SS and Widescreen

[jandw]

I was wondering: how does BTV handle widescreen broadcasts, when used with a PVR250 tuner card?

I have my plamsa tv connected and running fine at 1280x768@75HZ. Tats fine, interface and Windows run smoothly.

But, I'm wondering how it will handle widescreen boradcasts? Will the tuner card 'letterbox' the image, so it has black borders top and bottom, and the interface will be around these black borders, or will it correctly adapt the interface, so the interface is also adapted to widescreen, and thus visible on screen: no black borders on a widescreen plasma and full screen, native interface?

Tnx,


Jan De Wever

[Baylo]

I think the PVR250 just records a standard 4:3 screen with black borders top and bottom since this is essentially what is broadcast by the networks, so you'd have to use a zoom function to fill a widescreen TV.

I hope someone can tell me I'm wrong, though.

Mark

[darren_e]

I'm using a widescreen setting of 1776x1000i on my CRT RP TV and I do not have the black bars on the top or bottom of my programming unless the show happens to be shown in letterbox/widescreen format on my DirecTV.

Your TV is different and you should try different settings using powerstrip until you find the best that works for you.

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showt...hreadid=206854

Try this link and see if it helps you at all. Try putting your recording settings to 720x480 (or is it 740x480?) and see what happens.

[DonK]

720x480 still will result in letterbox bars if the *channel* is showing a widescreen show... Remember, most TV's still are 4:3, so the prevailing broadcast format on most channels still is that resolution. So if they're showing a movie or show in widescreen format, it's usually letterboxed within a 4:3 aspect.

The only time you have a widescreen format (16:9) show filling your screen is if you're running HDTV, or you are using a zoom function of some sort, OR... if your tv is like mine, it can take a 4:3 aspect ratio and intelligently or not intelligently stretch it to fill the full 16:9. My RCA Scenium has a very good stretch feature that has *very minimal* horizontal distortion. It's gotten to the point now where I don't notice it at all.

[jandw]

I'm sorry to say so, but these do not truely answer my question.

My question was: will BTW 3.5 'remove' the black bars top and bottom, so the BTV interface fits to it like a glove, in widescreen? Or doesn't the BTV 3.5 interface (OSD) adapt itself to widescreen footage, and does it remain in 4:3, while in the BTV OSD interface, I get a letterboxed image?

Tnx,


Jan De Wever

[Treetop]

Im not sure about v3.5.1, but in the 3.4 version there is an option (in the FSUI) that allows you to choose between: Auto, 4:3, Stretch, 16:9, and 16:9 in 4:3

I've yet to upgrade to 3.5 (though I have played around with it), so Im not sure if they took that feature out... but I havent heard anyone mention it, so Im guessing that its still there.

Regarding the OSD... in 3.5 there is a very easy (point and click) method to adjusting the OSD. I dont have a widescreen set, but I imagine it would work well...

Anyone with a widescreen tv that can verify this?

[DonK]

Yes, the aspect selection is still in BTV 3.5.1...

You still have to adjust your ui for overscan, whether you have 4:3 or 16:9, and it works fine on widescreen.

BTV can only work as well filling your screen as you have adjusted your ui, and also your input, and your TV.

It's not as simple as telling BTV "hey i have a 16:9" tv, if your tv won't stretch whatever input it's given, then BTV won't do a thing to fix that, plus it's a matter of what resolution you're outputting to your tv. If you have a 16:9 HDTV, you should be inputting via either DVI or Component, using the proper resolution and refresh, etc....

And no, BTV doesn't remove the bars if there are any. If you use the zoom setting in the aspect ratios, then yeah, it may, but even then, it's still dependent on your tv, not BTV itself.

[jandw]

Well, as stated in my original post:

• my PC and plasma are connected via VGA.
• the plasma is displaying the PC fine at 1280*768*75Hz
• 1280*768*75Hz will be the resolution I will be feeding my plasma with from the PC, allways. That will be the resolution BTV will be running in, allways.
• I don't plan on using the plasma tuner, ever. Allways the BTV interface/TV reception.

I understand that, when BTV is running in this widescreen resolution, a 4:3 broadcast will be displayed with borders left and right, within the BTV interface. But how will BTV/PVR150-250 handle widescreen broadcasts, in that display resolution (1280*768)?

• 4:3 letterboxed (with black borders top, bootom, lef and right)
• or a full image (no borders).

Remember: BTV is running at 1280*768, a 16:9 aspect ratio, filling my TV perfectly!!! I have no borders on the screen, when I feed the plasma this resolution!!!

Tnx,


Jan De Wever

[Baylo]

I just did some experimenting. I usually run BTVLink fullscreen on a 1024x768 monitor but switched to Windowed mode and set the window to approximate a widescreen ratio.

With that setting, normal 4x3 content uses the full height and has black bars on the left and right. This is using the 'auto' aspect ratio setting. A broadcast of widescreen-based material is recorded by the PVR250 as 4x3, hence it shows in my 'widescreen' window with black bars on all 4 sides, again using 'auto' aspect ratio. However, switching the aspect ratio to 'widescreen' (hit 'o' to pull up the menu while the video is playing) zooms the picture and effectively eliminates the black bars to the left and right. Of course you may still have black bars above and below depending on the original aspect ratio of the material - this is no different than the issues you have with DVDs anyway; there is no one widescreen standard.

Thus, it seems to me that you can use BTV's aspect ratio settings to zoom the picture to fill your widescreen display, but it has to be done manually - BTV will not do it automatically. Ideally, I guess, it would be nice to have the PVR250 recognize the broadcast as widescreen source and tag it as such so that BTV could make the necessary changes, but that's an issue for Hauppauge's programmers to wrestle with...

Mark

[jandw]

Thanks Mark, that's the answer I was looking for!


Jan De Wever