I noticed on the 68 series spec sheet (http://product.samsung.com/SamsungUSA/PRODUCT/20050707/DLP_68_series.pdf) on the bottom of page 4, the following:
3 Currently, HDMI, DVI and Component inputs can only accept up to 1080i signals. All 1080i signals are converted to 1080p. Off-air 1080p signals are displayed in their broadcast format. I know the VGA input accepts 1080p. But does this quote mean the RF input might also accept 1080p?

Mr. Wigggles,

I agree re: the screen material ... I *really* noticed the "sparklies" as you call them on the 42" 66 model. I'm hoping that jumping up to the 50" screen (and my subsequent further distance from the screen) will help me not notice them as much on the 5078 model.

Ah ... Finally two people to notice the graininess of the DLP rear projection screens. This sparkle or graininess is caused by the lenticular nature of the screen, which captures the light, makes it brighter and scatters it so that you can see the image from off center. I have noticed this graininess all along including the 2005 hl-r5087w pedestal model that is supposed to have the ultrafine pitch screen. The effect is most noticeable on bright colored scenes such as blue sky or white walls. To me, this is the only major drawback that I have with DLP. I find this sandlike effect so distracting. This is why I am still up in the air on whether to go with the hl-r5688w DLP pedestal, or the Samsung hp-r5072 plasma.

Are there folks out there who have found ways to reduce the appearance of graininess by lets say reducing brightness or contrast?

Painful can be such an understatement :D

LMAO ... :p

Painful can be such an understatement :D
Like anything taken to extremes, it can be terminal. :eek:

Wiggles, the diamonds get very hard to see against dark-colored backgrounds. I did see them on whites and -- especially -- in pans. The one bugaboo I see is that the diamonds are usually invisible and then they appear in situations like that. A different phenomenon to rainbow, but kin to it in a way. I would say that, yes, there might be a fraction of defocus in the system that I saw. Regardless, it is remarkable how against mid-tones you could not see the pixels at all. Just the hint of pixel centers or whatever the visible dots are that wobulations seems to provide. And I mean hint, because it's very faint, unlike DLP screen door.

You might well be right on DNIe or some other settings (or even the source) on the posterization. I know from experience that most decent DLPs can dial out a fair amount of it. Also, I don't really get why people would buy this thing at 50 inches in most cases -- especially if you can't input 1080p digitally which I'm not sure the status of -- and obviously the brightness will be lower in the larger sizes.

Clorox and UCSB, I think it's right to view the A- as a good grade. I'm not sure an A+ is out there because even the Qualia RPTV is a bit shy on contrast to gain an A+ on performance and on price it could easily be downgraded to a B-. The Samsung needs better pricing to get to A and needs to address those few performance issues to get to A+.

In the meantime, I'm not sure how one who likes DLP could go wrong with the set unless they have pixelekaphobia -- fear of production of more than one pixel from only one imaging element, except in the case of CRT where there is exactly one imagine element.

According to Samman's in Wayne, NJ, who spoke to the Samsung rep on 7/11, the 1080p sets are expected to arrive in NJ first week in August, approximately three weeks behind the West Coast.

great, thanks! Is Samman's taking pre-orders for the 1080p Sammy's ?

I know the 10,000:1 CR

Isn't the 5078 5,000:1? Or am I mixing my model stats???

Hi Mary ... the contrast ratio on the 5078 is described by Samsung as "up to 10,000:1". You can find a complete listing of the spec's in POST #1 of this thread (just click on first to go to first page). If you want to learn more about any spec there are also links to Samsung brochures, spec sheets, technical diagrams, owners manuals, and other resources.

...


In the meantime, I'm not sure how one who likes DLP could go wrong with the set unless they have pixelekaphobia -- fear of production of more than one pixel from only one imaging element, except in the case of CRT where there is exactly one imagine element.

Heh, that is an excellent point!!

The manual only lists the following resolutions as "supported" via the VGA connector:

640x350
720x400
640x480
800x600
1024x768
1280x1024
1920x1080

I find it interesting that 1280x720, 720x480 and 704x480 are not listed as valid resolutions.

John

Thats fine those listed, and 720p via the HDMI input, all that matters now is how does the down res look, and for that matter how does the full 1080p desktop look with wombling...

Can anyone with a HD3 set comment on how a 720p desktop looks compared to a hd2+ set?

great, thanks! Is Samman's taking pre-orders for the 1080p Sammy's ?

Yes, Sammans is taking pre-orders, but TV Authority in CA has better prices and hopefully will deliver it sooner. Other option is J&R in NYC, jr.com. Good prices and no sales taxes for us NJ folks. But we might have to wait longer.

Weird, I just went to confirm since I realized I had mistyped 5078 for (5678 – my intended model)
5678 being the model I’m waiting to spot consumer reviews for a possible purchase for my brother.

Specs At TVAuthority show the
5078 and 5678 both at 5000:1 contrast

with
5668 and 5688
up to 10,000.1 spec.

Samsung’s site however list all above models as
up to 10,000.1 spec.

I was trying to differentiate the pricing per specs between the 56” models, (other than stand/bezel differences)
Right now I’m only spotting the 5688 as lacking the PC input, as far as performance specs.

I would rather know the averaged contrast; as in RMS power or testing results, not at x watts @1kHz but rather x watts @20Hz-20kHz . I have to say I don’t like Samsung using the term “up to.” Most manuf P-releases are a tad loosey goosey for me. :D
Thanks USCB, for the reply!

.Also, I don't really get why people would buy this thing at 50 inches in most cases -- especially if you can't input 1080p digitally which I'm not sure the status of -- and obviously the brightness will be lower in the larger sizes.


Rogo, thanks for taking the time to share your thoughts.

Not sure if you *really* ;) want an answer on why some would by it at 50", but here's my rationale FWIW:

1) Cabinent constraints kept me to 46.5" in width, so I can't in the near future go for anything larger than an 50" set with speakers on the bottom (would prefer none at all).

2) I didn't notice the "sparklies" of the screen material nearly as much on any of the 5067's I looked at (in comparison to the 42" 66 model). I am hoping that even with the screen material masking some of the 1080p resolution some at this smaller size, I will still see an improvement over the 5067. (Interestingly, I just noticed on the xx67 spec sheet that the 42" model is the *only* one in the 2005 720p DLP lineup that doesn't have what they call their "HD Ultra Fine-Pitch Screen" ... when you'd think a size like that would need it most!).

3) I am hoping to see other picture improvements over the 5067 that might be due to the potentially higher contrast ratio.

4) Finally, I wanted the extra HDMI input the 78's offer.

Also, I don't really get why people would buy this thing at 50 inches in most cases -- especially if you can't input 1080p digitally which I'm not sure the status of -- and obviously the brightness will be lower in the larger sizes.


For me it is purely a size question.
If they had all the inputs in a 46 inch that I want (2 HDMI plus a PC connection (non shared) I would just as soon have a 46 inch set. It would have the most decorator acceptance factor. the 50 has all of the inputs (and the 1080p version has 2 hdmi) that I want so it is pretty compelling.

Pricing is an interesting issue as the prices on the 720P units at B&M around here (San Jose CA) get pretty tempting for a 720P unit (except for the HL-P4674 which is the last unit with all of the inputs I want) in terms of buy it, use it till the 1080P wars get sorted out then upgrade or move it to a different room.

Right now I’m only spotting the 5688 as lacking the PC input, as far as performance specs.

The 5688 has a PC input. The spec's in POST #1 are more accurate than any other source. Unfortunately, that includes the Samsung web site. :)

Calbert and Aka:

I'm not begrudging people buying it. And I'm with you on the better CR and extra HDMI -- those are worth money (and the worth depends on what one vaues).

And, yes, the further one sits from any size, the harder it is to benefit from extra resolution (I always tell people to look at 12-inch TVs in the store from about 7-10 feet away -- they look HD!).

But a 50-inch will typically require a viewer to be inside of 10 feet to benefit from the resolution (I think the actual number is even closer, but subysouth and mark_1080p aren't here to remind me what it is :)). In a small room, this is fine. In a larger room, it's just unlikely to happen. A lot of people won't buy bigger than 50 for that larger room anyway so they should just buy 720p and save the cash (in many cases, see my comments above).

The bigger the screen, the more likely someone will enjoy the extra pixels. A 50 is really the cusp of where it's even worth discussing them for video use in a room that might ever be used socially.

Some people, however, have cabinet or wall constraints and want the cutting edge and might sit on the floor to play Xbox while watching TV from the couch and want the latest and greatest and "all the pixels" and the new features -- and be willing to pay the price. Seems reasonable to me. Especially more so than the guy driving the Maybach I saw the other day. That made no sense. 20-30% more on a TV that will last 10 years at least I can comprehend. :D

I was trying to differentiate the pricing per specs between the 56” models, (other than stand/bezel differences)
Right now I’m only spotting the 5688 as lacking the PC input, as far as performance specs.

Mary, look again. The 5688 pedestal model clearly has a PC input. You can download the manual from Samsung's website and there are clear directions on how to hook up the computer using the VGA port.

The bigger the screen, the more likely someone will enjoy the extra pixels. A 50 is really the cusp of where it's even worth discussing them for video use in a room that might ever be used socially.

No begrudging perceived. ;) I agree that a 50 is borderline for any room intended for social uses. Our place is pretty small and not suited to huge SuperBowl parties and the like, so it will fit well I think. (Now setting up an awesome FP in the finished basement downstairs someday ... that's another story :D).

On another note, you made brief mention in your earlier post about the brightness of the screen reducing as the size increases. Just curious, what's the conventional wisdom on what that typically does to the image, other things being equal? I think I have an idea, but would rather here what someone who knows has to say about it.

Thanks!

Hi Mary ... the contrast ratio on the 5078 is described by Samsung as "up to 10,000:1". You can find a complete listing of the spec's in POST #1 of this thread (just click on first to go to first page). If you want to learn more about any spec there are also links to Samsung brochures, spec sheets, technical diagrams, owners manuals, and other resources.

However, I noticed that Magnolia specs attached to the HLR 5078 at Palo Alto had it at 5000:1.

Mary get some Bifocals!

Mary get some Bifocals!

...do those come with the site-to-site decoder ring?!!! :D :D

I will be getting one of the first 5668s from TVA...hopefully next week on the southeast coast. I am contemplating receivers and the routing. Should I press for an HDMI switching system? Will a component swithing receiver be OK? Should I send only audio to the AVR and bypass getting onscreen info from the receiver and run HDMI from my HD DVR? I am at a loss and need to think of cabling so I can make inputs back to you folks.

I will be hooking up a PS via component and will report back on that as well. Added the 950 for comparison also. Anything I am missing?

SCott

Yes, Sammans is taking pre-orders, but TV Authority in CA has better prices and hopefully will deliver it sooner. Other option is J&R in NYC, jr.com. Good prices and no sales taxes for us NJ folks. But we might have to wait longer.


Would you happen to know when they will aririve somewhere in Viriginia :D ??

Can anyone with a HD3 set comment on how a 720p desktop looks compared to a hd2+ set?
I get 1x1 bit mapping with the HLP5063 when I input 720p through DVI from my PC. There is about 1.5% overscan which is ok for the kind of desk top work that I do. Everything is sharp and readable from 10'.

For more configuration and test pattern information check here.

SethS Calibrated Our HLP5063 (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=548133)

I am told by TV Authority in CA that free shipping takes 5-7 business days to the East Coast. However, they have second day air for about $100 - $120.

Yes, the father back from a tv that you are,TVs with a lower pixel count will make up some of the disadvantage of those with a higher pixel count...If all things were equal. Things aren't equal though, and the 1080p models are putting smaller pixels into the same comparable area to achieve the higher pixel count. This is going to affect PQ no matter what distance you are from the TV...unless you are looking into your neighbors house from across the street.

My TV will be approximately 18 feet from my couch...I have a big room. However, my space is a little constrained and a 56, while it would fit, is not the best choice aesthetically. So I will be getting the 5078...plus if I switch my room around I will be sitting a mere 8 feet from the TV, so I didn'ty want anything too huge (well, I did, but the wife didn't). Anyway, while looking at the sets I looked at them from up to 20 feet away. While in Magnolia, I was able to see the 5078 and an HLP5674 and an HD2 model (not sure which one). At that distance, the difference in PQ was readily visible. I would equate the difference between the HD2+ and the 1080p to be about the same as the HD2 to HD2+. From 20 feet the sharpness and detail was not only evident to me, but to my wife as well, and she doesn't share the passion high quality TV that I do. It was enough for her to remark that it was a better picture.

So, if you are on the fence as to whether you think the 1080p is going to be an advantage or not from a greater distance...I would say that it is still going to be a better picture. Take a look at an HD2 versus an HD2+ from your seating distance. If you can tell a difference between the two, then you will be able to see a difference between the 1080 and the 720. Of course, this is also where things aren't equal. The color wheel, contrast ratio, tech advancements in the 1080 also figure in.

BTW....I am not prone to seeing rainbow effects, try as I might, but I didn't see any on the 1080 either. Nor was I able to lock on to seeing the pixels from close up, except in white parts of the picture, but even then it was hard.

As with everything, quality is subjective and in the eye of the beholder. Take a look for yourself before you reach any conclusions on which set to buy.

Just one man's opinion.

SHIPPING UPDATE - HLR6168

Just got my tracking number from TVA. It's on it way!!! :D :D :D

For those of you who think you have been waiting a looong time, I ordered my Sammy 1080P back on 12/13/2004. Can't wait for it to arrive next week.

SHIPPING UPDATE - HLR6168

Just got my tracking number from TVA. It's on it way!!! :D :D :D

For those of you who think you have been waiting a looong time, I ordered my Sammy 1080P back on 12/13/2004. Can't wait for it to arrive next week.

Oh yeah? Well I've been waiting for my 5078 since ... let me check ... last Friday. And the wait's KIIIIIILLLLLLIINNNNNNGGGG ME! :D :D :D

Looking forward to hearing your reports when you get yours!

Circuit City has the TR46X3 on sale. Web special only with store pickup. $190 plus tax.

http://www.circuitcity.com/ccd/Search.do?c=1&context=&keyword=TR46X3&searchSection=All&go.x=15&go.y=9

Any idea when the 7178's will be available?

I am told by TV Authority in CA that free shipping takes 5-7 business days to the East Coast. However, they have second day air for about $100 - $120.

When I went to the checkout, it listed 2 day shipping for $345. 3 day was $295. Where did you get the $100-$120 price from. If it is only $100 I would definitely upgrade to the faster shipping, but not for $$300.
How do I get this $100 -$120 price for 2 day shipping?

SHIPPING UPDATE - HLR6168

Just got my tracking number from TVA. It's on it way!!! :D :D :D

For those of you who think you have been waiting a looong time, I ordered my Sammy 1080P back on 12/13/2004. Can't wait for it to arrive next week.

I got mine as well for my 5668. Say's it will arrive on Florida coast on 7/22 (7 days) with a ship date of 7/15. Shipped by SEKO from North Highlands, CA. It has airport codes, so maybe part of the process is Donkey to the airport, flown to here and then transferred back to a different donkey and delivered to the house. Poor Donkey's! That is a heavy load with the DVD player!

Ok everyone, I need your opinion on what I should do this summer about getting an HDTV:

My tv room is a decent size where I have a sectional couch (L shaped) and the tv stand is facing the wedge part. From the ends of the couch, my tv is about 8 to 9 feet away and from the wedge your about 10 to 11 feet. (depends if you are leaning forward or with your head back). Unfortunately since I bought such a massive couch, this is the only furniture configuration that the room can handle without it looking weird. That is my setup and I have a nice 5.1 surround sound from Polk. My goal is to get an HDTV with a wide stand so that I can rest my two front speakers. So this factor limits me to a stand no wider than 58 or so inches, therefore I can only get an HDTV that is 46" or 50" wide. The Samsung is nice because of great reviews and the 50xx is only 46.5" wide and the 46xx is 42.5" wide. I have this narrowed down but now I need to decide if I want 720p or 1080p. Of course I haven't seen the 1080p and they are only shipping 56" or larger right now. I can wait longer for a DLP tv so its not a factor if sometime better is around the corner.

Can I get some opinions about what is right for me? Thanks everyone. If you need more info, please let me know.

Uh, NO, NO, and NO.

so maintainance on a DLP (bulb replacements during that 10 year period) would cost more than a plasma.

This would be offset by the fact that plasmas use more power.

Just received this EMail from Vanns where I pre-ordered a 6178.

Thank you for your recent pre-order from vanns for the Samsung
HLR-6178W, We have been notified by Samsung that they will not be
shipping
these TV's until mid August. I wanted to send you this email so you
know
that it will be close to the end of August before they are available to
ship
to you. Please let us know if you would like to keep this on an open
pre-order.

Sincerely,
Vanns

Does anyone know if TVAuthority has begun shipping the 6168 or 6178. I may have to switch stores. I do not care to wait until end of August.

Subwoofer:

A few pages back in this thread there are a few brief, first-hand impressions of the 1080p 5078 by rogo and brentley. Very promising reviews overall. Check out their comments, and the brief dialogue between them, MrWigggles, Aka and a few others.

In short, we all tend to agree that you'd get more out of a 1080p set at a larger size than 50". The smaller size combined with the relative coarseness of the screen itself will probably mask the improved resolution to a degree. Imagine that same screen material used on a 67" set -- the screen's texture will be smaller in relation to larger pixel sizes, reducing it's impact upon what you see.

But like Aka, brentley and myself, you can't go larger. So then it's down to how much improvement in PQ you'll see with the 5078 over, say, the 5067 at 8-11'. My particular, humble, first-hdtv-ever reasoning to try out the 5078:

a) I'm expecting to see some improvement in resolution/definition at the 50" size due to the 1080p chip, just not as much as I'd see with a larger set. The net effect at this size might be something between 720p and 1080p. Just a guess.

b) I'm expecting to see some improvement in dynamic range, both in color and in contrast, due to the higher contrast ratio. One of the others described the 5078's picture as having more "depth" than older Sammy models, but that wasn't a direct comparison to the 5067... I think the higher CR is greatly contributing to that sense, and I'm guessing its effects may be more dramatic and valuable to overall PQ than the improved resolution at this size. This expectation is actually the biggest reason I'm taking a chance on the 5078.

c) I wanted the extra HDMI input to make me an even happier camper.

There may be other benefits, and other drawbacks other than price, that I haven't realized -- but that's where I'm at. I like the 5067 picture a lot ... I just want to go for something a bit sharper and "deeper" in picture quality, even if at 50" I can't take full advantage of the capabilities of the 1080p chip.

Hope that helps some. Of course, we'll know more in about a week once some of these guys start receiving the first 68's.

:) With the 1080p sets in inventory at Magnolia HiFi and on the way to many people from TV Authority, I felt it was time to start a 1080p OWNER'S THREAD. CLICK HERE (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=559872) to go to the new 1080p thread. New owners please take the time to post your detailed observations. Prospective owners feel free to ask any open questions that you still have about the sets. This is going to be fun!!! :)

Hello everyone -
I'm new to this board and extremely inpressed with the courtesy and knowledge of the members. I have exhaustively researched buying a widescreen over the month or so and "HAD" finally decided on the Samsung HLR 5067. (I sit about 9.5' 56 would be too big).
I am just returning back from BB and CC. Here is what i noticed (Its just me, i am no technical like some of you guys)
1. The HLR5067, HLR5667 and HLR5087 were next to each other. The HLR5087 (the pedestal model) was the best set, the PQ was amazing. The 5067 and 5667 were no where near that. (I even tried adjusting the contrast, color, brightness to the levels that some here had mentioned here). But the 5087 was amazing. I know it uses a HD2+.

2. The Mits WD52525 was the next best (this is saw in BB, CC does not carry mits). Although the mits did not match up to 5087 but definitely it was much much better than the 5067 and 5667. I dont know what chip this uses. The mits web site does not give this info.

3. I did not notice any rainbow or black spot on any sets. The HLR5087 was much better than some of the LCD sets in the store.

4. The LG DLP model and Hitachi ultravision LCD model was also good, but not quite near to Mits and 5087.

I have read in this post that deciding between Mits and Sammy is just about personal preference - so i went to check out with my naked eyes and this is what i saw.

Am i missing anything here. Also why is Mits52525 expensive than the Mits52725? (This may be Mits thread question but you guys can throw some input).
Now i am back into thread Again researching!! I thought i will have a 5067 by end of today. :(

:) With the 1080p sets in inventory at Magnolia HiFi and on the way to many people from TV Authority, I felt it was time to start a 1080p OWNER'S THREAD. CLICK HERE (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=559872) to go to the new 1080p thread. New owners please take the time to post your detailed observations. Prospective owners feel free to ask any open questions that you still have about the sets. This is going to be fun!!! :)

Excellent. Thanks Bill!

(I sit about 9.5' 56 would be too big).


Some would argue that 56" is better than 50" at that distance. :D YMMV. For me, jumping from a 27" CRT to a 50" is going to be a bit of a shock, so it's plenty enough for me (I sit at 8-11'). Sorry, can't help on the Mits question ...

Just so all you crazy cats know, Vanns has TWO 5078 sets left (I bought one yesterday). Let the race begin for those who want one of them . . .

I also agree that a 50" (or even 56") is borderline for any room intended for social uses. Although we have a large house (with a large finished basement that would make a great media room someday when we can justify the expense) our HDTV is in our family room which is a bit small and not suited to SuperBowl parties and other social events, plus we don't want the TV to dominate the room (its just a TV), so a 50" set fits well for us we think.

I have a somewhat different perspective... Our family room isn't very large either (about 16'x18') but we really enjoy TV - movies, sports and some evening network shows - I'm getting the 6168 (recently upgraded in the powerbuy from the 5668) and I know it will dominate the room... but I don't care. I want it close by and convenient. If I'm going to spend $4K on a television set, I don't want to tuck it away downstairs in a "media room." I actually think it's quite a fine looking piece of equipment and on the rare occasions when we're sitting in the family room and don't want this awesomely super-cool HDTV in our faces - I'll turn it off. Just my 2 cents... Bill

for the people with PC's connected to their sets.. i had my pc connected to my sammy r4667 on the pc input at 1280x720. the set automatically picked it up and showed the input as PC PC. the image had small black bars around it but i adjusted that with the picture size button and the arrow buttons to more or less take up the full screen. today i recieved my DVI to HDMI cable in the mail and replaced the PC VGA cable with the DVI-HDMI cable and switched my input to HDMI. the picture showed up but for some reason its too big and i'm not seeing any of the edges of the screen, like having a picture in a frame that is too small for it. i tried naming the HDMI input as PC but i can't adjust the screen like i could with the PC input. the computer is outputing at 1280x720 but i just can't make it shrink to fit the screen.. has anyone had this problem yet?

Matt

Go over to the HTPC forum for your answer - what you are describing is called Overscan.

yeah i just checked it out overthere.. it seems that the only solution is to create a custom resolution that will fit the screen. not the answer i was looking for but i guess there's no choise

Matt

Well, actually there might be another answer, but it could void your waranty(?) - some talk about making changes in the service menu. I know nothing about this, so it might mean some more searching.

for the people with PC's connected to their sets.. i had my pc connected to my sammy r4667 on the pc input at 1280x720. the set automatically picked it up and showed the input as PC PC. the image had small black bars around it but i adjusted that with the picture size button and the arrow buttons to more or less take up the full screen. today i recieved my DVI to HDMI cable in the mail and replaced the PC VGA cable with the DVI-HDMI cable and switched my input to HDMI. the picture showed up but for some reason its too big and i'm not seeing any of the edges of the screen, like having a picture in a frame that is too small for it. i tried naming the HDMI input as PC but i can't adjust the screen like i could with the PC input. the computer is outputing at 1280x720 but i just can't make it shrink to fit the screen.. has anyone had this problem yet?

Matt


The HLN models had a Wide (PC) mode as well as a Wide (TV) mode; when in Wide (TV) and feeding it a signal via DVI from the PC, there would be overscan. If you switch to Wide (PC) then there is underscan. I would usually leave it on Wide (PC) and accept the slight underscan; for some movie viewing I would switch to Wide (TV) and accept the slightoverscan...I never really monkeyed around with Powerstrip but maybe that could help.

When I went to the checkout, it listed 2 day shipping for $345. 3 day was $295. Where did you get the $100-$120 price from. If it is only $100 I would definitely upgrade to the faster shipping, but not for $$300.
How do I get this $100 -$120 price for 2 day shipping?
Speak to Chambren, Ext 520

Since a lot of this page is discussing screen size and seating distances, I have a question or two.

My current set up is Directv with a 10 year old 32" CRT at ~9 feet with two stereo speakers (from the 70's). So you can see HDTV is a big leap for me. My main concern regarding screen size is wanting SD channels to look *acceptable*. I know that's very subjective. But I would like to get at least what I am getting now with the 32" because most of the content is still SD. That is why I am thinking of either the 50" or 56".

My seating distance is flexible from 6 to 12 feet. At the local BB, I viewed the only HDTV they had hooked up to Directv. It was a Sony 50" LCD. I scrolled through most of the SD channels. The only drawback I saw besides looking a little grainy was extra vertical lines. All the SD channels were 16:9 so I asked 5 different *salesmen* over the course of two days if they could make the SD channels 4:3. They said, "Sure." None of them could! I think when viewing SD on Directv in the 4:3 format with a 50" or 56" 1080p HDTV at ~ 10feet it will look ok. I just haven't been able to confirm it.

Any opinions? Oops, probably the wrong thing to ask. :)

I would love to go 60" or larger if all I watched were DVDs and HD material. Oh BTW, I am not only upgrading just the 32" CRT, but the other components as well. I have the new speakers and sub as well as the DVD player. So all I need is the receiver and the right size 1080p HDTV!

I have a somewhat different perspective... Our family room isn't very large either (about 16'x18') but we really enjoy TV - movies, sports and some evening network shows - I'm getting the 6168 (recently upgraded in the powerbuy from the 5668) and I know it will dominate the room... but I don't care. I want it close by and convenient. If I'm going to spend $4K on a television set, I don't want to tuck it away downstairs in a "media room." I actually think it's quite a fine looking piece of equipment and on the rare occasions when we're sitting in the family room and don't want this awesomely super-cool HDTV in our faces - I'll turn it off. Just my 2 cents... Bill

I agree 100%. There's a serious WAF issue with large TV's. "It's intimidating", "too big", "imposing". The real words they should be using are "manly", "masculine", and "imposing".

I never understood why it was acceptable to have 100" front projection screen in your house but a slim 70" RP is too big.

Anyway, if they don't like the size, they know where they can watch the 27" - the media room.

-Mr. Wigggles

2. The Mits WD52525 was the next best (this is saw in BB, CC does not carry mits). Although the mits did not match up to 5087 but definitely it was much much better than the 5067 and 5667. I dont know what chip this uses. The mits web site does not give this info.

Am i missing anything here. Also why is Mits52525 expensive than the Mits52725? (This may be Mits thread question but you guys can throw some input).
Now i am back into thread Again researching!! I thought i will have a 5067 by end of today. :(

The 52525 and 52725 both use the HD2+ DLP chip.

The 725 should be more expensive than the 525. They are identical TVs other than the fact that the 725 has an anti reflective coating on the screen, and it has a black grille.

The HLN models had a Wide (PC) mode as well as a Wide (TV) mode; when in Wide (TV) and feeding it a signal via DVI from the PC, there would be overscan. If you switch to Wide (PC) then there is underscan. I would usually leave it on Wide (PC) and accept the slight underscan; for some movie viewing I would switch to Wide (TV) and accept the slightoverscan...I never really monkeyed around with Powerstrip but maybe that could help.

the HLR's only have wide tv and wide pc on the vga input.. you cannot adjust the hdmi input unfortunatly

Speak to Chambren, Ext 520

When i call next week or if TVA calls me 1st to confirm my 5688 order, I'll mention this shipping rate & mention this Chambryn person @ ext:520.

Okay, first post, here we go...
so the amount of information, in this thread and others, is staggering. Amazingly helpful. Just thought I'd seek out a couple pieces of advice:

1) With all the recent posts about screen size versus viewing distance, I feel the paranoia setting in that perhaps I am trying to go too large. I was looking forward to the new 50" Samsung DLP, but I'd be watching it at around 7 feet; considerably closer than what most of you are mentioning. I've done some basic measuring/watching of the older Samsung's in Best Buy, but am I asking for trouble/headaches in the long term?

2) I'm desperately trying to find a TV stand that isn't too wide (46-50"; just big enough for the 50" Sammy) but can also hold, among other equipment, my HK 635, which is pretty high and deep. Most every stand I find is either too wide or doesn't have appropriate shelf space.

and finally

3) I live in NYC, and when I go to the Samsung store, their DLP's look like heaven. Then I go to Best Buy, and they look, for the most part, kinda lame. Is it wrong to assume/hope that if I buy this tv, I'll be receiving the better of these two worlds, or is there all sorts of crazy mojo going on at the Samsung stores that make it look so much better?

Any input would be GREATLY appreciated. Again, you people rock.

7 feet is pretty close and beyond just the pixel issue you could very well suffer some eye strain from the eye movement that will be necessary. This is no big deal over short periods but over longer viewing sessions and during non-cinematic television it can be very straining and annoying.

With a 1080p HLR 78 series you likely will not see any pixels at seven feet, but you probably will with a 720p set. So the picture will probably look great on a 1080p if you can handle always scanning the screen with your eyes. There are many other issues that are much more subjective such as the brightness and motion issues from being so close, but those are very personal. It may sound looney but you may want to think about going to the store and sitting there watching the TV you want from 7 feet for an hour or so...then see how you feel and remember you will be watching from that distance for 4 hours or more on a regular basis.

As far as Best Buy v. the Samsung store goes it is widely recognized that Best Buy usually does nothing to enhance the picture that their TVs show on the floor...for example they do not adjust the contrast, color, or brightness settings and they do not use the best inputs (commonly its a shared feed over composite cables). It is also very possible that someone before you messed with the floor models settings and did not do so properly. i don't know but it seems more likely that Samsung would properly adjust and feed their sets, but I really doubt they do any expensive calibrations that you could not and would not do yourself. I would ask them though flat out why their sets look better there than at Best Buy...10 bucks says that they tell you something like what I just typed above.

I agree 100%. There's a serious WAF issue with large TV's. "It's intimidating", "too big", "imposing". The real words they should be using are "manly", "masculine", and "imposing".

Hehe, I will probably adopt wmwrose's position next time around. I didn't quite manage the WAF issue as well as I would have liked (she sees through my tactics quite well, and we joke about it all the time ;)), but we do love the width-constraining furniture we've bought quite a bit, so we'll be quite happy for now.

:) Baby steps for me ...

ps ... is there a "Managing the WAF" thread anywhere?

... as I posted a few pages ago (but did not get any response to) I would be concerned that the opposite is true. That is, the blacker blacks and increased brightness due to the increased CR could actually result in more rainbows in those typical rainbow invoking scenes (bright objects on dark backgrounds).

Interesting question. My best guess is that a higher CR wouldn't affect the frequency of RBE occurance, but instead it may very well increase the intensity of the effect.

I think this simply because contrast has never really been cited as a cause of the effect AFAIK. High-contrast, dark scenes may expose it for some people, as you say, but the cause is typically ascribed to eye movement: Since the color wheel is actually displaying colors in sequence (as opposed to the simultaneous color display of a 3-chip arrangement), rapid eye movement sometimes results in your brain registering of only some of those colors if you were looking at a position on the screen for a time shorter than the color wheel can deal out all three hues.

Contrast doesn't seem to be a part of that cause, so we shouldn't see any increase or decrease in RBE. I'd expect a faster color wheel (10,800 RPM, same as xx67 series) to have a positive affect, of course.

If I've got it wrong, I'm sure someone will correct me. I'm by no means an expert, but I did sleep over at the AVS Forum last night. :)

Well high contrast, dark scenes produce rainbows for me and are dependent on contrast settings. On my Samsung DLP, if I crank the contrast setting way up (> 80) I see rainbows much more frequently and more easily (minimal eye movement in high contrast scenes) than at my normal setting (70-72) where I see them occassionally. If I reduce contrast well below normal (<60) the rainbows go away completely. Changing Gamma from default (4) to 0 also reduces rainbows, presumably because it has a similar effect as reducing contrast.
Fwiw, before I found this forum late last year and became enlightened about best settings for my Samsung DLP I had it set to Contrast = 60 and Brightness = 60 for two years since I bought it in November 2002 and had never, ever seen rainbows on it.
My old DLP has a lower CR (it is an HD2) than the HLP 63 (HD3) or HLR 67 (HD4) which also cause rainbows for me with contrast setting up high.

Wow, thanks for the info, that's good to know. Theory doesn't always coexist nicely with reality, does it? ;) Guess I was thinking that contrast only dialed the effect forward or back, sort of like volume -- that the effect is there at low contrast, too, just not as noticeable. I haven't been one of the lucky ones to see rainbows yet at the stores, but that's a far cry from my living room. I'll definitely play with the settings to see if contrast affects it for me.

EDIT: To clarify my second sentence, I don't mean to imply that contrast has no effect on one's likelihood of seeing RBE ... only that maybe it's a constant effect, and that contrast might only affect your ability to see it ... I guess in the end it's all to the same net effect, eh?

SECOND EDIT: I'm getting tired I guess. My clarification made no sense! Corrected as best I could, going to bed now ...

This would be offset by the fact that plasmas use more power.

Not much.

Plasmas are rated for peak power use and recent testing by forum members shows how rarely they use peak power. DLP always uses the same amount of power as the lamp is always fully on.

I'd bet that a 50-inch DLP and a 50-inch plasma use a very similar amount of power.

"On another note, you made brief mention in your earlier post about the brightness of the screen reducing as the size increases. Just curious, what's the conventional wisdom on what that typically does to the image, other things being equal? I think I have an idea, but would rather here what someone who knows has to say about it.'

I'd say that a lower average brightness is generally good for masking artifacts and is, in fact, recommended by SMPTE and the "powers that be." A lot of us, however, like a super-bright image that the experts would scoff at.

Oh, and though it wasn't you who implied this I want to make clear: No one can see the resolution difference between a 720p and a 1080p set of 50 inches from a viewing distance of 20 feet. No one on earth. There might be other reasons why the higher-res set looks better -- including different setup, different quality of the wires feeding the set, and better performance on other metrics like CR -- but the visual acuity required to spot the extra pixels on a 4-foot wide screen from 5x that distance is not possessed by humans.

Am I making sense?

Yep, all of your points make sense. :) I'll be very interested to experiment with the settings. I'm hoping that the higher CR will give us more flexibility in adjusting those settings to our liking!

So I obviously haven't gone to bed yet, and now I've gone cross-eyed. That's what I get for being obsessed about such things ...

You are undoubtedly right about not being able to see the resolution difference between a 720p and a 1080p set of 50 inches from a viewing distance of 20 feet and I doubt that anyone would claim to be able to see the extra pixels but at closer distances (say 10-12') surely there must be an overall improvement in PQ due to the increased resolution just as it is possible to see a better PQ at 10-12' from 720 versus 480? If not, then you could also argue that it is pointless having a 1080p set with a larger screen size (such as 56" or 61") at > 12-15' away. IOW, why pick on 50" sets as being unsuitable for 1080p? Or, am I missing the point?

As you can see on the page before this one, I can't decide if I want a 50 or 46 inch DLP. My viewing distance is 8-11 feet and I don't want to overkill it. Plus will I notice a big improvement with a 1080 vs 720.

Boring, too many brainacs showing off here!

My brain hurts from trying to read all this mumo jumbo talk.

I have simulated (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=5591488&&#post5591488) the differences and xHD4 with a pinch of sharpening actually looks more promissing than true 1080p.

But alas not even some of the manufacturer's engineers I know are NOT taking the chip seriously eventhough TI has said it will work in FP. So the FP guys are waiting on true 1920 X 1080 chips which should be available in displays for purchase sometime early next year like Rob stated. (Oh, and when they come they will likely be $10K+)

-Mr. Wigggles
Your false promotion is too much. I and many other engineers (even including TI's own) disagree with you totally.

The fact is over-lapping of pixels degrades picture quality. Any fool can reason that. There is no better picture quality than a panel with 100% fill factor and one discrete display pixel for each input pixel.

Here is evidence of this simple truth: The following is from a new Sharp DLP HD4 review authored by Gary Merson of AV Guide:

"The Sharp uses Texas Instrument's latest HD4 DLP chip, which has a matrix of 640 x 720 and uses
TI's "Smooth Picture" pixel-shifting technique to place 1280 x 720 resolution on the screen.
I began my viewing tests by setting the user controls
(BRIGHTNESS, COLOR, TINT, etc.) to the industry SMPTE standard.
None of the factory presets were close to correct, but this was not unusual.
My initial observations: The black levels were excellent, making this TV
suitable for rooms with low ambient light levels. Turning off the
room lights while viewing HBO's Six Feet Under revealed film-like
blacks in dark scenes. My measurements confirmed the Sharp's exceptional
brightness with a maximum of 67 ft lamberts (100 IRE) after the contrast
control was properly adjusted. Performance Testing In an early scene in Sideways [Fox],
when Miles (Paul Giametti) arrives in Los Angeles, we see above his Saab
convertible a deep blue sky. Using my DVD player's 480i component video
output, I observed some false contouring, which broke the clear, smooth,
azure expanse into separate pieces, each with different amounts of brightness.
Not good. After switching to a DVD player with upconverting DVI outputs
the degree of false contouring was reduced, but not eliminated. The
Sharp offers five color temperature settings, with the LOW setting most
closely approaching the ideal D6500, and producing colors of black and gray
that were quite neutral out of the box.

The set was able to pass a "one pixel on/one pixel off" test (vertical rows)
using a native 720p RGB test signal, fed through the PC input, though the
pattern was more gray/white than black/white, indicating that the bandwidth
was not as wide as it should have been. Even more interesting was the
crosshatch test, which has a white one-pixel dot in the middle of each
square—or at least that is how it should appear. The latest TI DLP chips
(720 and 1080) display square pixels turned 45° from vertical, so the
"square" dots appear as single diamonds, but these are still
basically the same single-pixel dots. However, when I would
input any type of signal other than 720p RGB (480i, 1080i
component, etc.) many of the single diamonds would turn into
twins, with side-by-side, overlapping pairs of diamonds showing
in most parts of the screen. Over-and-under pairs appeared
in some cases, and in still other areas, an "X"-shaped grouping
of diamonds. I speculate this phenomenon is a scaling artifact
and contributes to an apparent lack of image sharpness on all
signals (other than 720p RGB signals, which bypass the
scaler). For example, on HD Net's Designing America, which
is a pristine HD program videotaped in 1080i, the Sharp—
unlike other similarly-sized HD displays I have tested—lacked
sufficient detail to reveal individual hair strands of reporter Kim
Schlegal or hostess Jocelyn White."


I rest my case except for just one question that still goes unanswered:
What is the fill factor of these new wobuulated DLP chips?:)

Have a nice day!

Reincarnate,

Mr. Merson's complaints about the Sharp set seem to be related to the set having a lame scaler and not due to wobulation. You highlighted a long section near the end talking about single diamonds turning into twins but the whole section was bracketed with the cavet of "any type of signal other than 720p" and "other than 720p RGB signals, which bypass the scaler." His complaint about not being able to see individual hair strands was on a 1080i signal which had to be scaled as well.

- Anthony

Oh boy, here we go again. ;)

Reincarnate: Engineer or no (a title which doesn't blindly grant anyone with the lion's share of the wisdom on this forum), your apparent lack of mutual respect for those who don't share your point of view greatly hampers your ability to effectively debate your position.

Perhaps there are those who would take offense at your comments on their own merits. However, I have no problem with you sharing your opinion. That's what the forums are for, right? I enjoy the debates about subjects like this; I learn quite a bit from them.

But a modicum of civility on your part would be appreciated. Calling many of us "fools" for accepting that which you do not is not constructive, nor is it welcome. And it certainly doesn't make it any easier for you to convert some of us to your point of view -- which then begs the question of the purpose of your post in the first place.

I need some expert advice on having a receiver with multiple HDMI inputs. If each input on the TV can be calibrated to its unique source, wouldn’t passing multiple video signals through a receiver to a single TV input defeat this benefit? This would also apply to component inputs.

I need some expert advice on having a receiver with multiple HDMI inputs. If each input on the TV can be calibrated to its unique source, wouldn’t passing multiple video signals through a receiver to a single TV input defeat this benefit? This would also apply to component inputs.

Each input on a Samsung set can have it's own settings. If you directly route your sources to the TV's individual inputs you can have a custom setting for each source. If you do all your switching in your receiver and you want the same level of setup, you would need to do your adjustments on the source piece of equipment. Some components offer this type of feature, but not all.

Based on calberts comments I may regret getting involved in this but here goes anyway. :)
The fact is over-lapping of pixels degrades picture quality. Any fool can reason that. There is no better picture quality than a panel with 100% fill factor and one discrete display pixel for each input pixel.This statement is demonstrably false (eg: compare these pictures (http://mysite.verizon.net/kiwishred/HTS/composite_100percent.gif) taken from this thread (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=5304769&&#post5304769)) and reveals a fundamental misunderstanding of the basics of sampled data systems. The real world is not made up of little squares !

In the theoretical limit, there is better picture quality than "a panel with 100% fill factor". It would come from a panel made up of 2D Sinc functions. And, these would overlap. Unfortunately, such a panel cannot be built and we have to accept a compromise solution.

Standard panels are one such compromise. Wobulated panels are a different, and arguably better compromise (especially for the practical case of fill factors less than 100%). Specifically, one gives up a little detail resolution for a lot of artifact reduction (ie: reduction of pixelation & screen door).

I would argue that the brilliance of the wobulation approach is that it actually allows a physical realisation of overlapped pixels. The theory is sound and well understood (at least by those with the pre-requisite technical proficiencies). Whether it translates into real-world image quality improvements will depend both on how well it is executed (wobulation speed and precision) and the human visual response. The former is quite predictable, the latter is not.

Brent

UCSB,
Thank you for the reply. I am not planning to use external switching myself because my STB does not have any video adjustment capabilities. I posted the question more to have someone with more experience than myself comment on the tradeoffs of external switching for those that are considering it.
donb1948 also commented on this in the Samsung 1080p owners thread.

Whether it translates into real-world image quality improvements will depend both on how well it is executed (wobulation speed and precision) and the human visual response. The former is quite predictable, the latter is not. But, without which, we would not have the joy of these forums.

Nice post Brent.

I'm trying to find out how to start a new thread. :( Can someone point me in the right direction? Thanks

It seems like I figured out how to ask a question in this thread so here goes.
I am a new owner of an HL R5667W. I am using a DCT 6200 Motorola STB on the Patriot Media cable system (New Jersey and Northeast). So far, I am impressed with the PQ of the analog, digital and HD programs.
Here are the questions that I could use help with.

1. Is there anyway to use PIP without hooking up a VCR? I was thinking of running a splitter, sending one signal thru the DCT 6200 hooked up to the Antenna (Cable) input and the other hooked up to the Antenna (air) input. I think I can then select this input and memorize the channels (of course, not the HBO type). Could I then use the PIP function, so that I can watch two channels at the same time?

2. I am in the market for a Combo recorder (DVD/VHS)..... My wife needs something simple. Simple would mean to me buying a Samsumg unit and using ANyNet. However, the little info I have been able to find on various sites indicate that the tuners in the Samsung DVD/VCRs only go up to channel 125. Most of the HD channels and things I watch are in the 150-175 range. Some searching indicates that JVC combo units have a tuner that goes to 181. Are there others that go to 181? So, overall, am I better going for something like the JVC unit and sacrificing commonality and AnyNet?

Sorry for the "newbie" questions, but I am merely ok with AV stuff and this froum seems to be a good place to get answers I can understand

There is a similar discussion regarding the technical merits of wobulated DLP chips here: HD4 - Wobulated or not ? (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=559600&page=1&pp=30). It may make more sense to keep the discussion all in one place. :D

kiwishred, thanks for jumping in. Your and MrWiggles knowledge of this subject far outstripps mine.

Hi....been reading this forum for a couple of months now...very informative. I have a 5668 on order without ever having seen the actual picture. I hope to see one before I take delivery on mine (Long Island, NY). I'm a little worried about how sports broadcasts will look.

Has anyone seen "motion" on the 1080p's at any of the shows? If so what did you think? My thanks to you all for this very informative forum.

Also everyone seems to be focused on the 1080P resoluton, what about better contrast ratio & other improvements not found in the 720p sets? Wouldn't these other differences be another reason to go with the 1080p sets?

don, rob, & schaffer970 -

Thanks for the comments. I tried to be moderate in my response. I must admit I am kind of hoping, just for the sheer entertainment value, that MrWigggles shows no such restraint to such a blantant and ill-informed provocation.

schaffer970, while we are forming a mutual admiration society, I have a lot of respect for your helpful and even-handed contributions to these and the FP forum threads and, in particular, your nack for coming up with so many obscure but germaine references.

I have pretty much said all I wanted to say and did not intend to hijack this thread.

Brent

I just got back from Tweeter and looking at the 6178 1080P set. I looked at the Qualia 006 and some 720P sets also. Basically everything I saw on all their TVs looked pretty bad. The feed from DirecTv just didn't look very good. I was standing 3 feet away from a 67 series as well as the 78 series set and I couldn't see a difference. So it was pretty much a waste of time. Even the Qualia looked lousy. When I saw the Qualia at Myer Emco, it looked fantastic, a 3D look. But they had a feed from Comcast. But it also looked better from DVD at Myer Emco. At tweeter the DVD and HD pics didn't look very good. So it was pretty much a waste of time for me. I need to get a clean signal to really evaluate the picture. I did notice the 42" set and the terrible screen it has. That did stand out as the worst picture because of the screen it has. I also found out that I like the wobulated picture better. I needed to get much closer to see the diamonds on the wobulated sets than on the non wobulated. I could see the squares on the non wobulated from several feet away on all the DLP sets, Mitsubishi and Samsung. I don't see it until a couple of feet on the wobulated sets with the 1080P set having to be even closer to see the Diamond pattern. I am still going to be anxiously awaiting my 6168 set in a few weeks from the Powerbuy. I'm sure once I have a good signal and adjust the settings on the set the picture will be fantastic.

Sorry guys, did not mean to sound so hostile in my last post earlier today. I really enjoy the time I spend on this forum learning and sharing with everyone ... experts and newbies alike. I should have just left it alone.

Have a great rest of the weekend everyone :)

Sorry guys, did not mean to sound so hostile in my last post earlier today... Hostile? Your response, of course, without the reference to Reincarnate, should be added to Mr Bott's post on special rules for the area. It clearly and succinctly expresses the downsides of "flaming." Please excuse my presumptiveness to edit your comments...
On posting:

Any apparent lack of mutual respect for those who don't share your point of view greatly hampers your ability to effectively debate your position.

There will those who will take offense at your comments on their own merits. However, you are nevertheless encouraged to share your opinion. That's what the forums are for, right? Enjoy the debates; Learn from them.

But a modicum of civility would be appreciated. Calling fellow posters "fools" for accepting that which you do not is not constructive, nor is it welcomed. And it certainly doesn't make it any easier for you to convert others to your point of view -- which then begs the question of the purpose of your post in the first place.

Sorry guys, did not mean to sound so hostile in my last post earlier today. I really enjoy the time I spend on this forum learning and sharing with everyone ... experts and newbies alike. I should have just left it alone.
I didn't think you sounded hostile at all.

Your tone was exactly what I would have attempted.

I think donb1948 did a good thing when he reposted your message.

:)

Based on calberts comments I may regret getting involved in this but here goes anyway. :)
This statement is demonstrably false (eg: compare these pictures (http://mysite.verizon.net/kiwishred/HTS/composite_100percent.gif) taken from this thread (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=5304769&&#post5304769)) and reveals a fundamental misunderstanding of the basics of sampled data systems. The real world is not made up of little squares !

In the theoretical limit, there is better picture quality than "a panel with 100% fill factor". It would come from a panel made up of 2D Sinc functions. And, these would overlap. Unfortunately, such a panel cannot be built and we have to accept a compromise solution.

Standard panels are one such compromise. Wobulated panels are a different, and arguably better compromise (especially for the practical case of fill factors less than 100%). Specifically, one gives up a little detail resolution for a lot of artifact reduction (ie: reduction of pixelation & screen door).

I would argue that the brilliance of the wobulation approach is that it actually allows a physical realisation of overlapped pixels. The theory is sound and well understood (at least by those with the pre-requisite technical proficiencies). Whether it translates into real-world image quality improvements will depend both on how well it is executed (wobulation speed and precision) and the human visual response. The former is quite predictable, the latter is not.

Brent
Correct just as Mr. Wiggles states! I, TI's own engineers and many others disagree with this point of view. Yes, there are several technologies which could product better pictures than what we have now. Sony for example, has purchased the patents and IP to bury the technologies. Nothing new here, but lets stay on track to the products being sold (almost) today.

So wobulated technology, all you need is a little sharpening to compensate?

I've simulated the effect by mis-focusing a front projectors lense. Here we have infinite wobulating cycling.

Following this logic, digital camera's would work better if their pixels overlapped and misfocused slightly. Eye doctors should misfocus eye charts and their prescriptions too.

Maybe DLP users should put on 3-D glasses for the best picture quality? Why are there no front projector with this new and exciting technology? (Hint: the front projectors designers state the quality is "not good enough". What do they know.:)

Why the total DLP blackout on technical information? Instead consumers get told misleading claims of "1080p".

As Mr. Wiggles stated, TI expected to release the real 1080p chips next year. This is good news. Now the only question is what will it cost for projectors which include the real McCoy DLP chips? Based upon past performance I'd say a cool $30K.

Lastly: Even TI's presented conference papers admit that their wobulated 1080p chips are not as good as a DLP which has 1920*1080 discrete micro-mirrors. For one of the AVS forum "experts" to state that all you need to do to compensate for is to "turn up the sharpness is just plain silly. (The wobulated pixels being twice the size is the real issue).
The inability to discriminate fine detail is all to easy to predict. Read the professional review in AV guide above for starters. This HD4 chip unit could not even show a reporters hair on HDNET? Kind of sad in that the technology take the thrill out of watching HD signals.
Surely, more to come I'm sure on this subject of High (and not so high) Definition!

Lastly: Even TI's presented conference papers admit that their wobulated 1080p chips are not as good as a DLP which has 1920*1080 discrete micro-mirrors. For one of the AVS forum "experts" to state that all you need to do to compensate for is to "turn up the sharpness is just plain silly. (The wobulated pixels being twice the size is the real issue).

Reincarnate,

Check out the following *TI* document, SmoothPicture.pdf, found at the following
post: http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=5891147&&#post5891147

Looks like the TI documents you have been reading may conflict with the above.

TI is the leader in Digital Signal Processing and this is their core compentency
from which they leveraged when they entered the DLP consumer market space.
It may appear to be "black magic" to the untechnical savy but it is backed up
by complex mathematics.

If you find this thread boring then feel free to go elsewhere. I've yet to see you add anything of any value to this (or any other) thread. Apparently all you can manage are repetitive childish rants about not having received your TV yet and various other ramblings that have little to do with the subject matter being discussed!

Yea I do, can you please pipe down with this mumbo jumbo? thanks.

Maybe you need to borrow the Bifocals from Mary, b/c obviously you haven't seen my other threads & posts.

Aka Thank you sir may I have another one!

Reincarnate,

Check out the following *TI* document, SmoothPicture.pdf, found at the following
post: http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=5891147&&#post5891147

Looks like the TI documents you have been reading may conflict with the above.

TI is the leader in Digital Signal Processing and this is their core compentency
from which they leveraged when they entered the DLP consumer market space.
It may appear to be "black magic" to the untechnical savy but it is backed up
by complex mathematics.
Thank you. However please be precise and state the wobulated technology actually was developed by HP (from the "untechnical savy").

P.S. I love TI's digital audio quality. It sounds fantastic. I'm glad TI purchased this technology too.

Let our eyes be the judge...

You are undoubtedly right about not being able to see the resolution difference between a 720p and a 1080p set of 50 inches from a viewing distance of 20 feet and I doubt that anyone would claim to be able to see the extra pixels but at closer distances (say 10-12') surely there must be an overall improvement in PQ due to the increased resolution just as it is possible to see a better PQ at 10-12' from 720 versus 480? If not, then you could also argue that it is pointless having a 1080p set with a larger screen size (such as 56" or 61") at > 12-15' away. IOW, why pick on 50" sets as being unsuitable for 1080p? Or, am I missing the point?

Yes, at 10-12 feet it's possible to notice an improvement in the picture from resolution.

I'm not picking on the 50, it's just out first and is the size where the average home is least likely to benefit from the increased resolution.

With a 56, you can sit farther away and still notice the extra res. With a 61, farther still. Etc. The typical TV room has a TV that is 10-18 feet away from the primary viewing spot. In that typical room, the 50 is least likely to be valuable at 1080p vs. its 720p cousin.

And, yes, at 10-12 feet 720p can outpoint 480p assuming the screen is large enough and the visual acuity is there to complement it. By 12 feet, tho, I'd tell the typical 42-inch plasma buyer to skip HD and go for ED and spend the extra money elsewhere.

Thank you. However please be precise and state the wobulated technology actually was developed by HP (from the "untechnical savy").

P.S. I love TI's digital audio quality. It sounds fantastic. I'm glad TI purchased this technology too.

Let our eyes be the judge...

I never stated who invented "wobulated" technology but it is my understanding
that the HP "wobulation" differs from TI's. Thanks for your post just the same :-)

Your false promotion is too much. I and many other engineers (even including TI's own) disagree with you totally.

The fact is over-lapping of pixels degrades picture quality. Any fool can reason that. !

Well, I agree with Wiggles, who knows more about this stuff in his little pinky than some will ever know in their whole heads....

So I'm happy to join Wiggles in the "Fools on the Hill Gang."

Oh, and you said this, "Following this logic, digital camera's would work better if their pixels overlapped and misfocused slightly."

In fact, there are reasons why this is true. The simulation of a photograph can be enhanced by illusions to make the discrete pixels appear closer to the continuous tones of film.

Reincarnate,

Check out the following *TI* document, SmoothPicture.pdf, found at the following
post: http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=5891147&&#post5891147

Looks like the TI documents you have been reading may conflict with the above.

TI is the leader in Digital Signal Processing and this is their core compentency
from which they leveraged when they entered the DLP consumer market space.
It may appear to be "black magic" to the untechnical savy but it is backed up
by complex mathematics.
Toney,
I went to TI site to find this "TI document". I could not find it. However I did find this one when searching for "SmoothPicture"

http://focus-webapps.ti.com/general/docs/sitesearch/searchsite.tsp;jsessionid=VONKWWTIE3XU1QC1JAWBF2Q?selectedTo pic=1653260327&numRecords=25&searchTerm=+SmoothPicture&statusCode=null

The claim:
"CRT, LCOS, psiLCD = 3 panels, or CRTs that will misalign over timeSingle" :)

DLP timeSingle Panel, no misalignment

and then: "No noise in picture"
Is dither noise gone?

This years DLP camp claims are simply outrageous. In my opinion, these are acts of desperation. Boy, this sure is a rough year for the A/V industry!

That Aka, he's a sensitive one yes? - Yoda Jedi Master

Well, I agree with Wiggles, who knows more about this stuff in his little pinky than some will ever know in their whole heads....

So I'm happy to join Wiggles in the "Fools on the Hill Gang."

Oh, and you said this, "Following this logic, digital camera's would work better if their pixels overlapped and misfocused slightly."

In fact, there are reasons why this is true. The simulation of a photograph can be enhanced by illusions to make the discrete pixels appear closer to the continuous tones of film.
You may keep your "simulations" and "illusions". However, the industry solution is to use more bits of color depth. Its called the RAW mode. They are up to 14 bits which translates to 4,398,046,511,104 "continuous" tones!

What DLP technology should really do to improve the picture quality is use more than 8 bits in their signal processing!

From TI:
"Conclusions
Continuing a tradition of display excellence, Texas Instruments has invented
SmoothPicture™ Technology that enables high resolution digital display systems at an affordable price point."
I rest my case. My tanks to everyone who participated!

Just posted by me on the HLRXXX8 owners thread:

Anyone living close to Anaheim, CA can have a look right now at an HLR6168W. The Fry's just off the 91 freeway on La Palma has one on display. Amazingly, it was being fed the local HD channel 28 (KCET) via the ATSC tuner hooked up to a rabbit ear antenna. I have to assume that that there was some sort of transmitter or antenna-antenna connection inside the store but who knows. I believe this was a live feed and not a .ts file running off a computer somewhere but there was really no way to tell for sure. OTOH, when I came home and tuned into KCET with my MyHD MD-130 (fed from an outside antenna) it was running what I saw at Fry's so I'm pretty sure that it was a direct over-the-air feed.

As far as the picture goes - it was stunning. The blacks are very black and the color depth just seemed to me to be outstanding. The contrast ratio is higher than what I am used to seeing. There was no way to compare it to any of the other sets in the store without walking 100 feet but it looked like it was better than the 50" Sony and Panny plasmas that Fry's had on display.

The one big negative was that there was very consistent macroblocking on scene transitions that lasted maybe a quarter second. I took a look at the plasmas and they were suffering really severe macroblocking (much worse than the 6168) but it was random and not on scene tranitions. This would indicate low or marginal S/N to me and that could be what was giving the 6168 problems. The picture that I am looking at right now at home via my MD-130 also shows the macroblocking for scene transitions but it is much less noticeable than it was on the 6168.

I would be interested in what others have to say about the macroblocking issue. But other than that it was as advertised even with a rabbit ear antenna feed.
Report Post

Toney,
I went to TI site to find this "TI document". I could not find it. However I did find this one when searching for "SmoothPicture"

http://focus-webapps.ti.com/general/docs/sitesearch/searchsite.tsp;jsessionid=VONKWWTIE3XU1QC1JAWBF2Q?selectedTo pic=1653260327&numRecords=25&searchTerm=+SmoothPicture&statusCode=null

The claim:
"CRT, LCOS, psiLCD = 3 panels, or CRTs that will misalign over timeSingle" :)

DLP timeSingle Panel, no misalignment

and then: "No noise in picture"
Is dither noise gone?

This years DLP camp claims are simply outrageous. In my opinion, these are acts of desperation. Boy, this sure is a rough year for the A/V industry!

Hello Reincarnate,

Actually the claims above claiming misalligment for 3 panels vs. 1 panel is true.
If you don't see rainbows the one chip solution with color wheel avoids
possible convergence errors that result from misallignment.

I am not sure about *no* noise in picture I am believe it has been greatly
reduced.

Best regards,

Tony

Just posted by me on the HLRXXX8 owners thread:

Anyone living close to Anaheim, CA can have a look right now at an HLR6168W. The Fry's just off the 91 freeway on La Palma has one on display. Amazingly, it was being fed the local HD channel 28 (KCET) via the ATSC tuner hooked up to a rabbit ear antenna. I have to assume that that there was some sort of transmitter or antenna-antenna connection inside the store but who knows. I believe this was a live feed and not a .ts file running off a computer somewhere but there was really no way to tell for sure. OTOH, when I came home and tuned into KCET with my MyHD MD-130 (fed from an outside antenna) it was running what I saw at Fry's so I'm pretty sure that it was a direct over-the-air feed.

As far as the picture goes - it was stunning. The blacks are very black and the color depth just seemed to me to be outstanding. The contrast ratio is higher than what I am used to seeing. There was no way to compare it to any of the other sets in the store without walking 100 feet but it looked like it was better than the 50" Sony and Panny plasmas that Fry's had on display.

The one big negative was that there was very consistent macroblocking on scene transitions that lasted maybe a quarter second. I took a look at the plasmas and they were suffering really severe macroblocking (much worse than the 6168) but it was random and not on scene tranitions. This would indicate low or marginal S/N to me and that could be what was giving the 6168 problems. The picture that I am looking at right now at home via my MD-130 also shows the macroblocking for scene transitions but it is much less noticeable than it was on the 6168.

I would be interested in what others have to say about the macroblocking issue. But other than that it was as advertised even with a rabbit ear antenna feed.
Report Post

thanks - I am on my way !

Anyone living close to Anaheim, CA can have a look right now at an HLR6168W. The Fry's just off the 91 freeway on La Palma has one on display.

Thanks for the heads up.

I will definitely swing by there tomorrow on the way home from work!

Hello Reincarnate,

Actually the claims above claiming misalligment for 3 panels vs. 1 panel is true.
If you don't see rainbows the one chip solution with color wheel avoids
possible convergence errors that result from misallignment.

I am not sure about *no* noise in picture I am believe it has been greatly
reduced.

Best regards,

Tony
Engineers are very careful with the use of absolutes in their language.

If they had stated "may" instead of "will" I would be silent. Do they think we are fools?
I've got to go to work tomorrow. Thanks to everyone who participated in this point and counterpoint. Its a shame we could not bet on which camp will have this years best display technology!

I rest my case.
Is that a promise?

They are up to 14 bits which translates to 4,398,046,511,104 "continuous" tones!
Um, 14 bits give you up to 2**14 = 16,384 color values.

Folks: Thank you all. I have spent an embarassing number of hours learning from the
collected wisdom at this site.

Today I took the big leap. Into HD and into DLP. I picked up a HLR5067W and an OTA
indoors antenna. I have waffled for months because my programming of choice is
Dish, non HD.

Wow. This TV is amazing. Picture with Dish PVR 510 is a pleasant surprise.
I am so far delighted at the purchase. Samsung makes some good stuff.

The disappointments are slight, so far:
The Panorama setting is VERY annoying. Neither my son or I can stand it at all.
So we just leave it on 16:9. Also, the code numbers I would need to run the Dish
receiver are not included in the manual, so I can't use the remote as a universal.

Thanks again.
Dan

As you can see on the page before this one, I can't decide if I want a 50 or 46 inch DLP. My viewing distance is 8-11 feet and I don't want to overkill it. Plus will I notice a big improvement with a 1080 vs 720.



uhhh... i want your guys opinion on this, even though i've been trying to avoid it cuz i'm pretty sure i won't like your answer... but call me crazy....I'm at a distance of 9 feet and i'm gettin either: the 67 inch at the biggest, and i was gonna avoid going below the 61 inch. I was leaning toward the 67 inch :D

Hello, can this model handle PIP of DVI and Component, or DVI and HDMI?

I'm at a distance of 9 feet and i'm gettin either: the 67 inch at the biggest, and i was gonna avoid going below the 61 inch. I was leaning toward the 67 inch :D
Just test it for yourself. Maybe find a store where you can sit at 9' and watch a movie with lots of action. It's how you feel about it that counts.

thanks - I am on my way !Well hopefully you are back soon...looking forward to your first time look-see report :)

O.K.....I did it. After reading this thread for the past two hours I pulled the trigger on the Samsung HL-R6768W. I purchased from TV Authority due to the fact it was the lowest price I could find, and it seems people have delt with them before and have had a good experiance. They just sent me a confirmation email saying the TV was not due to ship until 7/31 and my credit card would not be charged until then. I want to thank everyone for all their insight and knowledge.

O.K.....I did it. After reading this thread for the past two hours I pulled the trigger on the Samsung HL-R6768W. I purchased from TV Authority due to the fact it was the lowest price I could find, and it seems people have delt with them before and have had a good experiance. They just sent me a confirmation email saying the TV was not due to ship until 7/31 and my credit card would not be charged until then. I want to thank everyone for all their insight and knowledge.

Wow, your first post and it is to announce that you ordered an awesome display.

Congrats!

Well hopefully you are back soon...looking forward to your first time look-see report :)

Just got back and posted my report on the 1080p HLRxxx8W thread which
can be viewed here:
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=5898560&&#post5898560

I posted earlier that I will be sitting 8-11 feet away from a new DLP tv. Would it be best to get a 46 or 50" HDTV? When I talked to the guy at Tweeter, he said that a 46" would be better. I'm starting to think that maybe a local store would be the best place to buy a DLP tv because if I get something too small or too big, I can always exchange it. Also, at this distance and from what everyone here is saying, a 1080p set is better than 720p. But it seems that if I get a 46" HDTV, then there might not be a 1080p of that size.

For 42 to 46-inch DLP TVs, might consider putting 10 to 14 feet between you and the screen.
50-inch DLP displays will look good from as far as 12 to 16 feet away, though you can certainly sit closer to the screen.
You can sit up to 15 feet away from a DLP screen that's larger than 60 inches. Again, the high fill factor inherent to DLP technology enables you to sit much closer to the screen without being annoyed by pixelated images.

I am trying to decide which Sammy DLP to buy and this weekend I went to three stores: Fry's, Best Buy and Tweeter. My viewing distance is 9-10 feet and I am going with the 46" because the 50" would overwhelm my living room and it is longer than my tv stand.

I found the following after watching most of the 720p samsungs DLPs:

The best picture goes to the HL-R5087W. This is a 50" with an ugly pedestal base. The chip is a HD2+ chip with a 7 segment wheel.

The next best picture was the 46" HL-R4677W. This is a very nice 46" "thin bezel" design with HD2+ chip and a 6 segment wheel.

The one I will be buying is the HL-R4667W that is the value model with the HD4 chip and a 7 segment wheel.

I also noticed that some stores still carry the older HL-P4667W, HL-P4674W and HL-P4663W models. So be careful what you are buying because Samsung has truly made it difficult for the consumer with so many different models and not even the sales personnel at the stores know which set has what chip, wheel, etc.

I posted earlier that I will be sitting 8-11 feet away from a new DLP tv. Would it be best to get a 46 or 50" HDTV? When I talked to the guy at Tweeter, he said that a 46" would be better. I'm starting to think that maybe a local store would be the best place to buy a DLP tv because if I get something too small or too big, I can always exchange it. Also, at this distance and from what everyone here is saying, a 1080p set is better than 720p. But it seems that if I get a 46" HDTV, then there might not be a 1080p of that size.
Get the larger size. I sit at 9 or 10 feet and after seeing the 6178 today I'm glad I ordered the 6168 instead of the 6768. One of the salesman at Tweeter said, while I was looking at a mitsubishi, that it was best to leave the glare shield on, yeah right. I could see myself in it like a mirror. I wouldn't put much stock in what the salesman says. Go look at the sets for yourself, but 46" or 50" is still pretty small at 8-11 feet. You should probably choose between 50" and 56" but to each their own. Just don't get the 42" 720P set. It has the worst picture of all the DLPs I saw at Tweeter because of the screen it has. The salesman swore it from from the feed until I pointed out the sky in larger Samsungs next to it. It was clearly the screen that was causing the problem.

I am trying to decide which Sammy DLP to buy and this weekend I went to three stores: Fry's, Best Buy and Tweeter. My viewing distance is 9-10 feet and I am going with the 46" because the 50" would overwhelm my living room and it is longer than my tv stand.

I found the following after watching most of the 720p samsungs DLPs:

The best picture goes to the HL-R5087W. This is a 50" with an ugly pedestal base. The chip is a HD2+ chip with a 7 segment wheel.

The next best picture was the 46" HL-R4677W. This is a very nice 46" "thin bezel" design with HD2+ chip and a 6 segment wheel.

The one I will be buying is the HL-R4667W that is the value model with the HD4 chip and a 7 segment wheel.

I also noticed that some stores still carry the older HL-P4667W, HL-P4674W and HL-P4663W models. So be careful what you are buying because Samsung has truly made it difficult for the consumer with so many different models and not even the sales personnel at the stores know which set has what chip, wheel, etc.

I generally don't get into the screen size debates, but give some more thought to the 50". My favorite viewing distance is 9.5' and I have had a 46" Samsung DLP for the past 2 years. It is nice, but from that distance go with a 50". I'm actually upgrading to a 56" 1080p, so relax you will be fine at 50".

^hmmm, thats what I'm thinking. A nice 50" would be perfect but then I will have to get a 55" wide stand to fit my two speakers onto (each are 4" wide). Because right now I got a great 52" stand for a 4667w and two speakers to fit on perfectly. But a 50" DLP sounds better :) haha

Tough call....

Hmmm I went to the Magnolia (in BB) and to my local Tweeters and no one had any of the 1080P sets on display. :( I did leave my name and # with the people at tweeters to call me when they get one on display. Hopefully its before my TV arrives from TVA.

...........
3) I live in NYC, and when I go to the Samsung store, their DLP's look like heaven. Then I go to Best Buy, and they look, for the most part, kinda lame. Is it wrong to assume/hope that if I buy this tv, I'll be receiving the better of these two worlds, or is there all sorts of crazy mojo going on at the Samsung stores that make it look so much better?
Alright, first post here, so here we go..
First, many thanks to UCSB and many others for all the knowledge you've put here.

I have been trying for the longest time to find a place where I can view these sets at a store that has the IQ to show some realistic PQ.

Anybody from the NYC area can tell me where is that Samsung Store? Any other stores you know about? Somebody posted about Magnolia stores in BB in North Jersey - Any specific locations?

I think I am set on the 6168 or 6178... but I need to see it first :o

Thanks!
~

I've been one of many, waiting for nearly a year for the Samsung 1080p sets to be released. And unlike many here, I felt obligated to delay my order placement until I actually saw one in-person.

Today, after looking all around the San Francisco Bay Area for any Samsung 1080p, I finally succeeded! Victory!

The Magnolia in Palo Alto, CA on University Avenue has an HL-R5078W on display. They have a nice display room including DirectTV with HD channels and normal SD channels. I'm actually going to buy a much larger set (67" or 71") but it was at least a 1080p. Here is my review:

(1) Brightness:
Phenomenal brightness. So intense and beautiful that it makes all the sets sitting around it look dim and dreary by comparison. The "dynamic" mode was serious intense and probably only for use in brightly lit rooms. The "standard" setting looked plenty bright for typical rooms and the "movie" setting was about right for watching in a very dim or dark room. I think they have achieved maximum capability on brightness - any more wouldn't be used in any but the most extreme lighting.

(2) Colors
Very nice and intense without the almost strained intensity of some of the previous HLN/HLP series. I remember looking at Samsung DLPs about a year ago and thinking that the green was a little over the edge when using the default settings. It was like they had tuned it to be way too vivid to grab the eye in the store. I suspect those old sets were okay after manually tweaking the colors, but I don't think these 1080p's need that. The colors looked great using defaults. Although I did not run any calibration material.

(3) Weird DLP effects (rainbows, etc)
I was unable to detect ANY weird DLP effects such as rainbows. But I will admit I had to work really hard to see any of those issues on the older Samsungs so I'm not the best judge of this attribute.

(4) Contrast (and Black/White purity)
Again, Phenomenal. The blacks were beautifully solid and in the case of bright white text over a solid black background, it looked like near perfection. I turned the color all the way off on this set and an adjacent Samsung 720p model so they were both showing the same black and white HDTV images. What an amazing difference! The 1080p was completely amazing in terms of pure blacks and whites. I'm not sure they could get much better. I think I'd need to run calibration material to even see that it isn't perfect.

(5) Sharpness
Razor sharp edges. Really a huge improvement. Again making the comparison with the adjacent 720p, watching DirectTV HDNet, the difference was remarkable. So sharp that the images had much more depth. Interesting that it looked so much better even with a 720p signal. I guess that says their 1080p upconversion algorithm, pixel interpolation, etc. are well executed.
Another note on sharpness - I didn't have any real 1080p content to look at (or 1080i for that matter) so everything was really upconverted. The only thing I got to see in true 1080p were the menus generated by the TV itself. And they were awesome sharp! Really pretty. And they were just menus! But 1080p is really nice. I'm sure these things would make way-cool computer monitors.

(6) Pixelation
Pixelation was an issue for me on the previous generations of DLP sets when looking at a standard definition image. HD images look great on 720p or 1080p. The problem is that the majority of the material I will watch is not HD nor will it be for most (or all) of the life of this set. Sad, but true. My huge SD DVD collection and the very small HD channel count guarantee this will be so. Even my XBOX in HD mode is mostly 480p, not even 720p, because the games don't support it. So, I'm stuck with SD. And the 720p Samsung DLP sets do a pretty bad job with SD. The pixelation on the large sets was really bad. I guess there weren't enough pixels in 720p to run a good edge blurring algorithm without killing the image sharpness so they stuck with sharpness at the price of pixelation. Anyway, they have made huge improvements in this area. A great test is to look at overlaid text on the old 720p sets vs. the new 1080p. On the old sets, you could count the pixels in each text character and trace each little zip-zag between them. On the new 1080p's, you can't see the pixelation in the text at all if looking from a distance. If you look really close at the 1080p, you can actually see their blurring algorithm in action. You can see the color of the text smeared out away from the text into adjacent pixels - this is a side-effect of the way these algorithms work and isn't really noticeable from a distance. So, they have basically fixed the old problem on these new 1080p sets and SD looks good on them. I guess one caveat is that I was only able to look at a 50" set and perhaps the old problems re-emerge on a big set like a 67" or 71". We shall see.
Another note on pixelation: looking really closely at the set, there is very little gap between pixels. Almost no grid effect, unlike all the LCD projection TVs that inherently suffer from this problem. I guess part of why there is so little grid effect is the wobbulation technique Samsung uses. It works. Looks good.

(7) Glare
Liked the anti-glare screen on the 1080p better than any of the others in the showroom. Looked good. Not perfect but good enough.

(8) Nits
What's with the huge, tacky, TV Guide logo ppermanentlypainted on the remote!?! Terrible! If that remote turned out to be any good for ongoing use (unlikely), I still wouldn't be able to use it due to the huge tacky TV Guide logo. Its much bigger than the Samsung logo and instead of being subtle its big red&white on the dark colored remote. Give me a break. They should just peacefully admit defeat, that the TV Guide magazine is doomed, and go out of business without torturing us all as they go! A few weeks ago the same logo appeared on my DISH Network online program guide. <sigh>.

(9) Concerns
I am an XBOX user and I require that this new TV work perfectly with video games, hence noticeable lag is not acceptable. I did not have an opportunity to test the lag issue, although Magnolia did offer to let me bring in my XBOX and play on their demo unit. Nice of them and I may do it if we don't soon get 10 reviews on here listing the results of the same test. This is now my biggest and only remaining worry about buying this set. So please, run this test and post the results including use of all the various input options!

I guess there is one more thing - I saw one of the Sony 70" Quilla (sp?) sets today as well. That thing was the most beautiful and amazing TV I have ever seen. I suspect if I could have seen it sitting side-by-side with the Samsung 1080p 71" that the Sony would look better. But I didn't get to run that test. And regardless, the difference would not be enough for me to justify the Sony costing double the Samsung. Sony is going to have to cut that price substantially now that it has real competition in the large 1080p market.

That's all for now. Still debating my size before placing the order. I'll probably do so on here in the next few days.

-Dan

I've been one of many, waiting for nearly a year for the Samsung 1080p sets to be released. And unlike many hear, I felt obligated to delay my order placement until I actually saw one in-person.

Today, after looking all around the San Francisco Bay Area for any Samsung 1080p, I finally succeeded! Victory!

The Magnolia in Palo Alto, CA on University Avenue has an HL-R5078W on display. They have a nice display room including DirectTV with HD channels and normal SD channels. I'm actually going to buy a much larger set (67" or 71") but it was at least a 1080p. Here is my review:

(1) Brightness:
Phenomenal brightness. So intense and beautiful that it makes all the sets sitting around it look dim and dreary by comparison. The "dynamic" mode was serious intense and probably only for use in brightly lit rooms. The "standard" setting looked plenty bright for typical rooms and the "movie" setting was about right for watching in a very dim or dark room. I think they have achieved maximum capability on brightness - any more wouldn't be used in any but the most extreme lighting.

(2) Colors
Very nice and intense without the almost strained intensity of some of the previous HLN/HLP series. I remember looking at Samsung DLPs about a year ago and thinking that the green was a little over the edge when using the default settings. It was like they had tuned it to be way too vivid to grab the eye in the store. I suspect those old sets were okay after manually tweaking the colors, but I don't think these 1080p's need that. The colors looked great using defaults. Although I did not run any calibration material.

(3) Weird DLP effects (rainbows, etc)
I was unable to detect ANY weird DLP effects such as rainbows. But I will admit I had to work really hard to see any of those issues on the older Samsungs so I'm not the best judge of this attribute.

(4) Contrast (and Black/White purity)
Again, Phenomenal. The blacks were beautifully solid and in the case of bright white text over a solid black background, it looked like near perfection. I turned the color all the way off on this set and an adjacent Samsung 720p model so they were both showing the same black and white HDTV images. What an amazing difference! The 1080p was completely amazing in terms of pure blacks and whites. I'm not sure they could get much better. I think I'd need to run calibration material to even see that it isn't perfect.

(5) Sharpness
Razor sharp edges. Really a huge improvement. Again making the comparison with the adjacent 720p, watching DirectTV HDNet, the difference was remarkable. So sharp that the images had much more depth. Interesting that it looked so much better even with a 720p signal. I guess that says their 1080p upconversion algorithm, pixel interpolation, etc. are well executed.
Another note on sharpness - I didn't have any real 1080p content to look at (or 1080i for that matter) so everything was really upconverted. The only thing I got to see in true 1080p were the menus generated by the TV itself. And they were awesome sharp! Really pretty. And they were just menus! But 1080p is really nice. I'm sure these things would make way-cool computer monitors.

(6) Pixelation
Pixelation was an issue for me on the previous generations of DLP sets when looking at a standard definition image. HD images look great on 720p or 1080p. The problem is that the majority of the material I will watch is not HD nor will it be for most (or all) of the life of this set. Sad, but true. My huge SD DVD collection and the very small HD channel count guarantee this will be so. Even my XBOX in HD mode is mostly 480p, not even 720p, because the games don't support it. So, I'm stuck with SD. And the 720p Samsung DLP sets do a pretty bad job with SD. The pixelation on the large sets was really bad. I guess there weren't enough pixels in 720p to run a good edge blurring algorithm without killing the image sharpness so they stuck with sharpness at the price of pixelation. Anyway, they have made huge improvements in this area. A great test is to look at overlaid text on the old 720p sets vs. the new 1080p. On the old sets, you could count the pixels in each text character and trace each little zip-zag between them. On the new 1080p's, you can't see the pixelation in the text at all if looking from a distance. If you look really close at the 1080p, you can actually see their blurring algorithm in action. You can see the color of the text smeared out away from the text into adjacent pixels - this is a side-effect of the way these algorithms work and isn't really noticeable from a distance. So, they have basically fixed the old problem on these new 1080p sets and SD looks good on them. I guess one caveat is that I was only able to look at a 50" set and perhaps the old problems re-emerge on a big set like a 67" or 71". We shall see.
Another note on pixelation: looking really closely at the set, there is very little gap between pixels. Almost no grid effect, unlike all the LCD projection TVs that inherently suffer from this problem. I guess part of why there is so little grid effect is the wobbulation technique Samsung uses. It works. Looks good.

(7) Glare
Liked the anti-glare screen on the 1080p better than any of the others in the showroom. Looked good. Not perfect but good enough.

(8) Nits
What's with the huge, tacky, TV Guide logo ppermanentlypainted on the remote!?! Terrible! If that remote turned out to be any good for ongoing use (unlikely), I still wouldn't be able to use it due to the huge tacky TV Guide logo. Its much bigger than the Samsung logo and instead of being subtle its big red&white on the dark colored remote. Give me a break. They should just peacefully admit defeat, that the TV Guide magazine is doomed, and go out of business without torturing us all as they go! A few weeks ago the same logo appeared on my DISH Network online program guide. <sigh>.

(9) Concerns
I am an XBOX user and I require that this new TV work perfectly with video games, hence noticeable lag is not acceptable. I did not have an opportunity to test the lag issue, although Magnolia did offer to let me bring in my XBOX and play on their demo unit. Nice of them and I may do it if we don't soon get 10 reviews on here listing the results of the same test. This is now my biggest and only remaining worry about buying this set. So please, run this test and post the results including use of all the various input options!

I guess there is one more thing - I saw one of the Sony 70" Quilla (sp?) sets today as well. That thing was the most beautiful and amazing TV I have ever seen. I suspect if I could have seen it sitting side-by-side with the Samsung 1080p 71" that the Sony would look better. But I didn't get to run that test. And regardless, the difference would not be enough for me to justify the Sony costing double the Samsung. Song it going to have to cut that price substantially now that it has real competition in the large 1080p market.

That's all for now. Still debating my size before placing the order. I'll probably do so on here in the next few days.

-Dan

Wow! Thanks Dan! I am glad I stayed up late to catch your in-store review.

I think your right about the Qualia but I bet the 1080p DLPs are going
to be superior for movies with dark content. The Sony SXRDs due out
later this year will probably be the only real competition for the new 1080p
DLP sets this year...

I've been one of many, waiting for nearly a year for the Samsung 1080p sets to be released. And unlike many here, I felt obligated to delay my order placement until I actually saw one in-person.

Today, after looking all around the San Francisco Bay Area for any Samsung 1080p, I finally succeeded! Victory!
Thanks for that outstanding review, Dan! I'm glad I got up early to check the forum!

Even without having seen one of these babies yet, I'm confident it was well worth passing on last year's HLPs and waiting for 1080p! Since I'm not a gamer, and most of my viewing is 1080i over cable, all I'm waiting for is the confirmation from the brave early adopters on this forum that the new models suffer from no major problems, as the HLPs did when they first came out (and still do, as far as I know, not having kept up with the HLP threads).

Thanks again for the great review!

(4) Contrast (and Black/White purity)
Again, Phenomenal. The blacks were beautifully solid and in the case of bright white text over a solid black background, it looked like near perfection. I turned the color all the way off on this set and an adjacent Samsung 720p model so they were both showing the same black and white HDTV images. What an amazing difference! The 1080p was completely amazing in terms of pure blacks and whites. I'm not sure they could get much better. I think I'd need to run calibration material to even see that it isn't perfect.
-Dan

Na. Just put it in a dark cave and watch "Dark City", preferably with a CRT TV next to it.

Anyone know what going with these TVs in Canada? I have been waiting for a High end TV in Canada for a while, and it seems the never come. What is the hold up?

The Magnolia in Palo Alto, CA on University Avenue has an HL-R5078W on display. Here is my review:-Dan

Dan, thank you for a fantastic first post! It appears that the major concerns out there are now focused on potential game lag and/or lip synch issues, and the non-native-1080p-on-all-inputs head-scratcher. If the new 1080p Samsungs don't experience "lag", then I would give it a perfect score. So far, it looks like it's everything most of us wanted, and more. Many of us are anxiously awaiting reports in these areas. Also, there are a few different threads that you might also want to check out. UCSB just started a new 1080p owner's thread which should kick into overdrive over the next few days as people start receiving their units. There is also the AVS/TVA Powerbuy thread, which has a lot of info. on it as well, as we wait for our sets to arrive. I'm in for the 5688.

I look forward to hearing more of your comments. Great job, guy!

Alright, first post here, so here we go..
First, many thanks to UCSB and many others for all the knowledge you've put here.

I have been trying for the longest time to find a place where I can view these sets at a store that has the IQ to show some realistic PQ.

Anybody from the NYC area can tell me where is that Samsung Store? Any other stores you know about? Somebody posted about Magnolia stores in BB in North Jersey - Any specific locations?

I think I am set on the 6168 or 6178... but I need to see it first :o

Thanks!
~

The Samsung Store is in the Time Warner Center at Columbus Circle on the third floor. Not sure if they have the sets on display or not, though, so you might want to call ahead to check.

the issue with SD pq may be the deal-breaker for me, and go for the 1080p instead of the 720p. if the difference is that dramatic, then I'd have buyer's remorse for years (don't want that!!)

Alright, first post here, so here we go..
First, many thanks to UCSB and many others for all the knowledge you've put here.

I have been trying for the longest time to find a place where I can view these sets at a store that has the IQ to show some realistic PQ.

Anybody from the NYC area can tell me where is that Samsung Store? Any other stores you know about? Somebody posted about Magnolia stores in BB in North Jersey - Any specific locations?

I think I am set on the 6168 or 6178... but I need to see it first :o

Thanks!
~

the only BB's in NJ that have a Magnolia in them are in West Paterson (Rt 46W) and Livingston (Rt 10W)

I'm having a problem with my HLR 4667 - when I turned it on yesterday, the display was white with dark vertical pinstripes about an inch apart. The audio was ok. Turning the set off and then on did not clear the problem, but unplugging the unit did.

Anyone else have this problem? Possible firmware upgrade needed?

I generally don't get into the screen size debates, but give some more thought to the 50". My favorite viewing distance is 9.5' and I have had a 46" Samsung DLP for the past 2 years. It is nice, but from that distance go with a 50". I'm actually upgrading to a 56" 1080p, so relax you will be fine at 50".And I'm going 61" 1080p at 8 feet. I agree, relax and enjoy the 50" at 9-10 feet.

Anyone else have this problem? Possible firmware upgrade needed?
Possible repair needed. :)

Nice to see that the thread has righted itself again. :)

It's worth ditto-ing the responses of several others ... Great review Dan! Thanks for taking the time to express your observations so clearly. LOL, that remote's going straight into a drawer and never coming out again!

htwaits and Don, thanks for the kind words. Hehe, I cheered myself up yesterday by going out and buying most of my cables and a UPS for my new 5078.

calbert,

Just a quick aside question: which UPS did you get?

(8) Nits
What's with the huge, tacky, TV Guide logo ppermanentlypainted on the remote!?! Terrible! If that remote turned out to be any good for ongoing use (unlikely), I still wouldn't be able to use it due to the huge tacky TV Guide logo. Its much bigger than the Samsung logo and instead of being subtle its big red&white on the dark colored remote. Give me a break. They should just peacefully admit defeat, that the TV Guide magazine is doomed, and go out of business without torturing us all as they go! A few weeks ago the same logo appeared on my DISH Network online program guide. <sigh>.



-Dan

Dan,

TV Guide magazine may in fact be a dinosaur, but the logo is on the remote because these sets have a chip in them to receive the TV Guide OTA signal that is present in most of the country's markets. It needs to be setup and takes about 24 hours to initialize. It has seven days of interactive guides in it for OTA and cables system, satellite guides to be added by the end of the year. The signal is broadcast in a(n) local OTA channel(s) Vertical Interlace Blanking time. That explains the 24 hours initialization, a low data rate due to restricted transmit time available. I'm sure that TV manufacturerers have an agreement with TV Guide to put the logo on the remote to try to encourage customers to use the information.

Lee

calbert,

Just a quick aside question: which UPS did you get?

I picked up an APC ES Series that's rated for 750VA (450 watts). I'm primarily using it to protect my lamp from overheating if the power goes out (which happens frequently enough here). Not using the coax surge circuits it has, b/c I want to buy a dedicated coax surge suppressor ... supposedly there are some good ones that won't degrade the signal as much, but I have much to learn about that yet.

Might have gone for something rated for a higher power output if I didn't have to be careful about costs ... my wife's starting to get just a little perplexed at all of the ancillary purchases necessary to make our nice new hdtv run at its best! ;)

So as to help keep this thread on topic, there's a great thread that's been around for a while that's dedicated to power issues here (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=277384) ... more than you'll ever want to know (I haven't read the whole thing yet).

Can PIP be acheived with Digital inputs (DVI, HDMI) on ANY model??

aydn, here is what all of the HLRxxx8 sets can do as far as PIP goes. The chart is from the manual which is linked in post #1. :)

I am waiting for my Samsung HLR5678W, It should be in by next week. I can't wait to hook up my Extreme Gaming PC to it.

Hi Lee,

Thanks for the information on the TV Guide thing.

That sounds like a beneficial technology. I don't personally use OTA broadcasts but perhaps with HDTV it will make sense to do so. I use DISH satellite and its always had a built-in 7-day programming guide that is embedded in the satellite signal. I don't know who previously provided that data, but I suspect it wasn't TV Guide. I guess its TV Guide now since they added their big logo onto the program guide screen. Or at least TV Guide started paying DISH to put that logo there to gradually get themselves embedded in our minds as the universal provider of online programming guides and not the "dinosaur" magazine.

I do think AV companies should realize that the appearance of their products does count for something and not make bad decisions like the TV Guide symbol on the remote for the sake of marketing campaigns. Regardless of how good their technology is. Idealistic, I know.

-Dan

p.s. - thanks to everyone for your complimentary responses

Dan, great review. Thanks for posting it. What distance did you view this 50" set from?

Thanks.

I think I like 16:9 TV's really big. Big and not all that far away. Especially considering how much 4:3 material I still watch, and I will be watching for the life of this set (unfortunately). I suggest you keep that in mind if you also watch lots of SD programming. When you watch a 4:3 image, it only occupies the middle area of the screen hence the screen size can hardly be too big, even with a 70". Do the math (simple trigonometry) on how big a 4:3 image is on a 70" 16:9 TV and you will see its not all that large compared to how big we all used to buy our 4:3 TVs. When you are watching 16:9 images, its usually movies and a "movie theatre" viewing experience is more appropriate, hence a big wide picture that is so wide it basically blocks out basically everything else. So that is my philosophy.

I watched the 50" 1080p at about 8'-10' away. By the time I got back to 15' it was definitely not an ideal size (too small). 5' was too close although the image quality was good enough that I didn't start seeing many defects, pixelation, etc. so that was a big improvement over previous DLP sets where I definitely felt like I needed to stand back to avoid seeing the bad stuff. I didn't have a tape measure with me to really measure distance exactly and see what it was like at 6, 7, 8, 9' etc. These are rough estimates on my part.

One other factor encouraging me toward a large screen size is video games. It makes me feel old to say it, but I have a darn hard time seeing the small details, reading tiny fonts, etc. on many of my XBOX games. I end up all bleary eyed after a day of playing. The games are dramatically easier to see with a bigger screen so I can survive the all-day (or night) gaming sessions without my eyes falling out.

My plan is for a 67" or 71" at around 12' to my viewing seat. My girlfriend's seat is only 10' away so she better like it big (haha).

-Dan

And I'm going 61" 1080p at 8 feet. I agree, relax and enjoy the 50" at 9-10 feet.

YOU'RE MY HERO!!! :cool:

I'm going to CA in a few days, so i'd really appreciate it if someone could gimme a list of all the places where the 68 series tv's have been spotted so i can check them out!


Thanks!

I'm going to CA in a few days, so i'd really appreciate it if someone could gimme a list of all the places where the 68 series tv's have been spotted so i can check them out!
California is kinda big. Where are you going?

dgilley

I know what you mean about the forced advertisements being shoved down our throats wherever we go today but I think the TV Guide thing was developed to plug a Gap created by One Way Cable Cards - that have been made available over the past 9 months or so. I would guess once Cable Cards become 2-way that shouldn't be needed. I would guess TV Guide subsidized the costs of that feature and probably why they will be dominant on the Remote - I'm thinking of getting the new Harmony Remote since I'll have too many remotes to deal with anyways.

I also cannot understand someone getting a 46-50" DLP at 12' and further as that is just to small. I don't know what calculators they are using it seems they must be going by 4:3 picture and SD. I wouldn't waste my money on such a small screen. We have the Spec sheet and other people that view 61" from 8-10' with no problems and that's not 1080P. I think these folks need to view the Manual viewing distance charts as they sure the hell do not recommend viewing from 14-16'.

Minimum viewing distance I believe on a 67" was 8.4' going from the last time I looked at the Samsung Manual. I viewed 61" DLP's plenty of times from 9' without any problems (and they were previous to 720P) so I don't understand limiting to 46"- 50" unless it's due to furniture limitations, they don't make a DLP 1080P in 46" size do they? I thought 1080P benefits are seen at a minimum of 50" diagonal? I'm with you on the larger screen and awaiting 6768 with 9-10' viewing distance. I have plenty of testimony from large screen plasma folks, Q006, and my own instore viewing to satisfy me that 67' will be great and not have regrets of not going bigger 2 weeks later which is the common post we see on these threads.

Dan's review seems to affirm a side-by-side review against the Q006 a few months back where it came close to PQ of it and for half to one third of the price so far it's good news for us that have waited the past 7 months to see it bear fruit and match the comments of CES 2005. :D

The Samsung Store is in the Time Warner Center at Columbus Circle on the third floor. Not sure if they have the sets on display or not, though, so you might want to call ahead to check.

Don't waste your time, I was there with my date, they had none of the 1080p models on display. When I asked 2 different store reps, if they had or when they would have a 1080p display up, they looked @ me like I spoke to them in arabic & I'm not arabic.

A lot can change in a 2week span, but I would call 1st.

dgilley

I know what you mean about the forced advertisements being shoved down our throats wherever we go today but I think the TV Guide thing was developed to plug a Gap created by One Way Cable Cards - that have been made available over the past 9 months or so. I would guess once Cable Cards become 2-way that shouldn't be needed. I would guess TV Guide subsidized the costs of that feature and probably why they will be dominant on the Remote - I'm thinking of getting the new Harmony Remote since I'll have too many remotes to deal with anyways.

:D

I sure hope not. OTA that some 30 million of us still use would once again be without a guide. I also don't think so, since TV Guide is going to add both satellite providers in the next six months or so. Besides, it is an OTA service in Vertical Blanking Interval of the local OTA broadcast transmitters.


Lee

I'm going to be 8 or 9 feet from my 71 inch.

This room will only be used to watch HD programming and DVD movies.

For the family room I'm getting the 56 and will also be 8 or 9 feet. that will be a mix of HD programming and SD.

TVA 30 day guarantee makes it easy.

TV Guide owns all sorts of patents on on-screen guides through the Gemstar merger. Not only is there nothing regarding subsidizing going on, it's the other way around. And, no, it ain't going away with 2-way CableCard.

As for viewing distances, I urge all the whiz kids who are reading some web page or some manual or some THX certification to go to a movie theater on a Friday night. Check to see if people are seated not only in the front, but also the middle and back of the theaters. Get there about 30 minutes before show time while there are still empty seats all around and see if everyone fights for the same seats or if people actually choose different spots.

Viewing your TV at your chosen distance is the very same principle as picking a row at the movie theater. Some like their vision filled with screen, some do not.

And beyond this visual-field-fill preference -- for lack of a better term -- there are things like decor, physical space, importance of the TV, etc. that dictate sizes for people regardless of where the couch is. I had a friend who was able to move the couch within a range of about 6-8 feet. He also bought a 50-inch plasma because that was the largest diagaonal, smallest TV that could be found. Those were the constraints in the system -- not some page 124 of a TV manual. Welcome to the real world.

For what it's worth, I'm a back-of-the-theater guy. I like 2 screen widths between me and the screen and don't mind a bit more. That's not to say I never sit on the floor or move a chair, but it is to say I have about 12 feet from the screen to the couch in the new place, and am looking in the 60s for a TV.

If people want to view a 50" 1080p TV from 12' away that is entirely up to them and they don't need to be disrespected by you or anyone else! Personally I would not want to watch a 67-70" TV from 8-10' away but I sure as hell wouldn't have a go at anyone that did. Each person has their own preferences and that should be respected. The manual and viewing charts are guidelines or recommendations, they are not hard and fast rules! To you a 50" 1080p at 12' may be a waste of money but its up to the purchaser how he/she spends his money even if they don't get the maximum benefit from it. I'm sure there are plenty of people that feel that buying a 67" TV is overkill or a waste of money but if that is what you want then go with it but don't be a snob and put down anyone that prefers (or is constrained to) a smaller screen size at greater than recommended viewing distances for whatever reason.

Some believe it is a waste of money since the human eye cannot resolve
the additional detail or resolution at that distance so this would be true
if everything was equal. But the new 1080p DLPs are also greatly improved
in a number of other areas including black levels and contrast ratios which
have a substantial impact on PQ.

Viewing your TV at your chosen distance is the very same principle as picking a row at the movie theater. Some like their vision filled with screen, some do not.

Good example. Funny that it's not cited more frequently re: this topic. My wife and I are back-row people (partially b/c we like the distance, also b/c we don't have to deal with getting kicked in the head!). Without really noticing the correlation, we bought furniture that constrained the size of our next tv, deciding that we'd not want anything larger for some of the same reasons rogo gave above. At the movies on Saturday I caught myself measuring how much of my field of vision was filled with the screen from where we sat, and it actually comes fairly close to the setup we'll have at home. Should be great, even though I didn't consciously think about it that way.

The only thing I can think of that might take getting used to (having never had a larger set before) is watching everyday SD content at the same "field-fill" level as movies ... but I'm willing to be the MSRP (EDIT: umm, that's stupid ... I'd bet the cost of shipping to send the thing back if I really wasn't happy of course ... don't have the kind of money that statement implies) of my set that it'll look just fine .... ;)

Aka your a backrow guy huh? you must be like 4'8''!

I hope someone could comment on the availability of true native 1080P dlp panel TV projection whether it is available or not. Several announcements indicated products of Samsung and Mitsubishi are about ready to be delivered in the market. The confusion part is whether it is the true 1080P or that is achieved with wobulation technology. Thanks.
I think it is a relatively old question but the answer could be different by assuming that the 1080P resolution panel has been worked on by Ti for sometime already.

Lin

Some believe it is a waste of money since the human eye cannot resolve
the additional detail or resolution at that distance so this would be true
if everything was equal. But the new 1080p DLPs are also greatly improved
in a number of other areas including black levels and contrast ratios which
have a substantial impact on PQ.
Tony,
If we follow your logic then what is the point of HDTV? Just go back to VHS and enjoy the indistinct grainy picture.:)

You are a nice guy but the lack of objectivity and bias towards DLP is appalling. The is AV Science forum, not AV Rationalization. Some question the motivations behind your postings.

Tony,
If we follow your logic then what is the point of HDTV? Just go back to VHS and enjoy the indistinct grainy picture.:)

You are a nice guy but the lack of objectivity and bias towards DLP is appalling. The is AV Science forum, not AV Rationalization. Some question the motivations behind your postings.

Stop being a Sony fangurl. We all know you don't like Samsung, so stop trying to start an ongoing arguement.
While your home all disgruntled calling up Aka saying how Samsung & DLP sux, the rest of us soon-to-be Samsung 1080p DLP 0wnerz are going to be home enjoying HDTV & LOL @ you!

California is kinda big. Where are you going?


whoops :D i meant to put that. Anywhere from Santa Barbara down to Sandiego- so, Southern CA

After many months of waiting I finally received word today from Samsung that my new HLR5688W has now shipped and is in transit to me here in upstate NY. I called the shipping company that they are using and verified tracking information which estimates a delivery date of between 7-10 days from now. Based on this excellent news I would say that others waiting for Captain Kirk's new 1080p pedastal masterpiece, including you TMSKILZ, should soon be hearing from the enterprise.

I'm going to be 8 or 9 feet from my 71 inch.

This room will only be used to watch HD programming and DVD movies.

For the family room I'm getting the 56 and will also be 8 or 9 feet. that will be a mix of HD programming and SD.

TVA 30 day guarantee makes it easy.


forget Ronnie 1.8!!! YOUR MY HERO!!!! Thanks for making me feel better :D

Agreed! Absolutely! Thats why I'm seriously looking at the 5078 even though we view from 10-12' away. Thats the wife and I, my teenage son likes to sit on the floor 5-6' away from the screen!
We are a middle of the theater home. :rolleyes:

By the way, I think you are going to be pleased with the viewing angles of the HLR5078. Based on my un-calibrated subjective view, they are noticeably better than our HLP5063. Your teenage rug rat should be happy. Anyone who has to sit out at the edges should be happy too.

I'm going to start a long term brain washing campaign directed at getting a 1080p set with wider viewing angles for our guests. :o

Tony,
If we follow your logic then what is the point of HDTV? Just go back to VHS and enjoy the indistinct grainy picture.:)

You are a nice guy but the lack of objectivity and bias towards DLP is appalling. The is AV Science forum, not AV Rationalization. Some question the motivations behind your postings.

Thanks Reincarnate,

Actually I have never been a fan of DLP until this latest release. I believe
triple chip LCOS to eventually be a major player if not the leader once
they get BL and CR up to par and the Sony SXRDs due out later this year
just might pull that off. Once this happens I believe we will see TI respond
with triple chip DLP. We all benefit from this.

I don't get how you draw the conclusion about going to a grainy picture.
The question I was responding to had to do with 1080p vs. 720p from a distance
where the human eye cannot discern the difference in detail. I just commented
there are many other reason to upgrade a TV.

Thanks for your reponse.

Best regards,

Tony

TV Guide owns all sorts of patents on on-screen guides through the Gemstar merger. Not only is there nothing regarding subsidizing going on, it's the other way around. And, no, it ain't going away with 2-way CableCard.

As for viewing distances, I urge all the whiz kids who are reading some web page or some manual or some THX certification to go to a movie theater on a Friday night. Check to see if people are seated not only in the front, but also the middle and back of the theaters. Get there about 30 minutes before show time while there are still empty seats all around and see if everyone fights for the same seats or if people actually choose different spots.

Viewing your TV at your chosen distance is the very same principle as picking a row at the movie theater. Some like their vision filled with screen, some do not.

And beyond this visual-field-fill preference -- for lack of a better term -- there are things like decor, physical space, importance of the TV, etc. that dictate sizes for people regardless of where the couch is. I had a friend who was able to move the couch within a range of about 6-8 feet. He also bought a 50-inch plasma because that was the largest diagaonal, smallest TV that could be found. Those were the constraints in the system -- not some page 124 of a TV manual. Welcome to the real world.

For what it's worth, I'm a back-of-the-theater guy. I like 2 screen widths between me and the screen and don't mind a bit more. That's not to say I never sit on the floor or move a chair, but it is to say I have about 12 feet from the screen to the couch in the new place, and am looking in the 60s for a TV.


Good post, and I completely agree.

That being said, if you want some general guidelines for viewing distance, here is a calculator that you can use (just type in the screen size and format and you are set):

Viewing Distance Calculator (http://www.myhometheater.homestead.com/viewingdistancecalculator.html)

Note that the THX "recommended" viewing distance for a 56 inch screen is only 6.3 feet! :eek:

I am considering a 67 inch set, and my viewing distance will be near 14 feet. The THX recommended distance is 7.5 feet, with a max recommendation of 10.5 feet.

In my main HT, I have a 123 inch screen, and I am 14 feet from it in the front row, which is perfect for me....so clearly you "can" sit much closer than what many here are planning on. But, as Rogo stated, this comes down to personal choice.

I'm having a problem with my HLR 4667 - when I turned it on yesterday, the display was white with dark vertical pinstripes about an inch apart. The audio was ok. Turning the set off and then on did not clear the problem, but unplugging the unit did.

Anyone else have this problem? Possible firmware upgrade needed?

Did it look like the attached picture (lines don't have to be white)? This is usually indicative of a failure in the DMD drive board.

Robert

After many months of waiting I finally received word today from Samsung that my new HLR5688W has now shipped and is in transit to me here in upstate NY. I called the shipping company that they are using and verified tracking information which estimates a delivery date of between 7-10 days from now. Based on this excellent news I would say that others waiting for Captain Kirk's new 1080p pedastal masterpiece, including you TMSKILZ, should soon be hearing from the enterprise.

You got yours directly through Samsung?

Ok TVA has officially pissed me off. I might cancel my TVA pre-order. :mad:

aydn, here is what all of the HLRxxx8 sets can do as far as PIP goes. The chart is from the manual which is linked in post #1. :)
:) Thank you for that.

BTW nice stand.


Can anyone tell me which colomn is DVI?

Wasn't Samsung replacing his HLP set with a 1080P HLR set? That is why Samsung is shipping it to him.

anyone notice any lag in video games if you have recieved your tv yet, i want to buy the 6168 bad but if there is lag in video games then it would be stupid for me to get one considering i will mostly be using it for games

I don't understand why someone who pre-ordered a 5078 from TVA doesn't cancel his/her order and get it from Vann's. It's in stock.

aaronwt is totally correct. My new HLR will replace my defective HLP, which is being replaced directly by Samsung. I was only trying to pass along the positive news that these long awaited 1080p pedastal models are finally beginning to ship. There's absolutely no reason why TMSKILZ should cancel his pre-order. I doubt highly that any company is better than TVA when it comes down to the purchase of a new Samsung DLP. At least that's my .02.

TMSkilz,

Ya know I did a search on your model (5688) and the lowest price from 4 competitors returned was $700 more than TVA and did not have free S&H.

Patience is bitter but it's fruit is sweet - this may be someone that has paid a hefty premium to get it a few days early - that lowest price when adding Shipping makes TVA is about $900.00 less.

Would you rather wait a tad longer and save $900 or more? I know your anxious but TVA has no benefit in making you wait any longer than you have to as they are in business to make money. Also many of these on-line vendors play games with ship dates. TVA has no history whatsoever of playing games or making us wait as I followed their JVC PB back in the spring and their support/service was quite excellent even though several of the JVC's had QC issues TVA stood by their 5 star warranty.

Hang in there and you may save a grand or so, I know I'm with the 6768 awaiting ours later this month but the discount makes it worthwhile. Got my new Bello stand assembled over the weekend, awaiting my Sammy 950 HDDVD this week and YSP-1 Receiver and in placce and then the TV arrives hopefully end of month but I'll know I've saved about $1400.00 versus anyplace else I've found and no tax. Enjoy your new KirK :D

I wish there was going to be a HLR5068 but I suspect you mean HLR5078 yes? :)
Sorry. Yes I meant HLR5078. :o

I don't understand why someone who pre-ordered a 5078 from TVA doesn't cancel his/her order and get it from Vann's. It's in stock.


The price difference might have something to do with it :-)

As well as TVA's reputation, service, etc.

Pushstar thats great you are getting your 5688 in 7-10 days, however Samsung rarely if ever sales direct to the public...

TMSKILZ, no worries ! Yours should be on the way soon. We do our best to take care of our forum members.

TMSkilz,

Ya know I did a search on your model (5688) and the lowest price from 4 competitors returned was $700 more than TVA and did not have free S&H.

Patience is bitter but it's fruit is sweet - this may be someone that has paid a hefty premium to get it a few days early - that lowest price when adding Shipping makes TVA is about $900.00 less.

Would you rather wait a tad longer and save $900 or more? I know your anxious but TVA has no benefit in making you wait any longer than you have to as they are in business to make money. Also many of these on-line vendors play games with ship dates. TVA has no history whatsoever of playing games or making us wait as I followed their JVC PB back in the spring and their support/service was quite excellent even though several of the JVC's had QC issues TVA stood by their 5 star warranty.

Hang in there and you may save a grand or so, I know I'm with the 6768 awaiting ours later this month but the discount makes it worthwhile. Got my new Bello stand assembled over the weekend, awaiting my Sammy 950 HDDVD this week and YSP-1 Receiver and in placce and then the TV arrives hopefully end of month but I'll know I've saved about $1400.00 versus anyplace else I've found and no tax. Enjoy your new KirK :D

HEY WESTA THANKS FOR THE INFO & WORDS OF ENCOURAGEMENT.

yEA I SUCK @ BEING PATIENT. I SEE A LOT OF PEOPLE GETTING THE 950 HDDVD, CAN YOU TELL ME MORE ABOUT IT? I'M IN THE MARKET FOR A DVD PLAYER BUT EVERYONE SUGGESTS DVD PLAYERS FROM A-Z, HARD TO DECIDE. NEED ONE WITH HDMI & DOE A GOOD JOB ON STANDARD DVDS & WILL WORK GREAT WITH MY 5688.

I got the Samsung 950 because I already bought a 32" Sharp LCD FP 3 months ago that goes into the bedroom when the 6768 arrives and I view alot of HD on it and my Sony progressive DVD has gotten rather boring looking.

HD on my Sharp is amazing - the Samsung has the ability to upscale and get rid of letterbox effects and plays advanced CD Music also. While it's not Blu-Ray I know how great 720 and 1080i looks on my Sharp and the Samsung 950 should be able to equal it and get rid of the letterbox. You can get some pretty good info on it at the Samsung website or at Vann's where I'd preordered mine with free S&H and I should have it within the next few days.

Also, it comes with it's own HDMI DVI cables so you don't have to buy any for this if the length meets your needs.

Vann's has alot of the 1080P sets but their price cannot come close to the PB when I last checked. But TVA has the 950 also last I saw. Good Luck :)

It's only $100 more than TVA, and Vann's has an excellent reputation.

HLRxxx8 sets don't have a DVI input but they do have 2 X HDMI inputs.

I noticed in the xx78 manual that the #2 HDMI input is labeled 'HDMI (DVI)', while the #1 HDMI input does not have this 'DVI' designation. Does this mean anything? The manual suggests that the #2 input would be using a DVI --> HDMI cable, e.g., from a Comcast stb to the tv. The #2 HDMI would then be used to connect to an up-converting DVD player. Make sense?

And my my 2 cents on the size business. It is indeed a personal thing; mine is for the 'big screen' effect, i.e., pretty close to the '1.5 x diagonal' HD design goal. So I will be going for 71" at ~ 10 ft. But I certainly have no criticism for anyone that prefers it differently.

I got the Samsung 950 because I already bought a 32" Sharp LCD FP 3 months ago that goes into the bedroom when the 6768 arrives and I view alot of HD on it and my Sony progressive DVD has gotten rather boring looking.

HD on my Sharp is amazing - the Samsung has the ability to upscale and get rid of letterbox effects and plays advanced CD Music also. While it's not Blu-Ray I know how great 720 and 1080i looks on my Sharp and the Samsung 950 should be able to equal it and get rid of the letterbox. You can get some pretty good info on it at the Samsung website or at Vann's where I'd preordered mine with free S&H and I should have it within the next few days.

Also, it comes with it's own HDMI DVI cables so you don't have to buy any for this if the length meets your needs.

Vann's has alot of the 1080P sets but their price cannot come close to the PB when I last checked. But TVA has the 950 also last I saw. Good Luck :)

Interesting. yeah I was just @ the Vanns site, HD950 it's $189 + FREE S&H, it beats TVA price by $5.07 (TVA price $194.06)

I think I'll go with the SAMSUNG DVD-HD950 to complement my 5688.

(Posted in the owners thread, but thought it might be relevant here as well).

Fry's in San Marcos, CA (Northern San Diego) had the HL-R6168W on the floor if anyone wants to see it. Price was about $900 more than the powerbuy. Ouch!

Only had a few minutes to look at it, I had cold groceries in a hot car, but it was beautiful (HDNet 1080i signal).

This was the only 1080P set they had on the floor.

I noticed in the xx78 manual that the #2 HDMI input is labeled 'HDMI (DVI)', while the #1 HDMI input does not have this 'DVI' designation. Does this mean anything?
I think it means that there is an analog sound (RCA) input associated with HDMI #2. I assume that if both HDMI ports are connected to HDMI sources the TV would receive sound through the HDMI connection.

I use a separate sound system so I run the sound through digital cables directly to my AV receiver.

In the future you may be able to run all your HDMI input (audio and video) to a AV receiver, and then one HDMI cable the TV. That would be a cleaner installation than my current rat's nest.

There shouldn't be any problem connecting two DVI devices to the "68", "78", and "88" HDMI ports if you are using a separate AV receiver for sound.

(Posted in the owners thread, but thought it might be relevant here as well).

Fry's in San Marcos, CA (Northern San Diego) had the HL-R6168W on the floor if anyone wants to see it. Price was about $900 more than the powerbuy. Ouch!

Only had a few minutes to look at it, I had cold groceries in a hot car, but it was beautiful (HDNet 1080i signal).

This was the only 1080P set they had on the floor.

nice! Did you change your wet pants or you still have them on after seeing that HD image?

I went ahead & ordered the SAMSUNG DVD-HD950 off of VANNS. I basically have everything I need for my HTS except the 5688!

(Posted in the owners thread, but thought it might be relevant here as well).

Fry's in San Marcos, CA (Northern San Diego) had the HL-R6168W on the floor if anyone wants to see it. Price was about $900 more than the powerbuy. Ouch!

Only had a few minutes to look at it, I had cold groceries in a hot car, but it was beautiful (HDNet 1080i signal).

This was the only 1080P set they had on the floor.

Thanks! i'll try to take a look when i visit

I have had a HL-R4667W set now for a few weeks. One thing I have noticed lately is what I would call a splotchiness in the picture for mostly solid color objects. It is mostly seen on SD DirecTV channels when solid color objects are in somewhat low light. However the effect is still there for DVD source and to a much lesser extent HDTV DTV channels.

It looks like the pixels are quite large and somewhat visible. Almost as if shades of colors for a solid color object are limited on a small scale. As the brightness for a solid object changes across the surface, clear breaks are seen rather than a smooth color scale.

I have two other HD sets in the house and they do not show this effect. One is an older Mits set and the other a new JVC.

Any ideas?

Ed

whoops :D i meant to put that. Anywhere from Santa Barbara down to Sandiego- so, Southern CA

Wow, quite a span of distance still. :confused:

Anyway, the only place I am aware of in Orange County, CA is at the Anaheim Fry's Electronics. There were some reviews posted earlier that stated they really didn't have the unit set up well yet (i.e. no ability to see it with DVD etc.) and only had a rabbit ear style HD antennae inside a steel building. So it is not the best viewing place, yet. They may improve things a bit, but this is no specialty store that will allow you to hook up your X-box.

I have been calling about 10-15 other stores in the Orange County area with no success so far. Will let you know if I see an alternate choice to the Fry's in Anaheim.

TV Guide owns all sorts of patents on on-screen guides through the Gemstar merger. Not only is there nothing regarding subsidizing going on, it's the other way around. And, no, it ain't going away with 2-way CableCard.

I thought Gemstar lost that patent. Echostar sued them and won, right?

I'm really leaning toward a getting the Sammy 1080 over the JVC (partially due to impatience and the start of the NFL season).

Here's is my request:

I need to find/hire a pro installer to consult with me on the components I want to get (I get them wholesale so I won't be buying for the installer and I am limited to certain, reputable brands). I have a difficult situation with regard to wiring my rear surround speakers. I have to go into the walls and ceiling.

I want to make sure I get the best match of components, the right wiring and wall boxes and have some guidance if not hire someone to do the actuall install.

I know this is not the right thread for this so any redirect would be appeciated.

Thanks,

RM34, frustrated HT neophyte.

What I think I'm getting:

Sammy 6168 or 6768
Marantz 8500 or HK AVR 635
Marantz DVD7600 or Sammy HD950
Marantz or Universal Remote
Bell O' or similiar cabinet

I have already

Energy 5.1 XL front, center, surround, sub
DIRECTV HD-DVR (Tivo) receiver
Mits High end VCR

Power Buy Question?

Now that TVA has started delivery on the 6168, how long will the Power Buy last for that model.

I know that I asked this question before, but the answer seemed to be relative to all the models, not just the 6168.

Any ideas?

You might have better luck in an owners thread for the HLRxx67 models. Try here:


Samsung HLRxx67W Owners Thread --- 720p DLP HDTV (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=537675&page=1&pp=30)

Now that TVA has started delivery on the 6168, how long will the Power Buy last for that model.
Why not use their 800 niumber and ask them?

I think a lot of posters are getting antsy and somewhat agitated now that some forum members are receiving their TV's or at least a Shipping Soon type notice and as a result are quick to switch retailers / dealers / installers / what have you, and/or get mad at a company because they're not shipping right away etc.

To anyone in this boat I must say you're acting somewhat childish, you've waited this long, why not wait a little longer? As an above poster stated "patience is a bitter and sweet fruit". I'm actually thankful that some people are getting their tv's before mine because that way they can check everything out and answer any questions that arise.

Now speaking of questions. If the issue you are about to ask about has already been covered in Post #1 OR talked about heavily in the thread please, please, do NOT post about it. Simply because we all know about these issues already, if and when someone gets their TV I'm sure they'll post a review and answer questions at that time. Just trying to stop some of the noise or filler posts that are starting to crop up such as "so video game lag..." or "how does it look with XYZ video connection?" or "what warranty did you get?".

I understad we'll all a little testy, but please try and excersise some restraint and kindess towards others when posting. I suggest keeping an eye on UCSB's Owners thread as well. I have them both on subscription and any new updates are forwarded to my inbox, and put in the "AVS Forum" folder automatically.

I believe this expression fits this situation well.

Good things come to those who wait.

- D

htwaits: I may call them. I just thought that someone may already have the answer. I will probably wait a week or so and see if I have any other questions after we start getting a few reports from people who actually have received the new 6168.

Thanks.

htwaits: I may call them.
A good idea even if someone in the forum has the answer. I like to get that kind of information from the horse. ;)

Surprised to see so many quotes on prices.

I thought that was against forum rules?!

Now that TVA has started delivery on the 6168, how long will the Power Buy last for that model.
My understanding was that the PB ends 30 days from when ALL models are shipping. The only thing I'm not sure of is whether that includes all 68s, 78s, and 88s, which I think it does if this is a 1080p PB.

(Hey! Welcome to page 179!)

I stopped by Fry's Electronics today in Sunnyvale, CA and they did indeed have an HL-R6168W on display plus one in inventory at the store. The guy there said each Fry's received two of these sets, put one on display, and the other for sale. Hence if one of you in Northern CA feels really impatient, and doesn't mind paying the brick-and-mortar premium, you can drive home with the 61" 1080p tonight!

Not me. I can wait.

My thoughts on the 61" compared to the 50" I reviewed yesterday:
Chassis:
Nice looking. I like the floating screen (68 series). I think I like it better than the attached screen (78 series). I don't have a choice with the 67" but if I were going for a 61" or 56" which are each offered in both chassis, I'd pick the floating screen I think. One problem with the floating screen is that it looks like it only has one shelf in its stand while the attached screen has two. Not an issue for those who use a non-matching stand but I plan to buy the standard Samsung stand hence my gear will now be homeless I guess. Not sure what I'll do about that since most of my gear space is now being consumed by the monster TV!

Colors:
The colors were great, just like the 50". Put all the various sets around to shame. Better than the Mitsubishi 62" nearby, better than the older Samsungs, better than all the Sony LCD sets. Better than the tube TVs. The colors were really nice. This is all after I reset all the settings back to defaults instead of their screwed up levels. Always check the settings of a TV at a store before even really looking at it!

Brightness:
This 61" set had a similarly stunning level of brightness when compared to all the adjacent sets. Even after backing the Samsung down to "standard" instead of the maximum settings it still outshone all the other rear projection TVs. Only the tubes were brighter.

Sharpness:
Fine. No issues. Pretty much razor sharp. There was a baseball game on the TV and there was no blurring of anything even in fast motion (example: baseball pitch).

Contrast (& black quality):
I don't know if it was the lighting, the signal quality, or the bigger screen, but the black definitely didn't look as black as the 50" yesterday. Still okay and better than the nearby rear projections, but not as dramatic as the 50".

Pixelation:
Some issues here that were much more noticeable than on the 50". To some degree that is to be expected with the bigger screen. This is a tough one to call because I didn't have control over the program selection and couldn't really tell what it was (such is Fry's). The input signal was 1080i (per the TV's menus) but I think the channel or broadcast program was not actually anywhere near that resolution. I suspect I was looking at SD material over a 1080i configured component input. If so, the image was as good as one could expect for an SD image at 61". This was really the only item that caused me to pause a bit and think about how the 67", my baseline, was going to look.

Motion artifacts:
I did see a few problems here but I don't think they had anything to do with the DLP technology and probably not with the TV at all. I think they were the fault of whatever signal source/decoder they were using to generate and distribute the picture to 50 TV's.

Anyone seen a 67" on display in the SF bay area?

-Dan

p.s. - I ordered the 67" this morning on TVA plus the stand and Samsung 950 DVD. I better decide on the 67" vs. 71" soon!

Wow, quite a span of distance still. :confused:

Anyway, the only place I am aware of in Orange County, CA is at the Anaheim Fry's Electronics. There were some reviews posted earlier that stated they really didn't have the unit set up well yet (i.e. no ability to see it with DVD etc.) and only had a rabbit ear style HD antennae inside a steel building. So it is not the best viewing place, yet. They may improve things a bit, but this is no specialty store that will allow you to hook up your X-box.

I have been calling about 10-15 other stores in the Orange County area with no success so far. Will let you know if I see an alternate choice to the Fry's in Anaheim.

Thanks! i appreciate you helping me! yeah, i know it's still a lot of distance- i'm drivin all over CA to see my relatives. I'm leaving on wednesday early in the morning. And if i see any 67 inch tv's i'll be sure to let u guys know! (but then again you'll probably know by the time i get back anyway because i dont' get back till August 2nd)

are there any hopes for a 46" 1080p set?

I thought Gemstar lost that patent. Echostar sued them and won, right?

I don't know if Echostar won >>a<< case or not, but Gemstar / TVGuide owns plenty of IP and everyone pays them. Even DirecTV agreed to carry the TV GUide channel to end litigation between the parties.

are there any hopes for a 46" 1080p set?

No, not for this model year.

No, not for this model year.

not sure if a 4667w now is worth the money or a 4678 or 4668 next year is worth it? any comments?

I think it means that there is an analog sound (RCA) input associated with HDMI #2. I assume that if both HDMI ports are connected to HDMI sources the TV would receive sound through the HDMI connection.

I use a separate sound system so I run the sound through digital cables directly to my AV receiver.

With my current hlp I, too, send the audio directly from the Comcast stb and the dvd player directly to an AV receiver (and a surround system) and the video from them to the tv via HDMI (for the dvd) and DVI (for the stb). And I am planning to do this also with the 7178 I'm planning on getting. I was just wondering if there was any difference in the 2 HDMI inputs on the xx78 sets since they did have this different labeling. I presume that they will both work in the capacity I am planning to use them for.

For the one labeled HDMI/DVI, isn't that the input you use when you input stereo audio? Since there is a stereo audio input labeld DVI.

For the one labeled HDMI/DVI, isn't that the input you use when you input stereo audio? Since there is a stereo audio input labeld DVI.

I don't want to input any audio into the tv, only (digital) video from the stb and the dvd. The audio from these two I will send directly to the AVR and external speaker system.

not sure if a 4667w now is worth the money or a 4678 or 4668 next year is worth it? any comments?
This is my opinion--nothing more, nothing less.

Consumers are extremely lucky Samsung decided to manufacture a 50" 1080p set at all. I think Mitsubishi might be making a 52" as well, but those will probably be the smallest 1080p DLP's you'll see for a while. I personally would not hold my breath waiting for a 46" 1080p DLP. Anything can happen in a year, but to wait that long on the chance someone is going to go smaller with 1080p is a bad gamble, IMHO.

dgilley :cool:
Thank you for taking the time for doing the review - excellent - it seems we're getting a pretty good consensus as I've been copying and pasting each review into a running text file. As far as the blacks I would guess that toning down the settings may have impacted CR and thus blacks to an extent - imagine what we get with a professional calibration. The brightness is good news for me since I have southern exposure and 12' windows and that brightness will help overcome my well lit room and another reviewer stated the anti-glare screen was also very good.

Congrats on the 6768 order I'm waiting for mine and good news your comments on the floating version. I bought Bello 2363 stand with two shelves as I could not handle one shelf not holding everything and that one shelf is angled in such a way as not to provide much storage space which is probably why the stand is so inexpensive. The Bello cost me about triple the samsung but it's awesome looking, has plenty of room for my components and the 6768 dimensions should fit perfect after removing that lip.

My Yamaha YSP-1 AVR arrives this week and I need to spend some time studying how to connect everything to maximize surround sound and digital connections. Guess I may have to visit the AVR sections to figure out how best to implement HDMI, DVI, Toslink or component. I would guess the Toslink would give me digital sound. It appears there may be many of us that aren't clear on the connections and I have to figure out what's in charge - the TV, the AVR, STB? To maximze surround sound and digital capability. I'll keep reviewing and hopefully see how the first folks respond to their settings the next 2 weeks and learn from them.

Good Luck dgilley :D

dgilley :cool:

My Yamaha YSP-1 AVR arrives this week and I need to spend some time studying how to connect everything to maximize surround sound and digital connections. Guess I may have to visit the AVR sections to figure out how best to implement HDMI, DVI, Toslink or component. I would guess the Toslink would give me digital sound. It appears there may be many of us that aren't clear on the connections and I have to figure out what's in charge - the TV, the AVR, STB? To maximze surround sound and digital capability. I'll keep reviewing and hopefully see how the first folks respond to their settings the next 2 weeks and learn from them.



I'm in the same boat as you as far as trying to figure out how to max my Receiver & which connections are best.

I have an Onkyo TXNR1000 sitting here in it's box waiting for the 5688. I'm going to visit the AVR forum & see if I can find help.

dgilley -

You mentioned it was a 1080i signal, but from a SD station. I assume 4:3.

Could you comment more on how a upconverted SD station looked 'razor' sharp.
I just can't imagine that. Wombled sets are soft to begin with, and add to that softness due to the additional upconversion to 1080p.

I'm surprised as a couple of reviews mentioned the new 1080p sets where nothing special, and others see them as a next generation leap.

Well my Hlr5688 will FINALLY be getting here next week. I got the confirmation yesterday from the shipping co. After 4 months of waiting for this replacement set I sure hope that I will not be disappointed. I will contrast and compare when I get it.

looking to look at an xx68 before i plunk my cash down for a 6168. havent been able to find one to see at BB, PCR, CC on LI; anyone been lucky yet?

millerwill: it may be a better choice to run all of your signals (video and audio) through the TV first and use the TV's optical output to drive your audio receiver. The issue here is the so called "lip sync" that many of us are, perhaps, concerned with. If Samsung "locks" the audio with the video, in frame to frame conversion, then, there should be no "lip sync." But, to take advantage of this feature, if it really exists, you would have to get your audio from the TV, not the DVD, cable or satellite source.

I am interested to see/ hear what people actually do for their connections when the first get their new sets.

Just something to think about.

Originally Posted by htwaits
I think it means that there is an analog sound (RCA) input associated with HDMI #2. I assume that if both HDMI ports are connected to HDMI sources the TV would receive sound through the HDMI connection..

the hdmi connection with rca audio inputs are for when you are using an HDMI<->DVI cable to connect to a component that only has a DVI output, and dvi is video only, hence the additional rca audio outputs.

anyone in NJ order the 5688 yet ? if so what is the ETA on delivery ?

looking to look at an xx68 before i plunk my cash down for a 6168. havent been able to find one to see at BB, PCR, CC on LI; anyone been lucky yet?

Well I attended the HES2005 show held here a couple months ago @ the NY Hilton Hotel on 53st & 6ave.

I went to the Samsung Rm where they had all 3 1080p models on display. The 68 was awesome as were the other 2 models (88 & 78 series) everyone @ that show kept standing in front of the 68 series, PIC was awesome.

I went with the 5688 model myself, purely b/c I prefer it's design, it's PIC too was awesome. The way I see it Rich,m you really can't go wrong with either 3 models.

[QUOTE=westa6969]dgilley .

My Yamaha YSP-1 AVR arrives this week

Westa6969
Looking forward to your opinion on the Yamaha YSP-1. This is on my list also along with a 6168. Who did you order the YSP-1 from?

millerwill: it may be a better choice to run all of your signals (video and audio) through the TV first and use the TV's optical output to drive your audio receiver. The issue here is the so called "lip sync" that many of us are, perhaps, concerned with. If Samsung "locks" the audio with the video, in frame to frame conversion, then, there should be no "lip sync." But, to take advantage of this feature, if it really exists, you would have to get your audio from the TV, not the DVD, cable or satellite source.

I am interested to see/ hear what people actually do for their connections when the first get their new sets.

Just something to think about.

This will work well for those that happen to have their components relatively near the TV. Even though mine rack is somewhat near the TV, the only way I could get a toslink cable (which I think max out at 16 feet) from the TV to my receiver would be to have it running out in front of the TV, then behind it and plug in.

So I'm very very much hoping that the TV won't have a problem with the usual setup of video to the TV, audio to the receiver... I'd hate to have the comments "you spent XYZ on a TV and you still have to have cables running loosely in front of it? boo"

- D

Here's some required reading for those of you interested in the lip sync issue and are not subscribed to the Samsung HLR Lip sync thread: Lip Sync and Input Switching (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=5903658&&#post5903658)

It might not be the definitive solution, but, IMHO, it's sure interesting. (Of course you should continue the topic over there.)

millerwill: it may be a better choice to run all of your signals (video and audio) through the TV first and use the TV's optical output to drive your audio receiver. I am interested to see/ hear what people actually do for their connections when the first get their new sets.

Thanks much for replying. I thought, though, that if one ran the audio through the tv, and then on to the receiver, that you could not get 5.1 Dolby; I thought that the only way you could get this would be to run the audio directly from the stb and/or DVD player directly to the AVR via toslink. Please educate me if I've got this wrong.

Thanks much for replying. I thought, though, that if one ran the audio through the tv, and then on to the receiver, that you could not get 5.1 Dolby; I thought that the only way you could get this would be to run the audio directly from the stb and/or DVD player directly to the AVR via toslink. Please educate me if I've got this wrong.


From the 5668 manual:

"Digital sound can be output from the rear-panel connector on your TV. The digital sound output is an optical connector labeled “Optical Out”. After connecting an optical digital-audio component, you must specify the transmission format (Dolby or PCM, as appropriate to your digital audio component). See the owner's manual of your Digital Audio component for further information."

Well I attended the HES2005 show held here a couple months ago @ the NY Hilton Hotel on 53st & 6ave.

I went to the Samsung Rm where they had all 3 1080p models on display. The 68 was awesome as were the other 2 models (88 & 78 series) everyone @ that show kept standing in front of the 68 series, PIC was awesome.

I went with the 5688 model myself, purely b/c I prefer it's design, it's PIC too was awesome. The way I see it Rich,m you really can't go wrong with either 3 models.

Yes - saw it there, also and feel the same way. Big investment; I want to see a production model, although I guess if this goes on much longer I'm just going to buy

From the 5668 manual:

"Digital sound can be output from the rear-panel connector on your TV. The digital sound output is an optical connector labeled “Optical Out”. After connecting an optical digital-audio component, you must specify the transmission format (Dolby or PCM, as appropriate to your digital audio component). See the owner's manual of your Digital Audio component for further information."

Yet another positive benefit of the 1080 sets. Maybe they have figured out how to get Dolby to the AVR. Thanks to all the posts, I think I am near completion on how to route everything...and the good news is that almost all the cabling will be provided with each component!

Scott

Don't mean to quash discussion, but you all need to remember that one of the "What we DON'T KNOW so far" items in post #1 is:

6. Will 1080p sets support multichannel audio (5.1) on the HDMI inputs? 720p sets only support 2 channels and this prevents a multichannel pass through to a receiver. This is important to manage sync in some situations.

I have a lot of hope that the answer to the question above is yes, but we still don't know yet. What we do know is that 5.1 from over the air broadcast can be output through the optical out. Other audio is not certain.

Don't mean to quash discussion, but you all need to remember that one of the "What we DON'T KNOW so far" items in post #1 is:

6. Will 1080p sets support multichannel audio (5.1) on the HDMI inputs? 720p sets only support 2 channels and this prevents a multichannel pass through to a receiver. This is important to manage sync in some situations.

I have a lot of hope that the answer to the question above is yes, but we still don't know yet. What we do know is that 5.1 from over the air broadcast can be output through the optical out. Other audio is not certain.

Doesn't do any good to output 5.1 through optical if it won't process it as it's inputted....

From the 5668 manual:

"Digital sound can be output from the rear-panel connector on your TV. The digital sound output is an optical connector labeled “Optical Out”. After connecting an optical digital-audio component, you must specify the transmission format (Dolby or PCM, as appropriate to your digital audio component). See the owner's manual of your Digital Audio component for further information."

I suspect that only means that signals tuned by the internal tuner will have 5.1 capability. This has been discussed before, and I confess that the true answer for the HLR series might not have been concretely established, but I believe the conventional wisdom is that 5.1 signals will not pass through from digital input to optical out.

-se

The circuitry certainly appears to be there to process the audio. The only question is whether this is a HDCP issue associated with content protection.

millerwill: as some have already posted, the manual seems to indicate that 5.1 will be broadcast through the TV's optical output. However, we did discuss this a little further somewhere on this thread a couple of weeks ago. Someone mentioned that they thought that only the 5.1 derived from the internal turner would be broadcast. 5.1 over the HDMI into the TV would be broadcast as 2 channel. I don't recall the rationale for this. Perhaps whomever made that post could refresh our memories.

I don't know if this comment about 5.1 is accurate or not. That is why I am awaiting a few answers from people who get the new 68/78 sets. I would have hoped that a qualified Samsung rep could have answered this question. I seem to recall, somewhere on this thread, that one was asked the question at a show and was not able to give a satisfactory answer.

I read the "lip sync" thread and must admit that I am somewhat confused by the multitude of posts. Some people seem confused about their basic setup, their options, and how it should operate. Others seem to be having "real" problems. I'm beginning to wonder if some of the source material is being screwed up at the source. If so, there may not be much that the TV can do to correct for it.

After all of this is adequately and properly sorted out, I wonder if it would be appropriate and worthwhile to list a preferred setup of cable connections on post #1? At least that would give people a place to start from.

I think as far as 5.1 goes from what we know now because of the handshaking 5.1 probably does not get transmitted over hdmi to the tv. The tv needs to tell the device that it can output/accept a 5.1 stream. From what we have seen so far this does not happen. The documentation seems to say that if you use a cable card or OTA hd you can pass the 5.1 out of the optical output just fine.

So...does this mean HDMI implementation on the tv doesn't support reception of a 5.1 signal therefore it tells the dvd player or cable box not to send it or does this mean that all the cable boxes/dvd players out there do not support sending out 5.1 over the hdmi cable therefore no matter what the tv tells the box it only has the ability to send out the max of 2 channel audio.


After all of this is adequately and properly sorted out, I wonder if it would be appropriate and worthwhile to list a preferred setup of cable connections on post #1? At least that would give people a place to start from.


I plan on posting exactly that when I get my tv in every configuration that I have the ability to test on. But others will probably beat me to the punch.

The blurb someone excerpted from the 1080p manual is identical to the blurb regarding digital audio from the 720p (67 series) manual. So unless someone knows differently, I would assume they work the same. Which is that they will output dolby digital audio (like 5.1) if you can get it in the TV. It does output dolby digital audio received over cable or OTA broadcasts. As far as I know that's the only way. With HDMI there is apparently a protocol where the sending device determines what the receiving device wants, which apparently is 2 channel audio for these Samsung TVs.

By the way, the Samsung manual blurbs for recommended viewing distances are the same for the 1080p and 720p sets. Identical for the sizes that are common between the two.

Jon

I just tossed my hat into this ring - bought a HLR4663W this weekend, open box at CC. Got an open-box high-def DVD player by LG, too. I'll see if I can get it hooked up this week...if not, then next week in the new house. Then I can start pitching my 2 cents in around here.

I just read the little mini review from the guy who seems to be the first to own a HLR6168 (at least from AVS) and he seems quite happy with it, eeeek I want mine now! *cries* why won't my installer return my emails? *glare*

- D

So...does this mean HDMI implementation on the tv doesn't support reception of a 5.1 signal therefore it tells the dvd player or cable box not to send it ...
Based upon what I've read so far, I agree with jlk_250 that 5.1 can't be input via HDMI because the TV doesn't "ask for" more than 2.0 input via HDMI.

or does this mean that all the cable boxes/dvd players out there do not support sending out 5.1 over the hdmi cable therefore no matter what the tv tells the box it only has the ability to send out the max of 2 channel audio.
I haven't yet done my research on typical STB specs and features, but I'd swear I saw a post recently about someone who figured out how to force their DVD player or STB (not sure which) to send 5.1 despite the TV telling it to send 2.0 ... I'll try to dig that up and confirm one way or the other later tonight.

The blurb someone excerpted from the 1080p manual is identical to the blurb regarding digital audio from the 720p (67 series) manual. So unless someone knows differently, I would assume they work the same. Which is that they will output dolby digital audio (like 5.1) if you can get it in the TV. It does output dolby digital audio received over cable or OTA broadcasts. As far as I know that's the only way. With HDMI there is apparently a protocol where the sending device determines what the receiving device wants, which apparently is 2 channel audio for these Samsung TVs.

By the way, the Samsung manual blurbs for recommended viewing distances are the same for the 1080p and 720p sets. Identical for the sizes that are common between the two.

Jon
I don't have the 68 manual yet but lets not confuse Dolby Digital with 5.1 channels. They are not the same. DD can be as little as .1 only, 2.0 or any combination of the 6 channels.

If there is a handshake between the sender and receiver that sets the number of channels, and the TV only requests/deals with 2.0 then we are stuck trying to do passthru via HDMI.

Also what makes us certain that OTA 5.1 can be output via the optical out vs 2.0 DD?

dgilley -

You mentioned it was a 1080i signal, but from a SD station. I assume 4:3.

Could you comment more on how a upconverted SD station looked 'razor' sharp.
I just can't imagine that. Wombled sets are soft to begin with, and add to that softness due to the additional upconversion to 1080p.

I'm surprised as a couple of reviews mentioned the new 1080p sets where nothing special, and others see them as a next generation leap.



It was actually a 16:9 image. But it clearly was not 1080 or 720 resolution because of the pixelation.

Just because an image shows some pixelation does not mean that it isn't "razor sharp". In fact, one of the ways people try to soften the pixelation is by turning down the sharpness of a TV. And the reason why DLP has such a pixelation problem is precisely because it is so sharp compared to the other display technologies. Defocus (blurring), due to the basic display technology or some image processing algorithm, definitely helps with pixelation but with serious other negative impacts on the image quality. The best display is perfectly sharp but has very good image processing algorithms to only soften the edges with large color differences. Algorithms like this are common technology these days and these Samsung sets definitely include something like this. You don't want to blend everything equally but it is important to blur the hard edges on a lower resolution image.

So the 61" 1080p had very good sharpness, like pretty much all DLP sets do. In the case of the particular image I was watching it had some pixelation that was not completely resolved by image processing and I was attempting to theorize why that would be without having enough information about the signal source. I think this needs a more controlled test where the viewer knows exactly what they are looking at.

-Dan

Based upon what I've read so far, I agree with jlk_250 that 5.1 can't be input via HDMI because the TV doesn't "ask for" more than 2.0 input via HDMI.

I haven't yet done my research on typical STB specs and features, but I'd swear I saw a post recently about someone who figured out how to force their DVD player or STB (not sure which) to send 5.1 despite the TV telling it to send 2.0 ... I'll try to dig that up and confirm one way or the other later tonight.

I am relatively new to all of this (waiting for 6168 in powerbuy), but saw this in the SA 8300 DVR User Guide...

--------------------------------------------------
IMPORTANT NOTE REGARDING THE HDMI INTERFACE

Some HDTVs do not contain circuitry to decode Dolby Digital formatted content. If you connect your DVR to an HDTV that cannot support DD audio, the HDMI interface instructs the DVR to switch its audio outputs to 2-channel PCM audio. In this case, all digital audio outputs on the DVR are formatted as 2-channel PCM. As a result, you will not be able to receive DD or DTS audio on your home theater system when connected to either the optical or coax S/PDIF ports. You can avoid this by overriding the automatic configuration through the General Settings menu and switching the audio output to Dolby Digital.

IMPORTANT: If your HDTV cannot decode DD formatted content and you have configured the DVR to output in the DD format, you will not be able to listen to audio through the TV.

Yikes - this latest topic really has me worried.

Its definitely true that there is some image latency (time between when an image is received at the input and when it is displayed on the screen) in some modes on all these sets. And that latency varies from TV to TV, and depending on the input type, input resolution, progressive vs. interlaced, and even based on mode selections like digital noise reduction, etc. So there are lots of variables that will cause differences in the latency.

If that latency in negligible, I'd say less than about 0.1second, we can ignore it and pretend there is no latency. Traditionally this is what we have all done when we split the audio from the video and run them along different paths through our AV systems.

But what we are seeing now is that the latency of these sets is tending to increase to more like 0.25 seconds. Once it reaches these levels, it is very noticeable to most people. With this level of latency, it is critical that the audio and video stay on the same path (go through the same pieces of equipment) and that each piece of equipment make sure that the sound stays aligned with the video. Hopefully they have done that in these Samsung TVs so the TV itself doesn't skew the sound and video (or we are hopelessly screwed). Note that this latency does hopelessly screw the video game players once it gets above about 0.1 seconds and there is no way around it except to make serious design changes to the TV (faster processors, less processing, etc).

Given all this, it has been my plan to use HDMI into the TV (thus keeping the video and sound together) and the digital audio out to forward that sound back to my AV receiver. The AV receiver introduces negligible latency from its digital audio inputs hence this would work okay.

BUT! If what people here are saying is true, and that the Samsung sets only send 2 channel stereo out that digital audio output even if the HDMI source is 5.1 dolby digital, then this hook-up scheme will not work. That will be a major bummer because it will force us all to run our audio separately to the AV receivers and it will be out-of-sync with the video based on whatever latency the Samsung set introduces. Let's hope that latency is very small?!

Like I said. YIKES!

-Dan

Finally, got my 6168W yesterday. The delivery guy dropped it off in my garage.

The box is easy to open and the TV is not that heavy (2 people can easily lift it).
The wife was very happy (Phew!! what a relief!!).

The TV is connected to a Dish Network 810 over DVI. I watched some SD and HD content last night and here are my first impressions. This is my first HDTV and it is very exciting..

1. The SD content over DVI will only show with black sidebars. The SD looks ok with some blurry edges in the image. The brightness and contract are very good. The colors look stunning.

2. The HD content (1080i) looks awesome. I can't make out any pixellation or wobulation artifacts (if there are any). I was sitting about 12 feet away and the picture is just beautiful. No rainbows.

3. The sound is very crisp and clear.

4. The remote is simple but why did they have to put that ugly TV Guide logo on it? Is samsung so strapped for cash that they need to get money from TV Guide??

I am going to try some DVDs (LORT, Star wars) tonight using my Oppo player.

All in all, this looks like the beginning of a "beautiful friendship"...

Yikes - this latest topic really has me worried.

...

But what we are seeing now is that the latency of these sets is tending to increase to more like 0.25 seconds. Once it reaches these levels, it is very noticeable to most people. With this level of latency, it is critical that the audio and video stay on the same path (go through the same pieces of equipment) and that each piece of equipment make sure that the sound stays aligned with the video. Hopefully they have done that in these Samsung TVs so the TV itself doesn't skew the sound and video (or we are hopelessly screwed). Note that this latency does hopelessly screw the video game players once it gets above about 0.1 seconds and there is no way around it except to make serious design changes to the TV (faster processors, less processing, etc).

...
Like I said. YIKES!

-Dan
The only way you can really solve the problems is the faster processor route. In other words no detectable latency in any of the pathways. If not then you can insure that we can't use these sets for gaming at all, as the game player cannot be slowed down (at least to my understanding).

So while you may be able to set delays on the source devices or even the SR processors and TV's, each introduces additional problems or only deals with its sphere of influence. This will be a consumer nightmare.

Yikes - this latest topic really has me worried.

Its definitely true that there is some image latency (time between when an image is received at the input and when it is displayed on the screen) in some modes on all these sets. And that latency varies from TV to TV, and depending on the input type, input resolution, progressive vs. interlaced, and even based on mode selections like digital noise reduction, etc. So there are lots of variables that will cause differences in the latency.

If that latency in negligible, I'd say less than about 0.1second, we can ignore it and pretend there is no latency. Traditionally this is what we have all done when we split the audio from the video and run them along different paths through our AV systems.

But what we are seeing now is that the latency of these sets is tending to increase to more like 0.25 seconds. Once it reaches these levels, it is very noticeable to most people. With this level of latency, it is critical that the audio and video stay on the same path (go through the same pieces of equipment) and that each piece of equipment make sure that the sound stays aligned with the video. Hopefully they have done that in these Samsung TVs so the TV itself doesn't skew the sound and video (or we are hopelessly screwed). Note that this latency does hopelessly screw the video game players once it gets above about 0.1 seconds and there is no way around it except to make serious design changes to the TV (faster processors, less processing, etc).

Given all this, it has been my plan to use HDMI into the TV (thus keeping the video and sound together) and the digital audio out to forward that sound back to my AV receiver. The AV receiver introduces negligible latency from its digital audio inputs hence this would work okay.

BUT! If what people here are saying is true, and that the Samsung sets only send 2 channel stereo out that digital audio output even if the HDMI source is 5.1 dolby digital, then this hook-up scheme will not work. That will be a major bummer because it will force us all to run our audio separately to the AV receivers and it will be out-of-sync with the video based on whatever latency the Samsung set introduces. Let's hope that latency is very small?!

Like I said. YIKES!

-Dan

Just adjust the audio delay with the reciever.

A couple months back, when the HDMI not passing 5.1 audio problem surfaced, I sent an e-mail to Toshiba customer service, asking if their HDMI inputs would accept 5.1 audio. They responded back that they didn't think any manufactures had this capability. This does not appear to be a Samsung unique problem.

So, from all the comments above it seems clear that the only way we KNOW that 5.1 sound will be achieveable is to send the audio directly from the source (stb or DVD) to the AVR, by-passing the tv. We'll have to see whether or not that induces psynch problems.

But note that the Comcast 6412 stb outputs only DVI (not HDMI), so that one will be connecting it to the tv via a DVI-HDMI cable, and that presumably canNOT carry audio at all. So one will HAVE to send the audio from the stb directly to the AVR for this source; right?

So one will HAVE to send the audio from the stb directly to the AVR for this source; right?
Right. :)

I only plan on using hdmi for the dvd player. My Panasonic has an audio delay option built in that I've read works just fine in this configuration with the new 720p samsung tv's. I'm going to use component out and optical out from my cable box (SA 8300HD) to my processor, then one component out to the tv. A while ago someone posted that they did not encounter any delay with this setup but with HDMI out of the cable box they did. I know that HDMI can technically pass the 5.1 signal, but it doesn't seem any current implementation does.

Everything I've read about using DVI or HDMI out of a cable box indicates that you don't get any better picture than with using component output. The only reason I'm using HDMI from the dvd player is to take advantage of the upconversion.

Finally, got my 6168W yesterday. The delivery guy dropped it off in my garage.

All in all, this looks like the beginning of a "beautiful friendship"...

This means you graduate to the owners thread Lucky Dogs (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=559872) Start doing the tests and answering the question we all been waiting for. :eek:

I don't have a lot to add to what others have reported above, but I too have finally seen a Sammy 1080p, the hlr 5078 (like everyone else), at the Magnolia HiFi in Santa Clara. This is really a superb display room; there were all sorts of Sammy and Mits 720p sets, as well as the Sony Qualia 06. HD heaven!

Anyway, I too liked the 5078 very much (I will not repeat the excellent reviews already presented above). I did play with the Contrast (white level) and Brightness (black level) a bit, based on experience with my hlp6163. (I also verified that, just like on my 6163, the Sharpness setting seems to have no effect on anything, so I set it to 0). I turned the Contrast up to 80 to 90, and the Brightness down to 45 to 50; these are what I've come to on my 6163, and they also seemed to do well with the 5078. On 'Standard' setting the picture is as bright as anything I could ever conceive of wanting; I think the 'Movie' setting (similar to the 'Cinema' setting on the xx63's) will be quite bright enough in most rooms with not too much light.

The 5078 is the smallest 1080p screen size, though, so I think it is good that it comes across as so bright, for the 56" and 61" sets have the same lamp. I think it's also good that the 67" and 71" sets will have a more intense lamp. So these larger sets should also be quite bright, and hopefully we want have to wait too long to verify this with our eyeballs.

I don't have the 68 manual yet but lets not confuse Dolby Digital with 5.1 channels. They are not the same. DD can be as little as .1 only, 2.0 or any combination of the 6 channels.

Also what makes us certain that OTA 5.1 can be output via the optical out vs 2.0 DD?

You are right of course. I was being a little sloppy because I wanted to convey "multichannel greater than two channels" rather than say 5.1. Anyway, since I have seen my HLR5067 output something between 2.0 and 5.1 so I'm assuming it can do 5.1 if any network ever broadcast 5.1.

Jon

I've got the HL-R6168W on pre-order and I'm looking for a DVD player. Any recommendations between the Oppo or the Samsung 950 would be appreciated. I plan on running the DVD player audio to a receiver.

Also, I plan on getting the TR61X2 stand, but it will not hold all my components (Directv receiver, DVD player, and audio receiver). It looks like there should be enough room to sit the directv receiver on the floor below the shelf.

Thanks for all the informative posts. I've been using this forum to research DLP's for the past year.

Just what we need, another message about screen size!

I've been putting off making a decision between the 6168 and the 6768 for some time now for my 16 foot viewing distance (though the kids often sit considerably closer). I'd love to go for the larger size, but the $1300 difference has been my hang up. Anyway, I just got the call from TVA that they are ready to ship me the 6168 if I'm ready (order was placed 6/6). So, to help me make a decision I've used office paper to replicate the screen sizes (61" in white, 67" in blue) and have hung this in back of my 32" Proscan. Either way it looks like I'll be pretty happy with the increase in screen size!

I've taken pictures at 10', 12', and 16' (respectively) feet away in the event that they might help anyone else in a similar situation.

So, from all the comments above it seems clear that the only way we KNOW that 5.1 sound will be achieveable is to send the audio directly from the source (stb or DVD) to the AVR, by-passing the tv. We'll have to see whether or not that induces psynch problems.

But note that the Comcast 6412 stb outputs only DVI (not HDMI), so that one will be connecting it to the tv via a DVI-HDMI cable, and that presumably canNOT carry audio at all. So one will HAVE to send the audio from the stb directly to the AVR for this source; right?
NO

That's why one of the HDMI inputs is also label DVI. It has a seperate audio input that in theory matches the two signals in the set. Hopefully keeping them in synch.

I only plan on using hdmi for the dvd player. My Panasonic has an audio delay option built in that I've read works just fine in this configuration with the new 720p samsung tv's. I'm going to use component out and optical out from my cable box (SA 8300HD) to my processor, then one component out to the tv. A while ago someone posted that they did not encounter any delay with this setup but with HDMI out of the cable box they did. I know that HDMI can technically pass the 5.1 signal, but it doesn't seem any current implementation does.

Everything I've read about using DVI or HDMI out of a cable box indicates that you don't get any better picture than with using component output. The only reason I'm using HDMI from the dvd player is to take advantage of the upconversion.
Until someone trys the HDMI 1080i feed on a true 1080P set we don't have any idea how it will work with the synch issues. Keep in mind all the comments out there are for HDMI signals to a 720 set. If they are sending 1080i (or anything other than 720P) then the TV is going to be busy with all the processing. We are hoping that a simple deinterlace from 1080i to 1080p in the TV will happen fast and in that case no delay between the signal and the picture, and hence no synch delays since the AVR's have no delays of any notice.

With component you are doing a bunch of DA/AD and that has to worsen the issue.

Somebody with a DVD player that can put out 1080i HDMI (like the SS DVD HD 950) needs to try this asap. If I had my 5668 this is the first item on my list.

NO

That's why one of the HDMI inputs is also label DVI. It has a seperate audio input that in theory matches the two signals in the set. Hopefully keeping them in synch.

So I would connect the Moto stb to the tv via DVI--> HDMI (the one also labeled 'DVI'), and then also connect a toslink for the audio from the stb to the tv, and then a toslink for audio out of the tv to the AVR? And that would produce 5.1 surround sound (assuming, of course, that that is what the source produces)?

I do agree with someone's suggestion above, namely that when all the dust settles on this series of questions, that we encourage UCSB to provide a list of recommended connections in his 'master post' on pg 1.

ccouper, that will only give you stereo sound out from the TV. If that's what you are looking for no problem. If you want 5.1 sound from the STB then you will have to send it to the AVR.

millerwill, there is no digital audio input to the sets except via HDMI.

I've been using this forum to research DLP's for the past year.
That's great. Now cut out using the "Color" tag. :)

At least don't use yellow. Some of us are using the "white" option and your "yellow" can't be read.

[QUOTE=WannaBinHD] Anyway, I just got the call from TVA that they are ready to ship me the 6168 if I'm ready (order was placed 6/10). QUOTE]

Crap my preorder for the 6168 was placed on 6/7 and I haven't received a call yet.

You should be hearing from them soon Aaron. Hang in there!

Re: 5.1 via hdmi.

I recall reading somewhere in these bizillion messages that the 1.0 version of hdmi only passes stereo, while the 1.1 version passes 5.1 digital. Then the question would be does Samsung implement the newer 1.1 hdmi interface.

Re: 5.1 via hdmi.

I recall reading somewhere in these bizillion messages that the 1.0 version of hdmi only passes stereo, while the 1.1 version passes 5.1 digital. Then the question would be does Samsung implement the newer 1.1 hdmi interface.

I highly doubt that these new Samsung 1080p sets with implement the HDMI 1.1 interface. My Onkyo TXNR1000 will soon release a modular card to slide in the back that will support HDMI 1.1 @ an extra cost I would presume, wish Samsung had copied Onkyo using some form of modular card system to allow for future proof compatibility. :(

I highly doubt that these new Samsung 1080p sets with implement the HDMI 1.1 interface. My Onkyo TXNR1000 will soon release a modular card to slide in the back that will support HDMI 1.1 @ an extra cost I would presume, wish Samsung had copied Onkyo using some form of modular card system to allow for future proof compatibility. :(

According to the block diagram, the Samsung 1080p use a SiI9021 which is HDMI 1.0 compliant only.

block diagram (https://svartifoss2.fcc.gov/prod/oet/forms/blobs/retrieve.cgi?attachment_id=528328&native_or_pdf=pdf)

SiI9021 (http://www.siliconimage.com/products/product.aspx?id=19&ptid=1)

ccouper, that will only give you stereo sound out from the TV. If that's what you are looking for no problem. If you want 5.1 sound from the STB then you will have to send it to the AVR.
That is true. Only stereo analog inputs. No digital sound. :(

68 back panel pics from post 1 (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/attachment.php?s=&postid=5554765&fullpage=1)

Just what we need, another message about screen size!

I've been putting off making a decision between the 6168 and the 6768 for some time now for my 16 foot viewing distance (though the kids often sit considerably closer). I'd love to go for the larger size, but the $1300 difference has been my hang up. Anyway, I just got the call from TVA that they are ready to ship me the 6168 if I'm ready (order was placed 6/10). So, to help me make a decision I've used office paper to replicate the screen sizes (61" in white, 67" in blue) and have hung this in back of my 32" Proscan. Either way it looks like I'll be pretty happy with the increase in screen size!

I've taken pictures at 10', 12', and 16' (respectively) feet away in the event that they might help anyone else in a similar situation.

At that distance, it is a no brainer: Go with the 67 inch set.

I think you are much more likely to regret buying the smaller set than you would be paying $1200-1300 more for the larger one.

At 16 feet, that seemingly huge TV becomes much smaller!

Here's a quick set of facts on HDMI: HDMI FAQ Sheet (http://www.hdmi.org/consumer/faq.asp)

It's an easy read (scroll down about 10 paragraphs), but for those without the time:
1. HDMI has supported multi channel audio (up to 8) from the start.
2. Most HDMI TV built to date only support 2-channel audio over HDMI.

Guess we'll have to wait and see what Samsung has done for the 1080p sets.