Hello All!

Hoping someone here can offer some advice regarding my particular calibration scenario. The specs of the display of my set is given below for reference: (Philips 37PF9631D - 37" LCD)

* Diagonal Size: 37 in - Widescreen

* Technology: TFT active matrix

* Resolution: 1366 x 768

* Display Format: 720p (supports 480i, 480p, 720p, 1080i)

* Image Aspect Ratio: 16:9

* Dynamic Contrast Ratio: 6000:1

* Brightness (cd/m2): 500

* Progressive Scan: Progressive scanning (line doubling)

* Widescreen Modes: Zoom 14:9, Zoom 16:9, Super Zoom, WideScreen, Wide Expand, Subtitle Zoom, Conventional 4:3

* Viewing Angle: 176 degrees

* Viewing Angle (Vertical): 176 degrees

* Pixel Response Time: 6 ms

* Analog Video Format: NTSC

* Analog Video Signal: Composite video, S-Video

* Comb Filter: 3D digital

* V-Chip Control: Yes

* Color Temperature Control: Yes

* HDTV Ready: Yes

* HDMI Ports: Yes


I recently purchased DVE Calibration Disc and am using a Toshiba HD-A3 HD-DVD player. After calibrating with the DVE disc, things still seemed too dark, and I have ran the calibration many many times.

Then I downloaded the free AVS HD 709 Calibration Disc made available here on AVS Forum. I burned it to a DVD and ran it last night but had difficulty calibrating my set because of the following reasons:

1) Under Basic Settings of AVS, the Black Clipping Pattern, vertical bar 16 (reference black) is never visible, no matter how high or low I set the brightness control. At this point in time, I should note that I had contrast set to about 50. (50-60 really). So I am not sure how to calibrate the brightness properly if I can never see vertical bar 16. Does anyone have any ideas on why this would occur?


The same type of problem seems to propagate/occur for the Average Picture Level black and white test. Again, I cannot seem to see the reference bars (bar 16)

How should I go about a calibration in this case? Again, when I run calibration with DVE, the end product to me appears too dark (ie. not vivid enough). I am inclined to believe that my set should be able to be better then this. I could be doing something wrong, and hopefully someone here will be kind enough to point out my errors or guide me in the right direction.

Could there be something in the service menu I could access which would improve on these results?

All the best,

Craig

How much light do you have on in the room? Also, is your backlight on a power-saving mode?

Hi BearSK,

Thank you for taking the time to reply. As I usually don't get home till nightfall, most of my movies are viewed in the evening. One whole wall of the room is floor to ceiling windows, but again I am viewing at night. As well, the TV uses ambient lighting, and wall behind the tv is white, so really it is a low-light room, dimly lit, with most of the light coming from the Ambient Lighting.

Not sure if the backl ight is on a power-saving mode, I would have to find a way to check this. Would this be in the Service Menu?

Not sure if the backl ight is on a power-saving mode, I would have to find a way to check this. Would this be in the Service Menu?
Shouldn't be. You may be suffering at least a little bit from a deficiency of LCDs.

Could there be something in the service menu I could access which would improve on these results?

All the best,

Craig

First step, turn off all "auto" brightness, contrast, picture controls on your TV and player.

When you are trying to set the level of black you need to use the brightness control on your TV. Assuming the player/TV isn't clipping you should be able to turn it up so that you see both the 16 and 17 bars. Once you get that lower it until 16 disappears.

If you don't see this double check the player and TV settings for HDMI level to see if you've set it correctly.

Contrast will affect the settings of the white bars.

Be aware that contrast and brightness will often interact.

Hello All!

Hoping someone here can offer some advice regarding my particular calibration scenario. The specs of the display of my set is given below for reference: (Philips 37PF9631D - 37" LCD)

* Diagonal Size: 37 in - Widescreen

* Technology: TFT active matrix

* Resolution: 1366 x 768

* Display Format: 720p (supports 480i, 480p, 720p, 1080i)

* Image Aspect Ratio: 16:9

* Dynamic Contrast Ratio: 6000:1

* Brightness (cd/m2): 500

* Progressive Scan: Progressive scanning (line doubling)

* Widescreen Modes: Zoom 14:9, Zoom 16:9, Super Zoom, WideScreen, Wide Expand, Subtitle Zoom, Conventional 4:3

* Viewing Angle: 176 degrees

* Viewing Angle (Vertical): 176 degrees

* Pixel Response Time: 6 ms

* Analog Video Format: NTSC

* Analog Video Signal: Composite video, S-Video

* Comb Filter: 3D digital

* V-Chip Control: Yes

* Color Temperature Control: Yes

* HDTV Ready: Yes

* HDMI Ports: Yes


I recently purchased DVE Calibration Disc and am using a Toshiba HD-A3 HD-DVD player. After calibrating with the DVE disc, things still seemed too dark, and I have ran the calibration many many times.

Then I downloaded the free AVS HD 709 Calibration Disc made available here on AVS Forum. I burned it to a DVD and ran it last night but had difficulty calibrating my set because of the following reasons:

1) Under Basic Settings of AVS, the Black Clipping Pattern, vertical bar 16 (reference black) is never visible, no matter how high or low I set the brightness control. At this point in time, I should note that I had contrast set to about 50. (50-60 really). So I am not sure how to calibrate the brightness properly if I can never see vertical bar 16. Does anyone have any ideas on why this would occur?


The same type of problem seems to propagate/occur for the Average Picture Level black and white test. Again, I cannot seem to see the reference bars (bar 16)

How should I go about a calibration in this case? Again, when I run calibration with DVE, the end product to me appears too dark (ie. not vivid enough). I am inclined to believe that my set should be able to be better then this. I could be doing something wrong, and hopefully someone here will be kind enough to point out my errors or guide me in the right direction.

Could there be something in the service menu I could access which would improve on these results?

All the best,

Craig
Hi,

I also have a 37PF9631D but have never calibrated it. I usually use the default settings under the picture menu. There are 6 settings under auto picture. I use either the natural, rich or personal settings. Under Natural the default setting for contrast is 83 and brightness is 50. A contrast setting of 50 would be very dark. In fact the Eco setting in auto picture is a 63 and I would never watch anything that low. In fact you couldn't ....
it's way too dark. I personally prefer the Rich setting which sets the contrast to 100. If you adjust some of the settings from here the auto picture is then moved to personal.

What I mean here is if you set the auto picture setting to "Rich" and then change something like the contrast or brightness it sends you to the personal setting since rich, eco and natural are all selections with spedific values which can't be changed.

I'm not that knowledgable about calibration but I know what I like. Here are my preferred settings. I like Rich for movies and usually TV too. It gives you that extra push I like in an LCD. Sometimes I may switch to natural though.


1. Auto picture to "RICH"
2. Color Enhancement to "ON"
3. Digital Processing to "Pixel Plus"
4. Dynamic Contrast to "ON"

I usually leave the others alone but sometimes change DNR (digital noise reduction) on if I need to. I might also reduce the sharpness from 4 to 2 or even 0 when using HDMI as it sharpens too much and you actually loose detail. Actually the DNR works great for component and DVD's as the video noise is greatly reduced or eliminated. I always leave digital processing on because this is Pixel Plus 2 HD and that's why I bought this TV in the first place. It makes everything look brighter, sharper and better all around. Personally, I won't buy anything but Philips for this very reason. Pixel Plus has been accused of making film look too much like video but I like it. It's called Perfect Pixel on the newer models and just improves the picture quality tremendously though some people don't like it. And at higher contrast levels, at 100 or so, you can really see what it does.

Anyway try these settings and see what you think.

Check the DVD player settings. May be some goofy setting, such as a cranked up black level adjustment.