I have a Lumagen Radiance, just upgraded from XD to XE version (XE has new HDMI 1.3 board). Sim2 C3X 1080 3 chip DLP projector. Stewart Cine-V
curved 1.3 gain 128" wide 2:35 screen (96" wide for 16:9), 54" high.
ISFed by Michael Hamilton. Almost 1100 hours on bulb and still plenty of brightness and never use projector more than 230 (settings from 200 to 250) watts.

Recently with my Radiance out for upgrade, I used the projector's built-in scaling/video processing. How do they compare?

The projector's built in processing does a very nice job. But not as good a job as in combination with the Radiance. I find this particularly on DirecTV including HD channels (that's pretty much all I watch), but even with
Blu Ray or HD DVD. For DirecTV in particular, HD just seems - more HD, less noise, clearer.

For subtitled Blu Rays, HD DVDs or Blu Ray discs, its easy to set up a special aspect ratio to include the subtitles, which will shorten the width of the picture a bit. But this handles subtitles correctly. The Lumagen website has instructions how to set this up.

Using the Radiance, lets say a channel broadcasts a program in 720p or 1080i but the picture is centered in the middle of the screen - shrunken 16:9 picture, well, the Radiance allows you to increase the size

What's interesting is how to interface settings of the projector vs the Radiance. The Radiance has a "scale bias" setting:

From the Radiance manual: "Scaling is normally on in order to adjust the source to exactly fit the output resolution. If the bias is set to “On”, scaling is enabled unless the input and output resolution match exactly. If the scale bias is set to “Off” scaling is disabled if the input and output resolutions are close. Scaling is disabled/enabled independently for horizontal and vertical. When the bias is off there can be small borders on the edges of the image. The second page of on-screen status information indicates whether scaling is enabled."

"MENU → Input → Video Setup → [Resolution] → Size → [Aspect ratio] → Scale Bias → OK"

From the Sim C3X 1080 Manual:

"Normal: projects the image occupying the full height of
the screen while maintaining the aspect ratio of the input
signal. When the input signal aspect ratio is 4:3 black vertical
bands are displayed on each side of the picture.

Anamorphic: correctly displays a 16:9 image.

Pixel to Pixel: performs pixel to pixel mapping of any image,
without adapting to the screen. The image is projected in
the centre of the screen and if it’s horizontal and/or vertical
dimensions are smaller than the display, it is bordered by
vertical and/or horizontal black bands."

I find that the best picture is with "scale bias" set to "Off" for all HD sources;
and with the projector's picture mode set to "Normal". One might think that using "Pixel-to-Picture" mode for the projector would be better, but there is something magic about using this Lumagen-Sim2 combination, with the "Normal" picture having more 3D, natural and more natural blacks than the "Pixel to Pixel". The latter looks nice, but the "Normal" just is a WOW!

For ten days I used the "Normal" setting direct from video source to projector, without the Radiance - let me tell you the Radiance is a winner and clearly improves the picture across the board!!!

Other Radiance & Sim2 C3X 1080 owners out there - your thoughts and observations!!!

I was following you up to where you threw in `pixel to picture` mode. That`s the mode I use on every digital projector I have ever used. Unless you can boot strap a pixel to picture mode on top of a pixel to pixel mode, the whole mess is useless.

I was following you up to where you threw in `pixel to picture` mode. That`s the mode I use on every digital projector I have ever used. Unless you can boot strap a pixel to picture mode on top of a pixel to pixel mode, the whole mess is useless.

Rom the Sim2 manual:

"Pixel to Pixel: performs pixel to pixel mapping of any image,
without adapting to the screen. The image is projected in
the centre of the screen and if it’s horizontal and/or vertical
dimensions are smaller than the display, it is bordered by
vertical and/or horizontal black bands."

"Normal: projects the image occupying the full height of
the screen while maintaining the aspect ratio of the input
signal. When the input signal aspect ratio is 4:3 black vertical
bands are displayed on each side of the picture."

At least on some stuff I was watching recently, although the picture geometrically is identical (when using Radiance 16:9 1080p 60 as input),
the picture looked beter using the "Normal" picture mode on the projector.
I was watching some HD shows Monday nite - Heroes, 24, Medium - and I found this that evening. Though I am still experimenting and don't necessarily find a difference on some stuff.

Gotta quit drinking!

Steve,

Do you use the Lumagen to trigger the CineSlide when the movie's AR changes?

I recall Jeff mentioning how you could use the scaler to auto trigger the lens when changing from the 16:9 disc menu to the 2.39:1 movie and vice versa.

Sean

He does.

Steve. The more important question is what are you drinking now. I have switched to Compari mixed with Prosecco, a splash of soda and a piece of orange. Its called a spritz over in Venice.

Steve,

Do you use the Lumagen to trigger the CineSlide when the movie's AR changes?

I recall Jeff mentioning how you could use the scaler to auto trigger the lens when changing from the 16:9 disc menu to the 2.39:1 movie and vice versa.

Sean

Of course. Both the Cineslide and the screen are plugged into the two 12V triggers on the Radiance. Hit "2:35" on Radiance remote, and the anamorphic lens slides into place, the bars at the sides of the screen come up, and the Radiance changes video format into 2:35. To go back to 16:9 for everything, simply hit "16:9" button on Radiance. Way Cool!!!

Originally Posted by Steve Bruzonsky
I have options of:
(1) Radiance XE scale bias on or off
(2) Using Radiance XE three different "Enhancement" noise reduction settings
(3) Setting projector picture to "Normal" or "Pixel-to-Pixel".

Recently with DirecTV including local OTA HD programming, I find my liking
#1 with scale bias on (still experimenting based on program), #2 often all three noise reduction settings at 0 but on occasion at 3 for each of three settings, and #3 at "Pixel-to-Pixel".

Tonight with bunch of OTA HD programs on I'll experiment more. Last week,
I found different settings than above to work best, #1 with scale bias off, #2
with all three noise reduction settings at 0, and #3 with projector at "normal". I really saw a picture difference vs "pixel-to-Pixel". So tonight I'll watch the same shows and see what gives.



A week ago, I had just got the Radiance XE back after upgrade, so its possible the board burning in some could make a pictorial difference. Tonight I'll find out what I "see".

Maybe its my eye brain or maybe the new HDMI 1.3 board on the Radiance XE needed some burn in, but now I'm finding that I am always setting the projector at "Pixel-to-Pixel" (although it may be difficult to discern any difference compared to the projector at "Normal"). As for Radiance XE,
for DirecTV stuff, I leave scale bias set to "On" and only a small part of the time find that the video Enhancement settings are of additional benefit (and if I use them, such as mosquito noise reduction, I go no higher than 3). For
Blu Ray or HD DVD, I will generally set scale bias to "Off" and not use any Enhancement.


Other nite watched the HD DVD of "In The Wild". What a beautiful scenic
cinemascope picture througout!!!!

Hey guys- I asked this in the radiance thread but maybe it is better asked here- do you think the radiance would be a better fit than using the processor in the Sim HT-5000- I use it mostly for BR- thanks,gary

Steve, what are the changes with the upgrade? I got my Radiance at the end of last summer and haven't done any firmware upgrades either. Everything looks so great I hate to mess with it.
Ken

Steve, what are the changes with the upgrade? I got my Radiance at the end of last summer and haven't done any firmware upgrades either. Everything looks so great I hate to mess with it.
Ken

Ken... You need to open your horizons..

It only has another 40 other functions and PQ improvements.

Hey guys- I asked this in the radiance thread but maybe it is better asked here- do you think the radiance would be a better fit than using the processor in the Sim HT-5000- I use it mostly for BR- thanks,gary

Many HT5k users (and Sim2 users in general) don't use a Radiance or other VP. Myself and others here, have found the Radiance to soften the image compared to the native processing. I'll caveat that by saying this may have been resolved in the interim period.

It does offer flexibility and some better options for SD, but I have no need for that. I run pixel to pixel fro 1.78 and stretch for 235., and use a great scaling SD-DVD player for any DVDs I watch. My only common excursion from that is with the 360, where mine has some dots on the very top couple of lines of pixels. The dual axis AR control wipes that out beautifully and is set as the default memory for that i/p.

CM. Such observations of softening may no longer be valid. There have been many software revisions to the radiance since then and severak revusions have improved the video quality. I recently upgraded my software or firmware whatever and the video quality improvement was significant. I know longer see any softening nut my observations were not with a HT5000. Perhaps SB can comment using his c3x1080 withand without his Radiance rather than just or without certain settings on or off.

Originally I did not use the Radiance with HD DVD or Blu Ray as there was some softening. That is no longer the case. PERIOD!

Look, the Sim2s have very nice built-in scaling. I do definitely see an improvement on
DirecTV and local OTA HD channels using the Radiance - but frankly, the picture was still good with the Sim2 processing alone.

The Radiance makes it easy to watch subtitled discs.

When an occasional 16:9 program is broadcast in the middle of the screen, the Radiance makes it easy to zoom the picture over the whole screen, in the original aspect ratio, and still look good.

I can't say the Radiance makes Blu Ray look necessarily better - unless its an old movie with too much video noise and then the Radiance may be helpful.

My 2:35 curved screen is only 128" wide. What looks like more pronounced video noise on some discs when one has an even larger screen often looks fine on this size screen.
Lon (LJG) commented that the Blu Ray "The Lookout" was unwatchable on his screen, much larger than mine, without using the Radiance noise reduction. On my screen,
"The Lookout" looked fine - we could see the noise but it was sort of "little" film noise in dark scenes that wasn't distracting - and this was back when I didn't use the Radiance at that time for Blu Ray.

Lon (LJG) commented that the Blu Ray "The Lookout" was unwatchable on his screen, much larger than mine, without using the Radiance noise reduction. On my screen,
"The Lookout" looked fine - we could see the noise but it was sort of "little" film noise in dark scenes that wasn't distracting - and this was back when I didn't use the Radiance at that time for Blu Ray.

Steve:

That was with my HT5000, with my Christie HD6K-M virtually all video noise is non existent, the HD picture is Chrystal clear. This is on a 14' 2.35 screen zoomed image at about 1 x screen width.

The HD6K-M produces the cleanest, sharpest image I have observed from a 3 chip Consumer DLP.

Intuitively there could be a variety of sources of video noise? the material being watched (embedded in the transfer), generated by the source device, generated by the various devices in the patch between the source device, and the displaydevice itself.

The Radiance uses the noise reduction features in the Gennum chip. Obbviously those features could remove or decrease source material and source noise such as that in the transfer referred to by Steve.

Now some have observed video noise they believed was generated in and by the projector. There is no reason a projector could contain its own noise reduction circuits to make such noise invisible on the screen. Such circuits could also remove some or all noise entering the projector. Either by design or coincidently. Of course most noise reduction emplooys filterig which removes some positive video information in the transfer.

Everything for the next 10 days in almost 24\7 HD sports. College basketball tourneys, golf, world baseball championship tourney, NBS, and NHL. I actually unplugged my blu ray player for the next10 days. I told my wife it was broken, she will just have to watch sports in my HT.

Ken... You need to open your horizons..

It only has another 40 other functions and PQ improvements.

Yikes!
Ken

Steve:

That was with my HT5000, with my Christie HD6K-M virtually all video noise is non existent, the HD picture is Chrystal clear. This is on a 14' 2.35 screen zoomed image at about 1 x screen width.

The HD6K-M produces the cleanest, sharpest image I have observed from a 3 chip Consumer DLP.

Lon, are you using the Radiance with your Christie? Have you compared the Christie's built-in video processing to using the Radiance with it? Color me curious?

And enjoy all the NCAA basketball on your big screen the next few weeks!!!@@@

Steve:

I am running my Directv DVR's (4) through the Radiance only because that is how my AMX system was programmed with The HT500 and I know it switches sources perfectly with no HDMI issues.

There was a definate improvement with Directv sorces vs Direct to HT5000, I am not so sure vs direct to Christie HD6K-M.

I never compared as the cost of each 2 input HDMI card for the HD6K-M is about $1400 per card.

I am running my Sony BDPs1 Bluray player and also my Axonix MD4 Bluray / HDDVD media server direct to the HDMI input card of the HD6K-M.