Yesterday, my 88 year old mother purchased a 32" widescreen LCD TV (for $422 + tax, not bad!). The picture is sharp as a tack. It’s skinny and lightweight - she and I, a totally unfit 52 year old woman, were able to bring it in to her apartment and set it up ourselves. It’s beautiful. But what the heck is it for?
I figured widescreen movies would fit, if not perfectly, at least better than they did in regular TVs. Nope. Turns out that unless you stretch the picture (which you have the option of doing, both horizontally and/or vertically) you get a pic about half the area of the entire screen. I called the store back and the salesguy actually recommended pan 'n scan. TV broadcasting that isn’t in letterbox broadcast format does a little better, filling the screen vertically, but leaving blank sidebars. Again, you can stretch it, but people starting looking a bit out of proportion. So my mom’s new 32" screen actually has a picture size a tad smaller than her old 27" tube TV. Clearer, but slightly smaller.
Now, she does not have digital cable. Apparently in February we all get digital, but we’re also being told that our cable company will take care of everything, so I suspect it will be translated to analog before it reaches us. This TV can handle digital, but I don’t know if it will ever get the opportunity.
What the heck is the extra width for? In the store, they were using it for whatever they were playing. But when I asked the salesguy on the phone, he mumbled something I didn’t catch and called it a day.
Regular TVs used to be 4:3 (4 units wide by 3 units high, or 1.33:1), while the new widescreen TVs are 16:9 (1.78:1). Digital broadcasts, IIRC, are broadcasted at that ratio. Widescreen movies are displayed in theaters at 1.85:1 or 2.39:1, explaining why you’re still getting bars on the top and bottom when you watch in widescreen.
Upon preview, are you saying that you don’t fill the screen when you’re watching a movie horizontally? If so, your zoom settings are wrong; try “full”. If it’s only a problem when you’re watching TV, and you’re getting bars on the top and sides… well, I haven’t figured that one out on my TV yet. :smack:
HD TV is broadcast with an aspect ration of 16:9, so that fits the wide screen perfectly. If you don’t have and HD TV source, then the wide screen is a waste of money. Digital is not that same as HD. All SD channels broadcast digitally are still 4:3.
OK, so Widescreen movies should be viewed on Full, Santo? Oh, and we’re only getting bars on the sides, not the top or bottom during TV, unless they’re showing a widescreen movie. Nothing you can do about that last - it’s the way they’re broadcasting.
John, so any show that says it’s being broadcast as HD TV is 16:9? Because that’s a different set of aspect ratio options on the TV from 4:3.
My mom is going to go nuts. She’s mentally absolutely fine, but she has no confidence, so she’s certain she’s going to screw it up. sigh. I swear, I’m happier about this new TV for her than she is, although she is pleased (the old tube TV had developed horizontal pin stripes, so the tube was going).
Wrong! Digital channels should be broadcasting in 16:9, but they may show programming that has been recorded in 4:3. HDTV is more likely to be 16:9 only because it’s part of the standard specification for HD. Here in Australia, I’ve had a widescreen TV for five years, and almost all our SD programming is in 16:9.
Anyways, check out this webpage to explain what you should be seeing when using a widescreen TV.
Just learn where the button for switching between aspects is and anytime you start watching something new, cycle through till you get the one you prefer. There’s nothing much complicated about it.
True, if she just watches regular ol’ TV, the extra screen area might be wasted, but that’s sort of…well…something that you needed to consider before the purchase. I realise that you/she didn’t understand the issue, but the point remains. You might prefer to trade it back for a 4:3 TV set.
Where it will be nice is with new fangled TV shows like Lost or 24 which are broadcast in 16:9 and various DVDs. But there’s not going to be one aspect on the TV that will work for all of these. Some DVDs/TV shows assume a 4:3 TV screen and others assume a 16:9. But like I said, it’s just a matter of cycling through to the one that looks right for that particular show.
For your 88 year-old mother things shouldn’t be so complicated that she needs to know what 16:9 is vs. 4:3 vs. digital vs. HD etc. etc.
For movies on DVD you just need someone to set up your DVD player so it automatically adjusts the picture to your screen. It’s a one time setting and from then on everytime she pops in a DVD it should fill the screen as best it can in widescreen format automatically.
For broadcast TV it depends on your source for watching TV. Cable, satellite, antenna? and if she has HD programming which usually costs extra with cable and satellite. There are actually seperate but identical channels for SD and HD.
At least with Comcast cable there is a SD NBC station on one channel that has the smaller picture with bars on the sides. And on a seperate channel there is a HD NBC station that gives the full widescreen picture.
You just need someone who knows what they’re doing come by to do the initial setups for you and show you which channels will give you the widescreen picture.
Not all digital broadcasts are in 16x9, most are going to be, even the old 4x3 stuff, but it doesn’t have to be. We have a few channels here that are not.
I don’t know how you receive your signal, though I’m guessing that you get it from cable and have no digital box. If you hooked up the cable directly from the wall then chances are you still are only getting the old standard def signal. That means that everything will still be in 4x3 so you’ll have bars on the sides. You can stretch it, but as you’ve noted it might not look great.
If what you’re seeing is bars on all four sides then they are broadcasting widescreen in 16x9 for some reason, our local Fox does this with a couple of shows for some reason, it looks really funny.
When you watch a DVD most likely the DVD is outputting at 4x3 as that’s how a lot are set up. There’s most likely a setting in the menu for 16x9 output and then you’ll not have to stretch anything.
You could also try an antenna for local channels. Depending on how far away from the antenna you might pick up a lot of channels. These channels will be something like 4.1 or 4-1. The period or dash means it’s a digital signal. If you find a 4.2 then it’s a sub channel, lots of stations have them.
In February you will have to do nothing if you are getting cable, they will either convert the signals to analog or require you to get a box. The only time you will need to get a box not from cable is if you use an antenna an have an older TV that does not have a digital tuner.
It’s certainly wrong for here in Australia. But America I can’t speak for. It ought to be the same situation in the US as here, but I have gathered from anecdotal reports that in some places it is, and in others it’s not.
I get frustrated when people equate 16:9 with HD, when really they should be equating 16:9 with Digital. John Mace said the former.
Second, for the time being, I’m it. You and the internet are my info pool.
I’m not aware of there being separate HD and SD TV stations in my area (which includes all NYC and Philly stations). However, a number of individual shows are announced as being broadcast in HD just before they air.
We are running the experiment of going through aspect ratios while we watch TV. Understand that I don’t live with my mom, so I can’t always be there to do this, and she’s not confident on her own. I can’t figure out if the TV can detect what kind of signal it’s getting. When it had a widescreen DVD as its input, it viewed it as 4:3, or at least the terms it used for aspect ration reflected those in the manual it used to describe the choices for 4:3. The choices were something like Sidebar (space all the way around), Full (which was fullscreen width, but top and bottom bars blank), Cinema (entire screen filled), and something else that was taller than Full but not filled like Cinema. Unfortunately, it was an animated movie, so if it was stretched and distorted for Cinema or any of the other settings, it wasn’t visible. I’ll be checking further today.
When watching broadcast TV, the Sidebar choice filled the screen vertically, but left blanks on the side. Any other setting stretched the proportions and just wasn’t something we wanted.
We will not return the set; the picture is clearer than the old set, whose tube was going anyway, the set is much lighter weight, and it’s a very cool toy. We’re just trying to figure out what good all the extra width is for. Since I haven’t seen the TV with a show that I know for a fact is officially HDTV and run the remote through its aspect ratio paces, I don’t know yet. But from what I’m seeing here, you folks are telling me that something that is broadcast in HD should fill the screen without distortion on some setting of the aspect ratio, right? Please confirm or set me straight.
I think what you mean if they’re broadcasting a 16:9 show at 4:3 (aka letterbox format). The image being broadcast is at a 4:3 ratio, even if the show you’re watching isn’t.
If you’re seeing bars just at the top and bottom, then either you’re watching a letterboxed movie that’s been stretched horizontally*, or what you’re watching isn’t at a 16:9 ratio (not all widescreen is 16:9)
*Our local Best Buy had this setup on some of their HDTVs when we were shopping for one. Great sales tactic–“Buy our TVs, they make everyone look fat!”
Correct. An HD broadcast will fill a 16:9 widescreen TV completely with no top/bottom or side bars and no picture distortion due to stretching.
Best and easiest example would be Leno or Letterman nightly.
OH, lordy, lordy. Is it channels or shows? Around here, it seems to be shows. I’m not at my mother’s house at 11:30 to check out Leno! But does that mean only in digital or does it include analog?
On the plus side, she seems to be taking the idea of experimenting when they say a show is being broadcast in HD pretty well! I’m so proud of my mom. Eighty-eight years old, and she’s still brighter than the vast majority of people out there. If she could get past the language and her own lack of confidence, she’d make a good Doper.
You can also try the news. I know that NBC’s Nightly News is in HD, and I think CBS has just changed over as well.
As I said before though if you are using cable you will almost certainly need a cable box to see an HD signal. While some cable companies do send out an unencrypted signal, most do not.
I don’t know how your TV works, but mine has four different zoom levels. I don’t play with them much so I don’t know them, but what should be normal is actually called stretch. You’ll want to find the one zoom that doesn’t distort anything so you’ll know when it looks correct, otherwise you can actually have some of the picture off the screen.
Jayn_Newell I know that Fox shows Stargate in a letterbox format in a 4x3 box. It looks really strange as there are black bars on all four sides, there’s actually more black then picture. I have seen this with some commercials as well.
I also have seen some, mostly a few football games, here in the States that are in SD but shown 16x9. I don’t know if that’s how it was supposed to be or just what happened in the local station.
I almost forgot Oy!, you should be able to change the output for the DVD player in the DVD player’s menu. You’ll not fill up the entire screen most likely, but at least the majority of it will be filled.
You’ll want to find the one zoom that doesn’t distort anything so you’ll know when it looks correct, otherwise you can actually have some of the picture off the screen.