I’m taking the liberty of posting this on both the HiDef Forum and the AVS Forum for DVD recorders:

In the last couple of days, I’ve attempted to use my Panny DVDR to record two HD “broadcasts” on HD channels from my set top box. Up to this point I’ve had complete success recording from SD channels and playing those recordings on my plasma panel, adjusting the aspect ratio to “just” to fill the screen (I’m still in the anti-burn-in break-in period).
The problem: I recorded “Meet the Press” on the local HD NBC-affiliate KING-TV and a movie on TNT’s HD channel. In each case, the finished recording appeared with top and bottom bars when replayed on the Panny plasma’s “full”, “hi-fill”, 4:3 and “just.” On “zoom” which I’d normally use to eliminate the black bars, I got a smaller (than on “full”) picture with black bars on all four sides.
I’m just hoping to be able to make SD recordings from HD channels without black bars anywhere.
Is there something in the HD broadcast screen aspect ratios or screen size that gives me this unwatchable (at least during the break-in period) result?

Equipment, All Panasonics:

Plasma Panel: TH-42PZ700U
Blu-Ray Player: DMP-BD30K
Hard Drive DVD Recorder: DMR-E80H
VCR: PV9664
PV7662 (backup for when the PV9664 fails)

plus the
ComCast Set Top Box: Motorola DCH3200

Some STBs will simply not put an HD source out the composite or S-Video ports without letterboxing the content. Some can but have to be coaxed into putting the content out anamorphic. Without knowing specifically the limitations and capabilities of your model STB, it is difficult to know where to start looking for the problem. As a first guess, maybe you have the wrong display type selected in the STB setup. Someone here will have specific experience with the Motorola DCH3200, and they should be able to help you much more.

see if u can find a video squish (anamorphic) mode for sd composite or s video outputs on your stb.
afaik, to make your recordings properly, u'll need said stretch mode.

i used to make 480i sd dvds out of downrezzed hd content by using the squish mode (anamorphic) (going out the s video output) on my sa8000hd dvr (stb).
the squeezed image would be recorded on my pan. es-15 or toshiba dr2 and when replayed on a widescreen tv would be stretched back out to normal width.

worked great and the content looked(s) great! and no letterboxing! (unless the content was 2.35x1 or 4x3, which would be normal.)

i got rid of dvrs last year but thats another story.

Westgate's right. If you can feed your DVDR squished 16x9 or real 16x9 your DVDR should be able to record the whole 16x9 frame. Try hooking your STB directly to your TV to see if you get WS then. Note not familiar with the E80H, but on other Panny's I have used you need to go into it's setup and select 16x9 for TV type. If you have 4x3 selected you will not be able to record full 16x9. It should be under functions, other functions, screen type, at least on my Panny's.

[QUOTE=jjeff;13462315]Westgate's right. If you can feed your DVDR squished 16x9 or real 16x9 your DVDR should be able to record the whole 16x9 frame.
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i dont understand what you mean by 'or real 16x9'.
afaik, sd dvdrs record all content into 4x3 'frame';
the only way they'll properly record non-letterboxed widescreen material is if its squished 2 fit into said 'frame';
and then unsquished back to widescreen, upon playback.

The STB is a ComCast Motorola DCH3200. I neglected to point out that simply viewing HD content on HD channels from the STB, except for obtrusive station logos in (usually) the lower right hand corner and commercials which are more often than not in SD, is fine.

It's the recording and playing back that is a problem. I'd be sort of satified if I could just zoom away the black bars as I did the BD "I Am Legend" disk i viewed this afternoon after my first posting. Again, I'm conservatively avoiding black bars and logos at least until I get past the forum-recommended break-in period(s) [some say 100 hours, some say 200, some say you never really get past break-in and some say burn-in is no longer a problem.

As Far as the Panny E80H is concerned, its "setup" has a huge variety of options:

TV Type -- 16:9(480p) [selected by plasma installer]
Aspects under this type -- 4:3 and 480i, 4:3 and 480p, 16:9 and 480i and 16:9 and 480p

TV Mode(4:3)
TV setting for DVD-video -- Pan and Scan and Letterbox
TV setting for DVD-RAM -- 4:3, Pan and Scan and Letterbox

I've got lotsa choices here and appreciate suggestions.

The STB is a ComCast Motorola DCH3200. I neglected to point out that simply viewing HD content on HD channels from the STB, except for obtrusive station logos in (usually) the lower right hand corner and commercials which are more often than not in SD, is fine.

It's the recording and playing back that is a problem. I'd be sort of satified if I could just zoom away the black bars as I did the BD "I Am Legend" disk i viewed this afternoon after my first posting. Again, I'm conservatively avoiding black bars and logos at least until I get past the forum-recommended break-in period(s) [some say 100 hours, some say 200, some say you never really get past break-in and some say burn-in is no longer a problem.

As Far as the Panny E80H is concerned, its "setup" has a huge variety of options:

TV Type -- 16:9(480p) [selected by plasma installer]
Aspects under this type -- 4:3 and 480i, 4:3 and 480p, 16:9 and 480i and 16:9 and 480p

TV Mode(4:3)
TV setting for DVD-video -- Pan and Scan and Letterbox
TV setting for DVD-RAM -- 4:3, Pan and Scan and Letterbox

I've got lotsa choices here and appreciate suggestions.

i believe the panny settings u show r of no use for recording purposes, if i remember correctly.
zooming sucks as u lose pq; but if there is no (anamorphic) squish mode on stb, then u may be stuck.

maybe call cableco and find out what other stbs they have, then do research on whatever machines they have to offer (the cable folks most likely will be completely clueless about a squish mode-my cable folks were-i only found out about my dvrs having the squish by accident-after having them for 6 months!:eek:).

also if u dont have a hard drive onboard your stb, u should have one, along w the squish mode, for your recording purposes.

edit-DEMAND, politely, that comcast find/get u an sa8000hd; sa8300hd may work also. most of your recording issues could be solved with one.

with any of these dvrs, nowadays, u may run into copy protection issues. a whole 'nother ish!

I record HD channels from my Comcast Moto DVR all the time, using the S-Vid out to my DVDR. I can't get a squeezed picture over the S-Vid out, so I can't record anamorphic. So, the recording is in 4x3, letterboxed. I use a zoom setting on my HD TV to eliminate the black bars on all four sides. Why that doesn't work for you, I can't explain, unless maybe your DVD player needs to have its output set to 16x9.

i dont understand what you mean by 'or real 16x9'.
afaik, sd dvdrs record all content into 4x3 'frame';
the only way they'll properly record non-letterboxed widescreen material is if its squished 2 fit into said 'frame';
and then unsquished back to widescreen, upon playback.
What I meant by real 16x9 was if the STB could output full frame 16x9 that would work, as well as if the box could output the squished 16x9(all fitting into a 4x3 frame.
Yes you are correct as I understand it either way the DVDR will only record the 4x3 frame, it's just to get a true 16x9 at the end you will need to store it as squished 16x9. Hope that makes sense. Sometimes this whole aspect ratio thing gets confusing:confused:
All I know is I can either feed my DVDR full frame 16x9(example from another DVD player) or squished 16x9(in a 4x3 frame) from my Samsung 260 tuner. Either way works fine in the end when my TV stretches it back to full frame 16x9.
Jim, not sure why you are having a problem. Looks like your settings are correct. The main thing to look for is 16x9 for your TV type, which it looks like you have set.

The first thing to do in diagnosing such a problem is to simplify the situation. Remove the DVD recorder from the signal chain and see if the STB will give you a full frame when connected directly to your television using the composite or S-Video (whichever you are using). If it will only send you a letterboxed output, then you know it is not the DVD recorder. If it sends you full-frame content, then you should look at the DVD recorder settings.

It is not surprising that "simply viewing HD content on HD channels from the STB...is fine." Since DVD recorders can only record 480i signals (those without component inputs anyway) it is ironing out the problems of getting the HD content converted to a 480i output that is the problem. SD to SD and HD to HD are rarely an issue. Many STBs automatically letterbox the composite and S-Video outputs to SAVE YOU from aspect ratio problems because they erroneously assume that these connections are for 4:3 televisions only. They are merely trying to help. Many here wish that the would not be nearly so helpful.

The DVD recorder is one of three components in the signal chain and the STB gives me a full frame when the Panny plasma's "zoom" setting is used and the STB is connected directly to my television. I use the component connection from the STB to the plasma rather than using the composite or S-Video. I use the S-Video output from the STB to the Panny DVDR since it does not have component or HDMI inputs (it does have component output which I connect to the other component input on the plasma).

Perhaps there is a clue here.

Okay, there was actually a lot there. 1) For diagnostic purposes, connect the STB to the television using the S-Video connection and play with the settings until you get a full screen anamorphic picture with the correct aspect ratio. I would strongly suggest you not use the zoom setting, but the equivalent of stretch (horizontal stretch with no change in vertical) because that will give you, by far, the best resolution. 2) THEN put the connections back the way you have them now and make some test recordings. If you can get your STB to cooperate with the stretch mode, then you are almost all the way there.

Jim, we've all been there. It takes a while to figure out correctly what's going on and how to make it all work. But usually it can be done.

The first thing to realize is that the DVD recorder just records the frame that it gets from the source. It has no control over the aspect ratio or the letterboxing in that source frame - that's entirely a function of the video source. So you can initially take the DVD recorder out of the chain for diagnostic purposes.

What you want is for your source (the STB) to output an "anamorphic" frame, which means that the picture fills the frame completely with no embedded black "filler" bars on any side. If you are using the SVideo output of your STB to feed the DVD recorder (as you should be), you want to plug that SVideo output directly into your Panny HDTV and see what you're getting on the "Full" aspect ratio setting. When the STB tuner is receiving a 16:9 HD program, the SVideo output should look exactly right with the 16:9 TV on the Full setting. It should fill the screen with no black bars, and the aspect ratio should look right. If you see black letterbox bars above and below the picture, then something is wrong with the STB settings and you are not getting anamorphic output.

It can be very tricky to get stable anamorphic output with some STBs, so you may have to play around with the settings a bit on your own if you can't find explicit instructions for you model on the web. With my own Motorola STB, the SVideo output defaults to anamorphic, but it flips to letterboxed non-anamorphic and stays that way every time it displays channel information (doh!). The only way to get it to flip back is to change the TV input away from HDMI1 and back to get the STB to "re-negotiate" the HDMI connection to the TV (something about that process resets the SVideo output back to anamorphic).

Once you are getting anamorphic output from the STB on SVideo, just connect that to your DVD recorder SVideo input, and it will happily record that at 720 x 480 resolution. No problem with that part.

Next problem: Most DVD recorders have no way to tell what the correct aspect ratio of the input program is, so they just default it to "4:3" in the IFO header of the recording. When you play back that recording, it comes out as squished 4:3 aspect ratio, just as specified in the header. That's not a problem for your Panny HDTV - just select Full or HFill mode (depending on whether your DVD recorder/player is sending 480i or upconverted HD res) to stretch it back to filling the screen, and everything will look right.

A few DVD recorders provide the means to manually set the aspect ratio of a recording to "16:9", but for most of them to only way to set this correctly is to transcribe the recording on a computer and use a program like IFOEdit to fix the header. It's not really a problem as long as your TV as enough flexibility to stretch 4:3 with an even horizontal stretch to 16:9. It's just that you have to do it manually when the aspect ratio is wrong in the recording header.

The one remaining problem you may encounter is that the procedure that works correctly for recording and playing back a 16:9 HD program doesn't work optimally when the broadcast is a 4:3 HD program, or (as I've sometimes seen) a 720p program on a 1080i channel where the picture has black filler bars on all sides.

Jim, we've all been there. It takes a while to figure out correctly what's going on and how to make it all work. But usually it can be done...
Hey, that is what I was trying to say... but I don't have the patience to type all that, so thanks. Yes, I fully agree with what you have said.

Jim, The Panasonic recorders only see and keep the WS flag with recordings made using -RAM disks. I don't know specifically about the E80H, it might not even keep the flag with -RAM disks. On playback, you will have to use the stretch mode because whatever player you use will be unaware of the anamorphic content of the disk unless you copy the contents to a computer and force the WS flag. Many here do that.

If your STB is sending your DVD recorder a video stream that has letterboxing, pillarboxing, or postagestamping black bars--that is, if those black bars are in the video stream itself, then there is nothing the DVD recorder can do to "fix" the image. You have to send the recorder full screen video for it to record full screen. As has been said, the DVD recorder just records what it is given, and if what it is given has black bars, it will record them as if it were program material because it does not know that the black bars are not an intended part of the content. You can look at it and see it in a second, but the DVD recorder has no way of knowing.

amesdp,

Which Motorola STB do you have? I just picked up a new Motorola DCH3200 & connected it to my HDTV via both component and S-Video. The component input works just fine & displays the full 16:9 WS picture. But the S-Video only displays the floating postage stamp letterboxed image with black border all around. I can change the TV to "Full" in order to fill the screen, however that will not help in properly recording the image.

I need the 720 x 480 anamorphic output like you are able to get. I do not have an HDMI connection at the moment as I need to get a cable. But switching between the TV's component input & S-Video input does not change the S-Video to anamorphic.

As I'm typing this I wonder if I should disconnect the component connections as perhaps this is somehow telling the STB something. I doubt it, but will have to try that later & see what happens.

Perhaps you have a different model STB which could make a difference. Or maybe there's a service menu somehow available in order to change this.

I have the Motorola 3200. As some other posters have opined, I think we are limited by the parameters of each broadcaster's technology, rather than by our equipment.

in case this applies,
the anamorphic 'squish' needs to take place in your source (stb) in order for it to be recorded and stored (in 4x3 'framework') on the disc being recorded to. look in the stb menus and on the remote for any 'aspect ratio' controls;
the stb may not be set up to do it.
only on playback on a widescreen tv will it be stretched back out to look normal.

The Motorola DCH3200 does not have any aspect ratio controls, at least not available for the consumer from what I see so far.