Hi - been very happy with my 42" Panasonic (720p) TH-42PX80U, plugged into HDMI to a cable box. HD pictures are fantastic.

However, i just bought a Sony Sony DVP NS700H/B "upconvert" DVD player with tons of great reviews on all sites. It's plugged directly into the TV with an HDMI cable.

I wasn't expecting perfect quality, but based on the reviews i thought the picture would be very good. However, it's terrible. Grainy, bitmapped/blurry around the edges, etc. Dark Knight, which i figured was about as good production value you can get, looks horrible.

I tried other HDMI cables, various DVD player settings (eg setting it down to 780p), etc and nothing makes any difference.

Could i have a lemon DVD player? other ideas?
thank you for your help

Get a calibration disc and properly set up the display. Turn off any and all picture enhancements in the player and set it to output 720p.

RG rime is right. The calibration must be off if you have tried various players. I have 720 Samsung abd the Toshiba XD-E500 looks better than broadcast HD(mind the artifacts that go away once you foll the story line.).

I tried other HDMI cables, various DVD player settings (eg setting it down to 780p), etc and nothing makes any difference.

Did you mean 480p? Did you try component cables instead of HDMI?

Try either 480p or 1080p - I'd expect 1080p will give you best results - internal scaler is 1080p and not of the best quality, de-interlacing isn't good either.