Mike Fusick has done us all a favor and compiled a wealth of Hitachi tweaks here (51F500 Tweaks) (http://archive2.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=273639) (these tweaks apply to all models with ISF menu, 2002 and beyond)

Lets move all the Q&A concerning these tweaks here in this thread.

Service menu suffixes

FWX20b/UWX20b/SWX20b/TWX20b/XWX20b/F500
4 - 480i Composite, S-Video
F - 480i/480p Component
G - 720p/1080i Component HDTV

S500/S700 (from BillG)
First Letter:
3-NTSC [480i Composite, S-Video]
D-SDTV [480i/480p Component]
E-HDTV [720p/1080i Component HDTV, DVI 480p]

Second Letter:
H-High Temp
M-Medium Temp
S-Standard Temp
B-Black and White Temp

Ghosting on the ISF series Hitachis is a somewhat peculiar problem.

Most RPTVs have an inherent ghosting/haloing I refer to as ringing. This can be tweaked out of most Mits sets but not most other brands. Hitachis historically have not been plagued by this form of edge enhancement.

In addition to slight ringing, the ISF Hitachis actually display 3-4 ghost images to the left and right of objects. This can be quite distracting and can muddy fine detail. Luckily, the effects of this can be minimized through the ISF menu tweaks and the problem becomes virtually invisible with actual content.

Ghosting tweaks summary:

SHARP-4 20 10
SHARP-A 20 10
SHARP-B 1F 10
SHARP-9 1F 10
SHARP-E 20 10

APRTR-4 01 00 To minimize ghosting set to 00
APRTR-A 01 00 To minimize ghosting set to 00
APRTR-C 00
APRTR-E 01 00 To minimize ghosting set to 00

SRTGA-0 10 0 To minimize ghosting set to 00

Y-DTL-0 07
Y-DTL-0 will transition the ghosting from black to white. Find the optimal point for your TV.

For those who find the PQ too soft after performing all the ghosting tweaks, here are my tweaks to find a happy medium.

MUST DO TWEAKS FOR GHOSTING:

SHARP-4 20 10
SHARP-A 20 10
SHARP-B 1F 10
SHARP-9 1F 10
SHARP-E 20 10

Y-DTL-0 - 05 has been the best on the sets I have done so far (but it was a tossup between 05 and 06 on my FWX and between 04 and 05 on the S500). Use AVIA sharpness test pattern for your set (some like using resolution pattern).


The other parameters seem to affect more of the classical ringing/EE.

I recently restored Tbass2k's S500 to defaults and we agreed the picture was much sharper without noticeable ringing (although ringing was apparent on test patterns)

APRTR-4 01 or 00
APRTR-A 01 or 00
APRTR-C 01 or 00
APRTR-E 01 or 00

SRTGA-0 0-10 according to preference
I am most happy with SRTGA-0 0A as the best compromise between a soft and sharp image with minimal ringing. Troy was willing to deal with any extra ringing to get the sharpest possible picture (SRTGA-0 10).

Experiment with these looking both at test pattern and actual content to determine the best medium for your preferences.

Also, Edge Enhancement on the S series can be beneficial.

I generally disliked it for DVD (low was ok on some stuff but med was always overkill)

For HDTV, only on the US Open did I find low to cause some distracting artifacts that I liked it off. Medium was fine in some cases.

Generally, I would keep EE low for most material. Medium might be ok for some programs. If you notice artifacts, just turn it off.

For the non S sets, things get a bit more complicated. Perhaps Bill G can post some info about tweaking SVM. What I did on my FWX is leave everything at defaults except the GAM (gain?), which I reduced to 01.

VSM-PH4 06
VSM-PHA 06
VSM-PHC 05
VSM-PHE 06
VSMGA4 07
VSMGAA 07
VSMGAC 07
VSMGAE 07
VSMGAM4 01
VSMGAMA 01
VSMGAMC 01
VSMGAME 01

Marc,

How about an ultimate Mitsubishi tweaks thread? I can't seem to find any info on tweaking a Mits... Can somebody give me some search suggestions?

I've gone through 3 s500's and the Hitachi tweaks thread proved to be an invaluable source of information.

I'm about to get a 55413 and would love to have a thread just like the Hitachi's for my new Mits.

Hopefully, someone in my area will get one of the new Mits so I can get some experience other than sneaking into the SM at Sears and Best buy (I don't know the codes for the new ones yet). ;)

Who knows...I may have the new Diamond come Xmas!:cool:

For the non S sets, things get a bit more complicated. Perhaps Bill G can post some info about tweaking SVM.

The S models do not have gain values that I have found yet in the Service menu. They only have phase (combo of ringing and scan speed). However, there are varying levels of gain in the user menu. So, you can adjust the phase parameters in the ISF menu so you can balance the amount of distortion vs ringing.

Parameters:

VSM-PHP ANT/NTSC/480i/480p
VSM-PHJ HDTV


Also, I would like to edit one item from above. After playing with a Bravo D1 player a few times during calibration, I am convinced DVI-480p is the best solution for the HItachi. The internal scaler on the Bravo is garbage. DVI-480p is treated as HD on the S model.

So, E-HDTV [720p/1080i Component HDTV, DVI 480p]

Bill

I see skewed lines on DVD black bars and 4x3 gray bars on my 57S500. Should I replace my set? Is it a geomtry problem or a convergence problem?

Geometry is your problem. You should order a template and rebuild it yourself using the tweaks.

Bill

Marc-

You've done and excellent JOB here!!!

Thanks

HIT 57TWX20B

I have done the above to remove the red push and the colors look much better overall. I am still having some issues with darker scenes in DVD movies....they look more green than black and grey. The only things I have really done in the SM are the above, and a few tweaks to RY and R/G on 480p to help with the red push as indicated by Bill. I have not focused, converged, and do not have AVIA yet. Is there anything I can do at this point, or do I need to get avia to set the TV up? I would still like to get a much crisper and clearer picture from by TV on DVD playback. Any suggestions?

Template ordering information here:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=295607&highlight=hitachi+template

If you see green in black, that is graycale. You can try to reduce G-Cut to remove it. Right down your current settings before you start. AVIA won't help in the process. You really need video essentials to monitors to lower end of the grayscale.



Bill

Originally posted by pillguy
HIT 57TWX20B

I have done the above to remove the red push and the colors look much better overall. I am still having some issues with darker scenes in DVD movies....they look more green than black and grey. The only things I have really done in the SM are the above, and a few tweaks to RY and R/G on 480p to help with the red push as indicated by Bill. I have not focused, converged, and do not have AVIA yet. Is there anything I can do at this point, or do I need to get avia to set the TV up? I would still like to get a much crisper and clearer picture from by TV on DVD playback. Any suggestions?

I advise you get a copy of AVIA or Digital Video Essentials (haven't seen any reviews on this yet). The test patterns will help you get the green out (I like to look at 10 and 20 IRE windows, gray steps and ramps).

Originally posted by gambrelw
If you see green in black, that is graycale. You can try to reduce G-Cut to remove it. Right down your current settings before you start. AVIA won't help in the process. You really need video essentials to monitors to lower end of the grayscale.



Bill I was told [by Gary Kuo I believe] that AVIA can be used if color is set to 0% and that it really didn't matter if you are doing grayscale by eye (they accidentally encoded some color into the patterns).

That is not the case. There is color contamination on most sets. On the HItachi, going from 0 to 50 on color will increase blue and red by 20% at 20IRE. In a perfect world, Guy Kuo is right. But, that is not the case on most sets. Keep that in mind when you start calibrating professionally.

Bill

Originally posted by gambrelw
That is not the case. There is color contamination on most sets. On the HItachi, going from 0 to 50 on color will increase blue and red by 20% at 20IRE. In a perfect world, Guy Kuo is right. But, that is not the case on most sets. Keep that in mind when you start calibrating professionally.

Bill Reallly? I'm glad this came up.

Do you agree that AVIA can be used for "by eye" calibration for pillguy's greenies?

I will be getting a HD test pattern generator so that I won't have to rely on AVIA (and be able to calibrate HD inputs)

marc - thanks for the information. when going through the tweaks listed above in the ISF menu, what would you suggest the user menu color settings, etc. be in order to accurately see changes made in the ISF settings?

I will write down all of my SM settings under ISF and post them here for you guys to take a look at (if you do not mind). I have used the other HIT tweak threads to adjust for red push (seems to be working quite well). Give me a few minutes to write them down....

Another good question....
When you use the FAC RESET in the SM, does this reset all of the ISF Mode settings? I seem to have noticed that it does not, but I may be incorrect. :confused:

If I have a geometry problem and I am withing my 30 day period , is it advisable to replace the set. The gray bars on 4:3 looks very skewed.
I am not very comfortable opeing the tv.

Originally posted by dogongt
marc - thanks for the information. when going through the tweaks listed above in the ISF menu, what would you suggest the user menu color settings, etc. be in order to accurately see changes made in the ISF settings?

I like to center the sliders at 50%. Except for contrast, which I set to 75%. Once you set SUBCNT and SUBBRT in SM, you really don't have to worry about the set being in torch mode and burning-in (or the wife and kids turning contrast up to 100% before you can intervene).

Originally posted by pillguy
Another good question....
When you use the FAC RESET in the SM, does this reset all of the ISF Mode settings? I seem to have noticed that it does not, but I may be incorrect. :confused: I don't think so, I'm not sure what it does but I think is definitely should be avoided.

Bill G?

Originally posted by jdoe7890
If I have a geometry problem and I am withing my 30 day period , is it advisable to replace the set. The gray bars on 4:3 looks very skewed.
I am not very comfortable opeing the tv. I would say yes. Hitachis generally have great geometry OOTB (although overscan is generally not even).

Do you agree that AVIA can be used for "by eye" calibration for pillguy's greenies

You can use it for 100IRE, but not 20IRE.

Bill

Here is is my calib in .txt. Anyone is welcome to use it as a template for their settings. Please do NOT use My settings, as they are currently FUBAR. The default settings are correct to the best of my knowledge.
Again, my questions are how to reduce the green color in dark environments that should be black and grey.

Marc and Bill, thanks in advance.

:D

Current video settings:

Movie mode

CON 60%
BRT 50%
Color 50%
Tint middle
Sharp 40

(should be system defaults)

Some advice please.

I worked on convergence on my 57TWX20B last night for awhile, but need to clarify that I am doing things correctly.

Should I calibrate the green first?

If so, how do I compare the red (and blue for that matter) and align it with green? Do I use the color swaping buttons to go back and forth?

Also, the blue seems to have really blurry edges on it, and I can always see it on either side of the white convergence gridlines.

Thanks to you guys for the7x5 switch....it helped me get things going much faster. Anyway, I want to go back and work on it some more, but I need to make sure I am doing things correctly.

:D

I have attached some photographs of the screen with skewed lines. Please advise. This is a 57S500.

Originally posted by Marc Alexander
I like to center the sliders at 50%. Except for contrast, which I set to 75%. Once you set SUBCNT and SUBBRT in SM, you really don't have to worry about the set being in torch mode and burning-in (or the wife and kids turning contrast up to 100% before you can intervene).

so set everything in the color mgt and color decoding menus to 50, along with everything in the main menu, except for contrast? and once SUBCNT and SUBBRT are changed, do you just leave the contrast settings up around 75% or do you bring it back down using Avia? or does it even matter.....do the ISF changes remove the torch mode extreme burn in risk?

right now i have SUBCNT0 brought down from 12 to 05, and SUB-BRT brought down from 83 to 7F. i made those changes while watching normal programming, not using Avia, with my contrast set around 25% or so. should i change the user menu settings like you said, and change only the ISF settings while using an Avia test pattern?

thanks.....still a newbie....just trying to figure it all out ;)

Greetings

Here's another odd one.

With the Bravo sending out 1080i via DVI ... the SWX Hitachi colour decoder parameters affected were the ones normally associated with 480P and not the 1080i parameters. To optimize DVI colour decoding, you have to adjust the 480P items ...

Regards

Dumb question following...but where...in all of the sharpness corrections...is the actualy user menu sharpness set?

Originally posted by jdoe7890
I have attached some photographs of the screen with skewed lines. Please advise. This is a 57S500. That is not too bad. I'd ask them to send a tech out with a grid to fix it. Or order a grid and fix it myself. No reason to exchange the whole TV IMO.

I've been tied up today...i'll try to answer more questions later tonight if I get some time...hopefully, someone will beat me to it. ;)

is the actualy user menu sharpness set?

It usually falls between 30 and 45.

Bill

Should I calibrate the green first?

Yes, if you are fixing geometry. It is easier to see with only one color up.

If so, how do I compare the red (and blue for that matter) and align it with green? Do I use the color swaping buttons to go back and forth?

When you are in the geometry mode (hitting menu and info will bring up only green), you can put red against green by hitting "0" and blue against green by hitting "ant".

Also, the blue seems to have really blurry edges on it, and I can always see it on either side of the white convergence gridlines.

Do you notice a blue hue when viewing material? I am a proponent of defocusing blue on the hitachi because of the nasty hue around a tightly focused blue (not because of light output). It has been know to cause a hue around items in your viewing material.



Bill

Jdoe:

My 51SWX20B looked just like your TV before I fixed the geometry using service level convergence. It looked great when I was done! I would highly recommend you just fix it yourself. You will want to know how to do this when your convergence slips out of alignement in the furture (and it will over time).

John

Can you list the instructions to perform a service level convergence to fix the geometry problem.

The first post has a link to a post that has the DCAM convergence instructions. I don't know if instructions are there for getting only green. Once you get into DCAM, hit menu followed by info. You will now only have green. After getting geometry correct, you want to hit "0" to put up red. Converge red with green. Do the same for blue by hitting "ant". When done, hit menu for older sets to get all colors back up. For the S500, you will have to hit menu several times to get back. The S500 will also allow you to display AVIA crosshatch while doing convergence (you will still be able to see the DCAM crosshatch). I think you have to hit menu a few times when you get in DCAM. I don't remember the exact number. This is a nice feature for fine tuning convergence.

You should order a template from the link provided by Marc to fully correct Geometry. If you buy a grid, you might also think about centering the magnets on the CRTs. You will have to zero out convergence, center the magnets and rebuild geometry/convergence. Start in coarse adjustment and work your way to fine adjustment.

Originally posted by gambrelw
I am a proponent of defocusing blue on the hitachi because of the nasty hue around a tightly focused blue (not because of light output). It has been know to cause a hue around items in your viewing material. Can you give some more details on this? I am an advocate of focusing blue as tightly as possible, what is this side effect you see on the Hitachi?

Originally posted by Marc Alexander
Can you give some more details on this? I am an advocate of focusing blue as tightly as possible, what is this side effect you see on the Hitachi?

Electro defocus only...

Manual lense focus as tight as possible

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?s=&postid=2662407#post2662407

here is your Link Marc

If you focus tightly and look at the dot crosshatch pattern, you will notice a strong purple hue around the bright blue lines. The only way to get rid of it is a slight defocus. Depending on how bad the particular set is, it can really be visible in the picture around white lettering or dark objects. If you can tighten blue without an adverse affect on the picture, then tighten it as much as you can.

Bill

From the Blue Focus threadOriginally posted by gambrelw
One thing I forgot to mention from my testing last night was that I did not see the blue hue in the crosshatch dot pattern when I did the manual/electronic focus. The blue hue on black is only present in tight groupings of circles like the User menu manual convergence screen on the Hitachi. Therefore, I believe it is better to use a dot pattern where there are lots of circles/light to do the focus. That way use know how you are affecting black with your focus adjustments.

Bill I will start using the dot crosshatch from now on for focus. Thanks guys, I think I've learned more in the last 3 days than I have over the last year. :D

this thread and the others kick serious ass, up until a ways back i was a toshiba panasonic fan boy that had both those calibrations down to a tee

i am officially tired of ****** build cheap ass rptvs so on that note my 57s500 will be arriving in a little over a week, just in time to let it settle a week and get it calibrated to perfection in time for hockey season

thanks a bunch for these threads guys, oh yeah keep the tweaks coming;) :D

Originally posted by Gary Murrell
this thread and the others kick serious ass, up until a ways back i was a toshiba panasonic fan boy that had both those calibrations down to a tee Welcome to the club, you won't regret it. This is coming from a former Panasonic (PT56WXF95a) and Toshiba (34HD82) owner.

It has often been said that the benefits are not so great on the Hitachi on DVD with interlaced component vs. progressive input.

I am able to see the improvement of 480p over 480i on a JVC DVD player, but that is because the JVCs have a poor interlaced output. The interlaced output from my Panny A-120 matches the progressive picture of the JVC (the JVC has an excellent output, no chroma bug, just with a bit of high frequency rolloff). The one drawback of interlaced is that subtitles tend to comb if the Hitachi movie mode is doing the 3-2 pulldown detection.

3-2 pulldown is the process in which 24 progressive frames/s is converted to 60 interlaced fields/s. Progressive DVD players and TV film/movie modes detect this and restore back to progressive frames and display as 60p frames/s.

Because of this combing, I recommended Tbass2k pickup one of the Panasonic DCDi players (RP-82/XP-30/XP-50) on ebay (all but impossible to find retail since discontinuation). The X-P30 he purchased is nothing short of amazing on his 57S500.

I have long said that the 540p upconverted output of the Hitachi is close but not up to par with the native 480p performance of the Mitsubishis. On the S500, the XP30 is definitely equal if not better than a Mits combined with a JVC. This has prompted me to start looking for a player of my own with such a good progressive output.

I have listed the "affordable" players below with great outputs (according to http://www.hometheaterhifi.com/volume_7_3/dvd-benchmark-introduction-9-2000.html)

#1 - Panasonic RP-82/XP-30/XP-50 - virtually identical: excellent ouptput (2ms Y/C delay), DCDi deinterlacing for non-film, XP-30 has no DVD-A, discontinued and hard to find

#2 - Pansonic RP-91 - excellent output (slightly better than #1?!?), aspect ratio control, DVD-A, no DCDi (inferior Genesis deinterlacing for non-film), discontinued but available (bumps this down to #2 for me)

#3 - Denon 1600 (excellent output with just a bit more Y/C delay (5ms) and a touch of high frequency rolloff compared to 1&2, DCDi deinterlacing, readily available)

#4 - Panasonic CP-72 - same as XP-50 with a bit more Y/C delay than the others (10ms) and a frequency response comparable to the Denon, discontinued and hard to find

I know that posting this jeopardizes my ebay bids, but all is fair I guess. Enjoy :)

Originally posted by Marc Alexander
#1 - Panasonic RP-82/XP-30/XP-50 - virtually identical: excellent ouptput (2ms Y/C delay), DCDi deinterlacing for non-film, XP-30 has no DVD-A, discontinued and hard to find

#2 - Pansonic RP-91 - excellent output (slightly better than #1?!?), aspect ratio control, DVD-A, no DCDi (inferior Genesis deinterlacing for non-film), discontinued but available (bumps this down to #2 for me)

#3 - Denon 1600 (excellent output with just a bit more Y/C delay (5ms) and a touch of high frequency rolloff compared to 1&2, DCDi deinterlacing, readily available)

#4 - Panasonic CP-72 - same as XP-50 with a bit more Y/C delay than the others (10ms) and a frequency response comparable to the Denon, discontinued and hard to find



discontinued, discontinued, redily available, discontinued.............

well to me this is one of the most dissapointing things in Home Theater right now. So what are the NEW players that are good. Hometheaterhifi needs to do some reviews on dvd players that are just coming out, so the rest of us who are in the market around Christmas time will have an idea of what we should buy.

Marc-

I have a Panny DVD72S... and it has an excellent 480p picture.

I was really down on the Bravo D1 after the first time I saw it during a calibration. However, I only viewed 1080i mode and saw massive jitter. I realized it was probably a scaling issue, so I thought I would test for it the next time around. I came up on a Momitsu (same processing as Bravo) and switched between 1080i and 480p DVI out. The 480p performed flawlessly during the five minutes of viewing while the 1080i still had the same scaling artifacts. I didn't see any abnormal artifacting when running test patterns in 480p.

So, many are probably wondering what the benefit is of using 480p DVI? The direct digital path is one reason, but not the main. The benefit to DVI 480p is that you reduce one D/A and A/D conversion. If the signal is sent to the Hitachi digitally, the Hitachi will not have to digitize the signal when scaling it, utimately reducing potential artifacting. If you send an analog signal, the Hitachi will have to digitize it, scale it, and convert it back to analog. Hope this helps.

This was just one short test, but any of you Bravo D1/Hitachi owners might want to run it.

Just my 2 cents.

Bill

I like the DVD player list. BUT..............

I would switch the order of #2 and #3

Joel

My .02 Cents

I know where you can still get a Panny CP72s

Guys and Gals,

I have read countless case studies from proponents of getting an RPTV set calibrated professionally.

After doing convergence, and tweaking color decoder and other various settings in the HIT 57TWX20B Service Menu (colorgo for red push, lime green corrections, G cut to remove green from greys and dark areas) I am fairly satisfied with my picture.

My question is if I get a pro (Gregg L. is headed to Houston in November) to calibrate my set at this point, for $400, is it worth it, and is it going to make that much of a difference.

Originally posted by Joel Solid
I like the DVD player list. BUT..............

I would switch the order of #2 and #3
Because of DCDi I presume?

I know where you can still get a Panny CP72sLet us in on it, Mike Fusick won't give me his;)

Originally posted by pillguy
Guys and Gals,

I have read countless case studies from proponents of getting an RPTV set calibrated professionally.

After doing convergence, and tweaking color decoder and other various settings in the HIT 57TWX20B Service Menu (colorgo for red push, lime green corrections, G cut to remove green from greys and dark areas) I am fairly satisfied with my picture.

My question is if I get a pro (Gregg L. is headed to Houston in November) to calibrate my set at this point, for $400, is it worth it, and is it going to make that much of a difference. Have you done focus yet? Generally, Greg won't charge the full rate if he doesn't have as much work to do. Sounds like you've done alot yourself. The one thing you cannot do yourself that you need a professional for is grayscale. At least get him to do that, the other stuff you can do decently yourself.

I have not done focus. What is it, how is it done, and can you post any links on the procedures for the HIT TWX5720B? I am eager to learn.

i'm also looking for a decent first-timer guide for manual/electronic focus and convergence for an S500.

still looking for an answer to my question about ISF menu/Avia calibration -- do you set all the user menu settings to 50% (except contrast.....about 75%), then go through all the Avia basic test patterns using the ISF menu settings? if so, is there a good list or description to correlate the ISF listings with the color and other user menu settings so i can tell which settings to change for each test pattern?

the more i read, the more i realize the less i know ;)

It's all here [link below] guys, you may have to do alot of reading to find it...but its there.

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=273639

Focus assist (MUST DO TWEAK!!!):

All focus procedures apply to all Hitachis

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=181474

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=197296

Originally posted by dogongt
still looking for an answer to my question about ISF menu/Avia calibration -- do you set all the user menu settings to 50% (except contrast.....about 75%), then go through all the Avia basic test patterns using the ISF menu settings? if so, is there a good list or description to correlate the ISF listings with the color and other user menu settings so i can tell which settings to change for each test pattern? That is what I do...it is really up to you and your personal preference.

AVIA and ISF Color Decoder adjustment

BLUE COLOR BARS
COLOR (Saturation)
TINT (Hue)

RED COLOR BARS
RY-PH Phase (Hue)
R/B-GA Gain (Saturation)

GREEN COLOR BARS
GY-PH Phase (Hue)
G/B-GA Gain (Saturation)

Anyone have a soft copy they are willing or able to share with me? I would like to focus my lenses, but based on recommendations I need the SM first. Thanks

PM is fine.

Is there any reason to do the static focus and not the mechanical lens focus? I am pretty new at this, so I would prefer to do just the static via the focus pack knobs behind the grill on my 57TWX20B. Will this static focus help my set? Also the SM recommends to receive the circle pattern. How do I do that on my RPTV?

do both pill, to me at least on every mechanical i have down it has shown much more results than electrical
also remember that if there is a error even slightly in manual that no amount of electrical focus will fix it so again do both you won't regret it
personally i like the full convergence grid to focus, looking at the center and all 4 corners to get the best overall, not the best in the center only don't go for that go for a even focus all around that should help you not notice (as much) the less focused corners

I think you'll get the best results by doing an electrostatic first, then mechanical, then electrostatic again. I agree with Gary, the mechanical is the most important. Get both perfected and you'll be amazed at the difference in detail and clarity.

Also, doing a mechanical focus is really not hard at all. I took off my s500 screen without any instructions, only with the knowledge that I had to pull the screen up and loosen the magic focus wires inside the cabinet(new 500 series only). I'm not a handy man or familiar with these electronics either and was also very hesitant about taking off my screen like so many out there. But it really is easy to do, just take it slow and be careful not to drop, bang, or scratch anything.

You can also perform mechanical focus by going in throught the back (Without removing the screen). But I advise you have a friend view from the front to verify focus.

Originally posted by pillguy
Anyone have a soft copy they are willing or able to share with me? I would like to focus my lenses, but based on recommendations I need the SM first. Thanks

PM is fine. There is nothing in the SM to assist you on focus that has not been posted here on this forum. Just follow the links on focus and read up.

Sounds good. I am waiting for my new DVE calibration DVD to arrive. Dont I need it to display the cross hatch and circle patterns for calibration? Or is there a way on the 57TWX20B to display these without a calibration disc? If so, I can get started with the manual focus today!!

I have a HIT 57TWX.....and am considering getting a Bravo D1.. I currently have a progressive scan low end pioneer. Do you think i will notice a increase in PQ with the change to DVI on t he D1?

You can use the convergence grid in the user menu to do your focusing.

Set magic focus to manual and hit start. Once you're in the convergence screen, pull the red and blue apart at the left,right,and center, so you can see all 3 lines clearly.

Try to get the best focus for all 3 locations (left,center,right) for all 3 colors.

Remember that the red will be the tightest, followed by green, then blue.
For blue, you'll want to tighten as much as you can, but with as little purple hue around the lines and without the blue turning into a greenish blue. You don't have to worry about this for red and green, just focus those are tightly as you can.


If you're a perfectionist like me, you'll get the best results by doing electrostatic focus again after you've completed the manual.

Goodluck

I have read many forum posts with disappointing results with regards to the DVI DVD players (Bravo D1, Sammy 931). In addition to my question above, if DVI does not look that great on CRT RPTV's because of the D-A conversion, why does HDTV look so amazing, and much better than the regular progressive DVD PQ? Will I get near HDTV quality with the DVI player and upconverting (720p, 1080i)?

Originally posted by pillguy
I have read many forum posts with disappointing results with regards to the DVI DVD players (Bravo D1, Sammy 931). In addition to my question above, if DVI does not look that great on CRT RPTV's because of the D-A conversion, why does HDTV look so amazing, and much better than the regular progressive DVD PQ? Will I get near HDTV quality with the DVI player and upconverting (720p, 1080i)?

HDTV looks better than 480p DVD simply because of the increased amount of picture elements that make up the picture.

more pixels = sharper picture.

720pX1280 > 480x852

Originally posted by pillguy
if DVI does not look that great on CRT RPTV's because of the D-A conversion, why does HDTV look so amazing Nobobdy said DVI does not look great. DVI just does not look much better than component due to the extra D/A conversion required in CRT sets. Bill has stated that the DVI DVD players tend to look best in 480p with the Hitachi sets. This is because these players do a poor job of scaling to 1080i. They do better at 720p, but there is no point since Hitachi must convert this to 540p/1080i.

I did some experimenting of my own with the various isf settings and came to some conclusions.

I much prefer the picture quality with the sharpness settings at 20, y-dtl-0 at 07 and with srtga and all aprtr parameters at 00.

srtga acts as edge enhancement and with anything greater than 00, the picture looks unnatural due to the edges of everything being thicker. To me it gives the effect of actors/objects against a blue screen with the special effects in place in the background.

The aprtr settings seem to act similarly to srgta. I'm not sure exactly what it does, but it adds thickness and enhances the brightness of certain parts of the picture. For example, when watching the two towers, I saw more detail in frodo's face, but in the same scene Frodo's collar became brighter and stood out.

I found that raising the y-dtl-0 setting from 07 created extra noise and gave a slight outlining to all objects. Decreasing the value made the picture much softer and seemingly less focused, which smeared fine detail.

My conclusions were that srgta and aprtr add unnatural effects to the picture and take away greatly from the 3dimensional effect. the Sharpness settings on the other hand, don't add any unnatural effects, it acts just like the sharpness setting in the user menu. You have to adjust it to the perfect point for the best detail without noise, but no other unnatural effects are created. I found the best point to be at 20. As for y-dtl-0 I prefered it at 7, this settings allowed me to see the most detail, but again without any unnatural effects. The picture was MUCH more natural, filmlike, and 3dimensional with these settings.

I also didn't notice any extra ringing/ghosting created from the Sharpness parameters. I checked with the sharpness pattern and the resolution pattern. And I didn't see it from judging by the picture on actual movies either.

Keep in mind I'm watching my 51s500 from 10ft away, so those who sit closer may want to decrease the values of sharpness and maybe y-dtl-0. And those sitting even further away may like to increase it.

So experiment to see what you like, I just thought I'd give people some more options to try.

I just got the Hit 46F500 from Sears over the weekend and out of the box the picture is very disappointing. There are problems with the focus (ghosting??), the picture looks very pixelated at times, and the colors seem a little off. I talked to the reps at Hitachi and they were useless, telling me that unless I was watching HDTV or a DVD I would not see a quality picture in 16:9. The book that came with the TV is basically useless. I'm connected to a RCA Direct TV receiver. I've see a lot of good information on here from Marc and Mfusick and others both I have some questions.

1) I wanted to try and use some of the suggested changes to the ISF menu but cannot figure how to get into it. Is there another button on the 41' model. I do not have an "input" button on my remote.

2) Would it help my picture to used the S-video input on my RCA receiver instead of the standard cable?

3) Would the Hitachi warranty or the Sears 3 yr warranty cover someone coming out to adjust the TV?

Any help/suggestions that you can give me would be appreciated. I'm a beginner and a lot of this is like a foreign language to me. I really want to fix my set so I can be happy with my purchase. Thanks.

1) I wanted to try and use some of the suggested changes to the ISF menu but cannot figure how to get into it. Is there another button on the 41' model. I do not have an "input" button on my remote.

If you will read some of the posts in this thread, you will see links to other threads that cover this in detail. You can also do a search for "hitachi tweaks" and should get some great info. As for the SM access....I have found the easiest way is to hold down the input button on the front of the TV (with the TV off) and press the power button. As you press the power button, you must release both buttons at the same time. INPUT and hold, then POWER, then release both the instant you press POWER.

2) Would it help my picture to used the S-video input on my RCA receiver instead of the standard cable?

I would just go ahead and get component outs, or maybe DVI. Not that you will notice an immediate increase in Picture Quality (PQ) but no need spend the $$$ on s vid when you can get component. Also, are you watching standard TV (SDTV)? Pop in a DVD and check out the picture quality. Is it better? Also, you may want to change the aspect ratio to cater to your viewing preferences. Experiment.

3) Would the Hitachi warranty or the Sears 3 yr warranty cover someone coming out to adjust the TV?

I would personally not let them touch my set. I would look into professional calibration. It will cost you a few hundred $$$, but well worth it. Post a message on the forum asking for recommendations for an ISF calibrator in your area.

Oh, and MAKE SURE YOU WRITE DOWN ALL OF YOUR SETTINGS BEFORE YOU START CHANGING ANYTHING.
I know there are over a hundred, but do it. Trust me.

Originally posted by jcarr72
1) I wanted to try and use some of the suggested changes to the ISF menu but cannot figure how to get into it. Is there another button on the 41' model. I do not have an "input" button on my remote.

2) Would it help my picture to used the S-video input on my RCA receiver instead of the standard cable?

3) Would the Hitachi warranty or the Sears 3 yr warranty cover someone coming out to adjust the TV?

Any help/suggestions that you can give me would be appreciated. I'm a beginner and a lot of this is like a foreign language to me. I really want to fix my set so I can be happy with my purchase. Thanks. Buy a setup DVD like AVIA or Digital Video Essentials

1) re-read the instructions to get into the ISF menu...you don't use the remote, you use the front panel

2) Definitely!!! Coax is the worst connection you can make...all ways use the best connection available (component, S-video, composite, then 75 ohm coax last)

3) probably only if there was a problem with it...won't hurt to ask

Originally posted by jcarr72


1) I wanted to try and use some of the suggested changes to the ISF menu but cannot figure how to get into it. Is there another button on the 41' model. I do not have an "input" button on my remote.



If you have to ask this- You should probably stay out of the service menu.

Anways--- the INPUT BUTTON is not on the remote. It's on the TV, under the flap.


Originally posted by jcarr72

2) Would it help my picture to used the S-video input on my RCA receiver instead of the standard cable?


YES. Reduce dot crawl and improve picture quality. Hitachi's have great S -video picture quality, and SDTV picture quality.

Originally posted by jcarr72

3) Would the Hitachi warranty or the Sears 3 yr warranty cover someone coming out to adjust the TV?

Don't know... I know Circuit City covers picture quality (and thus adjustments needed to make picture perfect) in writting. I have no idea what Sears claims or does not claim to offer. Call them is my best reccomendation.

Originally posted by jcarr72

Any help/suggestions that you can give me would be appreciated. I'm a beginner and a lot of this is like a foreign language to me. I really want to fix my set so I can be happy with my purchase. Thanks.

The Hitachi 46W500 is actually alot nicer RPTV than the 46F500. You might try and exchange, or if Sears does not carry it, try another dealer.

The 46W500 can be had for the same price at 46F500 in most cases.

46W500 has much better VIRTUALHD II processor, and better SDTV cable picture. I have seen both back to back on SDTV feeds. 46W500 does 1080p upconversion and uses a different/new/more advanced algorithym for upconversion of interlaced 480i sources to progressive scan display than the 46F500 (only 540p..not newer 1080p chipset) I have read that some disagree that there is no difference- but my eyes have suggested otherwise a few times.

Also- 46W500 features better remote (S series remote) new user menu with defeatable 4 step black level expansion, 4 level defeatable SVM, user menu access to color decoder, ability to shut off individual CRT guns for color calibration with AVIA setup DVD or the like, and built in DVD player. Most reject the idea of the DVD player built in... but- If you purchased the matching stand like most... that extra shelf will really come into play as your system grows. Also- the DVD built in gives better picture quality than a seperate DVD player with component cables... I have no idea why? But it does.

ALL IN ALL-

My reccomendation is to learn and perfect the manual convergence option and make sure your convergence is tight... buy AVIA set up dvd or like DVD and set it up correctly..... and read AVS and learn more and more.

When you brave enough to enter the service menu... change COLORGO value to reduce redpush.... and tune color decoder with AVIA

If you could swap for the 46W500 at little or no charge (very possible) I would also suggest that.

Read all the Hitachi tweaks links.... learn convergence, focus, SVM, picture settings, grayscale, ect.... these are all worthwhile tweaks.

:D :D

Hope that helps

HOW THE HELL DOES MARC KEEP BEATING ME LIKE THAT.....

HE SNEAKS HIS REPLY BEFORE MINE EVERYTIME:)


I NEED TO LEARN TO TYPE FASTER;)

46W500 also has the improved stretch mode of the S500s

I was wondering if anyone that does calibrations would have any field feedback on the Hitachi 57S500 series. I have been reading the Hitachi Tweaks thread and allmost all the tweaks are for late model Hitachi, not the 2004 model. I was interested in a good red push fix. I tried a few settings from the tweaks thread and was not really satisfied with the results. I tried using the "02" values for red. I guess part of the problem is the greyscale is screaming to be calibrated, and I Sears swapped in a Mits 2003 model for the Hitachi, (the Mits reportedly has an accurate low temp setting) which brings me to my next question. Does anyone have field calibration data from greyscale calibrations on the 57S500 series? I was curious as to the cuts and drives values after greyscale calibration. I would guess that if enough data is collected we could all benefit from the data as I'm sure these sets fall within a tolerence as far as adjustment of greyscale. I'm counting on Hitachi's quality of manufacture, to gleen some consistancy in the greyscale calibration. I'm guessing that the greyscale may fall between a few values of adjustment, for all sets in a series, since they theroretically use the same components, manufactured in the same way. I would like to try those values out on my set if anyone has kept a log of greyscale calibration for a number of 57S500 sets. Also does anyone know how the out-of-box Black and White temperature setting charts? Is it anywhere near the 6500K and is it linear or all outta wack? Just trying to tweak my set to a quality picture it reportedly is capable of. Thanks

Best Regards,

Tony

Originally posted by Marc Alexander
46W500 also has the improved stretch mode of the S500s

Good call:)

I forgot about that

daburgh, all the tweaks apply to the S500.

Grayscale is not something that can be ported set to set. Each set's calibration will differ. You must have a tech out with test equipment to properly cailbrate.

Thanks Marc:
I kinda knew that would be the answer, just assuming I could get a variation of greyscale readings that would sort of show some of the greyscale trending on these sets, I would try some of the values for the low temperature setting. The Hitachi's, (well at least mine) is miserable out-of-the box. I'm thinking of calling Sears and going back to the Mits RPTVs. I guess the Hitachi is capable but I hate to spend big bucks to get a calibration especially for the greyscale. Mits had a very accurate low temperature setting....that's half of the battle. Maybe my service contract will cover it, (an ISF Tech) or I had read on some forum that Hitachi will send techs out if you are within their 1 year warranty period to adjust the sets. Anyway, I'm not trying to be cheapo about it...I was laid off from my job. Thanks.

With Sears...you will be pretty assed out when it to grayscale. Their techs are not Mits authorized, let alone ISF certified.

Good luck (probably better to go back to Mits...or pay an ISF)

Hello

I noticed the following line in Mfusick's tweaks thread:

G-STR-0 02 00 "Green fix" set to 00

Would someone be able to clarify exactly what problem with green this fixes? I know there is lime green problem but the problem I am having is that after a VE calibration my blacks look green. When you select an input with no source the screen should be black but it just looks dark green. Will changing G-STR-0 to 00 fix this?

Thanks

Green blacks are a greyscale issue.....

Go into ISF service menu and Reduce your Green CUT slowly for a given color temp, like standard, high...ect....

Make sure to WRITE DOWN ORIGINAL VALUE OF ANYTHING YOU CHANGE SO YOU CAN CHANGE IT BACK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Drop green cut a few clicks and see if it helps... put a DVD movie in with dark scences........ and pause it.

Verify your changes on another scence like a flash tone...

You should still change G-STR-0 to 00 in addition to dropping the green cut

I believe the G-STR-0 to 00 fix was for issues with lime green, is that correct Mike/Marc?

YES

Does that lime green problem still exist in the new s500's? I haven't changed that parameter yet...I guess I'll try it out.

I believe the S500 defaults to G-STR-0 = 0

It is wise to double check

You are correct sir! I have the S500 and it does default to 00, (G-STR-0 = 00). I have to say I'm a bit dissapointed in the Hitachi out-of-box performance. The low temp setting, (black and white) is very red and you can some reds in the black, (brown). I'm sure the reds may be intentional by Hitachi to simulate the look of old Black and White photos. The other temps seems to really push blue and green. My greyscale is really outta wack so I'm sure I'm not being fair about my observation. I will need to get a calibration before I can judge the quality.

Yes, Hitachi OOTB grayscale has always left something to be desired. Standard is generally the best on the S500, once you reduce the green cut a bit.

I eyeballed greyscale on the B&W temp and I got it looking close to the Mits, (in some respects). It seems to me the Mits had richer color and a much sharper picture though. I'm still deciding on it. The wife dosen't like it as much as the Mits so I might get it swapped and go back to the Mits 2004 model. I had a 2003 Platnium (no DVI connector) and I exchanged it for the Hitachi. I still can't get past some of the Hitachi's color and the picture seems softer. I noticed some grain in the picture, though it might be noise from the cable. Also noticed some moire affect at times and the zipper effect. I took some of the tweaks posted here and applied them. The picture did improve somewhat. I guess my expectations are too high.

Eyeballing, it will be close to impossible for you to match up the Hitachi with the Mits. Until the grayscales are professionally calibrated, you can't really draw a conclusion Mits vs. hitachi in regards to color. I found that eyeballing standard color temp on the Hitachi yields better results with actual programming than B&W (not sure why).

All that being said, I do prefer the Mits and recommend going to a 2004 model if you have the opportunity.

Thanks for the replies guys!!

A Hitachi tech is coming out next week to "setup" my 51S500 (it was included with the purchase) and I was wondering if I should just mention the green blacks issue to him and the GCUT fix. Do you think he'll do more harm than good?

Originally posted by lorenmc
Thanks for the replies guys!!

A Hitachi tech is coming out next week to "setup" my 51S500 (it was included with the purchase) and I was wondering if I should just mention the green blacks issue to him and the GCUT fix. Do you think he'll do more harm than good? Gray scale calibration will fix your problem. If he doesn't have the proper test equipment (or doesn't know what he is doing), he may do more harm the good. Its a crapshoot whether or not you get a good factory authorized tech or not.

newbie questions about the grayscale and drives and cuts:

1) what exactly are these settings controlling?

for the S500 models, when you first get to the main service menu, it has i think 4 different CUTS listed there.....what are those for? and in the actual service menu there's G-DRV, R-DRV, G-CUT, R-CUT and B-CUT.....all for H (high temp), M (med temp), S (std temp) and B (b/w temp).

2) what exactly are each of these doing?

3) how come they are only for the Color Temperature settings, and not for different signal inputs (3, D or E) --- maybe a dumb question?

4) without the proper test equipment, what Avia or DVE test patterns would i use to eyeball calibrate these different settings?

thanks.

I'll start out with some basic info about TV in general. The TV mixes three primary colors of light, red, green and blue to achieve the full NTSC spectrum of color. It accomplishs this using light output, (luninence) in combination with the phasing, (mixing) of the three primary colors, to obtain all of the different colors of the spectrum. The light output of a TV can be measured and organized into a standard called IRE. IRE is defined as:

IRE (Institute of Radio Engineers) 1 Volt Peak - Peak Video is divided up into 140 IRE units. This is done to make numbers for luminance levels easier to communicate. The amplitude of the video signal from blanking (zero volts) to peak white is 0.714286 volts or 100 IRE units. Synchronization signals extend from blanking to -0.285714 volts or -40 IRE units.

Picture Black Level: 7.5 IRE (above zero volts)
Picture White Level: 100.0 IRE (above zero volts)
Blanking Level : 0.0 IRE (zero volt level)
Burst Pedestal : 0.0 IRE (zero volt level)
Synchronization : -40.0 IRE (below zero volts)
Black was raised above 0 IRE in the early days of color television to get around some transmitter problems. The practice has been with us ever since.
The SMPTE component video system does use the IRE system to define video levels. It is based on a 700 mVolt system rather than the 714 mVolt composite video.

Luminance is defined:

Luminance This is the signal that represents brightness in a video picture. Luminance is any value between black and white. In mathematical equations, luminance is abbreviated as Y.

For Color:

Chroma:
The characteristics of color information, independent of luminance intensity. Hue and saturation are qualities of chroma. Black, gray, and white objects do not have chroma characteristics.

Color Subcarrier:
The frequency that carries the color information in the baseband composite video signal. In NTSC the color subcarrier is 3,579,545 Hz, ± 10 Hertz. This number is usually rounded off in text to 3.58 MHz.

Unlike the black and white television standard, where the vertical and horizontal frequencies are derived from the 60 Hz power line frequency, the color subcarrier became the clock reference for the color system. The horizontal and vertical frequencies are now derived from the color subcarrier rather than the power line rate. When we shifted to the color system in 1954 the horizontal and vertical rates changed. The amount of change was small enough so that black and white sets would still synchronize to the updated rate.

A color sync burst of 3.58 MHz is added to the beginning of the horizontal lines to synchronize the color decoding circuits in the display device with the source video.

The phase of the color information in the video is changed 180° for every adjacent line. The change occurs automatically as part of the horizontal timing being derived from the color subcarrier. It has the overall effect of canceling the display of the color subcarrier in the picture. It does, however, produce "dot crawl" at color transitions.

It takes two complete pictures for the phase relationship between the subcarrier and horizontal signal to return to zero. (This presents a minor problem for laserdisc players when displaying a still frame. The color phase has to be electronically reversed every other time a single frame is repeated because a still frame is only half of a color cycle.)


Getting proper grayscale is calibrating gray to a reference standard (color temperature setting), across the IRE spectrum for the TV. The standard reference for movie studios is D6500K, where K is Kelvin, (the color of a flame at 6500 Kelvin). The shade of gray, (as measured against varing light outputs) will change as the IRE changes, producing an array of shades of gray and must be measured with a color analyzer to obtain accurate results, although you can eyeball the color of gray and adjust it "old school" style. You generally adjust cuts for low light output such as 20 IRE and 30 IRE windows, available on Home Theater tune-up DVDs such as AVIA. Drive adjustments are used for higher light outputs such as aan 80 and 90 IRE test windows.

Sorry for the long and winding road, hope it helps some.

Originally posted by dogongt
newbie questions about the grayscale and drives and cuts:

1) what exactly are these settings controlling?

for the S500 models, when you first get to the main service menu, it has i think 4 different CUTS listed there.....what are those for? and in the actual service menu there's G-DRV, R-DRV, G-CUT, R-CUT and B-CUT.....all for H (high temp), M (med temp), S (std temp) and B (b/w temp).

2) what exactly are each of these doing?

4) without the proper test equipment, what Avia or DVE test patterns would i use to eyeball calibrate these different settings? Bill G answers these questions in this and the linked threads. All the info is here guys, you just have to do a little reading. It is a bit tiring to answer the same questions for those who don't thoroughly read or search. (not to say anybody is lazy, you may have just missed it). This thread is intended for Q&A on the list of compiled tweaks. Not for just Q&A.

Originally posted by Marc Alexander
Mike Fusick has done us all a favor and compiled a wealth of Hitachi tweaks here (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=273639)

Lets move all the Q&A concerning these tweaks here in this thread.

Originally posted by dogongt 3) how come they are only for the Color Temperature settings, and not for different signal inputs (3, D or E) --- maybe a dumb question? Imagine having to calibrate grayscale and even multiple temparture settings for each input. Not fun...not for me at least!

Can someone who has had their 51s500 or 51s700 ISF'd provide me with their color decoding settings? I realize that they aren't truly transferrable, but I would like to see what they look like on my 51s700. Also, if you could provide the out-of-the-box settings for your TV as well that would be great. This way I can see if my TV had similar initial color decoding settings.

Thanks,

John

Could anybody, who's satisfied with their color, share their G-drv-s,
R-drv-s, R-cut-s, G-cut-s, and B-cut-s parameters with us?

If you've changed the paramters of a different color temp thats fine. I just think the consensus is that the standard temp is easiest to work with?

When you are in the ISF menu:

1) Can you switch inputs as you normally would?

2) How do you save your values once you change them?

Thanks

Originally posted by lorenmc
When you are in the ISF menu:

1) Can you switch inputs as you normally would?

2) How do you save your values once you change them?

Thanks 1) YES

2) ENTER/SELECT on remote

Thanks to the help of everyone on the forum, I broke down last night and gave my TWX some major attention. I did the following, in order.

1. overscan adjustment, via analog control nobs and new DVE overscan grid (came out at 5% on all sides)
2. Took screen off (really easy to do) to get access to guns
3. Manual focus (covered guns not focusing)..I used a sheet of white paper to hold up to focus on, taped to the top of my set.. it worked well
4. Cleaned lenses with cotton based pads, vacumed to remove lint (TV is about 1 month old....but there was definitely visible dust.
5. Was going to remove antiglare screen, but decided against it ( I have a 2 year old)
6. Oh, For manual focus, I used Mike's recommendation of diverging the 3 colors in the magic focus manual convergence grid...worked like a charm.
7. replaced screen
8. Static Focus adjustments via VR knobs.
9. Redid convergence (although mine seemed just fine, even after overscan adjustment)...or maybe I just don't know what good convergence looks like.
10. Re-adjusted color decoder....used new DVE color bar patterns with white...worked well...tweaked Blue decoder with Color and Tint, Red and Green were done with R/B and G/B respectively (tried to mess with RY and GY...saw some differences, but it seemed to make one area look better, and another area of the screen look worse).
11. Eyeballed Grayscale..then used LOTR:Fellowship moria mines sceen to adjust for too much green in dark environments...seemed to come out ok. This is the one thing I have yet to tweak....

12. Watched SW Episode II...looked great.

13. DVD's PQ looks improved at this point. I am glad I did it.

Thanks again to all!

PS. Anyone do their own greyscale with a manual color bar strip?

To those who have removed a screen on an S500:

1) Do you just follow the intructions provided in the service manual?

2 ) If so, is the removal of the magic sensor quite easy or is it pretty involved? How is it connected to the screen?

Thanks

Loren

Is it possible to get a ISF Tech to just do a manual focus? I can do the rest myself. (except grayscale)

also, could someone explain to me the importance of overscan? does it effect the sharpness of the picture? color? what?

1080i...

It is obviously easy to calibrate the color decoder with a DVD, but that gives you the settings for 480p only...how do you guys calibrate it for HDTV, 1080i/720p?

I noticed I was watching Minority Report on HBO HDTV last night...the whites just seemed too bright. However, I never noticed it on the DVD.

My contrast is at 30% right now.

Originally posted by lorenmc
To those who have removed a screen on an S500:

1) Do you just follow the intructions provided in the service manual?

2 ) If so, is the removal of the magic sensor quite easy or is it pretty involved? How is it connected to the screen?

Thanks

Loren Why would you want to remove a magic sensor?

Originally posted by Ragermac
Is it possible to get a ISF Tech to just do a manual focus? I can do the rest myself. (except grayscale) You can do manual focus yourself. Grayscale is worth paying a tech IMO. You would be paying more $ just for the house call if all you wanted was focus.

Originally posted by pillguy
1080i...

It is obviously easy to calibrate the color decoder with a DVD, but that gives you the settings for 480p only...how do you guys calibrate it for HDTV, 1080i/720p?

I noticed I was watching Minority Report on HBO HDTV last night...the whites just seemed too bright. However, I never noticed it on the DVD.

My contrast is at 30% right now. HD signal generator or DVHS Digital Video Essentials

To answer a couple questions from above I've heard (not done it so beware) that its possible to do a manual focus without removing the screen on the s500. You remove the bezel piece and control panel below the screen (just let it hang...dont detach wires)and the wingnuts are accessible/ adjustable. This was reported on hts so perhaps search there. This sounds far simpler than screen removal. The majic focus sensors are cabled from the screen to a board inside the set but the manual is unclear where/how to detach the cable. Makes the no screen removal metheod look even better.

Originally posted by Paul Clancy
To answer a couple questions from above I've heard (not done it so beware) that its possible to do a manual focus without removing the screen on the s500. You remove the bezel piece and control panel below the screen (just let it hang...dont detach wires)and the wingnuts are accessible/ adjustable. This was reported on hts so perhaps search there. This sounds far simpler than screen removal. The majic focus sensors are cabled from the screen to a board inside the set but the manual is unclear where/how to detach the cable. Makes the no screen removal metheod look even better. This is how I focused Tbass2k's S500. The drawback of this method is that you can only see the bottom of the screen, and when you focus it tightly, the rest of the screen may not be tight. It is best to have a friend view from the front when doing this to ensure focus uniformity.

Also the importance of overscan is to ensure youre not missing picture information when viewing ....ala pan and scan. If credits are cut off like the wide ones in many of the bonds then you have too much overscan. If you decrease overscan too much some sets will introduce convergence errors that cant be corrected ...so its a balancing act. I'm generally happy with 4%-4.5%.

Originally posted by Paul Clancy
Also the importance of overscan is to ensure youre not missing picture information when viewing ....ala pan and scan. If credits are cut off like the wide ones in many of the bonds then you have too much overscan. If you decrease overscan too much some sets will introduce convergence errors that cant be corrected ...so its a balancing act. I'm generally happy with 4%-4.5%.

Part of overscan that is often not mentioned is centering the screen so the center is the center...

You do not have more overscan on one side than the other.... If one side is 10% and the other side is 3%.... that means your screen is not centered!!

Mike,

I definitely noticed that with my 57TWX. I had to center it first...it was off by about 3% to the bottom, and 2% to the right. Great point. It was pretty obvious once I started trying to tweak the overscan. Must center first.

Originally posted by Marc Alexander
Why would you want to remove a magic sensor?

Step 7 in the 51s500 service manual for removing the screen says:

"Disconnect the Magic Focus sensor connectors and
loosen the wires from the screen frame.
To avoid injury and breakage, please handle the long
wires and connectors cautiously."

This step is supposed to be done for the screen assembly is removed from the rest of the TV.

Loren

For all those wanting to focus their sets and don't like the idea of taking off the screen. You should do a manual focus by unscrewing the console with the power/input/magic focus buttons.

To do that just take off the speaker grill, unscrew the two grey plastic bars to the right and left of the power console. Then just unscrew the power console and let it hang. Right in front of that little space will be the lens.

Use the user menu convergence screen and focus all 3 lenses, red and green are most important for sharpness, try to get those REALLY tight.

The difference will be well worth the small amount of effort required and in most cases dramatically better picture quality.

Marc,

How do you do a manual focus on separate areas of the screen? Where is the best place to look at the focusing dot (I use the magic focus manual convergence grid and split the colors so I see dots)? Low on the screen, high on the screen, in the middle? I am just wondering, because if I focus it high, then look at it low...if I readjust the guns....wont that throw the top I just focused?

If they are greyscale values for cuts and drives... Don't bother wasting your time.

Originally posted by Propel
Can someone post the out of box ISF settings for 57S500? I know they are different from set to set, I am looking for this info because I lost track of some parameters.

If you are currently happy with your ISF tweaks, please share the settings with the rest of us. Thanks.

this thread (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=296998) has a list of the factory S500 ISF settings. i've changed a lot of the settings since then, so disregard most of the 2nd column values.

dogongt,

Just curious, what did changing the DABLGA0 and DABLPN0 values in the isfmenu do?

i didn't really notice any difference in the picture by changing DABLGA0 and DABLPN0, so i've since changed them back to factory. i made that list of settings because i hadn't been able to find a list for the S500 models. i based all the changes off Mfusick's ISF list for the older SWX models. since then i've changed most of the random settings back to the factory default value. here's a list of the most notable changes i've made.....it's always a work in progress.

(setting)(factory default)(my current value 10/14/03 ;))

SUB-BRT 83 80 set Brightness user menu value to 50% and use Avia to set
SUBCNT0 12 00 now safe for almost any Contrast value in user menu

SHARP-3 20 10 set Sharpness user menu value to 50%
SHARP-G 20 10
SHARP-I 1F 10
SHARP-9 1F 10
SHARP-C 1F 10

COLORGO 00 01 for red push fix

there are a lot more color, tint and hue settings that i haven't gotten a chance to mess with yet using Avia or DVE. as follows:

color: all 6 COLOR settings (different inputs/temp settings)
tint: all 6 TINT settings (different inputs/temp settings)
red hue: 3 RY-... settings (different inputs)
red saturation: all 12 R/BGA.... settings (different inputs/temp settings)
green hue: 3 GY-... settings (different inputs)
green saturation: all 12 G/BGA.... settings (different inputs/temp settings)

there are a lot of threads with information.....where i got some of my initial setting values and some info on what some of them are for. hope that kind of helps some. :cool:

Originally posted by pillguy
Marc,

How do you do a manual focus on separate areas of the screen? Where is the best place to look at the focusing dot (I use the magic focus manual convergence grid and split the colors so I see dots)? Low on the screen, high on the screen, in the middle? I am just wondering, because if I focus it high, then look at it low...if I readjust the guns....wont that throw the top I just focused? The middle of the screen is the most important. But I say it is best to achieve a good focus over the entire screen, so experiment to achieve a good balance.

I compare the middle of the screen to the top left for blue, top middle for green, and top right for red. Now that I think about it, it is probably best to use top left or right for green. I use these areas because they are furthest from the gun and the hardest to focus.

I must be crazy or something. When trying to ajust the contrast of my s500 using Avia, nothing seems to change on the test pattern. At least it doesn't change a ton. I thought the change would be drastic, and I can barely see a difference between 20 and 80. Am I doing somethign wrong?

Originally posted by ntode
I must be crazy or something. When trying to ajust the contrast of my s500 using Avia, nothing seems to change on the test pattern. At least it doesn't change a ton. I thought the change would be drastic, and I can barely see a difference between 20 and 80. Am I doing somethign wrong?

Ok, I just read a thread where the guy stated that he kept his contrast at 18. That would explain why I didn't see anything. I don't think I ever went that low. I figured it would have to be higher than that. I'll try going even lower.

Originally posted by ntode
I must be crazy or something. When trying to ajust the contrast of my s500 using Avia, nothing seems to change on the test pattern. At least it doesn't change a ton. I thought the change would be drastic, and I can barely see a difference between 20 and 80. Am I doing somethign wrong? Sounds like the dimmer is enabled. Although I have never seen an option for the dimmer on the S500.

Which test pattern are you using?

Hitachi has an excellent power supply and tends to bend the bars on the sides alot less than the "demo" shows happen in the AVIA explanation on how to use it.

Look for contrast bloom...

I like to tighten the blue Electro focus a little and throw up the small convergence dots..... and look for contrast bloom after I have done convergence work...

Contrast bloom from too high Conrast will soften your picture and accelerate the decay of your PQ and CRT life.

Normal safe ranges are 30%-70% as a base point...

Here's a question for those who've done manual focus without screen removal on s500. Is there enough access through that front panel to clean the lenses or is screen removal a must? Marc? Anyone?

Thanks.

Originally posted by Paul Clancy
Here's a question for those who've done manual focus without screen removal on s500. Is there enough access through that front panel to clean the lenses or is screen removal a must There is enough access wihout screen removal...but via the back panel.

I'm wondering which test pattern to use for overscan adjustment? The overscan pattern on AVIA is in 4:3. Do I set my set for 16:9 and then adjust or do I need to get DVE? Or do I use a different pattern on AVIA that is in 16:9?

Wayne

Originally posted by WitDaGrin
Do I set my set for 16:9 and then adjust Yes. The SVE overscan patterns are innacurate, stick to AVIA.

Yes. The SVE overscan patterns are innacurate, stick to AVIA.

Did you mean DVE. I don't know what SVE is. And by Yes, do you mean use the 4:3 overscan test pattern and set the set to 16:9? Thanks.

oops, yes Digital Video Essentials - DVE :p

Yes, use the 4:3 overscan test pattern and set the set to 16:9

Could anyone point me to some links to do centering and overscan on 57S500. I had mine apart and see the two small trim pots that adjust vertical and horizontal width but how do you center? I assume the horizontal width will adjust the overscan.

Also I have seen some guys put the masking tape around the outside of the set and then run strings across to do the geometry setup. How would I do that without any of the measurements? Is each set marked the same and then adjusted to those lines or is each set somewhat unique? How would I know how to mark those lines? Thanks.

There are digital centering controls in the service menu.

How would I do that without any of the measurements?

Get a template.

My recommendation is to stay away from the trimpots and use a template to factory specs. Adjusting the overscan pots can cause problems. The template won't give you the desired overscan, but I doubt you will notice much difference. And it is safer.

Bill

The template won't give you the desired overscan

How do ISF calibrators do overscan? Do they use the trim pots? Or is it done in the service menu? I've read so much by Mfusik on doing overscan adjustments. How does he do it?

How do ISF calibrators do overscan?

Some do, but that is a mistake. Overscan pots, in my opinion, should be fixed. When doing calibrations, you should set the pots to the proper voltage. You have to zero out convergence in order to accomplish this. Then you need to use a template to factory specs. I think the factory dimensions will give you a 5.5% (sides) by 4% overscan (top/bottom). If you go less than 5.5% on the sides, you will start to get bending on the tips of red on the right side. So, you want to stay with the factory dimensions.

Bill

Originally posted by Mfusick
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?s=&postid=2662407#post2662407

here is your Link Marc link no longer works...here's the thread http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=230835

where do i order a service manual for the hitachi 51swx20b??cant find the link...

deez, email me at
jeffch@myrealbox.com

I need to re-adjust the color trimpots on a 57uwx20b. I have tried using dve, without any success. Also, does anyone know of a ISF trained calibrator in mid-michigan.

Why do you want to readjust the color trimpots?

When i attempted to adjust the (3) focus pots I turn the color pots, creating a real mess.

oh...boy.....

All you can do is put on the avia black pluge with log grey and bring the green up until you just see the left bar.Then bring up the red and green and eyeball it for the best grey scale.Check flesh tones and tweak alittle from ther.
That is about the best you can do until you get a real ISF guy in there to redo the grey scalr properly.

Originally posted by deez
where do i order a service manual for the hitachi 51swx20b??cant find the link... service manuals can be ordered at www.servicemanuals.net

When preforming the calibration should the ISF calibrator adjust the gray scale using the trimpots, or does it matter at this point?

Trimpots shouldn't be touched...all adjustment should be made in SM

Thanks!
However, the trimpots are out of adjustment now! The SM values have not been modified.

ty marc i found it on cd rom for 9.50 us dollars!! now if i could only find someone to upload it to my ftp server......for free...heh

Marc and steviec, (Color trimpots)
I had a ISF service guy over last night for more than (3) hours, he was not able to properly set the output of the color trimpots correctly. He suggested that I have a senior technician from the mfg. come out and balance the crt outputs, which will allow the correct temperature settings for gray scale to be made. Does this make sense?

You cannot use the screen trimpots alone to correct grayscale. They act identical to the CUTS in the service menu, which means you are not correcting the upper IREs. What they should do is set the trimpots per the manual and adjust grayscale by using the CUTS and DRIVES.

Bill

Thanks!
He was able to set the gray scale to the following: 30 IRE=6436k, 50 IRE=6454k, 80 IRE=6487, but when we put the 5th element dvd on, the whites were better than ever, but had unacceptable green push, so we started over and over. He did not have a SM.

Wow, your service tech had a color analyzer? However, it sounds like he didn't know how to use it. You can obtain 6500K without hitting D65 (the appropriate 6500K). You cannot rely solely on color temp. You have to use the cooridinate system to determine the appropriate 6500K (D65). It sounds like he was a little high on the Y axis (hence the green 6500K).

Bill

That sounds pretty good but the hardest window to set is the 20ire.
The excess green should be fairly easy to fix.
Did he setup the color decoder properly?

No! He said i should have the Mfg. SMan do that, and decoder setup is not part of the standard calibration service. Just a little history on my set. The initial trimpot adjustment were done by a local Mfg. approved service center, he told me he was going to improve the picture sharpness and focus, from that point, (3) service calls and last nights calibration, has not resolved my sets problems.

Originally posted by wznrd5
No! He said i should have the Mfg. SMan do that, and decoder setup is not part of the standard calibration service. Just a little history on my set. The initial trimpot adjustment were done by a local Mfg. approved service center, he told me he was going to improve the picture sharpness and focus, from that point, (3) service calls and last nights calibration, has not resolved my sets problems. Are you sure this guy was an ISF? This doesn't sound right. How much did you pay him? Gray scale and color decoding are standard in an ISF calibration.

Hi gang - great thread! I have around 30 hours on a new Hitachi 57s500 and have improved the picture immensely with info on this thread and others. A couple of problems:

1. I haven't been happy with the results from the Magic Focus convergence auto mode and decided to do a manual mode convergence. This worked well except for some reason the convergence won't hold for more than an hour or two before drifting off significantly. Although I don't have 100 hours on the set as suggested by some berfore making this kind of adjustment, with 30 hours logged on the set, I wouldn't expect the convergence to drift so significantly in only a couple of hours. I've done this a couple of times now with the same results each time. The set was warmed up for several hours before doing the convergence, and also, the last time I did it, I removed my speakers from the area just in case speaker magnetic fields were causing problems.

2. A different problem is that on a grey or white screen, a slight but noticable pink hue is present on the left side of the screen, fading away gradually from the left to the right side of the screen. It is slight but present even after a manual convergence calibration.

Has anyone had either of these problems or have any ideas on what could be the cause?

Larry

Make sure you don't perform magic focus auto or manual until the set is warmed up. At least 30-45 mins. It is normal for it to drift slightly during warmup...but not to drift 3 hours after that. If you are still drifting after warmup hourly...time to call for warranty service.

Thanks Marc - I agree. Last night, I did find a changing magnetic source that might have affected things - a subwoofer several feet away that I didn't remove from the room when I removed the two other speakers nearest the TV in my last convergence test. The subwoofer cuts on and off as it detects a signal. I set it to stay turned on last night and so far, the last covergence seems to be holding pretty well.

How about the 2nd problem I mentioned: slight pink hue on left half of the screen noticable on all white, grey, or dark scenes - any ideas on this one? Is this a normal artifact of the CRT RPTV or is there a tweak or adjustment I need to do?

It's normal ...caused by the position of the red gun. Do a search on lens striping. I dont recommend you do lens stripe untill you're more familiar with the inner workings of your set.

Paul - thanks, I wasn't familiar with lens striping. I think I'll leave this problem alone for awhile!

Larry

Last night, I did find a changing magnetic source that might have affected things - a subwoofer several feet away that I didn't remove from the room when I removed the two other speakers nearest the TV in my last convergence test. The subwoofer cuts on and off as it detects a signal. I set it to stay turned on last night and so far, the last covergence seems to be holding pretty well.

I have a 12" subwoofer a few feet away. Will this effect my display? and if so how?

Not if it's properly shielded. Most newer subs are. My energy 12" sits 3" from my 57s500 ...no effect.

Marc,

I paid 350. Before the service calls, my 57uwx20b had great color.

Originally posted by wznrd5
Marc,

I paid 350. Before the service calls, my 57uwx20b had great color. I believe you are owed a refund. Please call the ISF (561) 997-9073 to report your calibration experience and find out about the guy who claimed to perform ISF calibration but wouldn't touch the color decoder.

People...it is wise to research your calibrator before you let him touch your set.

Hmmm...a minor criticism of this thread. IMO any discussion about making service mode adjustments should at the very least provide instructions for how to enter the service mode and how to navigate it (unless it is logically laid out: on front projectors it usually is and on TV sets it usually isn't).

That info may be here, but if it is it is burried somewhere.

I know the information can be found elsewhere, but people looking for tweaks are more likely to happen upon a thread such as this, and then have to do more searches to find basic service mode information. It's better to have all that here, it seems to me.

--Jerome

SIGH....

This is what is wrong with Americans. LAZY...LAZY...LAZY. Here is the very first post from this thread. Which has a direct link...to more direct links and the SM procedure.

I give the hell up!
Originally posted by Marc Alexander
Mike Fusick has done us all a favor and compiled a wealth of Hitachi tweaks here (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=273639) (these tweaks apply to all models with ISF menu, 2002 and beyond)

Lets move all the Q&A concerning these tweaks here in this thread. If someone still can't find the info with all this help...they need to stay out of the service menu.

Originally posted by Marc Alexander

This is what is wrong with Americans. LAZY...LAZY...LAZY.

Or is it what is right about Americans? :)

Sometimes folks follow a link into the middle of a thread, then becoming interested, they ask for more info.

Or maybe they are a relative newbie and don't know the in's and out's of forum etiquette.

Either way, we were all new once, so give a brother a chance!

By the way, Mr. Alexander's quoted link will be most helpful! By the way I'm not meaning to tear on you Mr. Alexander, just the premise of us "Lazy Americans!" Heck were getting all fired up about how to be the ultimate couch potato! :)

I cannot agree with Marc more... Spend a few minutes and even type something in the search box. There are about 3-4 threads specifically on the Hitachi CRT's, The are posted on the most popular threads at the top, each one points to the other threads. I mean the only thing we could do is everyone can put the SM procedure in thier Signature ....

chris

Ok, so we are lazy couch potatoes. We spend a small fortune on TV sets and sophisticated remotes so we don't have to even press too many buttons. And to what end? To lay on the couch and watch our favorite movies and sports.

To complain about folks within that genre as being lazy could be a tad disingenuous:D

You know something guys, it was an honest mistake. Instead of being gentlemen (and this goes for you too Marc), you decided to take personal offense at what was intended to be an honest critcism, one that I said at the outset was minor. Thanks for making a mountain out of a molehill.

Furthermore, you are way out of line with the lazy remark. I've been around here longer than you have Marc, and have made my share of contributions to AVS Forum, so you are barking up the wrong tree. I appologize for having missed that one word hyperlink. A simple "please check the hyperlink in the first post" would have been sufficient. If it pissed you off that much then you could have simply ignored it.

Whether you agree or not,

Hitachi 51F500 Tweaks Thread (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=273639)

is more attention grabbing than

here (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=273639)

Sorry to have bothered you.

--Jerome

Originally posted by jsaliga
Furthermore, you are way out of line with the lazy remark. My apologies...I just get tired of answering the same questions over and over when I have done quite a bit of work to compile info and help a large number of folks out. Many of these folks are lazy...even if you don't fall into that category. I'm curious why you found the need to criticize this thread out of the blue...minor as it may have been?
I've been around here longer than you have Marcc'mon now:rolleyes:

Originally posted by Marc Alexander
My apologies...I just get tired of answering the same questions over and over when I have done quite a bit of work to compile info and help a large number of folks out. Many of these folks are lazy...even if you don't fall into that category.
I'm not unsympathetic Marc. You should check out the Windows Media 9 HDTV encoding guide in my signature. That guide took over 200 hours of my time to write, and considerably more than that to do the research and testing. It didn't take long for my PM box to overflow with requests for information...information that I had painstakingly put into the guide. It got to the point where I had to back away from it for a while because it started to take up all my forum time. As it turned out that was a good thing, because people then started using the guide because they had no choice. That thread is at something like 550 posts, so can understand how someone new to the discussion might have a hard time playing catch up.

I'm curious why you found the need to criticize this thread out of the blue...minor as it may have been?
Mainly because I thought it would be helpful to have those instructions in the same thread (keeping in mind that I missed the hyperlink), but secondarily because I just bought a Hitachi 65S500 and was searching the forum looking for those very instructions for myself. I know my way around a CRT display (have lots of CRT FP experience), but need to familiarize myself with the Hitachi service menu. I do plan on getting the service manual, but for now all I want to do is an eyeball grayscale since this unit is very green heavy at the bottom. I found the information I was after over at HTS, so it isn't a big deal. Think of it as a request rather than a critcism, and that is how I should have worded my post. Poor choice of words on my part.

--Jerome

Water under the bridge. :D

:cool:

--Jerome

Originally posted by Marc Alexander
Mike Fusick has done us all a favor and compiled a wealth of Hitachi tweaks here (51F500 Tweaks) (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=273639) (these tweaks apply to all models with ISF menu, 2002 and beyond)

Lets move all the Q&A concerning these tweaks here in this thread. Original post edited ("51F500 Tweaks" added to make hyperlink more visible).

Can a manual convergence be done in the service menu that will allow the magic focus to duplicate these settings to achieve a more perfect auto convergence? If not, is there another way to tweak the magic focus?

Interpolation is an important step in doing manual convergence as I found out from my last Hitachi RPTV. The service manual states "After convergence and before saving to ROM press VID3 to interpolate or calculate then check convergence again, if OK, Save to ROM and then intialize sensors" Unfortunately this doesn't work with my 51S500. Has anyone had any success in this step????

I tried the vid3 interpolation too, it didn't seem to do anything at all.

-Dave

raueda1,
Dave did you put the remote in the VCR mode before trying to interopolate?? The instructions say to do it. I did and it still doesn't do anything. Does Yours???

Jim

After some arm-twisting with the dealer, I recently got my replacement set. Happy to report that geometry was good out of the box, the screen and bezel are actually flat on this one, and the greenies don't seem anywhere near as bad (btw, if you buy one of these in Ottawa in the next little while, and notice any of the above, PM me).

Focus was way off, especially on red. I did the electro focus (DCAM, dots, etc.), but not being blessed with a SM, am at a loss as to what to adjust on the gun/lens assembly for the manual focus.

I've searched the F500 tweaks thread, this Q&A thread, and 500/700 owners thread, to no avail.

Any pointers/pics would be appreciated.

tia,
r.

I just got my new 51s500, and did a manual convergence before anything else, to try and reduce the grainy effect (I didn't know what else might reduce that). It seemed to help some, although it might just be the properly converged colors making it look better in general. What do I need to do to reduce the grainy?
It seems to have improved some just over a few hours of watching it.
However, the colors on the TV seemed to be... changing towards the end of watching Braveheart.

Can anyone tell me what thread I can find some info on basic user menu settings? All I can find out is that most people seem to be turning the contrast way down, and I've played with Edge enhancement and the rest, but what are some good combinations?

Originally posted by Vhagar
Can anyone tell me what thread I can find some info on basic user menu settings? All I can find out is that most people seem to be turning the contrast way down, and I've played with Edge enhancement and the rest, but what are some good combinations?

There's tons of info - you just need to make the effort to look for it. (Hint: Try the "Popular Threads" sticky at the top of the forum, or the Search feature ...)

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=323602

Ok, I pretty much found what I was looking for.
I just need to do a Manual focus, and then when my AVIA DVD gets here I can adjust the colors and convergence again.

I've done focus and convergence, and the tweaks to reduce ghosting/ringing, but i'm still getting some artifacts/blockiness along edges while watching DVDs, and just general noise/blockiness it seems. By turning progressive scan off on my Sony combo DVD player and turning on Auto Movie mode it seemed to reduce alot of it.

I am sitting about 6-7 feet away from a 51 inch screen though.

I am going to be ordering a good DVD player and trashing the sh1tbox I have now soon. Will DCDi interlacing do alot to reduce the blocky edges and such?

Many of the Sony DVD players are pretty bad and create a lot of artifacts with DVDs while in progressive mode. What you are seeing is common with many of them.

Bill

I got my XP-30 yesterday, and it improved the picture alot. On Goldmember and a couple other DVDs it noticeably reduced blocky artifacts and stairstepping, but it really shined on the first season of the West Wing. The DVD for WW is not very good at all, but the XP-30 REALLY cleaned it up. sitting 6 feet away from a 51 inch screen I will probably always see some noise.

I might need to ask this in the DVD player forum, but when I turn on progressive scan on the XP-30, the picture actualy has more artifacts/noise. I tested this on the shot in Goldmember of Austins plane landing. With progressive on, There was very noticeable stairstepping along the top edge of the plane, but in interlaced mode it was reduced alot.
What gives?

Marc,

I have implemented the tweaks on my 51uwx20b

SHARP's 10
APRTR's 00
VSMGAM's 01
Y-DTL-0 08 looks best to me

I didn't change the STRGA, its left at 10.

After doing these my picture does indeed look sharper, I have a jvc dvd
player. I don't have hdtv source yet.

Here is my question.

I went thru the isf menu to record all my changes that I made onto paper,
which I also have my original factory settings and checked the entire ISF
menu for the heck of it.

I noticed different settings for these parameters, which I did not change.

SYNCDET 00
F-STD 00
V-STD 00
H-STD 00
These were all 01 originally, but now I cannot change the setting back to
01. It will not repond.

NOISE the settings for this keeps cycling back around and around and
does not stop. It was originally 00. The setting keeps moving every few
seconds.
This one has me the most concerned.

Now I don't have a clue what these parameters are for but it seems like
these may have changed due to changing the other parameters.

Angelo,
Some of the settings change right B4 your eyes when in the menu, I have seen this many times, and others have made note of it too.

I don't believe there is need for you to worry there.

I am not sure why you cannot change settings back though, maybe someone else who knows will chime in.

GL

m

Thanks Muzz,

At least I know its not a problem with my Hitachi.

Buy the way, even though the NOISE parameter settings keep scrolling
right before my eyes, the picture signal in the background remains the
same.

These settings you see dynamically changing are really status displays. It is normal.

Marc,

Thank you for your reply, too.

A big thank you for all of your input and sharing of knowledge in this
thread and forum.

Well, thanks to all the hard work and information in this forum I have successfully performed many of the tweaks for my 65SWX20B. I am very frustrated with the colors though, all synthetic colors look to hot.
I have done the following (some per the service manual instructions):

Lens hood
Mechanical followed by electrostatic focus
Overscan reduction
Rebuilding geometry with template then proper convergence in DCAM (after I messed it up :rolleyes: )
reposition Magic Focus patterns (due to overflow errors)
Misc tweaks for reduced ghosting, ringing ect... with good results!

I have an Onkyo DVD player that passes pluge signals and have used it with the new DVE disk to try and correct the color decoder problems.
With DVE's modified color bar up, I was able to balance the colors through the blue filter (was fine as-is), then I was able to turn down the red (r/b-GAF @ 02 from 0C) and balance the color bar through the red filter, but for the life of me I cannot balance the color bar with the green filter. I have tried every tweak listed in this forum for green. I have tried the g drives and cuts, no joy! :mad:
I have my DVD player hooked up via HD Component input 1, and a Sony HD300 via the DVI input. I just use one at a time. Faces of people seem the worst, with green tint in the shadows of the faces. All grass seems to be electric, and any picture with green plant life seems to cause other parts of the picture to have green tint. It is not as noticeable while watching DVD's, and HD broadcast on the HD300, but while watching standard satellite or OTA it is noticeably annoying.
While watching Underworld (nice! :) ) I still notice slight green tint in some faces even though the film is shot with a cool washed out filter of some sort.
I did not notice it as bad before tweaking, the only thing I can think of is a possibility of bumping one of the screen pots on the focus pack, but I don't think so, I know not to touch those. Or possibly the set is just broken in and needs adjusting? Could it be the HD300? I wish the digital stations would broadcast color bars during sign off....

G/B-GAF is at 00
GY-PH-F is at 00
It seems that if I could adjust G/B-GAF down below 00 it would fix the problem, but obviously I can't.
I am considering having a service tech out to fix this, since I still have part of the 1 year warranty avail.

Any thoughts?

Originally posted by JIMHALM4
Interpolation is an important step in doing manual convergence as I found out from my last Hitachi RPTV. The service manual states "After convergence and before saving to ROM press VID3 to interpolate or calculate then check convergence again, if OK, Save to ROM and then intialize sensors" Unfortunately this doesn't work with my 51S500. Has anyone had any success in this step????

Jim - did you go into 7x5 mode first? Not sure if that needs to be done first, but that's how Bill G. describes it in this thread (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=230835&perpage=20&pagenumber=4). He is using this to eliminate S-curves on the grid, do you have that problem?

The manual says "This process will take about 1 second and no picture will be seen at this time." You're not getting that?

Matt

Grinchyy,

Don't use the color filters...use RGBOUT in the ISF menu to isolate each gun when calibrating the color decoder. CUTs and DRIVEs should also not be touched when calibrating the decoder (they are strictly for grayscale).

What is your G-STR set to? Have you tried using different values?

Originally posted by Marc Alexander
Grinchyy,

Don't use the color filters...use RGBOUT in the ISF menu to isolate each gun when calibrating the color decoder. CUTs and DRIVEs should also not be touched when calibrating the decoder (they are strictly for grayscale).

What is your G-STR set to? Have you tried using different values?

I have tried G-STR down to 00 did not seem to help. Today I turned down the COLOR in the user menu to about 38. It seems to have taken the edge off. I can't tell if the colors are to washed out now or not...
I did also calibrate with the RGBOUT isolating one color at a time. I think the grayscale is whacked. :)

Okay, last night I did a electrostatic and manual focus on my 51S700, and then manual convergence in the DCAM. I had a few "lessons learned" I thought might help others out:

1) The Magic Focus button won't work if it is set to "Manual" in the TV menu.

2) While I did my covergence, I tried the VID3 button to interpolate the data. The picture did not disappear like the manual said, but the flashing line did pause for a second, so I believe it was working. I did not need to go into VCR mode first.

3) After I worked had worked on this for a while, I saved the results to ROM, and then I wanted to initialize the sensors. Both the service manual and the instructions I've seen posted here say to use PIP CH....Which isn't on my remote!! So after a small period of freaking out :eek: , I got the user manual for the SWX series and determined that SURF is the comparable button on the new remotes. Then I looked on the next page in my service manual and it shows the SURF button starts initialization. :rolleyes: :p


So I checked out a little HD Jay Leno, it looked good, I don't know if it was better. Everything was pretty good on my set from the factory, the only thing I could tell was improved was the blue focus. I guess they do intentionally defocus it some.

Matt

Originally posted by Grinchyy
I have tried G-STR down to 00 did not seem to help. Today I turned down the COLOR in the user menu to about 38. It seems to have taken the edge off. I can't tell if the colors are to washed out now or not...
I did also calibrate with the RGBOUT isolating one color at a time. I think the grayscale is whacked. :) Having a wacked grayscale shouldn't prevent you from getting the color decoder dialed in as they should be independent. Keep us posted.

Originally posted by Marc Alexander
Having a wacked grayscale shouldn't prevent you from getting the color decoder dialed in as they should be independent. Keep us posted. Are you sure about that Marc? The color decoder controls how colors are "added" to the base gray; if the base is off that would have to throw off the resulting sum, wouldn't it? I'm not saying the controls aren't separate, just that correct grayscale is a pre-requisite for getting the color decoder exactly right; at least that's what I was led to believe.

I'm not saying the controls aren't separate, just that correct grayscale is a pre-requisite for getting the color decoder exactly right; at least that's what I was led to believe.

That is a true statement. However, it is usually the primary color/tint controls that are affected most by changing grayscale. The Red/Green Push offsets aren't affected nearly as much, maybe a notch or two at most.

But, your point is valid from a whole color calibration perspective. Having blue to high or low in grayscale relative to D65 will cause a color setting that is too saturated or not saturated enough.

Bill

But, your point is valid from a whole color calibration perspective. Having blue to high or low in gray-scale relative to D65 will cause a color setting that is too saturated or not saturated enough.

This is what I am most concerned about, synthetic blue's red's and green's look way to saturated or "hot". I tried to adjust the color-bar in DVE with both the RGBOUT setting and the color filters provided with DVE. I was satisfied with the red, and the blue, but could not for the life of me fix the green. I have applied all the tweaks posted in this forum for green, and played with seemingly every combo in the ISF (carefully though :) ) and I came close by tweaking the GY-PH-F and G/B - GAF settings. But this only left the greens even more out of control.
Is it really important to balance the greens in the color bars?

I have been watching a lot of material with the user menu color turned down to 38% and I think that I am happy with it. I still believe that the gray-scale is off and I don't think I am comfortable enough to try and fix it.

I pulled the following quote from somewhere on this site: (author unknown :) )

Eyeballing Grayscale:

What is grayscale calibrration? Grayscale is used to calibrate the black and white in the picture. All images are created using a gray backdrop. If you unplug Pr and Pb on your DVD player, you will see a black and white image. The color decoder will then place color on top of that black and white picture. But, the gray is the foundation for your picture. The thing most people don't realize is that gray or black/white are also made of color, various levels of red/green/blue. So, by adjusting the color in the gray, you are also changing the color in your picture.

I was thinking of trying the above. Does it sound like something I could try to adjust the gray-scale of my set? If so what settings should I be addressing? cuts/drives in main service menu, or cuts/drives in ISF menu, ect...

Thanks for any and all input....

One other thing, the F's (4-F-G) in my ISF correspond to the DVI and HD Component input #1. Some others have posted that the G settings are the HD inputs, this is not the case for me. Is it different for some TV's?

Oh, almost forgot... Anyone think it could be my Sony HD300 that is giving the improper colors?

Is it really important to balance the greens in the color bars?

You should dial in everything. However, if grayscale is incorrect, you may need to compensate.


One other thing, the F's (4-F-G) in my ISF correspond to the DVI and HD Component input #1. Some others have posted that the G settings are the HD inputs, this is not the case for me. Is it different for some TV's?

I learned the hard way what all this meant.

DVI is F, period. No way to change it.

Compent HD is G and Component SD is F. This is assuming you have automatic selected for your color system in the user menu.

The color system has nothing to do with and HD or SD color matrix. It has confused many people. The color system menu determines which parameter suffixes are tied to scan rates inside the service menu. If I want to put DVD on G, all I have to do is select Color System HD for the input DVD is connected to. So, If I want to calibrate DVI and DVD. I will put input 2 color system on HD. Therefore DVD will use "G" instead of "F". And DVI will continue to use "F".

Bill

Originally posted by gambrelw
I learned the hard way what all this meant.

DVI is F, period. No way to change it.

Compent HD is G and Component SD is F. This is assuming you have automatic selected for your color system in the user menu.

The color system has nothing to do with and HD or SD color matrix. It has confused many people. The color system menu determines which parameter suffixes are tied to scan rates inside the service menu. If I want to put DVD on G, all I have to do is select Color System HD for the input DVD is connected to. So, If I want to calibrate DVI and DVD. I will put input 2 color system on HD. Therefore DVD will use "G" instead of "F". And DVI will continue to use "F".

Bill

I have my STB hooked up via the DVI input 1 and my DVD player via input 1 through component, while the XBOX sits on input 2 component. I have the color system set to auto and I noticed changes in both the DVD and STB picture while only adjusting the "F" settings. I did not notice any change while adjusting "G" on the DVD. Does this make sense?

I have the color system set to auto and I noticed changes in both the DVD and STB picture while only adjusting the "F" settings. I did not notice any change while adjusting "G" on the DVD. Does this make sense?

Yes, that makes sense because you are set to auto. Change input 1 to HD in the color system menu and adjust "G" for DVD.

Bill

I have been trying to get the best balance of sharpness for both DVD and Direct TV... The directTV looks like crap - no surprise - on my 57SWX20B, and I was wondering if playing with the settings below could help... What I would really like is an explanation of what each stting actually controls so that I could make informed, judicious changes, not just enter someone elses settings, as each set looks different.

Could anyone explain? I have also heard of V -ENH and H-ENH in the FLEX menu to be set to 0, but I haven't heard that one before....

Thanks for the education. OH, and I have had my set ISF calibrated, this is just followup personal preference tweaking...


Originally posted by Marc Alexander
Ghosting on the ISF series Hitachis is a somewhat peculiar problem.

Most RPTVs have an inherent ghosting/haloing I refer to as ringing. This can be tweaked out of most Mits sets but not most other brands. Hitachis historically have not been plagued by this form of edge enhancement.

In addition to slight ringing, the ISF Hitachis actually display 3-4 ghost images to the left and right of objects. This can be quite distracting and can muddy fine detail. Luckily, the effects of this can be minimized through the ISF menu tweaks and the problem becomes virtually invisible with actual content.

Ghosting tweaks summary:

SHARP-4 20 10
SHARP-A 20 10
SHARP-B 1F 10
SHARP-9 1F 10
SHARP-E 20 10

APRTR-4 01 00 To minimize ghosting set to 00
APRTR-A 01 00 To minimize ghosting set to 00
APRTR-C 00
APRTR-E 01 00 To minimize ghosting set to 00

SRTGA-0 10 0 To minimize ghosting set to 00

Y-DTL-0 07
Y-DTL-0 will transition the ghosting from black to white. Find the optimal point for your TV.

try this for a start: cologo to 01= more natural red
G-stro to 00= lime green fix

RYs to 02
R/Bs to 03
Gys to 01
G/Bs to 04
This will get you in the ball park. Everytime you change sources or players you will have to redo the decoder.When i hooked up the denon 2200 i ended up with 03 04 03 04.
used the RGBUTO 01= red 02 =blue 03= green.
With the dve color bars on the screen.tweak the RY f,Rb f,GY f, and G/B f until the bars match without using the filters.Then tweak the color f and tint f until the blue bars all match.All the other tewaks you made svm etc. put back to the original values.For some reason after usint the set for awhile these other tweaks are not needed.

user menu settings= contrast 11 /the point of blooming
brighnteness 51 /black level
color 50
tint center or mid point
sharpnee 40 or all the way off.

Does anyone or can anyone come up with a list of the ISF menu settings and their meanings?
Understanding these settings will help a great deal.

I want to calibrate the DVI input, which I watch the majority of television from, with a Sony HD300. Has anyone seen color-bars broadcast by any DirecTV stations at any time? I find it impossible to calibrate the DVI without color-bars, or a HD signal generator which is out of the question.

Does anyone or can anyone come up with a list of the ISF menu settings and their meanings?

Send me your email in a PM and I will send it to you.
At least the ones I am aware of.


I want to calibrate the DVI input, which I watch the majority of television from, with a Sony HD300. Has anyone seen color-bars broadcast by any DirecTV stations at any time? I find it impossible to calibrate the DVI without color-bars, or a HD signal generator which is out of the question.

HDnet used to put on the SMPTE color bar every so often. You might want to check their schedule.

Bill

I think I may be just reading to much into tweaking my set. I would perform the tweaks then do some channel surfing to test my results. I think it was wrong of me to expect that each channel (digital OTA) should have good color. I noticed that some stations, commercials or shows had downright terrible color or tint.
I do notice that the color seems to be excellent on most, if not all HD shows (OTA and D*). I think I was expecting to much from each channel and placing to much blame on the TV's color tuner.
Is it me, or is daytime TV (digital OTA) and commercials ect.. just terrible as far as quality. I see a vast difference from 5 pm on. The shows that are not in HD and commercials even have better quality, sharper, better color.

I need to get out of the house. :D

G.

Consider yourself fortunate that you at least have HD.

I am in the same state... I went from a 32" Sony XBR to a Hitachi 57SWX20B and I haven't like my DTV picture since.... DVD's look phenomenal...

My holy grail is to adjust the settings for each input to get the best possible picture without introducing ghosting or other nasty artifacts.

As to my Direct TV reception: I find the History channel and Discovery to be better than most, my locals vary... Mostly I put up with a mediocre broadcast picture -- that seems to be the case on any large screen RPTV...

If we could get a better SD picture, I'm all ears...

Originally posted by Grinchyy
I need to get out of the house. :D

Heh...I agree! ;) If you're getting too stressed out about your TV issues, it might be worth it to get a professional calibrator to come in and get the color fixed up.

Matt

STRANGE PROBLEM - ANYONE ELSE HAVE THIS?

Strange problem, blue coloration on tight vertical lines (multiburst). SRTGA-0 reduces but doesn't eliminate it.

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/show...&highlight=cast
http://www.***************.com/htst...rt=1#Post557387

Originally posted by Jason EC
STRANGE PROBLEM - ANYONE ELSE HAVE THIS?

Strange problem, blue coloration on tight vertical lines (multiburst). SRTGA-0 reduces but doesn't eliminate it.

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/show...&highlight=cast
http://www.***************.com/htst...rt=1#Post557387

Convergence? Can you be more descriptive?

His problem isn't convergence, focus, or any other basic calibration issue. Somehow the blue is higher the upper band of the Y signal. This is existed with the multiburst pattern from the DVD player and from my VP-403 signal generator using different connections.

I have never seen this on a hitachi before. So, I was stumped.

Bill

Is the Hitachi 46W500 basically the same as the s500/700 series, only smaller and with a DVD?
Does it have the same lens system and such? I'm considering downgrading from a 51, my viewing distance is only about 5 feet :)

Originally posted by Vhagar
Is the Hitachi 46W500 basically the same as the s500/700 series, only smaller and with a DVD?
Does it have the same lens system and such? I'm considering downgrading from a 51, my viewing distance is only about 5 feet :) The W hardware is closer to the F series, but it shares the software/feature set with the S series.

What kinda hardware differences are we talking about?
It'd be 318 bucks cheaper at circuitcity.com (again, anyone can see this price who can access the website, so please don't censor) and for my viewing distance I think it'd be a good move. I am one who really dislikes even the small artifacts I get from being so close to a 51s500. I think with the money saved I could get it calibrated, and then it would look alot better. Would an ISF calibrated w500 generally look better than a user s500?. I'm a newbie to tweaking too, so it's not like im doing that much of a quality job. I just wanna make sure theres an important technological feature i'd be missing out on, that i'd regret.

I would normally just pull the trigger and then take it back after 30 days if I needed to, but since i'd be returning my s500 I just wanna make sure.

Id say keep the 51 and get hd sources. ..ie sat, cable, dtheater(hd dvd coming). Now you're livin large. An hd ready set looks fabulous with hd sources in a big screen configuration with sources that match it's potential. Now that I have hd I'd really regret having gone smaller. As usual it's about source quality. 90% of complaints about big rptvs are really complaints about source. Start with a cable/sat box to get a taste. Once you see real hd (oscars, nfl, nascar, even some hd movie transfers)on the 51 there's no looking back. You'll forget about downsizing. If you must go small look at the new 34" Sony xbr tube.

The first HD programming I've ever seen has been on my Hitachi 65SWX20B. I have often wondered since a large RPTV often magnifies flaws in source material, does HD look better on say a 32" tube? Just curious for those who have seen both....

Originally posted by Grinchyy
The first HD programming I've ever seen has been on my Hitachi 65SWX20B. I have often wondered since a large RPTV often magnifies flaws in source material, does HD look better on say a 32" tube? Just curious for those who have seen both....

Comparing the pictures I have seen on many sets on "Display" The smaller 51" Hitachis look better then say the 57" or 65", But thats my opinion.

I just got me a 51s500 and have had a little warping near the bottom left hand corner....Just VERY slightly, But it still annoys me. Seems to be more noticable in "Stretch" mode's. Is there any way to correct this, Or should I hurry up and call in about my 30 day warranty?

I just got me a 51s500 and have had a little warping near the bottom left hand corner....Just VERY slightly, But it still annoys me. Seems to be more noticable in "Stretch" mode's. Is there any way to correct this, Or should I hurry up and call in about my 30 day warranty?

Sounds like a minor geometry problem which is not uncommon, this is something that you can fix yourself if you feel comfortable. Do a search on DCAM or Geometry and you will find tweaks for your television to help fix this situation.
But you can mess up your TV if it is not performed correctly, you may just want to have someone take a look at it instead.

Originally posted by JIMHALM4
raueda1,
Dave did you put the remote in the VCR mode before trying to interopolate?? The instructions say to do it. I did and it still doesn't do anything. Does Yours???

Jim

sorry to bring this old quote up, but i've not been able to do the interpolate function either. furiously pressing the vcr button follwed by vid3 does absolutely nothing on my 51gwx20b. anyone figured out how it works? according to the service manual, it should work.

vincent

Originally posted by vksf01
sorry to bring this old quote up, but i've not been able to do the interpolate function either. furiously pressing the vcr button follwed by vid3 does absolutely nothing on my 51gwx20b. anyone figured out how it works? according to the service manual, it should work.

vincent

Did you see my post, Vincent?

The screen on my 51S700 did not blank out like the manual said it would, but the flashing convergence line paused for a second. Try pressing it right before the line is about to flash to see if it works.

Matt

Originally posted by bigrig
Did you see my post, Vincent?

The screen on my 51S700 did not blank out like the manual said it would, but the flashing convergence line paused for a second. Try pressing it right before the line is about to flash to see if it works.

Matt

yes, i did but i didn't notice any difference in my convergence grid after i tried it. the reason why i'm asking is that i have an area in the top left corner where the lines are in an s-curve and i simply cannot get the lines to be straight. i remember reading somewhere (probably in this thread) that gambrelw was able to straighten the line by hitting the recalculate function. maybe i'm not reading it right. any ideas?

vincent

Any opinion on these guys for ISF Calibration of my TV:

http://www.imagingscience.com/isf_results.cfm?temp=8&Country1=none&State1=WA&dlr_status=CAL

I have a Hitachi 65T500.

Thanks,
Bill

Any opinion on these guys for ISF Calibration of my TV

I've talked to Robert a couple times. He called me about a Hitachi several months ago. I believe he is up to speed on your set.

Bill

Fine Tuning My greyscale....... by eyeballing only.......need some input...

I've had my Hitachi 51uwx20b for over a year now. Did all the tweaks
found here on the forum.

Out of the box so long ago my greyscale had a reddish cast in the lower ire #'s with the color control set to zero. I dialed it out by slightly reducing
R-cut-h and R-cut-s. The red was gone but after a month or 2 I felt my
blacks had a greenish cast to them, so I played with the G-cut-h and
G-cut-s., and slightly bumped up the R-cut-h and R-cut-s again. Now my
blacks are black.

Out of the box the #100 ire window had what I felt a blueish cast to it
and every image that had a light reflection on it, like someones nose or
forehead looked very glared out. I dialed down the r-drv-h, r-drv-s,
g-drv-h and g-drv-s. Also dialed down the b-cut-h and b-cut-s. It seems to
have eliminated the crushing glare for the most part and eliminated the
blueish cast.

Having lived with these cuts and drives changes I have made by eyeballing
I am for the most part very pleased, especially if I go to any retailer store
to check out their displays.

Let me just say to anyone who is an expert here, this is what I am
looking to do after living with and making mental notes of images while
I am watching dvds.

I want to take the last bit of glare I see in light reflected on foreheads
and noses, (by the way African American folks look fine on the display)
by adjusting my greyscale further. I don't want to change anything but
knock off the last bit of glare I am seeing. I dont want to lower my contrast and I dont want to increase my brightness, I've tried these and
I just gets me away from everything else I like about my display.

I'm thinking of again lowering the R and G drives slightly, and possibly
the B-cut slightly to keep the greyfields neutral shades of grey. I can definitely live with what it is now, and before I start playing around again
I would like to have someone let me know if I am on the right track.

I know that a pro greyscale calibration with equipment would hit it nuts on,
but part of my enjoyment of ownership for me is reading this forum and learning and applying knowledge.

Thanks

Out of the box so long ago my greyscale had a reddish cast in the lower ire #'s with the color control set to zero.

You should never set the Hitachi color control to zero when doing grayscale calibration (or even removing Pr/Pb cables). Unforntunately, changing the color control will affect the grayscale. This is common on many brands even though it shouldn't happen.

Out of the box so long ago my greyscale had a reddish cast in the lower ire #'s with the color control set to zero. I dialed it out by slightly reducing R-cut-h and R-cut-s. The red was gone but after a month or 2 I felt myblacks had a greenish cast to them, so I played with the G-cut-h and
G-cut-s., and slightly bumped up the R-cut-h and R-cut-s again. Now my
blacks are black.

Why are you adjusting High and Standard temp? You should only be adjusting the one you have your Advanced Menu set to.

Out of the box the #100 ire window had what I felt a blueish cast to it and every image that had a light reflection on it, like someones nose or
forehead looked very glared out. I dialed down the r-drv-h, r-drv-s,
g-drv-h and g-drv-s. Also dialed down the b-cut-h and b-cut-s. It seems to
have eliminated the crushing glare for the most part and eliminated the
blueish cast.


That is expected. Blue can cause a strain on the eye and creat an unusual look.

I'm thinking of again lowering the R and G drives slightly, and possiblythe B-cut slightly to keep the greyfields neutral shades of grey. I can definitely live with what it is now, and before I start playing around again I would like to have someone let me know if I am on the right track.


It sounds like you are on the right track. You just need to play with one color temp setting. In any case, the proper amount of blue is very difficult to detect by eye. You may be close, but you really need a color analyzer to dial it in.

Bill

Bill,

Let me make sure I understand this right..........

To get my set ready to eyeball the greyscale, I should leave my color setting to where it is nuts on using my avia color decoder check, and then
disconnect my component Pr/Pb cables from my dvd player.... and then
check the grey fields for neutral shades of grey and adjust accordingly.

If this is correct I will try it.


I have read that the High temp is the master for med and std. I have my
display set to Std . After eyeballing my greyscale, and then viewing movies
I fiddled with the High temp cuts and drives.


It seems to me that adjusting the high cuts and drives helped out with my
glare on faces problem. I feel that skin tones on my set look realistic enough now.

At first I only adjusted the std cuts and drives to get a neutral looking
greyscale, but I felt something was still needing to be done, after watching numerous movies.

Thats when I dialed the High cuts and drives only a number or two down. I

Unfortunately, there is nothing you can do with AVIA. Disconnecting the Pr/Pb signal is the same as setting color to zero. You need to have color in place when doing grayscale on the hitachi because of the contamination on grayscale. I recommend using DVE or VE for grayscale. Basically, I set color, do grayscale, and then set color again.

If you have your TV mode set to standard, you should calibrate standard CUTS and DRIVES. You are correct in that high is the master, but you don't want to screw up medium and high when you aren't even using them. It is wiser to just alter standard unless you are trying to calibrate more than one input type.

Bill

Listen to Bill- He knows:)

ok...i want to know the order in which you do these tweaks,as i have just ordered a template to do my dcam to fix geometry........but i want to do a elec/man focus, dcam,grayscale and color but what order for best picture?also i am using the dvi out(momitsu) and dve to do all adjustments anything i should know???

Elec/Man Focus
Convgergence/Geometry
Color Decoding
Grayscale
Touch-up Color Decoding (how much depends on how far grayscale was off)

DVI and component 480p use the "F" unless you force component 480p to use "G"

Bill

You forgot overscan reduction before convergence and geometry.

No I didn't. Overscan reduction is part of geometry on the Hitachi. Adjusting overscan without a geometry template is a mistake.

Bill

HI Bill,

Can you recomend me ISF technician in Dallas/Ftworth area.?

Hitachi 65T500

Just wondering if someone could post a picture of what exactly I need to adjust in manual focus on my 57s500. I can do electrostatic without a problem, and can access the color guns via the front (after reading all the great info here of course) but I am unsure how to actually adjust each of the guns. A picture would be great. Did search's out the yin yang here hoping to find one but never did.

Originally posted by 57s500rick
Just wondering if someone could post a picture of what exactly I need to adjust in manual focus on my 57s500. I can do electrostatic without a problem, and can access the color guns via the front (after reading all the great info here of course) but I am unsure how to actually adjust each of the guns. A picture would be great. Did search's out the yin yang here hoping to find one but never did.

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=364562

See the brass wingnuts on each gun? They're attached to a stud. You loosen the wingnut, then move the stud left/right to adjust focus. Pretty easy.

Matt

Cool, I will give it a shot tonight. Thanks for the photo.

I did the following to my Hitachi 46F500:

- Re-stack the glare screen
- Adjust the mechanical focus
- Adjust the electronic focus
- Adjust the convergence

The TV looks great without the glare. However, I may have introduced a problem during the adjustment process. Around 1/8 of screen at the left looks blueish, while 1/8 of screen at the right looks yellowish. The color is off the most at the edge of the screen. The middle 3/4 of the screen looks normal.

Any idea on what is wrong? Mechanical focus?

Thanks,

Try lens striping

does all this stuff work on the f510? im getting it soon and i'd like to know if i would be able to tweak it or not

Yes, most if not all applies to the F510 (the ISF menu suffixes should follow that of the S500). The only caveat is that the new remotes are different, so DCAM convergence requires the old remote or universal. Try here for more info - http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?postid=4314733#post4314733

2005 model DCAM INFO - http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=465457

A friend has an older version Hitachi 61sdx10b whose convergence problems are glaringly obvious on dvd + level content.

trying to get to the manual convergence but pressing magic focus a send time merely cancels the operation.

Has the standard f500 era remote, but cannot seem to get into the manual convergence. Spent the requisit hour + searching this forum, koeh and google in general btw.

Anyone still read this thread that can help?=)


Cheers!
-Liquidated