Ok, I get it - 1080i or 1080p is an amazing improvement - but - what do I need to take advantage of it? (and explain 1080i and 1080p, please)
I have digital cable, complete with HD feeds…do I just plug in the line-outs that are already running through my home-entertainment head unit, and then tune into the HD channels?
Will I have to throw out my 5-disc DVD changer unit and replace it to get HD-quality DVD? Is there such a thing as HD-quality DVD? Help!
You need to make sure you’re using the right cables. A coax cable ain’t gonna cut it, you need either an HDMI or component video cables from the digital cable box to your TV.
You need to get an HD cable box from your cable service provider. Your current box won’t give you the HD channels.
Neither will your current DVD player give you HD. The problem is that there are two competing HD formats, only a few movies have been adapted for them, they’re wildly expensive, and nothing about that will change until the format wars end. Wait.
Same with 1080p signals. All the sets you’ll see for sale still top out at 1080i, unless you go to a high-end specialty store and pay way too much money. The HD channels are 1080i. The human eye can’t distinguish between them on an ordinary set at an ordinary distance. Don’t even worry about it. Get a 1080i set, get an HDMI cable, get the HD cable box, tune in an Imax film that’s being shown on one of those channels and be prepared to have your breath taken away.
Even if you do nothing more than feed the TV with component video from a DVD player, you’ll be amazed.
As Exapno said, the HD DVD market is fractured, much like the early days of home video and VHS vs Beta. Make the wrong choice now, and you may be stuck in a year with the “wrong” format, limited to playing only the DVDs you’ve already got as no new ones are being made.
1080p isn’t worth it today - the only practical reason to get it now is if you want to “future-proof” the TV. But, for the price difference, you mght as well wait. By the time TV shows are being produced and broadcast in 1080p, you’ll be ready to shuffle that TV off to the bedroom and get a new one for the living room.
Currently it’s all either broadcast in 1080i or 720p - either is an immense improvement over standard-def. At the moment, all that’s available in 1080p is high-def DVDs.
Thanks for the input, folks…
for what it’s worth, I already have all my audio/video running through composite cabling, rather than any coax - the only coax I have is coming from the wall to the cable box…I HATE coax 
A few websites to get you started:
Both of these have great information.
One thing I’m not sure of, based on your posts, is that you understand you must have an HDTV set, first. If your set can’t display HDTV, it doesn’t matter what your cable company is giving you.
You asked about what the numbers mean. The “p” or “i” describe how the picture is scanned. Progressive scanning is when the each line of the picture is refreshed sequentially. That is, it starts with line 1, goes to line 2, then 3, and so on. Interlaced scanning is when the picture is refreshed in an every-other-line fashion. First, line 1 is refreshed, then 3, then 5, … , then 2, then 4, and so on. The number refers to how many lines. Standard definition TV is 480i. There are 480 lines, interlaced scanned. HDTV is 720p, 1080i, and 1080p. Supposedly, 720p is best for sports, action movies, and other fast-motion programs. Conversely, 1080i is supposed to be best for the fine detail of close-up documentaries.
My HD source is DirecTV. My TiVo is set to output 1080i. However, my TV can receive 1080i, but only display 720p. Still, I find that the picture is best if the source is 1080i and the TV does whatever it needs to do. Football on ESPNHD is eye-popping. You can see the blades of grass. The graphics jump off the screen. As an added bonus, the sound is 5.1, so it sounds like you’re at the stadium.
1080p is, as others have pointed out, unnecessary at this time. BluRay and DVDHD output in 1080p, but the software and hardware is still, IMHO, too expensive. I want to wait for the format war to settle out and for the titles to come down to prices similar to standard DVDs. Broadcast TV will not be in 1080p at any time in the forseeable future. The bandwidth is too great. Besides the improvement in quality is marginal, at best.
Yeah, I knew I needed a HD-capable TV. And I’d forgotten that “p” stood for “progressive” scan, just like my DVD player is progressive scan.
BTW, if you have a progressive-scan DVD player, you must feed the video to your TV with component video (3 RCA video connectors on the back of the DVD player), DVI, or HDMI. If you plug in using S-Video or composite, you’ll only get an interlaced picture.
I’m not a techno-phobe, but all of the stuff and the adverts on HDTV have me confused to the point where I am remembering the Beta-Max/VHS problem, and although I have seen HDTV’s in a store and was impressed with the quality, I am very reluctant to plunk down the bucks for fear of buying the wrong thing.
Speaking as a lay-person (and yes, godammit, an “entry-level” senior citizen!) I wish there were some kind of a primer, and some kind of reassurance that whichever set I buy, the damn thing’s not gonna go obsolete on me the first month.
[crotchety old man] “We didn’t have high def when I was a boy! We had black and white which ruined our eye-sight, and we liked it!”[/crotchety old man]
Seriously though, y’all: I’m not on cable. I’m on a dish, so is this thing gonna work for me, and how many attachments am I gonna have to buy?
A “High Def for Dummies” link would be nice.
Hell, I just now learned how to program my VCR, and guess what? :smack:
Thanks
Q
Here is a link to a thread at HDTVoice that might help you: Types of HDTVs, advantages and disadvantages
There is a lot of other introductory stuff on that chatboard.
In order to get HD, you’ll have to subscribe to it from your satellite provider. Both DirecTV and Dish offer it for a nominal fee. If you’ve been subscribing for a while, you might be able to get them to come down in price. I got a DirecTiVo HR10-250 for $19. A friend of mine paid $800+ for his less than a year earlier. We both bought them directly from DirecTV. Prices can vary widely. The HD service is supposed to be between $10 or $20. I don’t know exactly how much, because they gave it to me free for six months.
For the record, I have a Toshiba 42HM66, a 42" DLP. It has a native resolution of 720p, though I’m feeding it 1080i from the TiVo. We’re very happy with it. For sound, we have a Sony HT-7000. It is a “Home-Theater-in-a-Box” with an upconverting DVD changer.
No matter what you buy, it isn’t likely to become obsolete quickly. What is more likely is that the prices will come down quickly. You may spend $1500 on a TV today, only to find it at $1000 next month.
What’d you just call me? 
J/K, Drum God, and thanks for the link. I bookmarked it and will educate myself.
Sounds like we are fellow drummers? I play Pearls with Paiste cymbals, and I post on www.drumforum.org. Great site for vintage drums and information.
Thanks for the info!
Q
I definitely agree with this, but two caveats:
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Buy anamorphic widescreen DVDs, always! (sometimes labeled "Enhanced for widescreen TVs)
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Go into the setup screen on your DVD player (be sure there is no disc in the player) and tell the player you have a widescreen TV. This is very important because it tells the player not to throw away 1/3 of the resolution prior to sending to the signal to the TV.
Do not confuse composite with component cables - they look similar. Composite, also sometimes called RCA cables and usually colored red, white, & yellow (for right audio, left audio, and video, respectively), will not provide a high def signal. Component cables carry video only and are colored red, green, & blue. These are for analog HDTV and will work well for either DVD or cable/satellite HD input.
Component video uses RCA jacks. You absolutely can use a composite audio/video cable for component video, as long as you’re careful to match up the Y, Pb and Pr lines at both ends, since they won’t be handily colour-coded.
Of course you’re right. I should have referred to connections rather than cables.
Thanks for the link. I’ll browse it when I get a chance. I am actually a percussionist who became a school band director. I don’t get much chance to actually play drums, though I am planning on playing a couple of songs at an upcoming Christmas party. My personal set is a Tama. At school, we use Yamaha and Zildjian.
Well, you’re better off buying a decent set of actual component cables, instead of the cheap composite video & audio cables you’ve got sitting around. HD video runs at a much higher frequency than composite cables are designed for, so you can get some signal degradation using composite cables.
Don’t get Monster cables though - horribly overpriced. Shop around and you can get a 6 ft. component cable set for $10 or so.
The manual for the DVD player I just bought said you could use three of the yellow video cables for the component cables. I already had component cables, so I didn’t try it, but if you already have three of them laying around, it’d be worth trying.
Yep, I understand the difference - I have the red/green/blue connections going from my DVD to the (now new) HD-capable TV I bought. It’s only capable of 720p, but I got a HECK of a deal on it…
Frankly I think both HD DVD and Blu-Ray are too premature (by their own making).
The copy protection shemes on both require a full digital path from player to TV, and some early generation HDTV TVs do some sort of internal conversion to analog (to allow analog-out connectors) and then back to digital.
Not only is the player hardware expensive, but most people would have to replace their entire entertainment systems to realize the benefits. For standard def TVs (which most people have), DVD offers more than enough. Its seems a bit crazy to me that we have two expensive, buggy, and incompatible formats out there now. One is definitely going to be a loser, in a big way.
I predict Blu-ray. Even though it offers more features, its more expensive to produce the media and the hardware, uses an inferier codec which requires more disk space, and the initial products on the market were pitiful compared to the initial HD DVD offerings.