THE SONY SERVICE CODES - Articles, Comments, Discoveries [Text View] - Page 12

amazin

11-17-08, 02:21 PM

I assume you're also in "PRO".

Anyway, 8,9,9,6 are the Sony defaults (for the XBR960, anyway). They cause the "red push"... not resolve it.

Most people have changed these values (with slight differences among them), but they also depend on your settings for color axis, color temp, color/hue in the user menu, etc., in terms of what is the "recommended" set of values to use other than these defaults.

My own are 13,15,5,4, which go with PRO, color axis = default, color temp=cool, color=31, hue=0:

VITAL » 7 RYR 0-15 13 (8)
VITAL » 8 RYB 0-15 15 (9)
VITAL » 9 GYR 0-15 5 (9)
VITAL » 10 GYB 0-15 4 (6)

Yes I apologize. I just figured this out on my own that the numbers I put in were the same as the "special axis color"(default) therefore there would be no change. Too much tweaking on my part and not willing to leave well enough alone. I do like the look with these settings but I have gone back to RYR 14, RYB 14, GYR 6, and GYB 4 for the "monitor" color setting, I use these with the warm temp for movies and everday use but I have to admit I do like the other settings better for some games but I was using the neutral temp as I didn't really see a difference from the cool temp.

Thanks for your help anyways.

ziimen

12-01-08, 08:32 PM

I've a 34" KV-HS420, 3 years old. Maybe it's time to upgrade if anything size wise.... but picture has been great on this "old" crt.

I adjusted the geometry on hdmi the other day, since I started using my laptop as a media center.

The geometry turned out very well (2170D etc.) but there's one little thing that I wonder if it can be helped. When displaying a crosshatch pattern, white lines on the black background - verticals and horizontals, all the horizontal ones are good but vertical ones aren't the best. Lines are thin enough. Verticals would, going from one side to the other, start as white then slowly turn greenish then slowly go back to white then back to greenish and then white. Kind of a wave white-green-white-green-white pattern if you know what I mean.

Off hand, could anyone suggest a service menu group/parameters to adjust to get this right. Is it a focus problem? Or a color setting?

Mind you, this is not a huge issue, could just be a CRT inherent problem. Whites are otherwise displayed nicely on the greater-than-a-thin-vertical-line white areas.

Thanks!

SomeDouche

12-05-08, 12:03 PM

Guys, excellent thread, used the service menu to fix all the overscan and other issues i had with the TV. Only 1 single issue remains. The left side of the display, id say the left 4-5" or so, is blurry and out of focus compared to the rest of the display. Is there anything i can do in the service menu to fix it? TV is a KV-34HS510 btw.

ziimen

12-05-08, 08:13 PM

SomeDouche

12-06-08, 02:29 PM

@SomeD
Try checking the very first page of this thread, with the ToC, look for focus references. Otherwise, here's several direct links to relevant posts with instructions and patterns.

Dynamic Focus
http: //www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=5497529&&#post5497529
Patterns
http: //www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=5522658&&#post5522658
http: //www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=5648357&&#post5648357

Good luck!

Thanks for the tips! I tried all of those settings, but nothing really changed, it got a TAD sharper but its still really out of focus compared to the rest of the picture. Perhaps i should mention i am running 720p into the DVI port if that matters?

fahrenheit

12-08-08, 06:49 PM

I'm having some trouble with my HR36 (European equivalent to the XBR910).

The problem relates to 720p at 50Hz, so I'm not sure how much help you wise 60Hz-landers will be, but here goes...

720p60 signals display perfectly, but as soon as I playback a 720p50 signal, the TV switches to 480i and the picture loses vsync and shows static noise.
1080i (fortunately) is perfect at 50Hz as is 576i/p.

I'm not sure where to start with troubleshooting this because I can't work in 720p50 mode to do any adjusting (since the TV defaults to 480i as soon as 720p50 content is played).

I will look at uploading a video demonstration if it makes things easier.
Any suggestions on where to start looking would be much appreciated.

JimPV

12-15-08, 12:38 AM

fahrenheit

12-15-08, 12:51 AM

CRTs can't do 720p (at least mine can't - ;) ). Right?

Technically no, but I don't want to turn this into a debate about that.
The Sony CRT's are capable of accepting a 720p signal.

JimPV

12-15-08, 11:10 AM

The Sony CRT's are capable of accepting a 720p signal.
Hmm, did not know that. As a novice (and I'm genuinely curious, not being a smart-aleck), why would you want to output a 720p signal to it?

KyoDash

12-15-08, 03:12 PM

fahrenheit

12-15-08, 03:41 PM

Hmm, did not know that. As a novice (and I'm genuinely curious, not being a smart-aleck), why would you want to output a 720p signal to it?

For gaming and the preservation of framerate.

1080i can only resolve 30 whole frames per second (or 25 for 1080i 50Hz). This means that a game that runs natively at 720p 60fps needs to be truncated if it is output by the console to 1080i.
If your display doesn't accept a 720p signal, or changes a 720p signal to 1080i, then this point is moot. However, if your display (like my Sony) changes 720p to 540p, then framerate is preserved at the cost of resolution.

Same thing applies to TV broadcasts. In New Zealand we have broadcasters using 720p and others using 1080i. I currently have to tell my set top box to output 1080i (since 720p 50Hz results in rolling static). This of course means that sports events broadcast at 50fps are going to be signifcantly marginalised. I'd rather set the STB to pass-thru so that it can let my TV do the scaling.

fahrenheit

12-15-08, 03:51 PM

In the UK the Samsung SlimFit 409 and 419 can scan 720p natively. They do 480p/720p and 1080i native. You can tell 720p is native due to the lack of flicker in the display and the similar look it has to 480p in terms of solidness. Horizontal test pattern shows no interlacing.

No it does not do 720p natively. Infact the Slimfits can't even resolve anywhere near 1080i.
Sony's Super Fine Pitch tubes are the closest consumer level HD CRTs to 1080i on the market (well the second hand market now).

Like my Sony, you are seeing a progressive image with a 720p signal (540p resolved), but you aren't acknowledging the step-down in resolution.

JimPV

12-15-08, 05:25 PM

1080i can only resolve 30 whole frames per second (or 25 for 1080i 50Hz). This means that a game that runs natively at 720p 60fps needs to be truncated if it is output by the console to 1080i.
If your display doesn't accept a 720p signal, or changes a 720p signal to 1080i, then this point is moot. However, if your display (like my Sony) changes 720p to 540p, then framerate is preserved at the cost of resolution.

Same thing applies to TV broadcasts. In New Zealand we have broadcasters using 720p and others using 1080i. I currently have to tell my set top box to output 1080i (since 720p 50Hz results in rolling static). This of course means that sports events broadcast at 50fps are going to be signifcantly marginalised. I'd rather set the STB to pass-thru so that it can let my TV do the scaling.
Okay, I think I'm following you. You want your set to accept the 720p signal from your game console and scale it to 540p (not 480i, which it's doing automatically), so framerate will be preserved (albeit at the cost of resolution).

fahrenheit

12-15-08, 05:31 PM

Correct. Although the part in brackets where you mention 480i has me baffled.

JimPV

12-15-08, 06:12 PM

Correct. Although the part in brackets where you mention 480i has me baffled.
A reference to you saying:

"...as soon as I playback a 720p50 signal, the TV switches to 480i and the picture loses vsync and shows static noise."

fahrenheit

12-15-08, 06:35 PM

A reference to you saying:

"...as soon as I playback a 720p50 signal, the TV switches to 480i and the picture loses vsync and shows static noise."

Ah right, I'm with you now.

480i just seems to be the default mode when the TV isn't receiving a signal it can sync with.

I will try to get my video uploaded so that I can demonstrate what is happening

NextGen

12-16-08, 09:24 PM

For gaming and the preservation of framerate.

1080i can only resolve 30 whole frames per second (or 25 for 1080i 50Hz). This means that a game that runs natively at 720p 60fps needs to be truncated if it is output by the console to 1080i.

I think "truncated" is too harsh of a word because we still get half the line resolution of detail from each frame of the game. An example would be Gran Turismo 4 for the Playstation 2. Each frame of the game is matched with each field of the tv, so while you do only get 30 full frames you are still getting the benefit from the game running at 60fps.

At least I think I got that right. lolz

GlenC

12-16-08, 09:49 PM

For gaming and the preservation of framerate.

1080i can only resolve 30 whole frames per second (or 25 for 1080i 50Hz). This means that a game that runs natively at 720p 60fps needs to be truncated if it is output by the console to 1080i.
If your display doesn't accept a 720p signal, or changes a 720p signal to 1080i, then this point is moot. However, if your display (like my Sony) changes 720p to 540p, then framerate is preserved at the cost of resolution.

Same thing applies to TV broadcasts. In New Zealand we have broadcasters using 720p and others using 1080i. I currently have to tell my set top box to output 1080i (since 720p 50Hz results in rolling static). This of course means that sports events broadcast at 50fps are going to be signifcantly marginalised. I'd rather set the STB to pass-thru so that it can let my TV do the scaling.The 1080i is interlaced Odd lines are drawn, then even lines.... 30 times a second each...540 odd then 540 even = 1080 lines. A 720p signal is rescaled, not truncated, then interlaced. The rescaling may create some some issues, but 1080 lines still beats 720 lines. The major issue with CRT TVs is the size of the spot beam isn't small enough to resolve more than the 540 lines. Trying to display 720p would cause the odd and even lines to overlap resulting in a softening of the image. On a properly focused CRT RPTV, generally 9", you can start to see the scanlines (voids between lines), but not on a DV CRT.

fahrenheit

12-16-08, 11:47 PM

At least I think I got that right. lolz

Almost.

For your example of Gran Turismo 4 its true, but that game is the exception, not the rule.

Game developers generally avoid field rendering (both fields belonging to different frames) and opt instead to have the hardware draw both fields from the same full frame. This means that if a frame is dropped, the end user will simply see it as lag. If field rendering is used it has to be at a solid, unshakable framerate otherwise the image would go straight to hell if incoming and outgoing fields suddenly didn't match.

Sadly there is just not nearly enough talented game devs out there like Polyphony who can push a solid 60fps on the hardware.

fahrenheit

12-16-08, 11:58 PM

A 720p signal is rescaled, not truncated, then interlaced.

I'm with you on the "rescaled" part, but the "then interlaced" part doesn't quite wash.

My understanding is that DV CRT's that are capable of accepting a 720p signal will do one of two things (depending on the individual display).

A: Rescale to 540p but remain progressive.
B: Interlace and rescale to 1080i.

I believe the Sonys fall into catagory A.

NextGen

12-17-08, 06:05 PM

fahrenheit

12-17-08, 06:25 PM

So what does all this mean in regards to an XBR960 or my XS955? I always thought these sets could render 1080x1440 interlaced but, what about 720p? Are these sets taking the 720p image and resampling or scaling it down to 540p or do the sfp sets actually render 720p? Cause I sure do see a big difference from 480p to 720p.

No my sfp set does not render 720p. It does however resolve 1440x1080.
I mocked up these two jpgs for testing-

1080 - http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y64/faranheit/Beestripes1920.jpg

720 - http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y64/faranheit/Beestripes1280.jpg

These alternating black and yellow lines are a single pixel high.
With the 1080 res image I can clearly see each individual line. With the 1280x720 image its a smudged mess.

konicagray

12-17-08, 07:40 PM

I have an issue. I know, don't we all? Hoping someone will forgive my jumping right in to plead for help.

Driving the KV-34HS420 via HDMI with a DTV-HD box. At 480p/480i resolutions, all is well. At 720p/1080i, the image stretches vertically off the screen top and bottom, but not horizontally. I set service mode parameters throughout to factory ranges per Ken's supplied spreadsheet - did not have a baseline set of numbers, as I replaced the IP board late last year (fried inexplicably) and ALL the numbers were weird after that, but was using component inputs until recently. Help? Thanks!

raouliii

12-17-08, 09:07 PM

I'm with you on the "rescaled" part, but the "then interlaced" part doesn't quite wash.

My understanding is that DV CRT's that are capable of accepting a 720p signal will do one of two things (depending on the individual display).

A: Rescale to 540p but remain progressive.
B: Interlace and rescale to 1080i.

I believe the Sonys fall into catagory A.I believe the Sony DA-4 chassis, direct-view crts, fall into category B. The Multi-Image Driver (MID) handles the processing.

fahrenheit

12-17-08, 09:49 PM

I believe the Sonys fall into category B. The Multi-Image Driver (MID) handles the processing.

I think we can use 60fps footage to prove/disprove this either way.

keep in mind that in the space of time that 720p can display 60 whole frames (1 second), 1080i can only display 30 whole frames.

If the set receives 720p60 and then does a rescale to 1080i (as some are proposing), then there is going to be a significant hit to the overall smoothness of the footage.

I think with a camera with shutter control, it should be simple enough to capture some moments in time and compare them between my HD CRT and my multiscan PC CRT monitor.

Hmm, looks like I've got a new weekend project ahead of me.

primetimeguy

12-17-08, 09:59 PM

I believe the Sonys fall into category B. The Multi-Image Driver (MID) handles the processing.

Mine, KP-57WS510 converts 720p to 480p.

raouliii

12-17-08, 10:06 PM

From a Sony DA4 Chassis Training Manual:

"All video processing is performed on the B-board (DRC and MID processing).
The DRC circuit will double the horizontal frequency for input signals with 15.75KHz (NTSC) horizontal inputs.
The MID circuit will up-convert the horizontal frequency of the input signal to 33.75KHz, which is the scan rate of the DA-4 and DA-4X chassis. Table 5-2 shows the signal standard and its associate horizontal frequency.

Table 5-2 - Input Signal Standard and Horizontal Frequency
Input Signal Horizontal Frequency
Standard NTSC 480i 15.534KHz
High Resolution 480p 31.5KHz
High Resolution 720p 45KHz
High Resolution 1080i 33.75KHz

The following is a description of the signal flow for each standard listed in Table 5-2:
· 15.734KHz input: DRC circuit up-converts to 31.5KHz and MID circuit up-converters to 33.75KHz
· 31.5KHz input: MID circuit up-converts to 33.75KHz
· 33.75KHz input: XBR, HV pass through MID; HS bypass MID circuit
· 45KHz input: MID circuit down-converts to 33.75KHz

The difference between this set and a conventional set is the horizontal frequency, which is 33.75KHz as opposed to 15.75KHz scan rate in the conventional set. The 33.75Khz scan rate is considered a high definition horizontal scan rate."

raouliii

12-17-08, 10:11 PM

I believe the Sonys fall into category B. The Multi-Image Driver (MID) handles the processing.

Mine, KP-57WS510 converts 720p to 480p.Sorry. My statement was in relation to the Sony direct view crts (DA-4 chassis). I will edit my earlier post accordingly.

fahrenheit

12-17-08, 10:24 PM

From a Sony DA4 Chassis Training Manual:

Hmm, Mines an AX-1 chassis (model KV-HR36M31), so I'm not sure we are comparing apples with apples then.

raouliii

12-17-08, 10:39 PM

Hmm, Mines an AX-1 chassis (model KV-HR36M31), so I'm not sure we are comparing apples with apples then.I agree. I believe the DA-4 chassis began with the North American models, HS500/XBR800 and ran through the XBR970.

fahrenheit

12-17-08, 10:42 PM

Are those models Super Fine Pitch tubes? I recall Sony stopped using the SPF tubes at some point.

raouliii

12-17-08, 10:59 PM

I agree. I believe the DA-4 chassis began with the North American models, HS500/XBR800 and ran through the XBR970.

Are those models Super Fine Pitch tubes? I recall Sony stopped using the SPF tubes at some point.If I remember correctly, the XBR970 (newest model), along with all older models such as HS420, HS510, HS500, XBR800 don't have the sfp tube but the XBR960, XBR910 and XS955 do.

hitman25

12-18-08, 02:47 PM

Hello:

My 34xbr960 sometimes after I shut it off and try to turn it back on. It will blink 20 times(red light) and then not come on? Then if I let it sit for awhile it will just come on?? I know the code only goes up to 9 blinks so what is this?

fahrenheit

12-19-08, 05:01 AM

jdre

12-19-08, 02:17 PM

My 34xbr960 sometimes after I shut it off and try to turn it back on. It will blink 20 times(red light) and then not come on? Then if I let it sit for awhile it will just come on?? I know the code only goes up to 9 blinks so what is this?

Is that only if you turn it on immediately after shutting it off?

NextGen

12-20-08, 08:02 PM

No my sfp set does not render 720p. It does however resolve 1440x1080.
I mocked up these two jpgs for testing-

1080 - http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y64/faranheit/Beestripes1920.jpg

720 - http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y64/faranheit/Beestripes1280.jpg

These alternating black and yellow lines are a single pixel high.
With the 1080 res image I can clearly see each individual line. With the 1280x720 image its a smudged mess.

Thanks for the test pictures

hitman25

12-22-08, 09:40 AM

NO THE 34XBR960...only does this after it has been turnd off for maybe a couple of hours...it seems to have a problem turning back on..

natchie

12-28-08, 06:06 PM

Finally uploaded a video showing my issue. Its probably not going to give any helpful insight to where the fault lies, but hopefully it does a better job of explaining it than my muddled attempts.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6HX21hoAE_Q&feature=channel_page

I run through with 1080i first to show what should be happening.

Hi I have searched throughout the AVS and found this thread and while I am not sure if this is the right place, it is the most relevant I have found so far. :p
I inherited a Sony kv 20fs120 and it has a RGB component set in the back...but for some reason, it is not accepting it. I tested the component cable against my projector when connected to HD DVD player and Xbox 360 but when connected to the Sony, I get just unsynched scrambled darkness.

Is there a specific cable requirement? Yes I connected correctly. I don't have a remote for this tv but managed to navigate through its menu with front panel buttons.

Thanks for reading and helping out...:(

lcaillo

12-28-08, 06:11 PM

What resolution signal are you feeding it? IIRC, it would only accept 480i.

GanJahMan

12-28-08, 07:46 PM

Im having a big problem with my KV-34XBR800. I have used this thread to do my focus settings in the service menu, and everything is focused real nice. Im am having a problem with my 480P mode, I have a Sony progressive DVD player going to vid 5 via component cables. When I play a Widescreen DVD, the picture is just a small box in the middle of the screen. If I go into the TV menu under the "Screen" option I can set the picture modes under "Wide Mode" to "Full,Zoom,Wide Zoom,or Normal" When I use any of the settings, it will strech the picture across the screen, but with major letterboxing (like 4" on the top and bottom) If its set to "Normal" I get the small box in the center of the screen. I have a Xbox 360 going to the DVI connector on the TV, and using the same DVD in the 360, the picture is full widescreen, with just a 1/2" letterboxing on the top and bottom of the screen. Also, when using the 360 as the DVD player, I am not able to change the settings in the TV menu under "Screen", the options are greyed out. In the service menu it shows the TV is in 720p mode when watching DVD's on the 360, while the Sony DVD player shows 480p mode. So Im assuming the problem exists in the 480p service menus. I have the factory service menu settings PDF and when I look at the horizontal and vertical settings, they are the same as the PDF settings. Im not sure what setting was changed that affects this, if any. If someone can help I would greatly appreciate it.

I forgot to mention that when I set the Xbox 360 to 480p in its setup options, I get the same exact problem when watching a DVD. This is only in 480p mode, 720p and 1080i modes on the 360 display the DVD picture properly.

natchie

12-28-08, 08:21 PM

What resolution signal are you feeding it? IIRC, it would only accept 480i.

Right now, it is connected to the DirecTV HR-21 via composite. The format button on the DirecTV shows various signal settings, including 1080i, but that would not make sense. Just wondering why I cannot connect DirecTV component out to this Sony.

raouliii

12-28-08, 08:22 PM

... Im am having a problem with my 480P mode, I have a Sony progressive DVD player going to vid 5 via component cables. When I play a Widescreen DVD, the picture is just a small box in the middle of the screen. If I go into the TV menu under the "Screen" option I can set the picture modes under "Wide Mode" to "Full,Zoom,Wide Zoom,or Normal" When I use any of the settings, it will strech the picture across the screen, but with major letterboxing (like 4" on the top and bottom) If its set to "Normal" I get the small box in the center of the screen......Make sure the DVD player is setup for a 16:9 tv.

lcaillo

12-28-08, 09:23 PM

Right now, it is connected to the DirecTV HR-21 via composite. The format button on the DirecTV shows various signal settings, including 1080i, but that would not make sense. Just wondering why I cannot connect DirecTV component out to this Sony.

It is because you can only display 480i on the set and the output from the sat reciever is 480p, 720p, or 1080i. You have to have a 480i signal to display component on this set.

natchie

12-28-08, 10:20 PM

It is because you can only display 480i on the set and the output from the sat reciever is 480p, 720p, or 1080i. You have to have a 480i signal to display component on this set.

Thanks for reviewing. Guess at this point, it does not seem possible to make use of it. What would be a typical source of 480i signal? And also, at this point, does it matter for me to be concerned?

Dr_EluSivE

12-31-08, 10:04 AM

Hello, I have a 30xs955 and i have noticed recently that news crawls and other horizontal lines tend to go uphill from right to left, on both the top and the bottom. It looks like the whole picture needs to be rotated a few degrees. I have tweaked this tv before and made blacks and colors look better, but i havent messed with geometry. Does anyone know if there is an option in the menu for Rotation? and if so what it is called?

Thanks!
Dr.

raouliii

12-31-08, 11:14 AM

NextGen

01-05-09, 07:30 AM

I know this is an old thread but, I finally got around to completely re-learning all this stuff and completely recalibrating my set from geometry to color and beyond. I have corrected and/or alleviated much of the geometry errors I've had, used HCFR and an Xrite i1 Display 2 connected to a tablet PC to set grayscale, color, etc. I had an interesting finding I wanted to share and a question I wanted to ask.

The Finding.
Setting Light Output at Y=100.
I'd like to point out that, on my set at least, when trying to set contrast and black levels using the colorimeter sensor to achieve a light output of 100 Y(brightness) isn't as easy as point-and-shoot. With my 34xs955 every time you adjust Picture and Brightness you end up with a different brightness reading on the colorimeter when reading a 100% white window. I had to adjust the picture setting and brightness setting one notch at a time until I finally achieved proper grayscale tracking with a gamma of 2.2 and a light output of 100.

To explain this another way... If you put up a 100% white window then measure the light output and get say Y=102.5 then adjust your brightness to get .65 of that with a 10% window when you re-measure the 100% white window (without touching the Picture control) you might end up with Y=98.5 or some number other than 102.5. I had to continue to turn up the Picture control and recalculate until I finally ended up with a stable light output and, yes YLMT was at 3. I ended up with about Y=100.22 at 29.99ftl for the display. Sweet!

The Question.
If some of you, Dsperber, Ken, ADU, etc, had to pick only one set of settings for HD and one set for SD content would you set SYSM to 2 or 3 and what corresponding codes/image tweaks would go along with that if your sharpness slider stayed at 0?

I was watching The Matrix and noticed that with SYSM=2 and MHYL=3 and MHYE=3 really brings out texture detail but I'm wondering if there are other settings I should try to get a more pure picture. I have my sharpness slider at 0.

ADU

01-06-09, 07:05 PM

The Question.
If some of you, Dsperber, Ken, ADU, etc, had to pick only one set of settings for HD and one set for SD content would you set SYSM to 2 or 3 and what corresponding codes/image tweaks would go along with that if your sharpness slider stayed at 0?

I was watching The Matrix and noticed that with SYSM=2 and MHYL=3 and MHYE=3 really brings out texture detail but I'm wondering if there are other settings I should try to get a more pure picture. I have my sharpness slider at 0.It's been awhile since I posted here as well. I'd be glad to give a few pointers if I can though. The only inputs I use on my Sony 34XBR800 are DVI and Component at 1080i though, so I can provide some tips on adjusting the edge settings for HD signals. The SD settings are bit more involved, so I may not be as much help with those.

First thing I'd suggest is to start with the User Sharpness control at the middle setting rather than turning it all the way down to the lowest setting. Turning Sharpness all the way down will actually degrade the detail, rather than turning Sharpness "off" on the Sony HD tubes. If you don't like how Sharpness looks at the middle setting, then you can tweak the basic sharpening effect higher or lower for a given resolution/input/picture mode using the 2170P-3/SHOF Sharpness offset. If you want to go by the book there are some patterns that can be of some use in making this tweak, such as the horizontal luminance sweep, and edge-enhancement tests in DVE. Be advised though that these patterns can easily be skewed by the other myriad edge-filtering controls in the SM. So you may do just as well setting it by eye based on the amount of edginess you want in the picture as anything else. There are only four different settings for SHOF, so it shouldn't be that tough deciding which looks best to your eyes for a given input. Once you have SHOF adjusted, then you can tweak the User Sharpness control up or down as needed for different programming.

2170P-3/SYSM basically controls the coarseness of the Sharpness control. SYSM=3 provides the finest sharpening, and SYSM=1 provides the coarsest. I prefer SYSM=3 for both HD and SD sources to preserve the finest details in both types of signals. It may depend on your viewing distance though. There may be some benefit to using a coarser setting if your viewing distance is much greater than about 6 or 7 feet to the TV for example, because the ultra-fine details become harder to make out the farther away you get.

There is another 2170P-3 parameter that is also closely related to SYSM, called SHF0 (not the same as SHOF). SHF0 appears to act basically like a high-pass filter, filtering out ultra-fine detail from the picture. A setting of SHF0=1 turns this filter OFF, allowing the super fine details (or noise as the case may be) to pass through. This works sort of like a sub-SYSM control, giving one extra level of finetuning for the level of detail in the image. Filtering out the ultra-fine detail with SHF0=0 will tend to give the picture a bit more sense of depth and "looseness" (and some might say also a bit more harshness). While disabling it (SHF0=1) will tend to make the picture seem a bit flatter, tighter and more "computer monitor-like", if that means anything. I go back and forth on this control, so my advise is just to try it set both ways, and see which you prefer, and which may be less stressful for your eyes.

There are other edge controls in 2170P-3 worth investigating as well, including the VM controls. If you want me to get into those too, just say so.

MID5/MHYL and MHYE control the enhancement of luminance detail in a horizontal direction (ie the sharpness of vertical edges). These are part of a group of digital edge controls that effect luminance and color detail in either a horizontal and vertical direction. The other related controls in the grouping are MHCL, MHCE, MVYL, MVYE, MVCL & MVCE.

MHYE controls the amount of luminance detail enhancement in a horizontal direction. And MHYL controls how coarse or fine that horizontal luminance detail enhancement will be, with 3 being the finest setting. The other controls are paired up the same way. (Note that the coarseness control actually comes first in each case, because it makes sense to adjust that before deciding how much of a sharpening effect you want.)

MHCL = coarseness of horizontal color detail enhancement
MHCE = amount of horizontal color detail enhancement

MVYL = coarseness of vertical luminance detail enhancement
MVYE = amount of vertical luminance detail enhancement

MVCL = coarseness of vertical color detail enhancement
MVCE = amount of vertical color detail enhancement

To simplify things on my TV, I treat this group of parameters as though they were just two controls-- one for the overall coarseness, and one for amount of overall detail enhancement. I leave all the coarseness settings (MHYL, MHCL, MVYL & MVCL) at 3. And then just tweak all the "amount" parameters (MHYE, MHCE, MVYE & MVCE) up and down together like a single control. I would not be afraid to get a little aggressive with the amount parameters on SD sources, and softer-looking HD sources such as you might get from alot of upconverting DVD players (like mine). These filters can do alot to bump up the detail in such sources, giving them a much more HD-like appearance. Settings as high as 5, 6 or even 7 are not out the realm of possibility here for MHYE, MHCE, MVYE and MVCE.

For higher quality HD inputs though (such as a Blu-ray player or HD broadcasts), you'll probably want MHYE, MHCE, MVYE and MVCE a bit more toned down, or perhaps even turned completely off.

Hopefully that'll get you started. If you want me to get a bit more into the nuts and bolts of these and the other edge filtering controls, just say so, and I'll try to break things down in more detail. Note also that if you had the "1080i scrolling bar fix" applied on your TV, then chances are the MID5 controls will have no effect on 1080i on your TV because the MID/DRC circuits are being bypassed for those signals.

NextGen

01-06-09, 08:38 PM

It's been awhile since I posted here as well. I'd be glad to give a few pointers if I can though. The only inputs I use on my Sony 34XBR800 are DVI and Component at 1080i though, so I can provide some tips on adjusting the edge settings for HD signals. The SD settings are bit more involved, so I may not be as much help with those.

First thing I'd suggest is to start with Sharpness at the middle setting rather than turning it all the way down to 0. Setting it to 0 actually degrades the detail, rather than turning Sharpness "off" on the Sony HD tubes.

Thanks for the response. I think I'm really starting to understand why someone would want certain components connected to specific inputs and each input and source having their own service mode "tweaks" applied. When playing video games there isn't as much signal degradation because things are rendered in real-time and sent directly to the TV. So, for my PS3 and 360 it would make sense to have a very flat unfiltered signal set to "Pro" mode. Then an enhanced and slightly filtered signal on something like "Movie" mode for watching Bluray or HD DVD. For my Dish I may want to use a different input with different enhancements for 2 or 3 modes. Some stations and some shows themselves look bad even in HD, so having different modes with different tweaks added could really be beneficial in getting the most out of the broadcast.

But honestly, I'm not that picky. I'm the most picky with Bluray and Video Games. So maybe I should have asked what settings in MID5 and 2170P-3 give the purest representation of a direct real-time source? I'm sure it's going to be enhancements turned off but, even with everything posted here I'm not positive as to which codes should be set to 0 or 1 or maybe another number such as 7 or even 3. And some codes can't be turned off or bypassed so we would need to set them at either the middle/neutral setting or least amount of enhancement. The strange thing is that even with no sharpness applied to the signal I still see slight differences when adjusting SYSM. For the longest time I left it at 3, but at the moment I have it at 2 and, unless it's my imagination, I do seem to like this setting better for the time being or until I put up some more patters and play around again.

For a pure signal, here is what I have right now but, I'm not entirely sure this is as pure as I can get.

21703-P
SYSM=2
VMLV=0
VMCR=0
VMLM=3(no effect if VM off?)
VMFO=0
VMDL=0
SHOF=0
SHFO=1
PROV=1
FILV=0
LTLV=0
LTLV=0
LTMD=0
CTLV=0
MIDE=63
VM=0
VMH=0
VMM=0
VML=0
VGAP=0
VGAS=0
VGAB=0
VGAC=0
VGAV=0

MID5
ALL CODES = 0 for group 63 which MIDE points to.

I had no idea setting sharpness to 0 degrades the detail in the Sony tubes. However, I have mine set to 0 and can't see any degradation. This could be that I just don't know any better or it could have something to do with a group of codes in my 34xs955 that some owners don't have. ENHA

ENHA is like getting an eye exam, as you manipulate the group of codes they interact with each other to take the picture in and out of focus. I simply tweaked mine until I got the sharpest picture. It's like going from 20/20 vision to 20/15 when you get the right setting.

ENHA
HSHP=0
HSFO=15
HPOR=0
HLTL=3
HLTM=0
HAPL=0
HAPA=0
HCTL=0
HCTM=0

Mike2567

01-06-09, 09:10 PM

Wow you guys are smart. Maybe you can help me.

My KW34HD1 used to sync to 480p now it won't. It's the first generation Sony HDTV and it still has the best gosh darn colors and contrast out there. Anyway I changed the DVD player. I'm now using the Samsung BD UP5000 dual format DVD player, set to 480p and unfortunately the signal wont sync. On the OP device submenu, item AFD=1. Any other menu items that would help this to sync? Other suggestions (other than a new TV)?

johnc_22

01-06-09, 10:17 PM

NextGen

01-06-09, 11:32 PM

raouliii

01-06-09, 11:39 PM

...I've spent a ton of time reading this thread over the past few days and finally took the plunge with setting gray scale...Did you perform actual grayscale calibration using drives and cuts, xDRV and xCUT? This is very difficult to do without a color analyzer. If you did adjust drives and cuts by eye, this may be contributing to your decoder issues below.
.....I have one question about setting color decoding properly.

In Pro mode, Neutral color, color Axis set to Monitor (and all other sliders a default/middle) I seem to have what I can only describe as "blue push". In other words, following the instructions I saw, I set RGBS to 1 (blue gun only) and then adjusted UCOF and UHOF to get as close as possible and wrote the settings. I then cycled through the red gun (adjusting RYR and RYB) and green gun (adjusting GYR and GYB). Red and green are almost perfect. No adjustment would make it better. When I return to the blue gun only, I see that blue and cyan stand out from the blue background and I seem to have no way to impact this. Have I gone wrong somewhere along the way? If it matters I'm running the Blu-Ray DVE on a PS3 running into HDMI/Video7.......UCOF and UHOF are parameters that are video mode and input dependent and are, IMHO, not a good place to start to set your reference color decoding.

A reference color/hue adjustment might be better conducted using global parameters such as 2170P-4,SCLO and SHUO. Then, SCOL and SHUE, which are input dependent can be used to fine tune other inputs.

RYR, RYB and GYR, GYB are the correct global settings for the rest of the color decoder adjustment.

BTW, global reference offsets for picture (contrast/white level) and brightness (black level) would be 2170P-4,SPIO and 2170P-1,SBRT.

ADU

01-07-09, 12:00 AM

ADU

01-07-09, 12:30 AM

I have a 34XS955.

I've spent a ton of time reading this thread over the past few days and finally took the plunge with setting gray scale and trying to fix red push as described by KenTech.

I think I've been pretty successful in both however I have one question about setting color decoding properly.

In Pro mode, Neutral color, color Axis set to Monitor (and all other sliders a default/middle) I seem to have what I can only describe as "blue push". In other words, following the instructions I saw, I set RGBS to 1 (blue gun only) and then adjusted UCOF and UHOF to get as close as possible and wrote the settings. I then cycled through the red gun (adjusting RYR and RYB) and green gun (adjusting GYR and GYB). Red and green are almost perfect. No adjustment would make it better. When I return to the blue gun only, I see that blue and cyan stand out from the blue background and I seem to have no way to impact this. Have I gone wrong somewhere along the way? If it matters I'm running the Blu-Ray DVE on a PS3 running into HDMI/Video7.

I'm not hugely concerned because red push is definitely gone and the picture looks so much more realistic than when I started messing with it. I'm just curious if there's some way to maybe make it even better.

What are your values for RYR, RYB, GYR and GYB? From what I've seen, the Sony HD tubes tend to be pretty consistent as far as the color decoders are concerned. And the settings should likely be somewhere around 15-15-7-4 for proper color decoding. You might try starting with those values, and then going back and forth between the UCOF color and UHOF hue adjustments until you find a combination that works well with the different RGBS modes.

raouliii also makes a salient point regarding the sub-hue and sub-color controls in 2170P-4. The default settings of 7 work pretty well on my TV for SCLO and SHUO, so I personally would not mess with those too much. However, if there's not enough range of adjustment in 2170P-3/UCOF and UHOF to achieve perfect alignment on the color decoders, then you can tweak the 2170P-4/SCOL and SHUE sub-controls to get some better control on UCOF and UHOF. 2170P-4/SCOL and SHUE should both be around 31 to start with. Some adjustment may be necessary to these controls to correct the color and hue levels on your video source though.

It probably goes without saying that the User Menu controls for Color and Hue should also be set at the middle settings.

Check the color settings on the PS3 as well, to make sure they're appropriately set, and not twisting the HD color space in some way.

...or you may want to check your color gamma settings. GAMS GAMR GAMG GAMB.

The gamma controls really only come into play when adjusting greyscale. They shouldn't have any effect on color decoding. And you probably wouldn't want to tinker with the individual gamma color components unless you have pretty good instrumentation, and notice an obvious issue with the greyscale that can't be resolved with the other basic greyscale controls.

ADU

01-07-09, 12:41 AM

I had no idea setting sharpness to 0 degrades the detail in the Sony tubes. This could be that I just don't know any better or it could have something to do with a group of codes in my 34xs955 that some owners don't have. ENHAPerhaps. My TV doesn't have an ENHA group, so maybe that's something that's only on the later or fine-pitch tubes.

Here's a test you can try though to confirm whether or not there is indeed some degradation in clarity at the lower Sharpness settings on your 34XS955. Try setting SYSM to 1, and then adjusting the User Sharpness control from high to low with a fairly detailed pattern on the screen, and see if you notice some excessive softening/blurring of fine details at the lower Sharpness settings.

The effect is more subtle with SYSM set to 2 or 3, but there is still a similar loss in detail at lower Sharpness settings with those modes on my TV. Which is why I recommend starting with the User Sharpness control at the middle, and finetuning the effect at that position with the 2170P-3/SHOF sharpness offset.

If you finetune all the other edge parameters on your TV with the User Sharpness set to it's lowest setting, then the control becomes essentially useless for tweaking different types of program content, because it can only be adjusted in one direction (upward).

ADU

01-07-09, 01:57 AM

What are your values for RYR, RYB, GYR and GYB? From what I've seen, the Sony HD tubes tend to be pretty consistent as far as the color decoders are concerned. And the settings should likely be somewhere around 15-15-7-4 for proper color decoding. You might try starting with those values, and then going back and forth between the UCOF color and UHOF hue adjustments until you find a combination that works well with the different RGBS modes.

raouliii also makes a salient point regarding the sub-hue and sub-color controls in 2170P-4. The default settings of 7 work pretty well on my TV for SCLO and SHUO, so I personally would not mess with those too much. However, if there's not enough range of adjustment in 2170P-3/UCOF and UHOF to achieve perfect alignment on the color decoders, then you can tweak the 2170P-4/SCOL and SHUE sub-controls to get some better control on UCOF and UHOF. 2170P-4/SCOL and SHUE should both be around 31 to start with. Some adjustment may be necessary to these controls to correct the color and hue levels on your video source though.

It probably goes without saying that the User Menu controls for Color and Hue should also be set at the middle settings.

Check the color settings on the PS3 as well, to make sure they're appropriately set, and not twisting the HD color space in some way.

johnc_22,

If none of the above yields the results you're after, then you may also need to tweak a couple controls in the the CXA.... group, namely CBGN, CRGN, YGN. These offset the color decoding for HD signals.

The best strategy for adjusting color decoding on these TVs is probably to get it locked down pretty well with an SD source first. Then tweak the CXA..../CBGN, CRGN, and YGN offsets as required to bring the color decoding of HD signals into the best alignment possible. Pretty much everything described above should work though, and at least begin to get you more into the ballpark.

ADU

01-07-09, 05:12 AM

Did you perform actual grayscale calibration using drives and cuts, xDRV and xCUT? This is very difficult to do without a color analyzer. If you did adjust drives and cuts by eye, this may be contributing to your decoder issues below.As with the Gamma controls, the RGB Drives and Cutoff controls really should have no bearing on the color decoding adjustment. The greyscale was screwed all to hell when I first set color decoding on my 34XBR800 and the decoders aligned just fine.

You want both the color decoders and greyscale set pretty accurately for the color to look it's best on the TV though. If you adjust one without also fixing the other then you've really only done half the job, and may actually be worsening the picture quality on the TV in some ways.

johnc_22

01-07-09, 02:32 PM

Lots of good advice here. I'm rechecking my gray levels as it just dawned on me the relationship that *DRV and *CUT have on gamma, and while there are probably lots of combination of the 3 *DRV settings and 3 *CUT settings that get close to 6500K, they need to be set close to the 2.2 gamma. I've ordered the Eye-One Colorimeter and will quit using the Spyder2 as it's better than my eyes but apparently not that great (unless I got a bad one and then it's worse). The HCFR software (free) is super-easy to use, and I'm breaking in a new 42" plasma for my bedroom that will need some calibration work as well so I think a better sensor will be a good investment (not to mention computer monitors, etc).

I'll try all the suggestions here. I should be able to work on color decoding without the new sensor given that's pretty easy to eyeball even in a lit room with the "one gun at a time" approach.

I'm mainly interested in getting the gray scale and color decoding as correct as possible and then tweak VIDEO5 and VIDEO7 as needed from the user menu. I want to set it and forget it. Even with the stumbling around I've done so far the image is MUCH better than when I started.

I did have to DIY replacement of the D Board in this set a few months ago (should have tried soldering the ICs myself but . . .). Would that impact the state of my television and color calibration?

Thanks again for all the great advice and help here.

lcaillo

01-07-09, 04:58 PM

Remember that your target is D65, not 6500K.

NextGen

01-07-09, 07:03 PM

I've ordered the Eye-One Colorimeter and will quit using the Spyder2 as it's better than my eyes but apparently not that great.

My Spyder2 did an ok job at setting my grayscale, the problem came when I tried color decoding. For the life of me, I thought I'd never get the secondary colors right. I don't think the Spyder 2 can see the color yellow, my eyes actually did a better job. As soon as I tried out the i1 not only could I set the secondary colors in less than 5 minutes but, I even got my grayscale better.

After that I just started over and redid the whole calibration with the i1 and all the small corrections I made with it ended up as a fairly drastic difference from what I had with the Spyder2.

You'll love the Eye One and I wouldn't be surprised if half your problem was the Spyder 2.

johnc_22

01-07-09, 07:49 PM

Did you perform actual grayscale calibration using drives and cuts, xDRV and xCUT?

Yes but I'll do it over once I get the i1 colorimeter.

A reference color/hue adjustment might be better conducted using global parameters such as 2170P-4,SCLO and SHUO. Then, SCOL and SHUE, which are input dependent can be used to fine tune other inputs.

Thanks - these got blue gun only much better and everything else fell into place. It's not 100% perfect but it's very, very close. Weird thing is my settings are not like anyone else's I've seen:

SCLO: 8
SHUO: 6
RYR: 11
RYB: 15
GYR: 13
GYB: 8

RYR, RYB and GYR, GYB are the correct global settings for the rest of the color decoder adjustment.

BTW, global reference offsets for picture (contrast/white level) and brightness (black level) would be 2170P-4,SPIO and 2170P-1,SBRT.

Thanks, all great info!

ADU

01-08-09, 03:05 PM

In Pro mode, Neutral color, color Axis set to Monitor (and all other sliders a default/middle) I seem to have what I can only describe as "blue push". In other words, following the instructions I saw, I set RGBS to 1 (blue gun only) and then adjusted UCOF and UHOF to get as close as possible and wrote the settings. I then cycled through the red gun (adjusting RYR and RYB) and green gun (adjusting GYR and GYB). Red and green are almost perfect. No adjustment would make it better. When I return to the blue gun only, I see that blue and cyan stand out from the blue background and I seem to have no way to impact this. Have I gone wrong somewhere along the way?

...Weird thing is my settings are not like anyone else's I've seen

Some variation in settings is certainly possible. But whenever I see inconsistencies or obvious errors in color decoding results, my first instinct is to suspect there's a problem or misadjustment in the color settings on the video source. I've tested probably a dozen or so different makes/models of lower-end DVD players, and have found decoding errors or other color issues on about 1/4 to 1/3 of them. Sony's HDMI players have actually been among the more reliable ones. But I've never checked the color on a PS3, so I can't offer much guidance on that. (And my surveys have been far from exhaustive, so it's possible there could be decoding errors on some Sony models as well, and I've just not run across them.)

IAC, If you have the SD edition of DVE or AVIA, and another DVD player, I might recommend using that to try to confirm your color decoder settings for RYR, RYB, GYR, GYB using the Component inputs at 480p (or 480i if it's not a progressive player). Use the RGBS function in the service menu to isolate the different colors with these as well, rather than using their color filters.

As far as 2170P-4/SCLO and SHUO are concerned... I'd probably leave those particular controls at their default values (which is 7 on my TV). And use the other sub-color/hue controls, such as 2170P-4/SCOL and SHUE, instead to make any necessary tweaks to the color and hue on the PS3's input that are needed in addition to 2170P-3/UCOF and UHOF... unless you find some compelling evidence to suggest a consistent pattern of error in the color/hue adjustments on the other inputs which seems to warrant a more overarching adjustment.

As raouliii mentioned, 2170P-4/SCLO and SHUO are global controls. And changing them alters the color and hue on every other input/resolution on the TV. So IMHO you really only want to tinker with those particular controls if you discover a consistent pattern of misadjustment in the color/hue settings on all of the other inputs on the TV. If you tweak SCLO and SHUO out of their default settings based on the readings on just one input or resolution, you could be needlessly complicating the color adjustment on the others.

There is also evidence to suggest that the HDMI and DVI inputs are not the most reliable place to start making such color tweaks on the Sony TVs. Maybe I'm wrong about this, but I suspect the pros would recommend starting with the Component inputs, using SD color decoder tests, and then sort of cross-referencing the results on those with other inputs/resolutions before tinkering with the global SCLO and SHUO color/hue adjustments. If you start making decisions on how to adjust the global parameters this early in the game, based solely on the PS3, I'm afraid you could potentially be opening an unnecessary can of worms that you'll regret later on when you try to adjust the color on other inputs.

As mentioned above though, color decoding and saturation errors are not that uncommon on lower-end DVD players as well. So before using another player to confirm the color settings you might want to poke around a bit and see if anyone's reported problems with the decoding on your player, and make sure the player's color and hue are properly adjusted. You might also want to see if there are any reports of errors on the PS3 as well, or other issues using the HD decoding tests on the BD edition of DVE (which I also haven't tried yet).

It's also possible that your particular TV is just a little funky, or that your model works a bit differently than some of the other Sony HDTVs. It's hard to know for sure. If you really want to resolve the issue though, then the first steps are probably to try to confirm the color decoder settings on some of the other inputs and resolutions, and try to track down any potentially source-related issues.

blwegrzyn

01-13-09, 05:56 PM

Hello, I just started to read this post and I am at page 21.
Sorry if I ask a question that has been asked.
I want to go through the raster settings as explained in the manual.
I am not sure what do they mean when they say:
2. Reduce HSIZ to see sides of raster. (See Figure A) I dont understand what the shape means?

Also , I would like to know which input and what resolution should I use for those adjustments?
Can I use patterns in the service menu for this? Should the raster be done in 480i normal?
Can I use 1080I?
My tv is kd30xs955

EDIT:
I forgot to say that I screw the geometry without saving factory settings.
Should I restore it to factory defaults before I start with raster and then geometry?

thx

below the procedure from the manual:

2-8. H RASTER CENTER ADJUSTMENT
Preparation:
• Input a monoscope signal.
• Set to NTSC (DRC) mode.
1. Set to Service Mode and adjust as follows:
NO. Name Control Function Data
05 AGNG AGING 1, AGING 2 2
NO. Name Control Function Avg. Data
02 HSIZ Horiz Size 31
01 HPOS Horiz Position 31
NO. Name Control Function Avg. Data
00 HBLK Blanking Enable 0
CXA2170P-2
CXA2170D-2
CXA2170D-3
2. Reduce HSIZ to see sides of raster. (See Figure A)
3. Adjust H-Center with CXA2170D-2.
4. Adjust to the best screen position with H-CENT and write data.
5. Restore aging, HSIZ and HBLK to original condition.

WJonathan

01-14-09, 12:39 AM

I forgot to say that I screw the geometry without saving factory settings.
Should I restore it to factory defaults before I start with raster and then geometry?

thx

below the procedure from the manual:

2-8. H RASTER CENTER ADJUSTMENT
Preparation:
• Input a monoscope signal.
• Set to NTSC (DRC) mode.
1. Set to Service Mode and adjust as follows:
NO. Name Control Function Data
05 AGNG AGING 1, AGING 2 2
NO. Name Control Function Avg. Data
02 HSIZ Horiz Size 31
01 HPOS Horiz Position 31
NO. Name Control Function Avg. Data
00 HBLK Blanking Enable 0
CXA2170P-2
CXA2170D-2
CXA2170D-3
2. Reduce HSIZ to see sides of raster. (See Figure A)
3. Adjust H-Center with CXA2170D-2.
4. Adjust to the best screen position with H-CENT and write data.
5. Restore aging, HSIZ and HBLK to original condition.

DO NOT use factory resets. It is bad.

"Raster" is hard to define verbally, but when you see it in action, it's understandable.

This was my method for setting the geometry on my XBR970, which should be similar enough to yours. It's a minimalist approach, but it helped me accomplish my basic goals without getting too bogged down in terminology.

"First, adjust H Raster Center. This is a universal adjustment that should be done before the resolution specific ones.
1.Go to 2170D 2 group and set HPOS and HSIZ to 31 each, or at least until you can see the sides of the raster. Then set HCEN (or HCNT).
2.Go to MID1 and reduce overscan and center. Resize to edge of raster. This is another universal adjustment group.
3.Back to 2170D-2 and set raster back out to screen edges.
4.Go to MID2 and set your scan sizes and centering. This group is resolution and input specific, so you'll have to do it for each available resolution with each group of inputs (see your TV back for groupings). "

blwegrzyn

01-14-09, 09:02 AM

When I start setting the raster (still dont know what it is) according to the instructions in the manual and I set:
Set to Service Mode and adjust as follows:
05 AGNG AGING 1, AGING 2 2
00 HBLK Blanking Enable 0

The screen becomes kind of grey (AGNG) and HBLK causes to show more on the right site. I still dont understand the term "raster"
My understanding is that raster is visible area in the screen. So after I set above I see:

black stripes this extra is added by HBLK
| | | | |
| | | | |
| | TV SIGNAL | | |
| | | | |
| | | | |
< is this a raster ? >

is the idea to place the visible screen from < to > in the middle by using HCNT?

thx

blwegrzyn

01-14-09, 09:04 AM

When I start setting the raster (still dont know what it is) according to the instructions in the manual and I set:
Set to Service Mode and adjust as follows:
05 AGNG AGING 1, AGING 2 2
00 HBLK Blanking Enable 0

The screen becomes kind of grey (AGNG) and HBLK causes to show more on the right site. I still dont understand the term "raster"
My understanding is that raster is visible area in the screen. So after I set above I see: see attached

is the idea to place the visible screen from < to > in the middle by using HCNT?

thx

WJonathan

01-14-09, 10:42 AM

The raster is sort of like the picture frame, and the MID1 settings are like the photo mounted on the frame. The idea is to first reduce raster to see its horizontal edges, then center it. Then you set the size and center the picture with MID1 as close to the raster edge as possible. Then you reset raster just past the physical screen border (slightly overscanned).

kevm14

01-18-09, 10:56 AM

Been working on my 36XBR400. I bought the Avia II DVD and it seems promising. One thing that annoys me is that my set is missing many options from the service menu that the final generation of HD CRTs got, like full RGB gamma, RGB saturation and focus. According to the gamma screen of Avia, my set is running around 1.6. But things don't look all flat, so I am confused. Also, I found out it has not only a red push but is down in the greens a bit. Blue was accurate. With no RGB saturation adjustment I was forced to play with random options. I found one called AXIS in 2150P-4 (option 7) that said it was for "Color matrix setting." 0-3 range and default of 3 across the board. I played with the settings and to my amazement, a setting of 1 brought down the red saturation to about perfect AND brought up the greens to where they should have been. Still need to tweak white balance. Neutral seems whitest but despite trying to use it, I keep coming back to Warm, especially at night under incandescent room lighting.

Paradigm_Shift23

01-26-09, 12:37 AM

One piece of advice: NEVER attempt to adjust settings in the service mode while under the influence of drugs or alcohol.

After about 2 weeks of studying this thread I felt confident enough to tinker around a bit and fix some overscan. I fiddled around with the geometry settings WITHOUT writing down the original values! That was stoner-mistake #1. I thought to myself, "Everything will be cool, I'll just hit 0, enter, to bring everything back to their original settings."

It turns out I hit MUTE, enter, after changing each individual setting. At the time I didn't realize I only had to write settings once, and not after changing each specific value. This was stoner-mistake #2.

Needless to say, I ended up with a geometric oddity of a television. It was kinda like the very first projector screen I built, which was a piece of vinyl stretched over a bunch of pizza boxes, except worse.

Thankfully, after 3 weeks or so of studying this thread my sets geometry is now acceptable, with only a slight bowing at the top edges.

The color is now near-perfect, the blacks are no longer crushed, red push is fixed, and it looks 'balanced' and pleasing to my eyes.

Xbox 360 games look stunning now, and HD channels are near-perfection. I watched X-Men 3 in HD earlier today and it looked better than it did in the theater.

I gotta say Thank You! to KenTech as well as everyone whos been contributing to this monster thread. Its been informative, albeit a little scary at times, but hey, no risk no reward, right?

PublicSectorTech

01-26-09, 09:11 PM

So, should we start with these test patterns in the service menu or should we try and calibrate as best we can with Avia/DVE first?

Fiveways

01-30-09, 11:49 PM

I hope this thread isn't completely dead. I have a Sony KV-40XBR800 and I went into the service menu to adjust some of the options because I noticed in my vista media center certain UI elements were being cut off. I got everything working properly but then realized that maximized browser windows on my tv were missing the bar @ the top and some info at the bottom. The BBLK fixed the bottom but when I adjust the TBLK value, when I put it down to 0 (which shows everything) there are like 3-4 huge black scanlines through the part of the picture that gets shown, any idea on how to fix this?

Joseph Dubin

03-04-09, 04:03 PM

So, should we start with these test patterns in the service menu or should we try and calibrate as best we can with Avia/DVE first?

I had a problem using the 960's internal cross-hatch pattern.

Using the cross hatch pattern from the old INHD (which is stored on my HD DVR) I was able to set the geometry properly. However, with these settings the 960's internal cross-hatch test pattern was extremely distorted. Re-adjustments based on the service pattern badly warped the picture (in fact, the 960's pattern could not be adjusted as precisely as the external one). So my own personal experience has been to use external sources.

BEZMan

03-11-09, 02:17 PM

Just to make sure we've got the terminology straight: The vertical displacement of color on horizintal white lines is called vertical convergence -- fixed with permanent magnets stuck on the backside of the CRT and hard to fiddle with, plus rotating magnets on the neck of the CRT. The "other" convergence (vertical lines have color fringes) is horizontal convergence, and there are elaborate service-mode adjustments for this in the D-CONV. See those manual pages referenced above in #1889 for decent documentation.

I have calibrated my set (grayscale and color), and it is wonderful.

Only, there is still a slight vertical convergence issue towards the bottom of the set (red is "above" the white horizontal line of test patterns). The more to the bottom, the worst. I do not feel like removing the back of the TV, and I am afraid a service tech may even screw it more ;-) [set still has 3 months of warranty left]

Any ways to perhaps tame that issue a bit through the geometry settings (some posters talked about the tilt or may be the focus)?

I adjusted the geometry before to tackle a nasty bowing on the left side on my set. I now looks a lot better than we I bought it. The red convergence issue was already there before the geometry fix though.

Thanx!

petesimac

03-12-09, 01:22 PM

Okay, so, I have a Sony 34XBR800, and still love my set. But as I am wont to do, I tweak everything in my life; my tv is no different. Thanks to many here, I've gotten my set to look pretty darned good! Sadly, because I'm an idiot, I don't have all the original settings. I wrote down some of them, but as I tweaked, I changed some values that weren't written down, and confused myself with bad hand-writing and incomplete entries (such as not signifying which source I was tweaking, whether it be wide-stretch 480i or p, 720p or 1080i.

Lately I've been trying to work on the geometery of my set and nearly panicked last night when something really funky happened, and I was unable to reverse the problem. Hours later, I have it as close to perfect as I can get it for now, but I would love all the original default settings (preferably of all values for all sources) just so I can revert to the original should I get really frustrated. I know it's asking a lot, but does anyone here have such a wealth of info? If not, is there someone who has an untweaked 34XBR800 who is not afraid to go into the service menu and jot down the codes. I'm not made of money, being a single (widowed) father of two kids and two dogs, but I could offer at least a couple of bucks for your trouble. Any help?

petesimac

03-30-09, 11:09 AM

Bump.

PublicSectorTech

04-08-09, 02:08 PM

To anyone who has a 36XS955 ... what do you have your focus set to on the service menu? I'm a little nervous to go in there without a plan, at least if I have your settings I should be able to get some idea of what I need from mine.

PublicSectorTech

05-04-09, 12:06 PM

Hey, just wanted to thank KenTech, GlenC and everyone for this thread, I had a great time this weekend tweaking around. My set looks a lot better without all the overscan.

Thanks again for all your help!

ADU

05-13-09, 01:59 PM

Okay, so, I have a Sony 34XBR800, and still love my set. But as I am wont to do, I tweak everything in my life; my tv is no different. Thanks to many here, I've gotten my set to look pretty darned good! Sadly, because I'm an idiot, I don't have all the original settings. I wrote down some of them, but as I tweaked, I changed some values that weren't written down, and confused myself with bad hand-writing and incomplete entries (such as not signifying which source I was tweaking, whether it be wide-stretch 480i or p, 720p or 1080i.

Lately I've been trying to work on the geometery of my set and nearly panicked last night when something really funky happened, and I was unable to reverse the problem. Hours later, I have it as close to perfect as I can get it for now, but I would love all the original default settings (preferably of all values for all sources) just so I can revert to the original should I get really frustrated. I know it's asking a lot, but does anyone here have such a wealth of info? If not, is there someone who has an untweaked 34XBR800 who is not afraid to go into the service menu and jot down the codes... Any help?I haven't kept very good track of the original settings on my XBR800 either. If there are specific things you need assistance with though, I can try to help with those.

As far as geometry goes, I've always found a ruler and the right kind of pattern helpful. I only fixed the geometry for 1080i on my TV though. (It definitely makes things easier when you only have one input and resolution to tweak. That's not very practical for most users though.)

tommy18

05-31-09, 05:06 PM

Hi I have a similar problem with my 5 Year old Sony KD-36XS955 with black lines covering the bottom half of the picture where the top part of the picture is "prefect". The lines started 1 or 2 inches from the bottom and increased to 1/2 way after a couple of days. The stand-by light blinks twice and repeats after 5 seconds. Please help with this failure service code means... Thx!

avnstf

06-17-09, 11:15 PM

back in time to my 2003 32HS500:

This unit has been serving me well, and has a 1080i screen size that is still suitable for my small viewing room...(not to mention really NICE display of good black and white DVDs of old movies)

But I don't know whether I just didn't notice it before OR the picture has widened enough that the things often displayed near the sides, like numbers on the right or a pattern on the left, don't quite make it onto the screen. Maybe this is what I've seen referred to as "overscan" that may or not be designed in.

Can anyone suggest what is likely to be going on, AND (perhaps) what I can do about it? (I have never made any adjustments to this TV other than those available on the remote through the normal menu...) And - if there is a way to make adjustments to fix this issue - please mention any pertinent cautions about trying to do it!

Thanks - Tony :)

TomGreen321

07-05-09, 11:53 AM

I'm finally done with my 30hs420(gaming TV). Last night I comletely redid all of my geometry and the raster from scratch and input NextGen's text file settings(except for colour and geometry settings) and I'm floored by the picture. I've been playing around with the set for over a year, and I finally saw those settings and they work perfectly, even on my set. Good Job.

timm23112

07-30-09, 05:29 PM

Hello,

I was lucky enough to find a 960 on Craiglist last week, I have been working on geometry and overscan in small doses and have made significant progress with what was already a decent canvas.

I cannot locate the correct adjustment to correct the following at the bottom right of the screen:

________________________/

There is a noticable bow upward in this location that is especially pronounced as tickers enter the screen. Can anyone tell me the name of the adjustment for this? I see the vertical counterparts but no horizontal. Thanks!

mave198

08-18-09, 03:06 AM

siskiou

08-25-09, 03:22 PM

We just bought a used 960 and I'm trying to adjust the settings, particularly how dark the picture is with default settings.
I have to bring up the brightness to about 80% to have a reasonable level, and even then it's hard to distinguish details in dark scenes.

Current settings are: standard, neutral, monitor, with picture at 56 and brightness at 48.

I'm a total noob to going deeply into the settings and so far have only tried going into the settings to see if I can, and dialing through a million options without changing anything.
I haven't been able to find the 2170p 4 group at this point, but am a little overwhelmed by the amount of settings available.

Any advice where to find this group in the grand scheme of things?

robotech3

11-15-09, 03:45 PM

sony kv-hs34m61 default settings?
please help me :(

leiff

12-08-09, 05:51 PM

Can someone help me? After I moved my subwoofer too close to my Sony 32hv500 tv my picture is slanting to the side. Even after I have tilt correction at plus 7 max the entire picture is still slanting to the side. Is there a service menu setting that allows for additional tilt correction? If so what is the setting called? how do I get into service menu? I thought it was something like = display 5 vol mute enter but I don't seem to be inputting it right.

Mike2567

12-09-09, 09:26 AM

Search your users manual, find out how to degauss. Your big subwoofer magnet has distorted the magnetic field of your picture tube and its little magnets (sorry not the exact technical description) beyond the normal range of adjustment. To degauss it may be as simple as unplugging the set then plugging back in. Or turning the set off and on a few times. Or maybe you have a specific menu item. Good luck.

greg du jour

12-17-09, 01:21 AM

raouliii

12-17-09, 08:44 AM

I'm very happy with the screen parameters in Normal screen size mode, but I would like to back off the Zoom. When I watch "postage-stamped" material, the edges are cut off too much. Can I set the Zoom to be less without affecting Normal mode?I believe 2170D-1, ASPT is what you're looking for. Enter the service menu while already in ZOOM screen mode. As always, be very careful navigating, write down the initial settings and don't attempt ANY type of reset.

greg du jour

12-17-09, 02:11 PM

I believe 2170D-1, ASPT is what you're looking for. Enter the service menu while already in ZOOM screen mode. As always, be very careful navigating, write down the initial settings and don't attempt ANY type of reset.

Will do, thanks.

Although I notice that the default is 0, the range is 0-63, and I have not changed any settings. Does this mean I can only zoom in more?

raouliii

12-17-09, 04:15 PM

Will do, thanks.

Although I notice that the default is 0, the range is 0-63, and I have not changed any settings. Does this mean I can only zoom in more?Where did you learn what the default was for ASPT? Which model Sony do you have?

greg du jour

12-17-09, 05:03 PM

raouliii

12-17-09, 08:59 PM

My model is KD-30XS955. I read the default in the Service Codes List.pdf attached at the top of this thread, although I notice the model for that is 34XBR910. Thought it might be the same across the XBR/XS lines.That document is VERY misleading and misrepresents the structure of the service data lists. Many service data parameters are global, in particular geometry, convergence and color decoder, but many more can be dependent on input resolution, screen mode, picture mode, etc.

There are actually 7 different default values for ASPT, depending on the screen mode and input format. The default value for ASPT in ZOOM screen mode for your set is 43.

I would recommend that only the service data list found in an actual service manual be used by anyone navigating the service menu.

greg du jour

12-18-09, 01:52 PM

raouliii

12-18-09, 10:08 PM

I dipped my toe. FWIW, my ASPT was set to 47. I experimented with that setting and its neighbors, but it seemed these only adjusted the vertical size of the picture. Do I need to do an overall size adjustment to get the horizontal width I desire in Zoom?ZOOM, by definition, zooms the 4:3 content linearly so that the horizontal width equals the width of the screen. Therefore, the only adjustability would be the vertical size, which will affect the linearity of the picture.

Maybe we should back up a little. When you stated "When I watch "postage-stamped" material, the edges are cut off too much" in your earlier post, what content are you talking about? Which edges? Top/Bottom or Sides?

FWIW, I watch 4:3 content in WIDEZOOM screen mode and have no complaints.

greg du jour

12-19-09, 12:01 AM

raouliii

12-19-09, 07:54 AM

greg du jour

12-19-09, 10:41 AM

Okay, thanks for your help. Will look into it.

salty

12-22-09, 01:33 PM

I've enjoyed reading through this thread, and feel ready to start tinkering a bit in the service menu. I had a few questions still:

I really am just using this TV as a dedicated gaming monitor-I went with the CRT hoping to get zero input lag. Little did I know when I bought the set that it will have lag just like any other HDTV, due to analog>digital>analog conversion and the image processing involved with that.

I will be feeding a 1080i signal from an Xbox 360 via component, so scaling shouldn't be an issue. As I understand it, this signal still gets converted to digital and is passed through MID5 parameters and a few other enhancements in the 2170P-3 area of the service menu.

I'd love to skip the analog>digital>conversion with the HDPT=0 setting, but it seems to be unwise to do so with the newer sets that have the PLL fix, like mine.(Is that really the case?)

I Just wondered if setting all MID5 parameters to zero and turning off all image enhancements would actually allow for a straight delivery of the analog Xbox signal to the analog CRT display of the TV(which is what I'm really trying to accomplish!)

Thanks for any replies...

raouliii

12-22-09, 11:11 PM

......I'd love to skip the analog>digital>conversion with the HDPT=0 setting, but it seems to be unwise to do so with the newer sets that have the PLL fix, like mine.(Is that really the case?)..Have you tried it? IMHO, this is your safest and easiest option.
... I Just wondered if setting all MID5 parameters to zero and turning off all image enhancements would actually allow for a straight delivery of the analog Xbox signal to the analog CRT display of the TV(which is what I'm really trying to accomplish!)...This would likely cause a LOT of trouble for you and your set and not achieve your goal.

Good Luck

salty

12-23-09, 11:25 AM

I was also thinking initially that this would be the most direct and easiest way to get unconverted analog output. There does seem to be a lot of reading on the boards about this topic, but I have yet to read about anyone setting the HDPT parameter to 0 for the express purpose of eliminating input lag for video gaming.

I did a little more reading and came across a few posts (#984-#988 in this thread) warning users not to fiddle with the HDPT setting. Here is a snippet from one of them:

**disclaimer** At this point, I do not endorse, or recommend that anyone, at least with one of these newer Sony sets "check out" MID-by pass and the "HDPT" setting! As, (just based on my short experiments), #1). I don't think we know "enough" about what it does on these newer sets, it might not be 100% "safe", #2) I don't see that its "MID by pass" does anything "useful", and you can use all Zeros in a MID5 column+accomplish the same thing, at least that seems to be the case given my short experience with it, and from what I can tell. I could be wrong, of course. #3). Also, when you're in SM at least, you might find the screen becoming "all garbled" if you set it to "0" making the Service Menu info "unreadable", therefore you'll be in a real fix if you don't know a way "out" of it. #4). At least on my set, when using HDPT=0, the User menus and channel displays/banners/etc. do not display properly.

My main concern is somehow locking myself out of the service/user menus, and/or "bricking" my set with this setting. I'm all for experimentation, but I just want to make sure I'm not playing with fire here...

salty

12-23-09, 09:50 PM

Ok, went ahead and set HDPT to 0 for the component inputs. The user menus and OSD jump around the screen, but otherwise is working fine...very cool option to have for gaming.

NextGen

12-27-09, 11:03 PM

13.2 - PRECISION FOCUSING: A RECOMMENDED PROCEDURE.

I'm about to do this on a 34XS955 (16:9) set because my convergence is not to my satisfaction. I can get everything perfect in the center of the screen but the edges are pretty bad. I want to be able to put up a 720p or 1080i image from my computer via HDMI and read fine text when surfing the web. I see no reason why this can't be possible but, as of the sets current state everything about 6 inches on either the right or left side is pretty blurry and the red/gree/blue is clearly not lining up.

Anything I should be aware of before doing this?

Should I set ALL settings that have to do with focus and convergence to their standard default of 31/32? What about my landing settings, leave them as they are?

thanks.

raouliii

12-28-09, 01:24 PM

I'm about to do this on a 34XS955 (16:9) set because my convergence is not to my satisfaction. I can get everything perfect in the center of the screen but the edges are pretty bad......I don't think that procedure will fix misconvergence..... I want to be able to put up a 720p or 1080i image from my computer via HDMI and read fine text when surfing the web. I see no reason why this can't be possible but, as of the sets current state everything about 6 inches on either the right or left side is pretty blurry and the red/gree/blue is clearly not lining up. .....I would recommend working on the convergence and focus, independent of one another.......Anything I should be aware of before doing this?

Should I set ALL settings that have to do with focus and convergence to their standard default of 31/32? What about my landing settings, leave them as they are?

thanks.I would recommend starting with what you already have. Write them down and don't attempt ANY type of reset. BTW, the focus (QP) parameter defaults for your set are not 31 or 32.

Joseph Dubin

01-06-10, 12:29 PM

By postage stamp, I mean 4:3 stuff that is letterboxed, so that in normal mode, there is black space on all 4 sides. This is the only thing I zoom in on. I would like it so that in Zoom mode, the edges of the picture I see in normal mode go to the edges of the screen (or close), eliminating all the black space but still retaining all of the picture content I see in Normal. As it is now, all 4 edges of the picture are cropped, too much by my reckoning, in Zoom mode.

Since, as you pointed out, Zoom makes 4:3 material as wide as the screen, and I feel too much is cut off on the sides in this mode, does my adjustment then become a different issue? Not sure if I have the right words here, but one of RASTER and/or OVERSCAN?

Know I'm a little bit late on this. I also found the 960's zoom cut off the edges and since it stretched the picture beyond 34 inches it also caused the picture quality to appear less sharp because it was over-stretched.

The solution was not to use the 960's zoom at all.

I first went into the service menu to insure the 960's overscan in the full mode was adjusted properly. I then set my HD-DVR and DVD recorder to output everything at 1080i. Since all 480p material is upconverted to 1080i via HDMI, the 960's picture mode is automatically set to full and (with the properly adjusted overscan) fits the screen perfectly.

The DVR is set to "auto fit" so upconverted standard definition 4x3 material is seen 16x9.

The DVD recorder is also set to output 4x3 material to fill a 16x9 screen, however, DVD-Rs recorded from HD (downcoverted to 480i) cause 4x3 pictures to appear windowboxed. Using the DVD recorder's zoom enables the picture to fit the screen perfectly. The picture quality is also better compared to using the 960's zoom because it is not stretched out of proportion.

The 960's vertical expand is used (instead of full) when watching DVD-Rs recorded in letterbox.

Again, sorry I'm a little late with this response.

joemar103

01-13-10, 08:29 PM

CAN ANYONE HELP ME!!! I have a KV34XBR910 with the seven blinking code in replacing the IC ......... I accidently destoryed the resistor in R8058 location and the diode in the D8010 location on the D board anyone know the value and or the part #'s of these parts .

scitek

01-18-10, 01:21 AM

Is it possible to get this thread in Lamen's? :p

I was able to set my overscan last night. Once you figure out how to navigate the dang service menu, it's not so daunting.

justsc

01-19-10, 04:19 PM

Is it possible to get this thread in Lamen's? :p

I was able to set my overscan last night. Once you figure out how to navigate the dang service menu, it's not so daunting.

It is possible, but I am afraid if it is to be done it'll be you that does it. I don't mean that to sound condescending, but I can't imagine anyone doing such a thing at this point.

This thread has earned its place at the top of the pile. It started innocently enough by goodhearted people trying to help one another. As it grew it was joined by so many, including professional as well as laymen. It got so big so fast that at times the OP did summarize pieces for some. But those summaries are few. I can attest to having wanted that myself. But by forcing myself to dig, and dig, and dig I learned so much more by trial and error than I ever would have by being spoon-fed the codes and steps. If you do go through the entire history of the thread you will find attachments, or links to them, that have charts and lists of codes and effects, but I no longer recall exactly where they are.

I hope you choose to go "end to end" with this thread. So much of video and home theater will become clear and understandable. Lots of wonderful people argued, laughed and shared throughout this thread and the result is not just information, but how the information was arrived at and why it is what it is. This might well be the best of AVS.

Enjoy!

steve

shmup-o

01-30-10, 09:00 PM

I just picked up a 30SX955, but the display is tilted to the left slightly. I currently have a PS2 and Xbox hooked up via Component, a Turbo Grafx hooked up via Composite, and cable hooked up via RF. All inputs are tilted, so that the left side of the screen is lower than the right hand side of the screen.

For instance, if you were to watch ESPN or have a video game with scrolling in the background, you can see that you lose image when it's streaming right to left.

I played with the UVLN and LVLN and saw that it affects top and bottom of the screen. In other words, the left and right edges look fine, but the lower left corner is lower than the lower right corner. Same with the upper corners - left is lower than right.

I played around with the Geometry settings, but cannot seem to correct the issue. Nothing seems to take the left hand side of the screen and raise it.

Now, I haven't read through the thread, just enough of the tutorials to make myself dangerous, but I can't seem to find the right words in order to find someone else who may have had this issue. Can someone please help me or point me in the right direction?

Edit -
Found the "rotate" SM code of 2170D-1 #8 NSC0. Unfortunately, this does nothing to my display if I push it to the extremes. Should this have fixed the issue?

Edit 2 -
Found the "tilt" in the menu, does not adjust the display at all...

raouliii

01-30-10, 11:27 PM

I just picked up a 30SX955, but the display is tilted to the left slightly.....Have you read through these two pdf's? Geometry XBR960 (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=37943) & Geometry XBR2 (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=42213) I'm not sure where you got the idea that UVLN and LVLN might help as those two parameters are really only used to adjust the linearity of the WideZoom screen mode. I would suggest putting them back to the original values.

I would further suggest that you use a crosshatch pattern to adjust geometry. Its really the only way to see what is happening while changing parameter values.

shmup-o

01-31-10, 09:29 PM

Have you read through these two pdf's? Geometry XBR960 (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=37943) & Geometry XBR2 (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=42213) I'm not sure where you got the idea that UVLN and LVLN might help as those two parameters are really only used to adjust the linearity of the WideZoom screen mode. I would suggest putting them back to the original values.

I would further suggest that you use a crosshatch pattern to adjust geometry. Its really the only way to see what is happening while changing parameter values.

I looked through the Geometry XBR960, but I will try to get a crosshatch up on the screen and actually go through the steps.

If it helps, I had an image with a line across the bottom and nothing in the settings lowered the right bottom corner and nothing raised the left bottom corner.

Also, I only used the UVLN and LVLN to see the top and bottom edges - I never wrote the settings to memory.

shmup-o

02-02-10, 06:31 AM

Ok, here is what I did last night:

1) Wrote down all of my initial values for 2107D-1 and 2107D-2.
2) Found a crosshatch image on this forum and put it on a thumbdrive.
(Found here: http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=781394
3) Took the PS3 downstairs and hooked it up to via HDMI and put the crosshatch up on the CRT.

*** Please note, that this TV is not a 30XS955 as previously stated. It's a 30HS420. Trust me, I'm going to have words with the seller. :mad: ***

The image I used was the 20x20 in the link above. Picture before I started was losing .5 squares from right to left on the bottom and top of the display.

I started to go through the steps outlined in the XBR960 Geometry Setup to see if I could pull the image clockwise, but just like last time, nothing was the magic option.

So what is it I'm trying to do here? If NSC0 doesn't help me rotate the horizontal lines is it possible to use the other geometry settings to pull the image right? Do I need to just keep adjusting the other settings until I have an image that is off-center on a normal TV, but looks correct on this one?

PublicSectorTech

02-11-10, 10:58 AM

Hmm, this is an interesting problem. I'm about to adjust the geometry on my 36XS955 as well, I'll let you know my results.

Paulus_Grandis

03-03-10, 09:34 PM

So, after making a bunch of adjustments I'm pretty satisfied with my PQ now on my 960, but there are still a few minor problems I'm trying to work out.

My question is, are there HORIZONTAL versions of PIN, UCP, LCP, LANG, VBOW, LBOW? For example, HTPZ is the horizontal version of PPHA (or at least that how I associate the two). I hope that makes sense.

If I could find those equivalent settings I think I get the geometry just right and then try messing with the focus/convergence on the screen edges.

Thanks in advance!

NextGen

03-29-10, 10:55 PM

I don't think that procedure will fix misconvergence.I would recommend working on the convergence and focus, independent of one another.I would recommend starting with what you already have. Write them down and don't attempt ANY type of reset. BTW, the focus (QP) parameter defaults for your set are not 31 or 32.

Well, I've readjusted the convergence and focus. Basically, I had to give up a bit of focus in the center and instead just try and get a nice evenness of focus and convergence across the entire screen. This helped the overall picture immensely but I still have one problem.

*Horizontal convergence, especially with the red appears to be off. It's as if the red is up above blue and green. It's very slight and not noticeable when viewing movies or playing games but, it's there. It's easily noticed when viewing text from the PS3 web browser. Is there no way to adjust this?

Also, I have some issues with 480i as well.
I have a "soft" picture in 480i and I also can't get the black bars to center correctly on the screen.

*For the 480i image quality did anyone ever figure out what some of the service codes did that were specifically for 480i?

*What are all the codes that only effect the centering of the screen for the "Normal" picture mode?

The set looks pretty phenomenal as it is now. I spent quite a long time understanding how to do all this but it was time well spent.

Great thread everyone!

NextGen

04-06-10, 11:27 PM

I don't think that procedure will fix misconvergence.I would recommend working on the convergence and focus, independent of one another.

It ended up being that none of the code adjustments helped. I ended up doing a precision focus adjustment by filing out a hole in the back of the set then adjusting focus with a screwdriver. Then I went back in and adjusted the service codes to great effect alleviation much of the convergence issues.

Now I want to go back in and refocus the set to see how sharp I can get it. Without proper convergence in the center of the screen it's hard to achieve good focus. Although, I suspect I could turn off all but one gun and adjust focus for it then work my way up to all three.

I would recommend starting with what you already have. Write them down and don't attempt ANY type of reset.

What I already had about 1 year ago from the factory was absolutely terrible. I ended up getting it as good as possible myself. I just had no idea the precision focus pot was that far off. It was so bad that some of the focus and convergence codes did nothing at all that I could see. Once I got better focus of the screen all the code adjustments are noticeable now.

BTW, the focus (QP) parameter defaults for your set are not 31 or 32.

It's a good place to start from. That's what I meant. It's actually at 31 right now and adjusting it in either direction takes the picture out of focus.

I just had no idea turning that focus knob behind the set could do so much for the picture. I have my HTPC connected via HDMI and I can "almost" read fine text in 1080i from 6 feet away. In 720p I can read fine text with no issues at all. 1080i even allows me to use the PS3 browser and read forum like this from over 10 feet away. My TV is approaching the clarity and resolution of my FW900 computer monitor and, that is no easy task for ANY display.

Some ps2 games running in 480p look better than some xbox games. Tekken 5 is a great example on how greatly focus can effect your picture. I can play DOA3 or DOA2U on Xbox then switch to Tekken 5 in 480p and it's really difficult to argue which game is technically superior. Tekken 5 is cleaner than both DOA games. Upscaled field rendered games from PS2 really benefit as well.

I knew this was an amazing TV but, I never knew it was this amazing.

xomoi

04-07-10, 01:24 PM

raouliii

04-07-10, 01:47 PM

I'm having problems with the Landing settings on my kd-34xs955. On the Top Right there is a green discoloration and a red discoloration a little below that. I tried adjusting RT in the LANDING settings, but it only makes one color go away while the other gets worse. I also tried adjusting some of the other LANDING settings with no improvement. I have moved electronics away from the tv and let it degauss with no improvement. Anyone know a solution to this? Or do I need to call a technician?Was it originally caused by magnetism from a speaker or power supply in a component? If yes, then you might wait a little longer for power on degaussing to take care of it. Residual magnetism takes some time to degauss out.

xomoi

04-07-10, 04:55 PM

There is a radio under the tv, I'll remove for a couple of weeks and see if that clears it up. Thanks for the reply.

NextGen

04-09-10, 03:56 PM

see post 2878

phatal

04-13-10, 12:35 AM

Wow! That's what I said to myself when I first found this thread. I was looking for some information on possibly adjusting my 5 year old KV-34HS420, and boy did I find some!

At first I wasn't even going to attempt anything, but after reading (and re-reading) some posts I decided to give it a go. The set needed some overscan/geometry adjustments as well as focus. After some trial and error I can safely say I've brought this set back to life. I can't believe how far off the focus was, especially the sides/corners. Now I can read my DVR's TV guide without squinting. :)

A big thanks to Ken and everyone that contributed to this thread. The internet can be an amazing thing.

Cheers!

NextGen

04-13-10, 11:27 PM

In this post (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=7314307#post7314307) Kentech says that 480p bypasses the 2103 chip. However, every single time I alter some of the settings in 2103-1 they seem to directly effect my PS2/PS3 games. I believe now, unless schematics prove otherwise that, at least with an RGB signal from my PS2 or PS3, the 2103 chip is not bypassed, even with HDMI. I know I'm not imagining things either. I clearly see a tighter picture with less motion artifacts when rotating a camera in any game.

I've also come to conclude that MHLY and MHLC in the MID5 group of codes causes blur on fine text in HDMI on my PS3.

I'm now writing a short paper that lists all the important codes and how to set them to achieve the cleanest picture from an uncompressed source such as a game console. I'm sure many calibrators and long time members will find lots of things wrong with the article and that's fine by me. Just be sure and state what needs to be changed.

After proper grayscale and color calibration via the guide over at curtpalme.com, the precision focus adjustment per this thread, convergence, landing, and picture enhancement minimization, I know have a display that looks so good I have people tell me that some of the game characters look as if you could just reach in and pull them out of the TV. I never knew any display could look this good.

NextGen

04-14-10, 12:32 AM

Final Update... Probably.

5/22/2011

See the attached files for a complete revamped and overhauled set of code changes. IMO, for playing video games, they are above and beyond anything I've seen on my set before. It's almost as if the old CRT's have their own versions of Super Sampling, Anti-aliasing and, Texture Filtering with these codes.

Slinky11

04-24-10, 03:20 AM

NextGen

04-24-10, 06:23 PM

Thanks NextGen

I have been studying this thread for awhile know and have only fiddled with overscan and convergence. But I am starting to feel very comfortable with the menus and understanding of how everything operates.

The majority of the usage of my set is 360 games and sometimes DVDs, so I am interested in improving these aspects.

I know geometry can really be a pain. The one thing that has helped me is doing the precision focus adjustment. It just made it easier to see the slightest change.

xomoi

05-01-10, 07:00 PM

Why is it that some service menu codes are locked or do nothing on smaller sony crts? I have a sony model kv-13m40 and another small sony crt in which some common values do nothing. Values such as hsiz, cpin, pamp, trap, and some other do nothing to change the geometry. The numbers can be adjusted but they do not change the picture. I assume that this is done intentionally since I have two sets in which those same values are locked. It's not that big of a deal, but I would like to know why it set this way.

Eric_S

07-13-10, 10:07 PM

Hello Fellows.

Last week I was fortunate enough to purchase an XS-955 off of Craigslist for a mere $100.

It's a dream set for me, my first true hdtv, and much preferable to a cheap LCD television in terms of image quality.

I have been reading this thread daily, but it seems I still can't seem to get through the dense explanations and tutorials. It seems like a lot of data is all over the place.

Can someone help me out with just one aspect of the tv that I want to modify?

I would like to correct the overscan on my set. Currently it is cutting off quite a bit too much of the screen imo. I can tell by looking at various sources like games and network channels that I'm missing about 10% of the image. I know CRT's have a bit of overscan, but I think I can lessen this effect and improve image the quality.

What are the specific settings to change in the service menu to just reduce the overscan uniformly? I know that I am looking for H-Size and V-size, but I have been reading in this thread that I must also change some settings to maintain the image processing features are being applied over the same area. Does that sound right?

DSperber

07-13-10, 10:18 PM

I would like to correct the overscan on my set. Currently it is cutting off quite a bit too much of the screen imo. I can tell by looking at various sources like games and network channels that I'm missing about 10% of the image. I know CRT's have a bit of overscan, but I think I can lessen this effect and improve image the quality.

What are the specific settings to change in the service menu to just reduce the overscan uniformly? Start here (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showpost.php?p=8452998&postcount=2037).

Eric_S

07-18-10, 10:11 PM

I think I am all set to enter the service menu and correct the overscan on my set, but I have run into a small problem.

I don't have the original remote, and I can't figure out a way to press the 5 key that is required to enter service mode.

I have two universal remotes. One is from Insight Digital, and the other is an RCA universal remote. Both are able to perform every function of the tv, except to be able change the channel in OTA mode. If I press the number keys it always tries to send the signal to my cable box?

Does anyone know the specific universal code for this TV, or a universal remote that can enter service mode?

The Lizard King

08-06-10, 03:11 PM

Start here (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showpost.php?p=8452998&postcount=2037).
I must be missing something in your directions, because once I power off out of the service menu, the settings go back to the ones that they were previously at (i.e. no net change has occured aftering powering off).

Is there a way to "save" the new settings before powering off?

TLK :cool:

DSperber

08-06-10, 05:08 PM

I must be missing something in your directions, because once I power off out of the service menu, the settings go back to the ones that they were previously at (i.e. no net change has occured aftering powering off).

Is there a way to "save" the new settings before powering off?If you chased down the threads, you should have discovered that I had also provided (as an attachment to one of those posts) my own Excel spreadsheet that contained all of my settings (for all resolutions and inputs, and both USER MENU values as well as SERVICE MENU values). While the values in the spreadsheet are obviously unique to my own XBR960, the spreadsheet itself can obviously be used by you as a very convenient way to "write down" your own current values before you begin tweaking.

Note that at the bottom of the "Service Menu" tab on spreadsheet were assorted "Notes":

Notes:
Enter Service Mode = [PowerOff] - [DISPLAY] - [5] - [VOL+] - [PowerOn]
Menu item Next = [1]
Menu item Previous = [4]
Group Next = [2]
Group Previous = [5]
Adjust item value Up = [3]
Adjust item value Down = [6]
Save New Settings = [MUTE] - [ENTER]
Exit Service Mode = [PowerOff]
Warning: [7]-[JUMP]-[ENTER] and [7]-[9]-[ENTER] will reset the NVM data. Avoid key [7].

===> Save New Settings = [MUTE] - [ENTER]

You have to do this in order to "save" your updated settings before powering off. If you don't, then as you discovered your changes will not be saved and you'll be right back where you were before you started tweaking.

The Lizard King

08-06-10, 05:34 PM

If you chased down the threads, you should have discovered that I had also provided (as an attachment to one of those posts) my own Excel spreadsheet that contained all of my settings (for all resolutions and inputs, and both USER MENU values as well as SERVICE MENU values). While the values in the spreadsheet are obviously unique to my own XBR960, the spreadsheet itself can obviously be used by you as a very convenient way to "write down" your own current values before you begin tweaking.

Note that at the bottom of the "Service Menu" tab on spreadsheet were assorted "Notes":

Notes:
Enter Service Mode = [PowerOff] - [DISPLAY] - [5] - [VOL+] - [PowerOn]
Menu item Next = [1]
Menu item Previous = [4]
Group Next = [2]
Group Previous = [5]
Adjust item value Up = [3]
Adjust item value Down = [6]
Save New Settings = [MUTE] - [ENTER]
Exit Service Mode = [PowerOff]
Warning: [7]-[JUMP]-[ENTER] and [7]-[9]-[ENTER] will reset the NVM data. Avoid key [7].

===> Save New Settings = [MUTE] - [ENTER]

You have to do this in order to "save" your updated settings before powering off. If you don't, then as you discovered your changes will not be saved and you'll be right back where you were before you started tweaking.
Thank you.

One thing I DON'T understand is messing with the MID3 setting. After messing around with it, I really don't see how it "layers" on top of the 2170D-1 and 2170D-2 settings. They seem completely independet to me, at least with my KD-36XS955.

Thanks again!

TLK :cool:

Eric_S

08-06-10, 07:36 PM

I have successfully corrected the overscan on my XS955! :)

The image is much brighter and sharper now as an added bonus to seeing the whole image. I suppose it's because there is more energy from the scanning electron guns inside being focused in a smaller area than before.

I did this by adjusting the VPOS, VSIZ, HPOS, HSIZ setting in group 2170D. I adjusted it as small as could, but it still cut off part of the screen.

Then I went into MID3 and used the VDHP, VDHS, VDVE, and VDVS settings to further reduce the size of the screen.

From what I can tell the difference in the two sets of screen adjustments is that the first one is the size of the actual raster, and the other is a sort of digital image resizing to fit the image onto the raster. I have lined them up closely, but they do not line up pixel to pixel. Will this cause any negativity?

DSperber

08-06-10, 08:59 PM

One thing I DON'T understand is messing with the MID3 setting. After messing around with it, I really don't see how it "layers" on top of the 2170D-1 and 2170D-2 settings. They seem completely independet to me, at least with my KD-36XS955.Well I can't speak firsthand about the 36XS955, although the service manual says it applies to the common DA-4 chassis shared with the 34XBR960. But I don't think this doesn't necessarily mean that all particulars of the Service Menu or corresponding electronics work identically across all models in the product family.

Furthermore, I've read feedback from other Forum members (on this and related threads, for the 960) that they suggest against using MID3 for adjustment of geometry. Some kind of "risk", or "hazard", or "damage"... or some such discussion.

Personally, I don't understand any of this. Lacks the ring of truth to me, else why would Sony have invented MID3 at all?

Anyway, I can simply say that for me using 2170D-1 for vertical size/centering/positioning of the "background", and using 2170D-2 for horizontal size/centering/positioning of the "background", and using MID3 for vertical/horizontal size/centering/positioning of the "foreground image on top of the background"... well that was how I got my picture to look the way it does.

Of course you should be looking at a proper test pattern (see BMP inside of attached OVERSCAN.ZIP) when doing these three tweaks. And you'll go back and forth, one "click" at a time while watching a horizontal or vertical edge move in or out of your screen, so that you can clearly see what you're accomplishing by a plus or minus tweak, and whether that's "better" or "worse" than before. The extreme edge of the image (in the "foreground") may disappear when you shrink the "background" a bit, so you have to play with both foreground and background in order to maximize the visible image, reduce overscan to 1-2% (or maybe even 0%, but that usually exposes data artifacts like white dot crawl when watching SD channels), and maximize use of the full 16x9 screen. Actually, you'll probably end up with MORE image in that 16x9 screen than you started with (because you're trimming overscan toward 0%), which actually has the effect of reducing the size of things you see in that 16x9 screen but also visibly increasing apparent "resolution" and "sharpness". It's very satisfying when you're done.

You will play with the three sets of adjustors repeatedly, trying to get it just right. And when you finally really do zero in on the proper values for your set it will be obvious because now just one +/- click for any of the items clearly always makes it "worse".

In my experience, it took adjustments to all three groups (as you can see in my Excel spreadsheet, where I show both "service manual default" as well as "my final setting" for each of the crucial horizontal/vertical geometry adjustors in these three groups.

At least that's how it worked on the 34XBR960, where MID3 is "functional". It just may work differently on the 36XS955. I know for a fact that my cousin's older 34XBR800 doesn't have a MID3, so when I was adjusting his set I had to use its MID1 values which seemed to perform similar functions as MID3 on the XBR960. Maybe there's some similar subtle difference on the 36XS955.

DSperber

08-06-10, 09:26 PM

I have successfully corrected the overscan on my XS955!Excellent!

The image is much brighter and sharper now as an added bonus to seeing the whole image. I suppose it's because there is more energy from the scanning electron guns inside being focused in a smaller area than before.Probably you're seeing more image (wait until you see those score bars during ball games, or info crawls on news channels, etc., and realize just exactly how much information there really was to be seen... including OUTSIDE what was the old image perimeter you were looking at before your tweaks).

Also, everything inside the constant screen size is now somewhat smaller (since you have more image in that screen) although there's more to look at, which has an automatic "sharpening" effect to our eyes and brains.

I did this by adjusting the VPOS, VSIZ, HPOS, HSIZ setting in group 2170D. I adjusted it as small as could, but it still cut off part of the screen.In my own case with my XBR960, it wasn't just size and positioning in the horizontal and vertical directions which required adjusting... it was also centering.

So I had to play with VPOS, VSIZ and VCEN (2170D-1), along with HCNT, HPOS, HSIZ (2170D-2), and then VDHP, VHDS, VDVE and VDVS (MID3).

I also worked on tweaking pin cushion and corners, to get as much rectangularity and linearity on vertical and horizontal edges as I could. I cannot tolerate "bowing" and "curvature" at the corners of my screen.

From what I can tell the difference in the two sets of screen adjustments is that the first one is the size of the actual raster, and the other is a sort of digital image resizing to fit the image onto the raster.I always describe it like with Photoshop... "background", and "image". If the background's not large enough you lose image (like cropping). If the background's too large you have extra black space with no image on it. If the image's too small you're not taking advantage of all the screen real estate. If the image's too large then the smaller background will result in loss (crop) on the edges of the image.

Fairly delicate process of adjusting three tweaks all together, but eventually you do zero in on where just +/- one click on anything obviously causes you to say "no... that's worse". Now you know you're done.

I have lined them up closely, but they do not line up pixel to pixel. Will this cause any negativity?This is an analog set, and is therefore not pixel-perfect.

I'd say just get as close as you can, so that you're really happy... and be done with it.

ENJOY!

The Lizard King

08-06-10, 09:59 PM

Well I can't speak firsthand about the 36XS955, although the service manual says it applies to the common DA-4 chassis shared with the 34XBR960. But I don't think this doesn't necessarily mean that all particulars of the Service Menu or corresponding electronics work identically across all models in the product family.

Furthermore, I've read feedback from other Forum members (on this and related threads, for the 960) that they suggest against using MID3 for adjustment of geometry. Some kind of "risk", or "hazard", or "damage"... or some such discussion.

Personally, I don't understand any of this. Lacks the ring of truth to me, else why would Sony have invented MID3 at all?

Anyway, I can simply say that for me using 2170D-1 for vertical size/centering/positioning of the "background", and using 2170D-2 for horizontal size/centering/positioning of the "background", and using MID3 for vertical/horizontal size/centering/positioning of the "foreground image on top of the background"... well that was how I got my picture to look the way it does.

Of course you should be looking at a proper test pattern (see BMP inside of attached OVERSCAN.ZIP) when doing these three tweaks. And you'll go back and forth, one "click" at a time while watching a horizontal or vertical edge move in or out of your screen, so that you can clearly see what you're accomplishing by a plus or minus tweak, and whether that's "better" or "worse" than before. The extreme edge of the image (in the "foreground") may disappear when you shrink the "background" a bit, so you have to play with both foreground and background in order to maximize the visible image, reduce overscan to 1-2% (or maybe even 0%, but that usually exposes data artifacts like white dot crawl when watching SD channels), and maximize use of the full 16x9 screen. Actually, you'll probably end up with MORE image in that 16x9 screen than you started with (because you're trimming overscan toward 0%), which actually has the effect of reducing the size of things you see in that 16x9 screen but also visibly increasing apparent "resolution" and "sharpness". It's very satisfying when you're done.

You will play with the three sets of adjustors repeatedly, trying to get it just right. And when you finally really do zero in on the proper values for your set it will be obvious because now just one +/- click for any of the items clearly always makes it "worse".

In my experience, it took adjustments to all three groups (as you can see in my Excel spreadsheet, where I show both "service manual default" as well as "my final setting" for each of the crucial horizontal/vertical geometry adjustors in these three groups.

At least that's how it worked on the 34XBR960, where MID3 is "functional". It just may work differently on the 36XS955. I know for a fact that my cousin's older 34XBR800 doesn't have a MID3, so when I was adjusting his set I had to use its MID1 values which seemed to perform similar functions as MID3 on the XBR960. Maybe there's some similar subtle difference on the 36XS955.
So far with my KD-36XS955, I've only adjusted the 2170D-1 and 2170D-2 settings based upon the 1.33:1 cross-hatch pattern on the DVE DVD. I just can't figure out how MID3 works at all, though. I'm happy with my adjustments insofar that my overscan for TV (ATSC OTA), Component 5 (LaserDisc deinterlaced to 480p with a Faroudja NRS scaler), and HDMI 7 (Blu-ray and Dish Network HD DVR using an A/B switch) are minimized.

However, when watching 4:3 content in the 16:9 frame with the ATSC tuner, the screen mode of "zoom" still cuts off WAY too much of the 4:3 frame. The SD channels look fine, as I adjusted them with the 2170D-1 and 2170D-2 settings, but the zoom of the 16:9 HD channels still cuts off too much picture. I haven't been able to figure out how to overcome this yet. Have you solved this problem, Eric_S?

Finally, how do you get that cross-hatch OVERSCAN.ZIP file that you just posted displayed onto your screen? I'm guessing the Memory Stick slot. Regardless, will this particular cross-hatch pattern do anything different for adjusting the set than the cross-hatch pattern on the DVE DVD?

TLK :cool:

DSperber

08-06-10, 11:10 PM

Finally, how do you get that cross-hatch OVERSCAN.ZIP file that you just posted displayed onto your screen? I'm guessing the Memory Stick slot. Regardless, will this particular cross-hatch pattern do anything different for adjusting the set than the cross-hatch pattern on the DVE DVD?That BMP is a true 1920x1080 16x9 test pattern, produced by Sonera's "DisplayMate for Windows, Video Edition" on my PC. I have an ATI video card along with a DVI-to-component adapter and connected my PC to my XBR960 using a long component video cable.

You said your DVE test pattern was 4:3 (and no better than 480p), though you probably stretched it for use on the 16:9 set. The DisplayMate pattern is native 16x9, and 1920x1080 resolution. Note that there is a very tiny (perhaps 1 pixel?, but for sure at 1920x1080 resolution) dot at the center of each square in the entire pattern, which is fabulous for adjusting convergence throughout the screen. Poor convergence will show up as the familiar red/green/blue "ghosts" around that should-be-white dot, and having them uniformly splattered over the entire 16x9 screen is wonderfully useful..

I suspect you can put it on a memory stick and use it that way on your XS955, though I've never actually used the memory stick input on my XBR960.

NOTE: if you have a 16x9 LCD monitor on your computer, you can also display that BMP I posted with any image viewer on your computer in full-screen (no borders or toolbars), if you want to examine (and adjust if necessary, if you monitor has controls) your own computer video. Of course with a pixel-perfect LCD monitor there should be no need for adjustment. But I certainly used the 4:3 version of that same pattern to tweak my IBM P92, P96 and P275 monitors (they're old but gorgeous Sony Trinitron-based CRT monitors).

The Lizard King

08-07-10, 12:15 PM

That BMP is a true 1920x1080 16x9 test pattern, produced by Sonera's "DisplayMate for Windows, Video Edition" on my PC. I have an ATI video card along with a DVI-to-component adapter and connected my PC to my XBR960 using a long component video cable.
Aha! Okay, that's how you did it. I don't have this capability presently, sadly. I'll look into figuring out how though.

You said your DVE test pattern was 4:3 (and no better than 480p), though you probably stretched it for use on the 16:9 set. The DisplayMate pattern is native 16x9, and 1920x1080 resolution. Note that there is a very tiny (perhaps 1 pixel?, but for sure at 1920x1080 resolution) dot at the center of each square in the entire pattern, which is fabulous for adjusting convergence throughout the screen. Poor convergence will show up as the familiar red/green/blue "ghosts" around that should-be-white dot, and having them uniformly splattered over the entire 16x9 screen is wonderfully useful..
Since the KD-36XS955 is a 4:3 set, I went with the 4:3 test pattern from the DVE DVD. I will mess with the 16:9 anamorphic test pattern today. Maybe, I need to invest in the DVE Blu-ray. I bought my DVE as a HD DVD/DVD flipper. Obviously, the HD DVD side doesn't do me any good!

I will look into the convergence issue to see if my set is properly calibrated, or not. Thanks.

TLK :cool:

ShowbizPizza

08-10-10, 02:55 PM

I recently bought a Sony 34HS510 and have followed DSperber's advice on adjusting overscan and geometry, and have achieved outstanding results. I had to use the geometry/crosshatch patterns on the DVE DVD and Blu-Ray to get everything set up, since I didn't have access to anything else resembling a crosshatch pattern. As far as I know, I haven't seen any loss in resolution or picture quality, however....

I also have a copy of the service manual for the 34HS510 and was wondering about something I read in there. In the service manual section 2-9.1. NTSC (DRC) Full Mode Adjustment, there is a little note that says: "Make sure that the picture size is within specs. Vertical size
is 11.8 ± 0.1 sq. and horizontal size is 15.8 ± 0.1 sq."

Maybe I am missing the obvious here, but what exactly does that mean? What is the "sq." abbreviation they are talking about?

Then later on in section 2-9.2. 1080I HD Mode Adjustment, it says:" Adjust the geometry similar to Full DRC mode. Vertical size is 11.7
± 0.1 sq. and horizontal size is 15.6 ± 0.1 sq., if monoscope signal is
available. Otherwise, set the Vertical size to 91.0 ± 0.6% scan and
Horizontal size as 91.0 ± 0.6% scan."

Again, I don't really know what this means, other than that it has to do with the appropriate range for the ratio between your horizontal and vertical sizes, so that the geometry is spot on. I just don't really understand the math and the terminology.

raouliii

08-10-10, 05:20 PM

.... however....

I also have a copy of the service manual for the 34HS510 and was wondering about something I read in there. In the service manual section 2-9.1. NTSC (DRC) Full Mode Adjustment, there is a little note that says: "Make sure that the picture size is within specs. Vertical size
is 11.8 ± 0.1 sq. and horizontal size is 15.8 ± 0.1 sq."

Maybe I am missing the obvious here, but what exactly does that mean? What is the "sq." abbreviation they are talking about?

Then later on in section 2-9.2. 1080I HD Mode Adjustment, it says:" Adjust the geometry similar to Full DRC mode. Vertical size is 11.7
± 0.1 sq. and horizontal size is 15.6 ± 0.1 sq., if monoscope signal is
available. Otherwise, set the Vertical size to 91.0 ± 0.6% scan and
Horizontal size as 91.0 ± 0.6% scan."

Again, I don't really know what this means, other than that it has to do with the appropriate range for the ratio between your horizontal and vertical sizes, so that the geometry is spot on. I just don't really understand the math and the terminology.The "sq" is in reference to a standardized HD monoscope test signal used for geometry adjustments. The one referenced in the service manual is 16 x 12 "squares". Don't be concerned that this doesn't match the standard 16:9 ratio, the "squares" are actually rectangular. A service manual for a previous model, 34XBR2, explains that if a cross-hatch pattern is used then a calculated 90% is to be used. This would result in 5% overscan all around, which may be a little much. Your reference of 91% +/- 0.6% will result in 4-5%. I generally shoot for 2-3%.

ShowbizPizza

08-17-10, 10:13 PM

When working on my 34HS510, I noticed that the "MTRX" setting always defaults to a value of "0" whenever I input a 1080i, 720p, or 480p signal. It does this on the DVI input as well as both of the component video inputs. I searched this thread and read through all the information about the MTRX setting doing the "auto-switch" when people are outside the service menu. However, it appears my tv is not doing the "auto-switch" for MTRX either inside or outside the SM.

In other words, unless I am mistaken, my tv keeps using the SD color matrix even if I am inputting a HD signal. I checked using color filters when outside the SM and inputting a HD signal, and sure enough, it was displaying the same color matrix as if I input a 480p signal(the same one as when the value is the default of "0" inside the SM).

Every time I am in the SM, and I manually change the "MTRX" value to "1", I can see a significant change in the color bar patterns on the DVE Blu-Ray. The differences are especially noticeable in the cyan and green boxes. However, those colors are not being displayed whenever I input a HD signal outside the SM. The auto switch isn't working for me - even if I try to write/save the "1" setting for MTRX in the SM.

Is there anything I can do to get my tv to display the right color matrix for HD sources?

WithAlligators

09-26-10, 01:56 PM

I would like to fiddle around with some of the horizontal geometry problems on both my 36xs955 and my 40xbr800. I also have a very minor greenie on my 800 I'd like to play with. The 955 has a subtle upward bow in the middle of th lower part of the screen. It's noticable with the HD bars up. The 800 has the standard left side of the screen sag. I've got the back off of both of them and tried to move around some of the magnets but no fix. Can anyone point me to a guide on how to fix some of these distortions? How about where to get a magnet kit? I was hoping the 800 would have a simple fix like a magnet had fallen off on the left side during a move since the distortion is so uniform but no dice.
Cheers,
Alex

salty

09-27-10, 03:11 PM

I was just tinkering around with the service menu on an old CRT monitor, and I found that it stores a record of how many hours it has been on. In this case it was 18,020. Is there anything like that in this service menu? I have a 34xs955 and was thinking it would be interesting to know.

ARandomPooka

10-17-10, 08:39 AM

Not sure what term I'm looking for to describe what's happening with my set, but I've been searching like mad for the last week and have not found any reference to my problem. Thought I'd ask and see if I'm just doing it wrong and should go back to RTFM stage!

I have a kv30hs420, which has great picture geometry, at least on my HDMI input, since I haven't gotten around to tweaking the other inputs yet. So much to learn and do! Thank you all, by the way, and KenTech for starting this thread.

The problem is that red, green, and blue are all horizontally separated from each other by almost a quarter inch. Red to the left one quarter, green in the center, and blue to the right one quarter.

Each image is clear and straight, but it's like I'm projecting three separate images alongside each other instead of on top of each other as it's supposed to be. Colors so far look pretty decent in the areas where they overlap, but I'm not going to test too much or tweak the color levels until I can get them lined up proper.

Is there a code in the Service Menu that I am overlooking for adjusting the entire red, green, and blue display horizontally? D-CONV has provisions for minor tweaks in specific areas, but I can't seem to find a way to shift the entire R,G, or B horizontally to allow them to match back up.

D-CONV didn't allow me a great enough adjustment to move the image far enough to overlap properly. Sorry if this has been answered already. I've been searching and searching and learning amazing new things. Just haven't come across this one.

Afraid it's going to be a magnet issue and nothing I can do from the SM. Since the TV itself was completely free, I don't mind TOO much if I have to go have it serviced, but would much prefer attempting to fix the problem myself.

The Lizard King

10-17-10, 04:02 PM

raouliii

10-18-10, 02:05 PM

Not sure what term I'm looking for to describe what's happening with my set, but I've been searching like mad for the last week and have not found any reference to my problem.......The problem is that red, green, and blue are all horizontally separated from each other by almost a quarter inch. Red to the left one quarter, green in the center, and blue to the right one quarter......If this problem is across the entire screen, this is likely a static convergence issue. There are physical adjustments on the yoke for static convergence. Check out this service manual excerpt (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=54145) and read section 2-2 Convergence. Be sure to disable the dynamic convergence function per the first step of 2-2.1. but you can ignore the statement about default values for beam landing. You may also have to go through the physical alignments in 2-3. As a matter of fact, 2-3.2. TLH Plate Adjustment looks to be close to your issue.

Use a crosshatch pattern as mentioned and make small adjustments Good luck.

ARandomPooka

10-18-10, 07:41 PM

If this problem is across the entire screen, this is likely a static convergence issue. There are physical adjustments on the yoke for static convergence. Check out this service manual excerpt and read section 2-2 Convergence. Be sure to disable the dynamic convergence function per the first step of 2-2.1. but you can ignore the statement about default values for beam landing. You may also have to go through the physical alignments in 2-3. As a matter of fact, 2-3.2. TLH Plate Adjustment looks to be close to your issue.

Use a crosshatch pattern as mentioned and make small adjustments Good luck.

Thank you for the quick answer! Hopefully this will do the trick. When the house goes to bed and isn't watching DBZ Kai on the TV, I'll have to pop it open and see what I can do.

Will keep you posted on this, just in case anyone else has this issue and wants to know how it went.

Thanks again! And I'm keeping my fingers crossed.

ARandomPooka

10-18-10, 08:51 PM

Trying to locate a service manual for my set is more than a chore, so thank you, raouliii, for sending me an excerpt from yours, by the way.

ARandomPooka

10-18-10, 10:36 PM

Last post for a little while. Eternal thanks to Raouliii. It ended up being the Horizontal static control. A simple turn of a screw and I'm back to where I can start tweaking hardcore with the test patterns for geometry and color.

Now my absolutely free TV looks like it just came off the factory floor. Which, as we've learned isn't exactly optimal. So time to put the time in on making it BETTER than factory :)

salty

10-20-10, 04:27 PM

What code told you the hours of usage?

TLK :cool:

It was an old Nokia 445xi monitor. If I recall correctly, I held down the menu button when I powered it up. It then prompted me for a code 7177 I think it was. Found that info somewhere on the Internet...anyway, I'm pretty sure the Sony doesn't have that feature. Too bad-it would be cool to know!

OldTimerCanuck

10-26-10, 07:46 AM

Hello young and old! I have been scanning this thread as much as possible and picked myself up a very nicely kept KV-27FS120 and would like to tinker with this when the wife is off doing wifey things! All I really need to know is how do i get from one option to another in the service menu? do I press the Vol up/down buttons or do I use another button? I was a long time Toshiba user and could fly through the service menu with ease but the Sony's seem to be slightly different. I'm not completely new to these things but with those small questions answered I can be on my way to tinkering heaven!

OldTimerCanuck

jsmith967

01-23-11, 05:31 PM

So I have read lots in this thread and it is very helpful. I have actually performed many of the service menu tweaks already and my XS955 34" 16:9 really shines now! However, when I finished all the corrections, I started to notice an error that comes-and-goes depending on whats being displayed. I feel like it is not randomly displayed, but as of currently, have not deduced what exactly causes the error. Perhaps this is a defect in my set or some setting that I must tweak in the service menu. Below is two pictures I took of Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince. Notice has there are a coupld of large blue-red horizontal bands across the screen. Like I said, they're not always on there, but especially in dark scenes with highlights, it is very annoying and distracting. Any help or input would be much appreciated. Thanks in advance!

Link to photo or error:
http://i1132.photobucket.com/albums/m580/jman1503/AVSQuestion002.jpg

NextGen

01-26-11, 01:38 AM

jsmith967

01-26-11, 04:28 PM

I fixed it! My image was being scanned too far off the raster, causing distortion. I simply shrunk the image size using the regular controls (2170-D) and it went away. Thanks for responding!

Dark_Planet

06-25-11, 02:22 PM

NextGen

06-25-11, 06:16 PM

I just got the 34HS420 and its great except one annoying issue.

For example.....If I'm playing RDR or la noir or GTA4 and I run left and right really fast everything in the game has a nasty 3D look without glasses.

Kind of like bad motion judder and double imaging.

If I stand still in the game the ghosting doesn't occur.

What section of the service menu would I need to change to fix this horrible problem??

If it's what I think it is, double imaging, there isn't anything you can do. That sounds like the fact that the games are running at 30fps or lower. I get the same thing on Final Fantasy 13.

Anytime you send a 30fps signal to a 60hz screen you will get this although, you normally only see it with video games. On my CRT what helped to alleviate the problem was to do a manual focus adjustment. Get the focus and convergence of the set as good as possible, it should be computer monitor like in appearance so that you can read fine text even at 1080i from 5-10 feet away. You will still have the same problems but your eyes won't be as strained from seeing it.

I would imagine running the game in an interlaced mode (1080i) would help, since you get frame blending but, in practice I don't think it makes much of a difference.

Not that it has anything to do with it but, if this is the set you mainly play games on then keep in mind the Xbox360 has a gamma problem so some games will never look correct. The PC and PS3 both use sRGB gamma curves where the Xbox360 does not as it uses what is called a "Piecewise sRGB" or it badly approximates sRGB.

doveman

06-25-11, 06:45 PM

Anytime you send a 30fps signal to a 60hz screen you will get this although, you normally only see it with video games. On my CRT what helped to alleviate the problem was to do a manual focus adjustment. Get the focus and convergence of the set as good as possible, it should be computer monitor like in appearance so that you can read fine text even at 1080i from 5-10 feet away. You will still have the same problems but your eyes won't be as strained from seeing it.

I run my PC at 60hz into my XBR800 but most of the video content I watch is either 24/25 or 50fps and I don't really notice any problems, although I guess that's probably because the PC is doing something clever!

I struggle to read text from 6ft away in 720p though, which I just assumed was because the TV doesn't have as fine dot pitch as a PC monitor. Perhaps I just need to work on the focus and convergence some more though!

NextGen

06-25-11, 07:15 PM

I run my PC at 60hz into my XBR800 but most of the video content I watch is either 24/25 or 50fps and I don't really notice any problems, although I guess that's probably because the PC is doing something clever!

I don't notice it as much when playing video content. I assume because the material was filmed at 24fps so your TV will use Reverse 3-2 Pulldown to help correct it. For some reason though, I see it very easily on video games that run at 30fps. Perhaps someone else understands the technicality of it.

I struggle to read text from 6ft away in 720p though, which I just assumed was because the TV doesn't have as fine dot pitch as a PC monitor. Perhaps I just need to work on the focus and convergence some more though!

Hard to say, I do have slightly better than 20/20 vision though. I normally keep my HTPC set at 720p on my 955 set. Even though I can read text at 1080i the flicker makes the text a bit hard on my eyes. However, I can see fine text from my HTPC very clearly on my TV. My eyes are about 6 feet from the screen.

That isn't to say it looks anywhere near as nice as my 24" Sony GDM FW900 as my TV has tons of problems that make it a train wreck, such as, convergence errors that can only be fixed with magnets, center focus is much better than the edges of the screen, geometry is still bad off as there is bending of the image on the sides and corners, I also have this flickering issue that comes and goes probably due to failing parts inside the TV itself, and I need to have it gray-scale calibrated again.

Took a pic of the screen with some relatively fine text on it at 1080i. Keep in mind 720p is far more readable and is normally the resolution I use for my PC. That said I don't use the TV when using my PC except for games or video sites like youtube. Ignore the terrible focusing on the corners, minor overscan and, dreadful bowing/bending of the screen.:(

http://www.fotoshack.us/fotos/80520159small.png

fahrenheit

06-26-11, 01:03 AM

Dark_Planet

06-26-11, 02:11 AM

If it's what I think it is, double imaging, there isn't anything you can do. That sounds like the fact that the games are running at 30fps or lower. I get the same thing on Final Fantasy 13.

Anytime you send a 30fps signal to a 60hz screen you will get this although, you normally only see it with video games. On my CRT what helped to alleviate the problem was to do a manual focus adjustment. Get the focus and convergence of the set as good as possible, it should be computer monitor like in appearance so that you can read fine text even at 1080i from 5-10 feet away. You will still have the same problems but your eyes won't be as strained from seeing it.

I would imagine running the game in an interlaced mode (1080i) would help, since you get frame blending but, in practice I don't think it makes much of a difference.

Not that it has anything to do with it but, if this is the set you mainly play games on then keep in mind the Xbox360 has a gamma problem so some games will never look correct. The PC and PS3 both use sRGB gamma curves where the Xbox360 does not as it uses what is called a "Piecewise sRGB" or it badly approximates sRGB.

You were RIGHT!!

I popped in COD4 and GT5 that run at 60fps on PS3 and the double imaging wasn't there!!

So why the heck are some 2011 games still being at crappy 30fps or below??

I can only pray that battlefield 3 will have a good framerate.

By the way I tried tuning in the focus...etc. but it didn't affect the ghosting on the lower fps games.

NextGen

06-26-11, 03:27 AM

By the way I tried tuning in the focus...etc. but it didn't affect the ghosting on the lower fps games.

It won't really affect it as in remove it or reduce it, so to speak but, it can make it easier to digest and live with in my opinion.

On the super fine pitch capable models, 720p signals are downscaled to 540p.

My set will accept quite a few different signals from my PC and when I set my graphics card to NOT scale, 720p fills the screen properly. So when you say 540p I assume you mean 1280x540 pixels?

I can send an 1152x864 30Hz signal and I get black bars as I should with an 1152x864 pixel image projected inside a 1920x1080i frame.

I can also send an 1176x664 60hz signal and I also get black bars, as I should with 1176x664 pixels projected inside a 1280x720p frame.

I can also set my graphics card to scale and I can manually scale the horizontal and vertical pixels with a slider and 1280x720 fills the screen.

fahrenheit

06-26-11, 04:02 AM

My set will accept quite a few different signals from my PC and when I set my graphics card to NOT scale, 720p fills the screen properly. So when you say 540p I assume you mean 1280x540 pixels?

I can send an 1152x864 30Hz signal and I get black bars as I should with an 1152x864 pixel image projected inside a 1920x1080i frame.

I can also send an 1176x664 60hz signal and I also get black bars, as I should with 1176x664 pixels projected inside a 1280x720p frame.

I can also set my graphics card to scale and I can manually scale the horizontal and vertical pixels with a slider and 1280x720 fills the screen.

What you put in is definitely not what you get out.

My 36" could accept all of the resolutions you mentioned but when you actually feed a test pattern with alternating black and white (or black and yellow bee stripes), you get a muddy grey (or baby poo) amalgam.

If lines aren't being thrown out, then you should be able to make a 1280x720 bee stripe pattern (single pixel high horizontal stripes) and resolve every one of those unique lines.

It works with 1980x1080, but 720p never gave me all the lines.

Frank J Manrique

06-27-11, 12:07 AM

Are there any techs within the Riverside/San Bernardino areas in So. California that do in-home repairs to these behemoth tvs?
Mine took a dive in '08 (power supply problems) and been idle since I bought a Pioneer Elite Pro-151D KURO plasma display to replace it with back then.

Would like to get it fixed if possible...

-thts

Dark_Planet

06-27-11, 02:14 AM

Today was the first day I watched a widescreen movie on my 34hs420 with blackbars (the island ) and I noticed the black bars looked sort of warped.

I made a picture of how it looks.

Is there an easy fix in the service menu?

I just need to bend the screen down instead of up so the bars can be straight.

UPDATE: I changed the VPIN settings and it made the bottom bar straight but it made the top bar warped.

It's not that big of a deal anyways....I will just live with it since most CRT's aren't perfect.

I put the VPIN settings back to default 24.

http://i979.photobucket.com/albums/ae273/CalebDa/hs420look2.png

raouliii

06-27-11, 05:15 PM

......Is there an easy fix in the service menu?

I just need to bend the screen down instead of up so the bars can be straight.

UPDATE: I changed the VPIN settings and it made the bottom bar straight but it made the top bar warped.

It's not that big of a deal anyways....I will just live with it since most CRT's aren't perfect.

I put the VPIN settings back to default 24.You could try a combination of VCEN and VPIN.

Using VCEN: Adjust to make the bowing of the top and bottom lines equal.

Using VPIN: Adjust as necessary to make the horizontal lines as straight as possible.

ADU

06-28-11, 04:07 PM

^ That upward bow is fixable, but it'll probably require tweaking a few other controls than just VCEN and VPIN. If you want to go down that road, just say so. However, there's a chance it may foul up the geometry on some other signals.

ADU

07-16-11, 07:21 PM

Some patterns for geo adjustments in 720x480 NTSC DVD resolution.

Grid divided into 1/2's...

2.5% Overscan

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=217599

5% Overscan

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=217600

(Note: you must be logged in to see the attached images in these posts.)

ADU

07-16-11, 07:23 PM

Grid divided into 1/4's.

2.5% Overscan

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=217601

5% Overscan

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=217602

ADU

07-16-11, 07:26 PM

Grid divided into 1/8's.

~2.5% Overscan

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=217603

5% Overscan

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=217604

NextGen

11-20-11, 05:23 PM

On the super fine pitch capable models, 720p signals are downscaled to 540p.

The main advantage with using 720p sources is if the content is 50/60fps. You lose resolution by choosing 720p over 1080i, but you retain framerate.

Some other CRT TV manufacturers choose to upconvert 720p signals to 1080i, which keeps resolution at the expense of framerate (because you can't resolve 50/60 full frames per second with an interlaced source.

Old post I know and sorry for the bump but, does the information get thrown out or somehow resampled? Just asking because 720p pc games seem to get an antoaliasing benefit and keep very fine detail. Its a win win situation.

And where can I get a beestripe pattern or what does one look like ao I could make one myself

ADU

12-08-11, 07:32 PM

NextGen,

FWIW, my 34XBR800 converts 720p inputs to 1080i, not 540p.

There are different ways of scaling images, and I'm not quite sure how the Sony CRTs do it. There are various interpolation and resampling techniques that can be used though, so the extra lines don't simply have to be discarded when downscaling. Some examples here...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image_scaling

teamdoa

01-05-12, 05:11 AM

I don't suppose anyone knows why my CRT wont remember any changes when I adjust the screen position, ie height, width etc. It remembers them when I put it in standby, but when I switch off completely it forgets them.

The model is a SONY KV-16WS1U

ADU

01-07-12, 11:51 PM

^Not familiar with your model, but after making changes in the SM on my Sony HDTV, I also need to press a combination of keys on the remote to SAVE/STORE the new settings.

ADU

01-14-12, 07:29 PM

Following are a new set of grids for making geometry adjustments.

Instead of a black background, these new patterns use a 15% gray background to better approximate the average picture level (APL) of video over time. This should slightly improve the accuracy of pincushion, and also horizontal and vertical sizing adjustments for typical video content.

Overscan

The patterns can also be used for overscan adjustment, if you want a 2.5% or 5% overscan.

(Minor Note: The 2.5% overscan pattern that's divided into 8ths is not quite as accurate for overscan adjustment as the other patterns because there was no way to perfectly divide the width of the image by 8, and leave an exact 2.5% on the sides. Consequently, it's probably closer to 2.75% or 3% on the sides.)

Surround Reference

Used properly, the patterns can also function as a crude ambient/surround reference for high-quality home video content (Blu-ray, DVD, OTA broadcasts, etc.). For direct-view displays in the Region 1 US market*, I generally recommend surround levels in the 13% to 20% gray range for best viewing, with 15% being about the average for well-mastered DVDs & Blu-rays. (*Video content in other parts of the world may be brighter.) An easy way to accommplish that is to adjust the Picture/Contrast control on your display so that a full field gray pattern in that range approximates the average surround levels in the room around and behind the TV. Calibration discs can be very handy for this kind of thing. The better ones should include full field gray patterns which increase in steps of 5% or 10%.

There's alot of variation in video content these days though, which is why I try to accomodate a range of adjustment on my TV between about 13% to 20%. Most professionally mastered/color-corrected video content in the US is on the darker side. IMO, a 15% gray is a pretty good target reference for that.

However, games, commercials, music videos, anime (Japanese animation), and older NTSC material can be considerably brighter, and quite a strain on the eyes to watch with such dark surround levels. So something closer to a 20% (or even brighter) gray surround reference would not be unreasonable for such material.

If you also use your display as a computer or web interface, then you may need to accomodate an even wider range of contrast adjustment. The APL of computer content is about 35%, and the sRGB standard (which is basically now the "official" color space of the web) uses a "gray world" assumption for it's viewing environment, which is essentially the brightness of a 50% gray on your screen. For optimum viewing of computer and web content, the Picture/Contrast setting on your display (or the room lighting) should be adjusted so that a 35% to 50% full field gray on the screen is a close match to your room lighting levels.

Again, you should be able to find full field gray patterns like these on many of the popular calibration discs (or you could just make your own with Photoshop or some other paint program). In the final analysis though, your eyes are really the best judge. So if the picture seems too bright (or dark) with the above rules of thumb, then you should turn the contrast down.

"Full-Swing" Vs. "Studio-Swing" Levels

There are two versions of the grid patterns posted below. The first series uses 0-255 "full-swing" RGB levels. And the second series is compressed to 16-235 "studio-swing" RGB levels. For geometry adjustments, they should both work about the same.

If you want to get picky though... then the correct set to use depends on how you display the images on your TV. I usually convert the patterns to a standard MPEG-2 DVD-Video format (which is why they're all in 720x480 NTSC DVD-Video resolution). And the software that I use to encode the files into DVD-Video compliant MPEG-2 automatically compresses the palette in the images to 16-235 video levels (which is what commercial video DVDs use). So I feed the MPEG encoding software patterns and images authored in 0-255 full-swing levels to ensure proper output levels on my TV. Other MPEG/DVD authoring programs may work differently though, and give you different options for compressing the video levels.

IMO, properly converting the patterns to the DVD-Video format is probably the most reliable way to go. If you simply display them as still files (JPEG, etc.) from a flash drive or disc, then the results may be less predictable, and you'll need to pay closer attention to black level settings (and possibly other image display settings) on both your player and TV to ensure that they display at the correct levels.

If you are trying to use them as an surround reference, then the correct output levels are important. If you are just using them for geometry adjustments though, then the difference should be more negligible.

ADU

01-14-12, 07:33 PM

2.5% Overscan, 0-255 "Full-Swing" Levels, Part 1:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=234182

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=234183

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=234184

ADU

01-14-12, 07:35 PM

2.5% Overscan, 0-255 "Full-Swing" Levels, Part 2:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=234186

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=234187

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=234188

ADU

01-14-12, 07:38 PM

5% Overscan, 0-255 "Full-Swing" Levels, Part 1:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=234189

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=234190

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=234191

ADU

01-14-12, 07:39 PM

5% Overscan, 0-255 "Full-Swing" Levels, Part 2:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=234192

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=234193

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=234194

ADU

01-14-12, 07:42 PM

2.5% Overscan, 16-235 "Studio-Swing" Levels, Part 1:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=234195

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=234196

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=234197

ADU

01-14-12, 07:44 PM

2.5% Overscan, 16-235 "Studio-Swing" Levels, Part 2:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=234198

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=234199

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=234200

ADU

01-14-12, 07:45 PM

5% Overscan, 16-235 "Studio-Swing" Levels, Part 1:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=234201

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=234202

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=234203

ADU

01-14-12, 07:47 PM

5% Overscan, 16-235 "Studio-Swing" Levels, Part 2:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=234204

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=234205

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/attachment.php?attachmentid=234206

sumguy99

01-18-12, 09:59 AM

I've got a few questions I hope someone can answer about these Sony codes:

1) Is it possible to enable PiP or 480p mode (for a few, or maybe some, many, most ?) Sony TVs using these codes if the TV did not come from the factory as a model that was capable of PiP or 480p?

2) I have a KV-36FS10 that was bought I think in late 1999 or early 2000. Will any of these codes (or generally, anything in this huge thread) be useful or applicable to that TV?

ADU

01-21-12, 12:43 AM

^ I'm havin a hard time finding info on this model (36FS10). Is it an HD or SD tube?

sumguy99

01-21-12, 01:57 PM

^ I'm havin a hard time finding info on this model (36FS10). Is it an HD or SD tube?

It's a 36" Trinitron WEGA (flat-tube). If you do a google search for "KV-36FS10" I'm sure you'll get lots of hits.

This might be a Canadian model number. It was bought in Canada. I *think* it's one model level down from XBR (I think it cost a few hundred dollars less than the equivalent XBR model). It was made in September 1999. These are not hi-def TV's. 4:3 ratio, 480 lines.

I think the equivalent XBR model had PiP, 480P mode, and 3-line comb filter.

Here's a Sony link for it:

http://esupport.sony.com/CA/perl/model-home.pl?mdl=KV36FS10

These models are closely related to it:

KV-36FV15
KV-36XBR250

Those models have something called "S-Link" that my model doesn't.

ADU

01-23-12, 10:19 PM

I can't speak with authority on this, since I've never owned an SD Sony tube (only HD). But 480p would require a higher scanrate than 480i (31.5 kHz versus 15.75 kHz). So it seems unlikely to me that you'd be able to convert a 480i tube to 480p by simply throwing some switch in the SM. 480p also requires add'l processing to de-interlace the image.

I do not recommend using 480p on the Sony HD tubes btw. IMO, it's more fatiguing to the eyes than using 1080i, and the phosphor persistence is worse. (Note: both the Progressive and Cinemotion settings for 480i inputs will display as 480p on the HD tubes. So I recommend avoiding these as well, if you can.)

ADU

01-23-12, 10:50 PM

It looks like the 36FS10 also predates "V-compression", which was added to alot of SD TVs later on to improve the picture quality of 16:9 video content (e.g. widescreen anamorphic DVDs).

If you can get into the SM on the TV, you might be able to "convert" it to a 16:9 TV by squeezing the video image with the vertical sizing controls. Then you could change the setting on your DVD player to 16:9, and watch widescreen anamorphic DVDs at full 480i resolution.

I did this on one of my older (non-Sony) 480i tubes, and it worked quite well. Only problem is you have to go back into the SM and switch the vertical controls back whenever you want to watch a regular 4:3 source properly, which was a PITA. :)

Rasuache

01-27-12, 12:50 PM

i recently did a factory reset via the service menu on my bravia ex320 and now the rgb signal off my virgin box is really fuzzy especially on the blacks and greys like on the on demand menu can anyone help / have any idea what would cause this maybe i pressed something in service menu by accident??

remoderi7

01-30-12, 01:29 AM

Hey there, im in the same position, trying to adjust my 34HS420, any luck for u ?
would u be kind enough to send the right values on the service menu for me ?
my tv colors looks horrible after a friend of mine trying to tweak it , what a genius ah

ADU

01-31-12, 08:35 PM

You should never reset the SM on the Sony HD CRTs, under any circumstances.

Resetting the SM will not restore the TV to the original settings when you bought it. It will erase all data in the SM, including settings/tweaks made at the factory which are crucial to the TV's basic operation.

NEVER...

EVER...

EVER...

EVER... reset the SM.

If that's what you've done, then I think these your basic options:

a) Try to find a professional calibrator who knows his way around the Sony CRTs, and thinks he can fix it (which is becoming somewhat hard to find).

b) Take it to a Sony authorized repair shop, and hope they know what they're doin.

c) Contact Sony Parts, and ask if they still have a "900" (ie fee-based) nonauthorized technical support line where you can get some help. (Note: you may need a copy of the service manual for this as well.)

d) Order a service manual and try to fix it yourself (which may make matters even worse if you are not a very technical person, because there aren't really any detailed instructions included in the service manuals).

e) Try to find someone else with the same model, who's written all their original settings down (like you should have done in the first place), and has the time to help you figure it all out.

f) Accept that you made an unfortunate mistake and look for another similar TV on Craigslist to replace it, or get a shiny new plasma or LED TV instead.