Setup is as follows, for a primer:

Panasonic '10A Blu-ray player running HDMI OUT to an Onkyo TX-SR605 receiver's HDMI IN; a second HDMI cable runs from the receiver's HDMI OUT to my Sony SXRD's HDMI IN (VIDEO 6)

My set's model is the 50" A2020 series; I had been running the VIDEO 6 HDMI input, for DVD and Blu ray playback, in STANDARD picture mode, but because of horrible DVD upconversion from this Panasonic player, I have since changed the mode to Sony's CUSTOM, and adjusted the color, picture, brightness, sharpness, hue, etc. according to a calibration disc and a THX Optimizer...my issues now are with the ADVANCED SETTINGS of the CUSTOM mode...

Should these all be OFF? I had been advised to leave GAMMA at LOW, but all the rest -- NOISE REDUCTION, EDGE ENHANCEMENT, DETAIL ENHANCER, LIVE COLOR, etc. -- I was advised to leave OFF, and that's how I'm running the set now...is this correct?

Also, can someone please suggest some "standardized" values for the WHITE BALANCE settings with regard to the bias and gain for the settings there?

Edit

That is essentially how I am running my dvd input for my 60A3000. I tried sending 480p from my denon 2900 dvd player but the tv actually did a better job of deinterlacing standard dvd's than the player did. I am using component connection and have all advanced processing turned off for that input and adjusted the brightness/contrast/color/etc... with avia. It looks pretty good for standard dvd on such a large screen.

Thank you for your help, Russell...

That is essentially how I am running my dvd input for my 60A3000.

You mean THE ADVANCED SETTINGS all at "OFF" (I actually left GAMMA to LOW, based on a suggestion by a member of Home Theater Shack) INCLUDING the WHITE BALANCE being all left at ZERO?

I tried sending 480p from my denon 2900 dvd player but the tv actually did a better job of deinterlacing standard dvd's than the player did.

Well then wouldn't that make sense to set the PLAYER to 480p so the TV does the upconverting? I was having the same issue with my Panasonic Blu ray player -- that is, at 1080p on the player the artifacting was intense and the quality really sucked; at 480p fed from the player, the TV, I was told, upscaled the image to 1080p then and it looked slightly cleaner. Now, I'm still having those issues because of the horrendous quality of this deck's upscaler, but things seemed to have gotten a SLIGHT BIT cleaner and better running the CUSTOM mode of the Sony...

I am using component connection and have all advanced processing turned off for that input and adjusted the brightness/contrast/color/etc... with avia. It looks pretty good for standard dvd on such a large screen.

Indeed, I am using HDMI not component, but like you I am using Custom for my Blu ray/DVD input and have left all ADVANCED SETTINGS to OFF, except for GAMMA, which is LOW, but I still need settings for WHITE BALANCE...can you or someone else help with this?

I did too adjust the color, brightness, etc. with a calibration disc, but it's these ADVANCED settings I am now concerned with....should these ALL be OFF, like Black Corrector, Live Color, Edge Enhancer, etc? And if leaving all these OFF is the way to go, then what benefit do we achieve by keeping the set in CUSTOM instead of STANDARD?? :confused:

From my reading of the a3000 tweaks thread(may or may not apply to your 2020) the custom setting with warm2 color temperature setting is closer to the d6500 standard for the a3000. Also it was mentioned that standard was observed to add some sort of edge enhancement that was not present in the custom setting. I used the CNET settings for white balance(Rgain -3, Gbias -1) although I believe there may be set to set differences and these may not actually be accurate. I believe that without an actual measured calibration we can only guess at the correct settings.

As far as the upconversion, my dvd player only outputs 480i/p so the TV will be upconverting everything from that source. I noticed that the TV did a better job with the deinterlacing(in my opinion) so left the dvd player set to interlaced output. I also have a samsung BDP-1400 blue ray player and standard dvd's actually look better played on my denon 2900 dvd player at 480i over component than upconverted by the samsung blu-ray player.

These are my own observations on my 60A3000, they may or may not apply to your 2020. Unless you have instruments to accurately measure what these things are doing while calibrating it is all just guesswork.

I will say that with the exception of standard definition dishnetwork material, I am very pleased with the picture quality of my a3000. I am especially impressed with OTA HD and blu-ray on this set.

From my reading of the a3000 tweaks thread(may or may not apply to your 2020)

Oh no...well, that's not good news...if this doesn't apply to my 2020, then there's no telling whether or not I should use CUSTOM mode at all on MY particular set...:confused::(

the custom setting with warm2 color temperature setting is closer to the d6500 standard for the a3000.

...but I wonder if this applies to ALL Sony rear projection displays...

Also it was mentioned that standard was observed to add some sort of edge enhancement that was not present in the custom setting.

...now THIS could be very useful...indeed, it seems like some kind of "digital artifacting and ringing" could be seen around characters onscreen using STANDARD, but it also seemed to add more color "punch" on my screen in STANDARD -- of course, CUSTOM looks rich depending on the scene, too...

Is it decidedly the vote then that no matter the model, if someone owns a Sony, they should use the CUSTOM mode? My model DOES NOT contain a PRO or CINEMA mode, like some SXRDs do, just a VIVID, STANDARD and CUSTOM choice...would CUSTOM still make more sense here?

I used the CNET settings for white balance(Rgain -3, Gbias -1) although I believe there may be set to set differences and these may not actually be accurate. I believe that without an actual measured calibration we can only guess at the correct settings.

Indeed, I have heard this as well, that the sets vary from set to set, but I'm really not sure what to leave these at being that I do NOT have a measured calibration nor have access to professional material/equipment to set this section of the CUSTOM menu...what are the downfalls/dangers of leaving all of these at ZERO?

As far as the upconversion, my dvd player only outputs 480i/p so the TV will be upconverting everything from that source. I noticed that the TV did a better job with the deinterlacing(in my opinion) so left the dvd player set to interlaced output.

See, my Panasonic Blu-ray player does not offer a 480i HDMI output option -- just 480p and up, all the way to 1080p, so I leave the player on AUTO, which selects 1080p based on the fact that it's connected to this SXRD, and that way I can play Blu-rays in 1080 and DVDs get upscaled as well without having to switch the resolution each time -- EVEN THOUGH the picture quality looks a BIT cleaner by letting the SXRD handle the 480p signal...

Do you recommend me leaving my Blu-ray deck at other resolutions, like, say 480p, 720p, or perhaps 1080i?

I also have a samsung BDP-1400 blue ray player and standard dvd's actually look better played on my denon 2900 dvd player at 480i over component than upconverted by the samsung blu-ray player.

From what I have learned, Blu-ray players don't do a good job upscaling these DVD discs; I'm trying to squeeze the best possible quality out of my Panasonic...:mad::mad:

These are my own observations on my 60A3000, they may or may not apply to your 2020. Unless you have instruments to accurately measure what these things are doing while calibrating it is all just guesswork.

I wish I had some more answers on what the WHITE BALANCE settings should be, and whether ALL ADVANCED settings should be left OFF -- that is, Gamma, Edge Enhancement, etc...:(

I will say that with the exception of standard definition dishnetwork material, I am very pleased with the picture quality of my a3000. I am especially impressed with OTA HD and blu-ray on this set.

Yes, indeed, HD material looks MUCH MUCH better than standard def material on my A2020, as well....in STANDARD mode, I can't even watch some standard def cable broadcasts because of the ringing, noise and artifacting.

I'm going to say that if you did calibrate color and brightness and contrast with a calibration disk, use your personal preference as far as the other stuff. If you don't notice any weird tinting or odd color leave the white balance settings at their defaults. Everything I have read about the gamma says leave it at its lowest setting, changing does not improve picture quality. The other stuff I would leave off.

Unless you are ready to spend $400-500 to squeeze the last ounce of accuracy out of your set with a professional calibration I would just enjoy it. You can test the various settings with a blue ray or dvd and toggle them on and off to see what looks better to you. That is how I decided to leave my dvd player set to 480i. Good luck and enjoy the set.

All SXRD optical blocks are different and using someone else’s custom white balance settings is foolish. You can do a better job by eye using “Warm 2” as a base.

My only experience is with XBR2’s and on those sets the Gamma curve is too flat and closer to 1.8 rather then the industry standard of 2.2. Increasing the Gamma control to “Low” or higher is going the wrong way and takes Gamma closer to 1.0.
I can understand people viewing in bright environments would find increasing Gamma desirable, but for dim or dark viewing environments the lowest setting of “Off” is still way too high. This results in a washed out look to the picture and tends to make compression artifacts more visible.
There is a tendency for people to desire more shadow detail then a properly calibrated reference display provides, and unless you have such a reference you really can’t judge what is correct by eye.
The SXRD is very bright in a dim environment and that tends to obscure shadow detail. Using “Power saving” mode and iris control to dim down the image helps, although the real answer is fitting a neutral density filter, which has the added benefit of improving black levels by 50%. :D

All “Advanced” picture controls should be off except for Noise Reduction which can be set to “Low” without problems if desired, and Detail Enhancer which I set to Max, yes Maximum.
I have tested with various sharpness and resolution test patterns, both SD and 1080 HD and can’t see any detrimental affects such as ringing. There are also no problems with video sources ranging from low grade SD satellite to BluRay – HDDVD.
HD in particular benefits from the Maximum setting of “Detail Enhancer” and the results are impressively crisp without the problems you get using too much sharpness.

I find a “Sharpness” setting of around 20 ideal, much more invites ringing and less is unnecessarily softy.

I don’t normally use the DRC as I feed everything in as 1080p so DRC is not available.
DRC settings can certainly have a significant impact on sharpness, but I would not use its sharpening in place of “Detail Enhancer”.

I'm going to say that if you did calibrate color and brightness and contrast with a calibration disk, use your personal preference as far as the other stuff. If you don't notice any weird tinting or odd color leave the white balance settings at their defaults.

Okay; because I'm not experiencing what you mention, I'll probably leave the white balance off....it's just weird because if you read up online, you'll see so many people who own this set and mention that they use CNET's settings for EVERYTHING, including white balance values....:confused:

Everything I have read about the gamma says leave it at its lowest setting, changing does not improve picture quality. The other stuff I would leave off.

Okay; indeed, I am running the Gamma at the LOW setting, but it seems that this adds like an "artificial brightness" that SLIGHTLY washes out the image and I'm not sure if this is actually giving a better picture...do you suggest Low or OFF here?

Thanks for your continued help, sir. :o

Hello Owen and Thank You for Your Assistance...

All SXRD optical blocks are different and using someone else’s custom white balance settings is foolish. You can do a better job by eye using “Warm 2” as a base.

Okay; indeed, I am using WARM 2 on color temperature, but like I said to Russell above, if you go online and look for comments from users of this TV, you will see how everyone is copying those CNET values for White Balance right into their own sets....if you advise against this, would you recommend to a user like me to leave the WHITE BALANCE settings all at ZERO?

My only experience is with XBR2’s and on those sets the Gamma curve is too flat and closer to 1.8 rather then the industry standard of 2.2. Increasing the Gamma control to “Low” or higher is going the wrong way and takes Gamma closer to 1.0.

So, what are you saying here....GAMMA should NOT be on LOW, but OFF?

I can understand people viewing in bright environments would find increasing Gamma desirable, but for dim or dark viewing environments the lowest setting of “Off” is still way too high. This results in a washed out look to the picture and tends to make compression artifacts more visible.
There is a tendency for people to desire more shadow detail then a properly calibrated reference display provides, and unless you have such a reference you really can’t judge what is correct by eye.

So, again, what are you recommending....leave GAMMA OFF?

The SXRD is very bright in a dim environment and that tends to obscure shadow detail. Using “Power saving” mode and iris control to dim down the image helps, although the real answer is fitting a neutral density filter, which has the added benefit of improving black levels by 50%. :D

I'm running Iris on AUTO 2....is this okay?

All “Advanced” picture controls should be off except for Noise Reduction which can be set to “Low” without problems if desired, and Detail Enhancer which I set to Max, yes Maximum.

Wow....maximum on detail enhancer? Okay....I have set NOISE REDUCTION to LOW, which seems to be okay, but DETAIL ENHANCER I left off based on so many suggestions to do so; it's interesting that you leave this on HIGH, or maximum, which you call it....the actual setting is HIGH on the Sonys....do you actually own an SXRD? If so, can you confirm the rumor that using Detail Enhancer actually makes more pop for HD/Blu-ray than for standard def DVD? Can you tell me why you use it?

I have tested with various sharpness and resolution test patterns, both SD and 1080 HD and can’t see any detrimental affects such as ringing. There are also no problems with video sources ranging from low grade SD satellite to BluRay – HDDVD.

You can see some definite artifacting using Standard picture mode, believe me....

HD in particular benefits from the Maximum setting of “Detail Enhancer” and the results are impressively crisp without the problems you get using too much sharpness.

Okay, I suppose this answered my question above; if I didn't want to go High on Detail Enhancer, could I use low or medium with close results?

I find a “Sharpness” setting of around 20 ideal, much more invites ringing and less is unnecessarily softy.

I'm running Sharpness at 50....is this too high? It's Sony's factory default...

I don’t normally use the DRC as I feed everything in as 1080p so DRC is not available.

The DRC is locked when I'm on my VIDEO 6 HDMI input to HIGH DENSITY; is this not correct?

Okay; indeed, I am using WARM 2 on color temperature, but like I said to Russell above, if you go online and look for comments from users of this TV, you will see how everyone is copying those CNET values for White Balance right into their own sets....if you advise against this, would you recommend to a user like me to leave the WHITE BALANCE settings all at ZERO?

I would suggest that if you are not happy with the default “Warm2” you adjust by eye to suit your taste rather then use a setting from the net.


So, what are you saying here....GAMMA should NOT be on LOW, but OFF?

Correct


I'm running Iris on AUTO 2....is this okay?

Auto 2 gives you the lowest black level, especialy if you adjust the iris in the service menu. For some situations Auto 2 may be too bright on a standard SXRD and a fixed iris may be more appropriate.


Wow....maximum on detail enhancer? Okay....I have set NOISE REDUCTION to LOW, which seems to be okay, but DETAIL ENHANCER I left off based on so many suggestions to do so; it's interesting that you leave this on HIGH, or maximum, which you call it....the actual setting is HIGH on the Sonys....do you actually own an SXRD? If so, can you confirm the rumor that using Detail Enhancer actually makes more pop for HD/Blu-ray than for standard def DVD? Can you tell me why you use it?

You may be correct, the maximum setting may be “High” , I have not looked at that menu in a many months.
Obviously I do own an SXRD, a 70” XBR2, actually an Australian equivalent model that has a different model number but is the same as far as user and service menus are concerned and is visually and functional identical. Our model has to support 50 and 60 Hz as well as 240 volt operation and is manufactured in Japan not the US.
I have owned the set for over a year and have extensively modified it. (Blacked out the cabinet interior, fitted a neutral density filter, reprogrammed the iris in the SM etc.)
Detail Enhancer is not a normal sharpening filter and does provide more pop and clarity for 1080 HD.



You can see some definite artifacting using Standard picture mode, believe me....

Don’t know, I have only ever used custom settings.


Okay, I suppose this answered my question above; if I didn't want to go High on Detail Enhancer, could I use low or medium with close results?

You could but I see no reason to use anything except “High” with any source.


I'm running Sharpness at 50....is this too high? It's Sony's factory default...

Yes 50 is definitely too high and will result in ringing artifacts. 25 is about the absolute limit before visible problems occur.


The DRC is locked when I'm on my VIDEO 6 HDMI input to HIGH DENSITY; is this not correct?

If you are inputting 1080p DRC is not available.

Regarding the CNET white balance settings--- yes lots of people use them, and yes it's not necessarily a great idea. For my a2000 the cnet settings actually took me in the wrong direction. Also, they mentioned using the minimum iris to get 35fl peak output. The min. iris setting on mine coupled with their contrast setting was way under that(around 25fl) and thus I had a murky, dim picture. They also put sharpness at 50 which on my set definitely introduces artificial edge enhancement.

If you head over to the Display Calibration forum on here, download and burn the calibration disk alluringreality and hwjohn have been working on. It's very useful for a lot of the basic settings, including sharpness.

The detail enhancer is a tricky one. I can definitely see it's negative effects in test patterns. If you have a blu-ray player pop in a Sony one and use the menu code 7669 and the sharpness pattern there will very quickly show you those negative effects. I also don't like how the detail enhancer also enhances grain and noise. It also seems to me that if you have a 1080p source, when you are "enhancing" the detail, you are actually masking detail. There's a fixed amount of display information. Yet, it does seem to do what it advertises and make the details stand out a bit more. I just don't like that it seems to make the picture a bit more noisy. I personally wouldn't ever go above a medium setting. The best way I've found to test it out in real world use is to find a few of your favorite scenes, pause it, and flip through the settings.

Edge enhancer has never really seemed to do much. I can only see it's affect in test patterns, but not in real world use. I leave it off.

That said, I've really struggled with optimizing the sharpness on my set. The picture seems inherently "soft" to me. Currently, I'm living with a sharpness setting of 38(as set to just below the point where white lines started forming on the sharpness testing pattern) and detail enhancer and edge enhancer off.

As for gamma, I struggle with that one too. It seems that with gamma on off, shadow detail is crushed even if you correctly calibrate your display. If you switch it to low and adjust your brightness accordingly, you get better shadow detail but some of the "pop" of the picture is lost. I currently have it on off, and my iris on low. On "min iris" the crushing of shadow detail definitely seemed worse than on low.

I would suggest that if you are not happy with the default “Warm2” you adjust by eye to suit your taste rather then use a setting from the net.

No -- I'm not saying I am not happy with Warm 2...if you read carefully, I mention "Indeed, yes, I am using Warm 2..." but then go on to explain that I don't know what to do with WHITE BALANCE settings, and THAT'S what I wanted to know if I should base my settings on...

Correct

This is tricky for me as well, just like the other member who posted just above; I can't seem to balance this one correctly -- leaving Gamma OFF seems to make a crushed, murky picture, but leaving it on LOW seems to give that washed out enhanced look that shows the compression artifacts...

Auto 2 gives you the lowest black level, especialy if you adjust the iris in the service menu. For some situations Auto 2 may be too bright on a standard SXRD and a fixed iris may be more appropriate.

Well, I think I am definitely more comfortable using one of the dynamic auto iris modes and I definitely don't want to touch anything in the service menu because I'm not a professional...so the choices come down to AUTO 1 or 2...

You may be correct, the maximum setting may be “High” , I have not looked at that menu in a many months.

Indeed...

Obviously I do own an SXRD, a 70” XBR2, actually an Australian equivalent model that has a different model number but is the same as far as user and service menus are concerned and is visually and functional identical. Our model has to support 50 and 60 Hz as well as 240 volt operation and is manufactured in Japan not the US.

Okay...

I have owned the set for over a year and have extensively modified it. (Blacked out the cabinet interior, fitted a neutral density filter, reprogrammed the iris in the SM etc.)

This is not something I would ever get into...

Detail Enhancer is not a normal sharpening filter and does provide more pop and clarity for 1080 HD.

I will attempt it, but some are so against it too that I just don't know...

You could but I see no reason to use anything except “High” with any source.

Wow...you're the first Sony owner that I have encountered that insists on using anything but HIGH for any enhancement technique...I don't know now if I should use LOW or MEDIUM...

Yes 50 is definitely too high and will result in ringing artifacts. 25 is about the absolute limit before visible problems occur.

Funny...I didn't see any ringing at 50 in CUSTOM mode, but I'll definitely reduce it and see what happens...

If you are inputting 1080p DRC is not available.

Right; it locks this into HIGH DENSITY and greys out those selections when I put my Blu-ray player on; is this operating correctly then?

Regarding the CNET white balance settings--- yes lots of people use them, and yes it's not necessarily a great idea. For my a2000 the cnet settings actually took me in the wrong direction. Also, they mentioned using the minimum iris to get 35fl peak output. The min. iris setting on mine coupled with their contrast setting was way under that(around 25fl) and thus I had a murky, dim picture.

Right -- and I have read a ton of other user replies which state that they HAD to take their sets out of that MINIMUM iris and switch to at least AUTO 2 to brighten up the picture; hence, I have left mine on AUTO 2...do you use 1 or 2?

They also put sharpness at 50 which on my set definitely introduces artificial edge enhancement.

Can you recommend a sharpness setting? Is Owen's about correct at 25 or so?

The detail enhancer is a tricky one. I can definitely see it's negative effects in test patterns. If you have a blu-ray player pop in a Sony one and use the menu code 7669 and the sharpness pattern there will very quickly show you those negative effects. I also don't like how the detail enhancer also enhances grain and noise. It also seems to me that if you have a 1080p source, when you are "enhancing" the detail, you are actually masking detail. There's a fixed amount of display information. Yet, it does seem to do what it advertises and make the details stand out a bit more. I just don't like that it seems to make the picture a bit more noisy. I personally wouldn't ever go above a medium setting. The best way I've found to test it out in real world use is to find a few of your favorite scenes, pause it, and flip through the settings.

Okay; this is more what I thought detail enhancer would do -- although Owen swears by HIGH here, this scares me a bit...right now, I have it at off, but can low be toyed with maybe? Does it REALLY add pop to high definition material?

Edge enhancer has never really seemed to do much. I can only see it's affect in test patterns, but not in real world use. I leave it off.

I'll leave it off, too....

That said, I've really struggled with optimizing the sharpness on my set. The picture seems inherently "soft" to me. Currently, I'm living with a sharpness setting of 38(as set to just below the point where white lines started forming on the sharpness testing pattern) and detail enhancer and edge enhancer off.

Yes, sharpness has been a bug to me, too; I suppose I can totally accept all the other ADVANCED SETTINGS as being left OFF, but sharpness is tough too -- while most claim 50 introduces noise and edge garbage, I don't see it on my set....weird...perhaps I'll leave it at 38, like you? Is there a standard here of some kind?

As for gamma, I struggle with that one too. It seems that with gamma on off, shadow detail is crushed even if you correctly calibrate your display. If you switch it to low and adjust your brightness accordingly, you get better shadow detail but some of the "pop" of the picture is lost. I currently have it on off, and my iris on low. On "min iris" the crushing of shadow detail definitely seemed worse than on low.

Well, while I prefer the auto iris control, I am too struggling with Gamma; I had it LOW last night for watching Man on Fire on DVD, and some scenes looked just too...well..."slightly bright" and unnatural; perhaps I should follow you and Owen and leave that off....

Regarding the CNET white balance settings--- yes lots of people use them, and yes it's not necessarily a great idea. For my a2000 the cnet settings actually took me in the wrong direction. Also, they mentioned using the minimum iris to get 35fl peak output. The min. iris setting on mine coupled with their contrast setting was way under that(around 25fl) and thus I had a murky, dim picture. They also put sharpness at 50 which on my set definitely introduces artificial edge enhancement.

If you head over to the Display Calibration forum on here, download and burn the calibration disk alluringreality and hwjohn have been working on. It's very useful for a lot of the basic settings, including sharpness.

The detail enhancer is a tricky one. I can definitely see it's negative effects in test patterns. If you have a blu-ray player pop in a Sony one and use the menu code 7669 and the sharpness pattern there will very quickly show you those negative effects. I also don't like how the detail enhancer also enhances grain and noise. It also seems to me that if you have a 1080p source, when you are "enhancing" the detail, you are actually masking detail. There's a fixed amount of display information. Yet, it does seem to do what it advertises and make the details stand out a bit more. I just don't like that it seems to make the picture a bit more noisy. I personally wouldn't ever go above a medium setting. The best way I've found to test it out in real world use is to find a few of your favorite scenes, pause it, and flip through the settings.

Edge enhancer has never really seemed to do much. I can only see it's affect in test patterns, but not in real world use. I leave it off.

That said, I've really struggled with optimizing the sharpness on my set. The picture seems inherently "soft" to me. Currently, I'm living with a sharpness setting of 38(as set to just below the point where white lines started forming on the sharpness testing pattern) and detail enhancer and edge enhancer off.

As for gamma, I struggle with that one too. It seems that with gamma on off, shadow detail is crushed even if you correctly calibrate your display. If you switch it to low and adjust your brightness accordingly, you get better shadow detail but some of the "pop" of the picture is lost. I currently have it on off, and my iris on low. On "min iris" the crushing of shadow detail definitely seemed worse than on low.


All I can say is that the A2000 behaves very differently to my set, no problems on 1920x1080 test patterns with Detaill Enhancer on “High” here, no problems with noise either, no way I can run “Sharpness” at 38. Looks like people will have to make there own assessment of what works on their model SXRD.
It could well be that a setting of "High" for Detail Enhancer on an XBR2 is the same as medium or low on an A2000.


Using the “Picture” or Contrast control to limit the displays light output as I have seen recommended is a bad idea, it artificially lowers the native contrast ratio of the SXRD chips and kills the picture. Picture should be set as high as possible within the limits of acceptable grey scale tracking.
If the display is too bright use Power Saving lamp mode and or iris control.

I have no problem with shadow detail what so ever, every video level above video black (16) is clearly visible with Gamma set to “Off”.
Set to “Off” my SXRD has a Gamma of around 1.8, well above (brighter) then the 2.2 ideal. I use my HTPC to correct Gamma down to 2.2 and to give me an identical image to my calibrated Sony CRT PC monitor with perfect 2.2 Gamma.
This gives a darker but more pleasing picture with more punch, but shadow detail is still perfect, with every level above 16 visible as it should be.

Adjusting the iris has no affect on shadow detail it just affects overall brightness. A dimmer image may need to have brightness tweaked if you are viewing in a bright environment.

Okay, let me recoil and get things back on track for a second because I think we're going into settings discussions which really didn't focus on what this thread was originally about...

Here it is in a nutshell:

Under CUSTOM Picture Mode for the SXRD A2020 series, the basic settings have been calibrated by me via a disc, and these include Picture, Brightness, Color, Hue and Sharpness...now, Sharpness has been left at 50 which I'm told is too high, so I can use some suggestions for that...

The main issue is under the ADVANCED SETTINGS menu, which include settings such as BLACK CORRECTOR, DETAIL ENHANCER, LIVE COLOR, WHITE BALANCE, etc....I can also use suggestions for NOISE REDUCTION which I have been keeping on LOW...does NOISE REDUCTION actually work when watching non-broadcast channel material? In other words, I thought NOISE REDUCTION was just for watching noisy cable channels....is this not so?

Under CUSTOM Picture Mode for the SXRD A2020 series, the basic settings have been calibrated by me via a disc, and these include Picture, Brightness, Color, Hue and Sharpness...now, Sharpness has been left at 50 which I'm told is too high, so I can use some suggestions for that...



I said that 50 was way too high on a 70” XBR2, as for your A2020 I have no idea, I have never even seen one. The internal defaults on different models could vary significantly so you will have to make your own assessment.

I said that 50 was way too high on a 70” XBR2, as for your A2020 I have no idea, I have never even seen one. The internal defaults on different models could vary significantly so you will have to make your own assessment.

It has been of general concensus in here that no matter the model, "50" seems to be excessively high for sharpness; while I don't necessarily see any obvious ringing from this on my 50" SXRD, I could be missing something with my eye -- perhaps there is indeed noise added and I just don't detect it.

But no matter what, no matter how many test discs I run, I don't detect anything happening to sharpness as I go up or down; it doesn't seem to matter.

What IS important at this point however are these parameters:

NOISE REDUCTION
ADVANCED SETTINGS

I initially used the CNET settings on my A3000 right after I got it. I needed something to change it to until I had time to use avia to calibrate it. I have since changed settings based on my personal experience with some of the settings.

When I told you to set gamma to low, I thought that was the lowest setting. It has been a while since I was in the menu, mine is set to off.

Using test patterns I set my sharpness to 35. I may recheck that since I have adjusted the convergence since calibrating it.

For standard definition dishnet over s-video I have noise reduction set to off. I have tried it in the different settings, I used stationary text as my reference and got the least amount of noise with that setting. Your settings will depend on your source. I am not using any detail enhancer with any of my inputs.

Black corrector is off

There are other settings in the advanced menu that I can not think of since it is not in front of me at the moment. I have played with DRC but have not come to a definite conclusion with that one yet on my sd dish feed.

I would recommend that you just try them out, won't hurt your tv to try them. That was what I did with a few of them but ended up not liking the results.

When I told you to set gamma to low, I thought that was the lowest setting. It has been a while since I was in the menu, mine is set to off.

Okay; I think OFF will be the better setting for this....thank you....

Using test patterns I set my sharpness to 35. I may recheck that since I have adjusted the convergence since calibrating it.

Indeed; this is always giving me issues...

For standard definition dishnet over s-video I have noise reduction set to off. I have tried it in the different settings, I used stationary text as my reference and got the least amount of noise with that setting. Your settings will depend on your source. I am not using any detail enhancer with any of my inputs.

It's so weird that NOISE REDUCTION circuitry would give the LOWEST amount of repeatable noise on OFF...do you keep your set on CUSTOM mode for cable watching, as well? For cable I'm using STANDARD; does the NOISE REDUCTION circuirty work in Standard?

Black corrector is off

Indeed...this crushes the blacks even more, which we don't need....

It has been of general concensus in here that no matter the model, "50" seems to be excessively high for sharpness; while I don't necessarily see any obvious ringing from this on my 50" SXRD, I could be missing something with my eye -- perhaps there is indeed noise added and I just don't detect it.

But no matter what, no matter how many test discs I run, I don't detect anything happening to sharpness as I go up or down; it doesn't seem to matter.


Ringing does not introduce noise, it puts double edges of high contrast transitions like those on a black and white resolution test pattern. It’s not hard to see if you know what too look for.
Looking at normal video it will be very hard to see unless it is extreme, and many people will like the effect of a lot of sharpening anyway, so use what you like.


What IS important at this point however are these parameters:

NOISE REDUCTION
ADVANCED SETTINGS

I thought we had been over that, you can either try the settings I suggested or not, it’s your choice. The only settings you need to worry about are Noise reduction (Off or Low) and Detail Enhancer, everything else should be off IMHO.


At the risk of sounding rood, if you can’t see what affect the various setting have, why do you care what they are set at?:rolleyes:

so use what you like.

Because I "don't know what I'm looking for," as you say, I am asking suggestions from fellow members here to help a little.

I thought we had been over that, you can either try the settings I suggested or not, it’s your choice. The only settings you need to worry about are Noise reduction (Off or Low) and Detail Enhancer, everything else should be off IMHO.

Okay; I was trying to get some more concensus on what these should be set to -- in others' opinions...

I'll leave everything off, as you suggest, and play with noise reduction and detail enhancer; thank you.

At the risk of sounding rood, if you can’t see what affect the various setting have, why do you care what they are set at?:rolleyes:

Read the first reply above...:rolleyes:
By the way...didn't you mean "rude"? ;)

[
Right -- and I have read a ton of other user replies which state that they HAD to take their sets out of that MINIMUM iris and switch to at least AUTO 2 to brighten up the picture; hence, I have left mine on AUTO 2...do you use 1 or 2?

I am using low now. I had been going back and forth between min iris and auto 2. Auto 2 seems fine for the most part, but it's peak brightness was just too much for my room. I tried to get mine calibrated to a peak output of 35fl as suggested in some of the calibration threads.

Can you recommend a sharpness setting? Is Owen's about correct at 25 or so?

Not with any confidence. There appears to be variation between sets. The best thing to do is invest in a calibration disk and do it yourself. There is a free one I mentioned earlier that works well. I think a safe setting would be around 30. It's most likely not too low and it's probably not too high either.




Okay; this is more what I thought detail enhancer would do -- although Owen swears by HIGH here, this scares me a bit...right now, I have it at off, but can low be toyed with maybe? Does it REALLY add pop to high definition material?

I think low can safely be played with. It's very subtle, even on the test patterns.

It has been of general concensus in here that no matter the model, "50" seems to be excessively high for sharpness; while I don't necessarily see any obvious ringing from this on my 50" SXRD, I could be missing something with my eye -- perhaps there is indeed noise added and I just don't detect it.

It's not instantly obvious. You need a good test pattern for it. And then, you need to get up close to the screen and look for white halos on thin vertical lines. If you turn your sharpness down to zero you will actually see light grey introduced, or some sort of fuzzing. If you turn it up to 100 you will see white lines. Turn it down to the point where those two extremes disappear and you have just the original line. Personally I think a high def disk with a good pattern really helps on this as with upconverted dvds I had a hard time setting it.

I am using low now. I had been going back and forth between min iris and auto 2. Auto 2 seems fine for the most part, but it's peak brightness was just too much for my room. I tried to get mine calibrated to a peak output of 35fl as suggested in some of the calibration threads.

Okay; seems Auto 2 would be enough for me then...thanks...min was way too dim for my room...

Not with any confidence. There appears to be variation between sets. The best thing to do is invest in a calibration disk and do it yourself. There is a free one I mentioned earlier that works well. I think a safe setting would be around 30. It's most likely not too low and it's probably not too high either.

Okay...I'll try 30...thanks...

I think low can safely be played with. It's very subtle, even on the test patterns.

Thank you very much for these suggestions....I shall indeed plug them in and see the results....:)

Okay...

With the A2020 on Custom, and Noise Reduction on LOW, plus Advanced Settings on OFF, all except for DETAIL ENHANCER, which I kept on LOW, and dropping the SHARPNESS to "30," I popped in the MICHAEL CLAYTON Blu-ray last night and was horribly unimpressed....

Now, this may have been due to the nature of the disc's transfer, but there was video noise, heavy compression grain in very dark scenes and a lack of 3-D punch associated with high definition....I immediately went into DETAIL ENHANCER and dropped that to OFF, and it SEEMED like, to my naked eye, that it somehow cleaned up this noise a bit....but overall, with Auto2 Iris and Gamma OFF, there was horrible black crush with no shadow detail whatsoever...I hope this was the transfer of the film, because I didn't like the results of this calibration on this title.

I brought Sharpness back up to 50, and this didn't really make a difference either; should I be concerned at this point that my SXRD does not come equipped with CINEMA or PRO controls for picture adjustment -- only CUSTOM? :confused:

Okay...

Watched the Blu-ray of 30 DAYS OF NIGHT just the other evening and the disc again didn't impress me, just like the BD of MICHAEL CLAYTON; only this time I ran 30 Days of Night, at 1080p, using my SXRD's STANDARD mode instead of Custom...

These Blu-rays just don't have the three dimensional pop I was expecting from high definition; indeed, if I go back to running Custom mode for the VIDEO 6 HDMI/Blu-ray input on my A2020, these settings need to be confirmed once and for all:

I'll calibrate for Contrast/Picture, Brightness, Color, Hue, but these below need assistance and recommendations:

SHARPNESS
NOISE REDUCTION
ADVANCED SETTINGS:
GAMMA
LIVE COLOR
BLACK CORRECTOR
WHITE BALANCE
ETC.....

I have another question regarding these SXRD sets and their picture modes....do things like NOISE REDUCTION and SHARPNESS even function and work in the STANDARD mode? Are these things that only work and make a difference in CUSTOM? Nothing seems to happen when I adjust these settings in Standard.

Should the ADVANCED SETTINGS pretty much be all OFF? Would anyone recommend using Gamma or Detail Enhancer at all?

There really isn't much that can be added to what's already been posted. SXRD has a certain look which I find acceptable and not really worse than going to many theaters. I can try to explain what the controls do, but it's really up to you to set them however you want. I suppose 3d pop comes from higher contrast ratios, but aside from getting something like a Pioneer plasma or a projector I'm not sure what to say there.

Sharpness - This control will be most noticable on static images. Using a test disk or a static image would be the way to set this the same as contrast, brightness, color, hue.

Noise Reduction - If you watch something like Minority Report the setting can take some of the noise out of the image, but that noise is actually part of the signal. Cnet has made comments that the setting can work really well to remove problems in the image, but for things like Blu-ray it really shouldn't be necessary. This setting can introduce blur when it's not needed, so I always set it off. All in all this is a very subjective control, but I prefer to see what is in the signal and prefer for the TV never to introduce issues so I don't use it.

Gamma - This adds more light to the middle grayscale (approx half-way between black and white). Like Owen commented, off is the closest to the intended look of the picture in a low-light room, like would be typically used for watching movies.

Live Color - This changes red. I think that it increases red brightness in relation to blue and green. Off is probably the closest to the intended look of the picture from what I've seen.

Black Corrector - This increases the low-end gamma. If that doesn't mean anything to you, then it's basically that you'll see less shadow detail if you use this setting. Again, off seems to be the setting that comes closest to the way the image is intended to look.

White Balance - This works with the color temp setting for adjusting grayscale. Basically there is a standard for how much red, green, and blue are in gray. These controls can adjust the portions of those colors that will appear in gray. The only way to really set the controls is to have a device to measure the light coming from your TV, but having the color temp set to warm2 is typically the closest to the standard.

Detail Enhancer - This alters colors so that it appears that there's more contrast. It also introduces some things like jagged edges on certain images and moire. On my A2000 I used up to medium at times to give the impression of better contrast, but on the A3000 due to the better native contrast I stopped using it.

All of the controls you have access to should affect the image in one way or another. Generally on the A2000/A2020, Custom mode will allow you to get the closest to the TV standards. It does lack some of the processing of the image that the standard mode contains.

If you're going for accuracy - use the cusom mode, set color temp to warm1 or warm2, shut all the advanced settings and noise reduction off, and adjust the basic user controls according to a calibration disk. If you want to add some false contrast then use the Detail Enhancer, but I really think high introduces far too many issues. If you still don't like those settings then set the TV however you want, but you'll probably be moving farther away from the intended look.

If you're going for accuracy - use the cusom mode, set color temp to warm1 or warm2, shut all the advanced settings and noise reduction off, and adjust the basic user controls according to a calibration disk.

What if I made all of these adjustments while in Standard Mode? Would they work out to be the same. A little confused between making these adjustments in Standard versus Custom.

There's not much difference between custom and standard modes. On the A2000/A2020 there's processing in standard that is removed if you use custom. Because of that processing the two modes have different sharpness settings, but otherwise they're rather similar. Also I think that TV will not allow some of the color temps outside of custom unless you adjust the setting in the service menu.

What about in the A3000?

For the A3000 there is the report that standard can cause halos, but otherwise there's not much difference between the modes. Before the firmware update the sharpness settings varied and custom would roll-off 1080i, but I think after the firmware update that now the two might match for sharpness. The modes vary a little bit on the grayscale unless they're brought into line with the white balance. Unless you need to use two modes on the same input, I'm not sure there's much reason to use standard.

Haven't applied the update yet, so I'm using Standard because of the custom roll-off.

Not experiencing any pink tint issues, and being that I'm using Standard, I didn't see the need to get the update. Am I wrong here?

My A3000 always had image processing that could not be shut off if using standard mode before the firmware update. Not everyone reported it, but I wasn't the only one that was able to see how standard would alter the image. There have been a number of old firmwares reported, so I suppose it's possible that different firmwares react differently. The thing about having the current firmware is that at least you should have an idea about how the TV should be expected to react for discussion. It's really not a big deal, you fill out the Sony Support form and they send it in the mail, plug it in, and in five minutes it's up to date. Maybe the fact that I might not have ever used the firmware you have installed is why I don't agree that I've ever seen DE alter the sharpness setting. Before and after the A3000 firmware update there were some differences in how the TV reacted, but the A3000 never rolled off a 1080p input on custom and that's almost exclusively what I use my TV to watch.

The thing about having the current firmware is that at least you should have an idea about how the TV should be expected to react for discussion. It's really not a big deal.....

Ya know, it's that whole "don't fix what's not broken" deal that comes to mind. I read in a review (not sure which one), that after the most recent update was applied, it did correct the roll off in custom and cinema, but that it also appeared that Standard was a bit softer also. Also heard that there were some that had audio synch problems after the update.

So I figured, why "possibly" make a situation worse being that I'm pretty darn happy with the way it is now.

There really isn't much that can be added to what's already been posted. SXRD has a certain look which I find acceptable and not really worse than going to many theaters.

Thank you very, very much Alluring; these suggestions are indeed interesting and I WILL definitely take what you said -- and others -- and try and plug these suggestions into my 50" screen's Custom settings...indeed, I never thought these SXRDs looked WORSE than going to the theaters; I just expected more from this set in terms of that "popping off the screen" effect that high definition was supposed to deliver -- and I've seen this effect on some Sony LCDs....

I can try to explain what the controls do, but it's really up to you to set them however you want. I suppose 3d pop comes from higher contrast ratios, but aside from getting something like a Pioneer plasma or a projector I'm not sure what to say there.

Indeed....I think I made the wrong decision by going rear projection; I think I would have gotten that "pop off the screen, animated" look from my high def discs if I would have gone Plasma or LCD, and now I'm regretting it, 1500 bucks later....:mad:

Sharpness - This control will be most noticable on static images. Using a test disk or a static image would be the way to set this the same as contrast, brightness, color, hue.

Okay....I was just asking because no matter what test pattern I use or calibration disc, the Sharpness on this set doesn't seem to get less or more; it's really weird -- this is MOST notable on STANDARD mode, where the Sharpness does not move at all -- EITHER way, up or down. I think this is because Standard adds some kind of artificial sharpening, but this hasn't been confirmed...

Noise Reduction - If you watch something like Minority Report the setting can take some of the noise out of the image, but that noise is actually part of the signal. Cnet has made comments that the setting can work really well to remove problems in the image, but for things like Blu-ray it really shouldn't be necessary. This setting can introduce blur when it's not needed, so I always set it off. All in all this is a very subjective control, but I prefer to see what is in the signal and prefer for the TV never to introduce issues so I don't use it.

Okay....indeed, I will be using LOW or OFF; does NOISE REDUCTION actually affect non-broadcast signals, too? I thought this setting was only to reduce like over the air broadcasts and cable; does it work with an HDMI input for DVD and high def players, too?

Gamma - This adds more light to the middle grayscale (approx half-way between black and white). Like Owen commented, off is the closest to the intended look of the picture in a low-light room, like would be typically used for watching movies.

Okay, OFF it shall be...

Live Color - This changes red. I think that it increases red brightness in relation to blue and green. Off is probably the closest to the intended look of the picture from what I've seen.

Okay, OFF it shall be...

Black Corrector - This increases the low-end gamma. If that doesn't mean anything to you, then it's basically that you'll see less shadow detail if you use this setting. Again, off seems to be the setting that comes closest to the way the image is intended to look.

I have read that this actually introduces added black crush, which isn't desirable...I'm going to leave it OFF....

White Balance - This works with the color temp setting for adjusting grayscale. Basically there is a standard for how much red, green, and blue are in gray. These controls can adjust the portions of those colors that will appear in gray. The only way to really set the controls is to have a device to measure the light coming from your TV, but having the color temp set to warm2 is typically the closest to the standard.

Well....I'm leaving it on WARM2, but what about the INDIVIDUAL White Balance Settings....should I leave these on ZERO?

Detail Enhancer - This alters colors so that it appears that there's more contrast. It also introduces some things like jagged edges on certain images and moire. On my A2000 I used up to medium at times to give the impression of better contrast, but on the A3000 due to the better native contrast I stopped using it.

Some have suggested that Detail Enhancer adds a "3-D Pop" on high definition material; if this is so, perhaps LOW would be a good place to start unless you suggest against it?

All of the controls you have access to should affect the image in one way or another. Generally on the A2000/A2020, Custom mode will allow you to get the closest to the TV standards. It does lack some of the processing of the image that the standard mode contains.

What exactly is the "processing" that Standard adds? Do you mean in Custom, there should be less artifacting and "noise" in the screen? When in STANDARD, there is NO way to control anything other than the basic settings and Noise Reduction -- that's it. There are NO Advanced Settings in Standard, so is there anything to be said about that?

If you're going for accuracy - use the cusom mode, set color temp to warm1 or warm2, shut all the advanced settings and noise reduction off, and adjust the basic user controls according to a calibration disk. If you want to add some false contrast then use the Detail Enhancer, but I really think high introduces far too many issues. If you still don't like those settings then set the TV however you want, but you'll probably be moving farther away from the intended look.

I will indeed try all these.....thank you VERY much....I'll report back when I watch something using these settings. :)

What if I made all of these adjustments while in Standard Mode? Would they work out to be the same. A little confused between making these adjustments in Standard versus Custom.

Aside from the observations which Alluring shared regarding the modes being somewhat the same, these adjustments cannot be made in STANDARD -- in STANDARD, there is ONLY settings for basic things like Picture, Color, Sharpness, etc....THERE ARE NO ADVANCED SETTINGS AVAILABLE as there are in CUSTOM...making me wonder what kind of noise and processing is being added to STANDARD....

Aside from the observations which Alluring shared regarding the modes being somewhat the same, these adjustments cannot be made in STANDARD -- in STANDARD, there is ONLY settings for basic things like Picture, Color, Sharpness, etc....THERE ARE NO ADVANCED SETTINGS AVAILABLE as there are in CUSTOM...making me wonder what kind of noise and processing is being added to STANDARD....

What advanced settings are available in Custom that are not available in Standard? On my A3000, it looks like all the advanced settings are available on Standard.

What advanced settings are available in Custom that are not available in Standard? On my A3000, it looks like all the advanced settings are available on Standard.

On my 50-inch A2020, there are absolutely NO "Advanced Settings" available under Standard...all those Advanced Settings like Black Corrector, Gamma, White Balance, etc. that are under CUSTOM are NOT under Standard on my A2020 at all...these are ONLY available under Custom.

Ah, ok. Guess that's one of the differences between the A2020 and the A3000's.

Ah, ok. Guess that's one of the differences between the A2020 and the A3000's.

I suppose so; although now I am concerned because I'm wondering if there is a "hidden menu" on the 2020 that I don't know about perhaps through playing with the Service Menu or something...

Can someone else please confirm if the A2020s do not offer Advanced Settings under the STANDARD picture mode?

All SXRD optical blocks are different and using someone else’s custom white balance settings is foolish. You can do a better job by eye using “Warm 2” as a base.

My only experience is with XBR2’s and on those sets the Gamma curve is too flat and closer to 1.8 rather then the industry standard of 2.2. Increasing the Gamma control to “Low” or higher is going the wrong way and takes Gamma closer to 1.0.
I can understand people viewing in bright environments would find increasing Gamma desirable, but for dim or dark viewing environments the lowest setting of “Off” is still way too high. This results in a washed out look to the picture and tends to make compression artifacts more visible.
There is a tendency for people to desire more shadow detail then a properly calibrated reference display provides, and unless you have such a reference you really can’t judge what is correct by eye.
The SXRD is very bright in a dim environment and that tends to obscure shadow detail. Using “Power saving” mode and iris control to dim down the image helps, although the real answer is fitting a neutral density filter, which has the added benefit of improving black levels by 50%. :D

All “Advanced” picture controls should be off except for Noise Reduction which can be set to “Low” without problems if desired, and Detail Enhancer which I set to Max, yes Maximum.
I have tested with various sharpness and resolution test patterns, both SD and 1080 HD and can’t see any detrimental affects such as ringing. There are also no problems with video sources ranging from low grade SD satellite to BluRay – HDDVD.
HD in particular benefits from the Maximum setting of “Detail Enhancer” and the results are impressively crisp without the problems you get using too much sharpness.

I find a “Sharpness” setting of around 20 ideal, much more invites ringing and less is unnecessarily softy.

I don’t normally use the DRC as I feed everything in as 1080p so DRC is not available.
DRC settings can certainly have a significant impact on sharpness, but I would not use its sharpening in place of “Detail Enhancer”.

My calibrated XBR2 has a average gamma of 2.5 with the low gamma setting. Possibly your neutral density filter is affecting your readings. Low provides excellent shadow detail and the proper brightness setting will give excellent blacks.

Detail enhancer at any setting but off introduces unneeded noise into the picure. HD sources on the XBR2 are already very sharp. My calibrated setting for sharpness is at 5. Any higher looks unnatural to me.

To me the goal of any display device is to replicate the picture as if you were there. Real life is not as "sharp" as a lot of people prefer their TV's. Just take a look around the room where your computer is. Sure I could see more detail with a magnifying glass, but that is not how I normally see things. But this all comes down to personal preference. My calibrator and I share the same feelings regarding these topics though.

i have an 60" SXRD XBR2 that was professionaly calibrated and these are my settings

power savings- ON
cinamotion -AUTO

picture- CUSTOM
advanced iris- MEDIUM
picture-84
brightness-50
color-47
hue-0
color temp-warm2
sharpness-7
noise reduction -off
DRC-off
gamma-off
clear white-off
live color-off
white balance-all zeros
detail enhancer-off
edge enhancer-off

my average gamma is 2.29
color temp is tracking at D65

Hope this helps

Not sure if it would help if the calibrator went into the service menu and made any adjustments there. I did try your settings on my 55a2020 however and though they sem pretty decent I still have too much green push it seems.

I suppose so; although now I am concerned because I'm wondering if there is a "hidden menu" on the 2020 that I don't know about perhaps through playing with the Service Menu or something...

Can someone else please confirm if the A2020s do not offer Advanced Settings under the STANDARD picture mode?

When you are in the picture menu (where brightness, contrast, etc etc is located) and you scroll down to the bottom, is there an Advanced Settings title that is highlighted?

Not sure if it would help if the calibrator went into the service menu and made any adjustments there. I did try your settings on my 55a2020 however and though they sem pretty decent I still have too much green push it seems.

yes he did go ino the service menu

From the reports I read, the A2020 is the same TV as the A2000 aside from color. I've never really messed with an XBR2, but if anything it's probably closer to the A2020 than an A3000.


I think this is because Standard adds some kind of artificial sharpening, but this hasn't been confirmed...

Standard on the A2000 always seemed to have some sort of non-defeatable enhancement. My impression was that it used something like detail or edge enhancer.

I will be using LOW or OFF; does NOISE REDUCTION actually affect non-broadcast signals, too? I thought this setting was only to reduce like over the air broadcasts and cable; does it work with an HDMI input for DVD and high def players, too?

Yes the noise reduction setting can affect other sources. I notice even low can cause blurring. The possible negative effects are generally most noticable with fast motion.

I'm leaving it on WARM2, but what about the INDIVIDUAL White Balance Settings....should I leave these on ZERO?

Different TVs seem to vary and also they will change as the bulb ages. Generally the way to really set the white balance is to measure the screen. If you think you can pick out gray by eye you could adjust the controls that way, but I know I'm not great at picking out gray close to D65 by eye.

Some have suggested that Detail Enhancer adds a "3-D Pop" on high definition material; if this is so, perhaps LOW would be a good place to start unless you suggest against it?

I used up to medium at times.

What exactly is the "processing" that Standard adds? Do you mean in Custom, there should be less artifacting and "noise" in the screen? When in STANDARD, there is NO way to control anything other than the basic settings and Noise Reduction -- that's it. There are NO Advanced Settings in Standard, so is there anything to be said about that?

It's been a while since I really looked close at the A2000, but the way I remember it is that Standard seems to alter the image from what custom would show. Generally I was just using video material to make out what changes the different settings might cause and then I would use test patterns to try to get an idea what the TV might be doing. I always used custom because that seemed to measure well and it didn't introduce many issues that I could make out in the different items I looked at. My impression was that standard seemed to probably have some detail enhancer and/or edge enhancer turned on for the A2000 (again by all reports it's electronically the same TV as the A2020).

On the 2000's when you first go into Custom the default Advanced Settngs are:

Black Corrector=Low
Gamma=Low
Clear White=Off
Live Color=Low
White Balance=all zero's
Detail Enhancer=Medium
Edge Enhancer=Low

This makes me think, that is how they are set while using Standard.
While Vivid is probably set to High or Max for most settings?

My calibrated XBR2 has a average gamma of 2.5 with the low gamma setting. Possibly your neutral density filter is affecting your readings. Low provides excellent shadow detail and the proper brightness setting will give excellent blacks.

The ND filter has no affect on calibration, and certainly none on Gamma, it just cuts light output in half, nothing more.
It is possible reprogramming the iris controls has altered Gamma, but not by much from memory.
My set measures at around 1.7-1.8 and looks like it. Shadows are too bright in comparison to my calibrated Sony G500 CRT monitor with perfect 2.2 Gamma out of the box, and I need to adjust Gamma down significantly on my HTPC to get the XBR2 to match the CRT reference.


Detail enhancer at any setting but off introduces unneeded noise into the picure. HD sources on the XBR2 are already very sharp. My calibrated setting for sharpness is at 5. Any higher looks unnatural to me.

“Detail Enhancer” is a sharpening filter that operates in both horizontal and vertical plains, unlike the “Sharpen” control that only affects horizontal (vertical edges).
Neither sharpening systems create any noise, although they can make noise that is already present in the source more noticeable.
On my SXRD the available settings for Detail Enhancer are Off, Low, Medium, High and Max. “Max” uses noticeably less horizontal sharpening then “High”, but maybe a little more vertical. It also seems to act on higher special frequencies and looks less harsh then “High”.
On video content I find Max works great, noise is no worse then on a high end CRT monitor with no video processing of any kind, so I don’t understand the comments about noise being excessive, it’s only what is originally in the source. If anything the SXRD shows less noise then the CRT monitor.

I find Detail Enhancer on Max and “Sharpness” on a low setting or off the best overall setup for all video types. Low quality SD from my satellite pay TV provider is not visibly affected by Detail Enhancer no matter what setting is used, but HD certainly is. It gives the SXRD the sharpness of a flat panel without the nasty artifacts common to flat panels and LCD’s in particular.



To me the goal of any display device is to replicate the picture as if you were there. Real life is not as "sharp" as a lot of people prefer their TV's. Just take a look around the room where your computer is. Sure I could see more detail with a magnifying glass, but that is not how I normally see things. But this all comes down to personal preference. My calibrator and I share the same feelings regarding these topics though.

I have a 1080p video camera and can set it up to show an uncompressed live 1080 HDMI video feed to the SXRD so I can view the real world outside the window next to the 70” SXRD and the same scene in the same scale on the SXRD. I don’t find Detail Enhancer on Max and Sharpness off or on a low setting to be excessively sharp and noise is a non issue.
I do find LCD panels excessively sharp and unnatural and flat panels in general have more noise and artifacts then the SXRD has ever displayed.
A clean smooth picture free of artifacts and noise is what I really enjoy about the XBR2.


EDIT.

By the time an image has gone through a camera lens, film, digitizing, mastering/downscaling, video compression and finally projection onto the SXRD’s screen it has suffered very significant high frequency loss. Pixel to pixel contrast or system MTF (Modulated Transfer Function) is typically down to around 10% at 1920 horizontal and probably 50% at 1080 vertical, which is very soft.
Sharpening systems like Detail Enhancer attempt to partly compensate for this very significant loss and the result can certainly be an improvement, however with a combination of high Detail Enhancer and Sharpness settings it is easy to overdo it resulting in a harsh picture.

The argument that no enhancements will give you the most “true to life” image is flawed IMHO. That would only be true if a lossless video capture system where possible, but it isn’t. As it stands even the best video sources suffer a role off in high spatial frequency information (fine detail) in the order of 12db or more.
Try listening to a good HiFi system with the treble control turned down to -12db and see if it sounds lifelike.

Increasing Gamma to reveal more shadow detail, as many people seem keen on doing is a sure way to bring out noise and compression artifacts. Getting the Gamma curve accurate is one of the best things you can do for suppression of noise and artifacts, but I expect that most people will find the picture too dark for their liking, as they are used to viewing displays with inaccurate Gamma and too much shadow detail.

When you are in the picture menu (where brightness, contrast, etc etc is located) and you scroll down to the bottom, is there an Advanced Settings title that is highlighted?

No -- that's what I was saying. In STANDARD mode on my A2020 50", there are NO selections available for ADVANCED SETTINGS under the STANDARD mode. It jumps from Sharpness to Noise Reduction and then scrolls back up...

Standard on the A2000 always seemed to have some sort of non-defeatable enhancement. My impression was that it used something like detail or edge enhancer.

Indeed, something must be going on in Standard because each disc I watch with Custom on looks a tad bit cleaner with less smearing and pixelation than with Standard....but I cannot confirm which is "better" to use with more "pop"...

Yes the noise reduction setting can affect other sources. I notice even low can cause blurring. The possible negative effects are generally most noticable with fast motion.

Interesting....I thought this was to defeat random antenna- or broadcast-based noise in a signal; under Standard, this mode doesn't really seem to work; I'm using the LOW setting now for my VIDEO 6 HDMI/Blu ray/DVD input just to be sure, but I don't know how much this noise canceling circuit is actually doing...

Different TVs seem to vary and also they will change as the bulb ages. Generally the way to really set the white balance is to measure the screen. If you think you can pick out gray by eye you could adjust the controls that way, but I know I'm not great at picking out gray close to D65 by eye.


Indeed; the reason why I'm leaving them at zero because I'm not great either...

I used up to medium at times.

On detail enhancer? What effects does this have in particular?

It's been a while since I really looked close at the A2000, but the way I remember it is that Standard seems to alter the image from what custom would show. Generally I was just using video material to make out what changes the different settings might cause and then I would use test patterns to try to get an idea what the TV might be doing. I always used custom because that seemed to measure well and it didn't introduce many issues that I could make out in the different items I looked at. My impression was that standard seemed to probably have some detail enhancer and/or edge enhancer turned on for the A2000 (again by all reports it's electronically the same TV as the A2020).

Hmmmmm....and indeed that sounds like what Standard must be doing....the problem is I like the color "pop" Standard gives, but I know it must be adding some artificial ringing, enhancement on edges and sharpness.