and amplifies the heck out of it. Remember, the same guns fed a clean hd signal, reproduces a clear stellar HDTV image. It's like taking a 8-track tape and playing it back through a pair of Martin Logans speakers - for which it will reproduce and reveal every detail, or play it back through your computer speakers, which will mask it all. I for one, if only had only one choice, would prefer the Martin Logans, except I would electronically filter out the noise before sending it to the speakers.
If the picture is really bad, I believe there are processing options in the menu for noise reduction and Dynamic Picture (makes black blacker and brights brighter). However I never use those features. My picture looks pretty good already on those sources.

Steve