So I found a good price on an Anthem AVM50, (it'd be cheaper to sell my AVM30 and buy the AVM50), but I'm wondering if anyone know if the Genum chip would scale standard definition material better than the Pioneer 5080.

I'm very happy with how DVDs look on the Pioneer, it's just standard cable that looks like garbage. I have a HTPC, and standard channels look much better through media center. But it's painful switching back and fourth between the TV and cable box for SD and HD channels.

Any pictures would be great too!

Thanks,

Ming

You mention scaling, but there are really 3 issues: deinterlacing, scaling, and noise reduction image processing...

Since this is a 1365 x 768 display with a good to excellent scaler already, and since it won't accept 1365 x 768 via anything other than VGA, the best scaling will occur when it's fed a native resolution signal.

As for the deinterlacing, the Genum may do a slightly better job with inverse telecine and/or standard deinterlacing than the Pio, but the Pio is by no means a slouch. I'd stick with the Pio unless the processor can be set up to simply do deinterlacing in native resolution and no scaling.

As for image processing (noise reduction, etc.), I can't comment on the Genum solution, but I think the first 2 reasons should point you to stay with the Pio and just feed it native, and let it all image processing. I have a Pio 1365 x 768 display, and that's what I do (except I do use my XA-2 to deinterlace standard DVD to 480p and let the Pio scale)...

The Pio 5080 does accept native over HDMI. The problem is that is sees this as a "PC" signal and engages automatic contrast limiting. For best PQ, this isn't optimal. You are better off feeding the panel 1080p from a VP.

My experience with the 4280/AVM 50 suggested that the 4280 has equivalent HD video deinterlacing, superior HD film deinterlacing, superior SD video deinterlacing, and slightly inferior SD film deinterlacing compared to the AVM50.