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Tosh HD-A2 HD DVD - First End User Reports!

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#1 ·
Yes, got A2 From BB today! Had my A1 in to their repair facility for over a month and they said not repairable, so gave me exchange for A2. I tried to get A2 before lunch today but had not come in yet!


Behold, got phone call from BB at 1PM and UPS just delivered the first A2 shipment so dashed over and picked it up.


I know there are many questions, and I only had chance to do quick test but so far it's much better than A1 for performance. I checked out the first problem title for most folks with E.O.Days and played TrueHD track flawless not lag, pause or hiccups at all. Then checked out some of KK just to be sure it works and just fine with it.


First thing I noticed on my setup is even better blacks, at least to my eyes. Also much faster, how fast? just like Toshiba says about twice as quick as A1. Another plus is when movie does start don't get all the flashing and video noise like the A1, just starts smooth like it should.


Not a lot of time spent with it yet, so hope this helps take the edge of all you folks still waiting for it to get in your hands. I think it is well worth the wait, but of course my A1 was great for about 6 months before it got sick, hope our new A2's will have better results.
 
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#77 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by Kris Deering /forum/post/0


Got the player today.


Startup time, 35-45 seconds. Disc loading to play, 5-15 seconds depending on the disc. WAY faster than the A1 with loading.


The player does not clip head and toe room, no pixel cropping. It can resolve the full resolution of HD with both chroma and luma signals. No Y/C delay.


The player has CUE problems with 1080i out but doesn't with 720P. No CUE at all with SD DVD.


720P is not inverse telecine from 1080P. So this player is not doing the right conversion from the source to 720P. So anyone with a video processor capable of inverse telecine 1080i de-interlacing should take advantage of it even if you are outputting 720P.


Remote is improved from A1, it is more like a regular DVD remote, but its buttons are small and there is no way you can see what they are in the dark.


Just my observations so far.

Thats all fine and good but how does the picture look??????


SD = equal or better than the A1

HD = equal or better than the A1


Please sticky this thread!
 
#81 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by Schlotkins /forum/post/0


Did the A1 was the CUE issue or is that a "downgrade"?


Thanks,

Chris
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showt...&post8991978


Stacey is amazing. Here are his last objective measurements. I await his and Kris's assesments of the A2/XA2.


"11-25-06, 10:42 PM #1 (Print)

sspears

Dreamer


Join Date: Feb 1999

Location: Sammamish, WA, USA

Posts: 4,356


PS3 Objective Measurements

I ran some objective tests on the PS3 today, my results are below. I have included Panasonic, Samsung and Toshiba results as well. I only looked at the HDMI to HDMI scenario.


I fed the output of the PS3 (and other players) into a DVDO VP50 and then into the Marantz VP11S1. I looked at both the 1080p and 1080i outputs.



HDMI Output Format

PS3

R'G'B'


Panasonic DMP-BD10

Y'CbCr 4:4:4


Toshiba HD-A1

Y'CbCr 4:2:2


Samsung BD-P1000

Y'CbCr 4:4:4


Pixel Cropping:

PS3

Left: 0

Top: 0

Right: 0

Bottom: 0

Comments: This is perfect behavior. You actually get all 1920x1080 pixels.


Panasonic DMP-BD10

Left: 0

Top: 0

Right: 0

Bottom: 0

Comments: This is perfect behavior. You actually get all 1920x1080 pixels.


Toshiba HD-A1

Left: 0

Top: 0

Right: 0

Bottom: 0

Comments: This is perfect behavior. You actually get all 1920x1080 pixels.


Samsung BD-P1000

Left: 8

Top: 2

Right: 1

Bottom: 0

Comments: As you can tell, the Samsung is not able to provide a true 1920x1080 active image. You are only getting 1911x1078 of real picture.


Dynamic Range - HDMI to HDMI
PS3

Above White - Fail - Clips

Below Black - Fail - Clips



Panasonic DMP-BD10
Above White - Fail - Clips

Below Black - Fail - Clips


Comments: The player has built-in picture controls. If you lower contrast down to -4 through -7, it will no longer clip. However, you are compressing the dynamic range. Steps are introduced, which show up as contouring. If you adjust brightness, you can make below black appear. If you do this, you are actually raising the black level of the player. I suspect this clipping may be caused by the bug in the Silicon Image 9030 HDMI transmitter. If they were to output Y'CbCr 4:2:2, it may fix the problem. I recommend you do not change the picture controls.


Toshiba HD-A1

Above White - Pass

Below Black - Pass


Samsung BD-P1000

Above White - Pass

Below Black - Pass


Luma Resolution

I looked at both horizontal and vertical resolution out to Nyquist. All four players were fine in this regard. There was no apparent roll-off.


Chroma Resolution
PS3

The horizontal Nyquist burst was rolled-off. It was not gone like the BD-10, but not as good as the Samsung and Toshiba.



Panasonic DMP-BD10
The horizontal Nyquist burst was pretty much gray. Something in the player must be filtering out this high resolution information. Vertical was fine.


Toshiba HD-A1

Both horizontal and vertical produced the full resolution out to Nyquist.


Samsung BD-P1000
There was a loss of vertical resolution at Nyquist. I suspect this is caused by the filtering in the Cortez (Genesis/Faroudja) chip.


Chroma Bug

PS3

ICP: This player does not have a filter to reduce the ICP artifact.

2-2: Pass - This player does not suffer from 2-2 chroma bug.

2-3: Pass - This player does not suffer from 2-3 chroma bug.


Comments: The upsampling it not high quality, though it is correct. You can see some steps in the chroma. The BD-10 looked better, when it did not have CUE.


Panasonic DMP-BD10

ICP: This player does not have a filter to reduce the ICP artifact.

2-2: Pass - This player does not suffer from 2-2 chroma bug.

2-3: Pass - This player does not suffer from 2-3 chroma bug.


*1.02 FW update - I am not sure what happened, but it now has CUE. I am going to try and locate a 1.0 player just to double check my original results.
2-2: Fail - This player suffers from 2-2 chroma bug.

2-3: Fail - This player suffers from 2-3 chroma bug.



Toshiba HD-A1

ICP: This player does not have a filter to reduce the ICP artifact.
2-2: Fail - This player suffers from the 2-2 chroma bug.

2-3: Fail - This player suffers from the 2-3 chroma bug.



Samsung BD-P1000

ICP: This player does include a filter to reduce the ICP artifact. Sadly it is present on both 1080i and 1080p. If a filter is included, it should only exist for the 1080p output.
2-2: Fail - This player suffers from the 2-2 chroma bug.

2-3: Fail - This player suffers from the 2-3 chroma bug.



Deinterlacing

The PS3 does not appear to be able to output 1080p when the source is encoded as 1080i. It changes the output resolution back to 1080i while 1080i content is playing. The Panasonic is using the AVC2510 while the Samsung is using the Cortez. Neither player can deinterlace 2-2, but both support 2-3 deinterlacing.


If you have the DVDO VP50, Anthem D2 or the Marantz VP11S1, I highly recommend you use the 1080i output of these players. It will do a better job creating the 1080p image than the players will. "


I have bolded where units failed. As you can see the A1 fails the ICP test and exhibits CUE (unbeknowest to me). Otherwise it beats or meets his rigorous tests.
 
#86 ·
Can someone explain the CUE issue in layman terms? Is it a big deal? Seems like the A1 had it and no one cared, so I guess it's not something we will notice if we don't look for it?
 
#90 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by eapleitez /forum/post/0


Can someone explain the CUE issue in layman terms? Is it a big deal? Seems like the A1 had it and no one cared, so I guess it's not something we will notice if we don't look for it?

CUE (Chroma Upsampling Error) is an error created when the MPEG decoder only provides color for every other line in a display. This is really noticable in color saturated presentations like digital animation and other dense, solid color blocks.


That's CUE in a nutshell. Check out this link for a more thorough explanation.

http://www.hometheaterhifi.com/volum...ug-4-2001.html
 
#91 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by Forceflow /forum/post/0


CUE (Chroma Upsampling Error) is an error created when the MPEG decoder only provides color for every other line in a display. This is really noticable in color saturated presentations like digital animation and other dense, solid color blocks.


That's CUE in a nutshell. Check out this link for a more thorough explanation.

http://www.hometheaterhifi.com/volum...ug-4-2001.html


Thanks. That sounds like a big problem IMO, hopefully it is correctable with firmware. This shouldn't affect VC1 encodes, though, right?
 
#92 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by Sam S /forum/post/0


Is the A2 still made in Japan like the A1?
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showt...&post9109168


"

These first A2s are made by Toshiba in Japan.


They were built in December 2006 as Toshiba produced a new run to replace the first production rather than fixing them. I applaud Toshiba USA and Japan for working so hard and doing things so very well.


-Robert "
 
#93 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by eapleitez /forum/post/0


Thanks. That sounds like a big problem IMO, hopefully it is correctable with firmware. This shouldn't affect VC1 encodes, though, right?

Just SD DVD AFAIK.


CUE isn't really a big deal. I mean, its annoying and I wish that 5 years after it was discovered we wouldn't have to discuss it, but there are bigger issues.


The Chroma filtering on all BD units is bad (especially vertical filtering on the sammy). The BTB and WTW issues would annoy me more than CUE as they affect HD and SD. I have CRT so losing BTB and WTW really, really sucks. I think the Tosh runs hot, but I can't imagine having a unit fail BTB, it would be returned for negating one huge benefit of CRT. The sammy clipping some pixels would annoy fixed pixel display owners, it wouldn't bother me (overscan).


All in all, the Tosh only failed CUE. That's better than all other units on the market. The A2 seems even better, failing on 1 resolution (1080i, the best resolution!). Oh well, hopefully they can fix it without resorting to filtering.
 
#94 ·
Playing around I can report a few things...


1. It's much quieter than the A1 (very quiet).

2. HDMI and Component are active at the same time (along with S-Video).

3. From memory the HD image/sound appear very close (the same?) to the A1's. I don't play DVDs.

4. So far no hiccups, etc.

5. Turned off it opens the door in about 39 seconds.

6. Overall it responses much faster.

7. The A1's remote works with the A2.

8. The player's firmware is currrent.
 
#96 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by Charles R /forum/post/0


Playing around I can report a few things...


1. It's much quieter than the A1 (very quiet).

2. HDMI and Component are active at the same time (along with S-Video).

3. From memory the HD image/sound appear very close (the same?) to the A1's. I don't play DVDs.

4. So far no hiccups, etc.

5. Turned off it opens the door in about 39 seconds.

6. Overall it responses much faster.

Sounds great! Thanks Charles.
 
#98 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by Kris Deering /forum/post/0


Got the player today.


Startup time, 35-45 seconds. Disc loading to play, 5-15 seconds depending on the disc. WAY faster than the A1 with loading.


The player does not clip head and toe room, no pixel cropping. It can resolve the full resolution of HD with both chroma and luma signals. No Y/C delay.


The player has CUE problems with 1080i out but doesn't with 720P. No CUE at all with SD DVD.


720P is not inverse telecine from 1080P. So this player is not doing the right conversion from the source to 720P. So anyone with a video processor capable of inverse telecine 1080i de-interlacing should take advantage of it even if you are outputting 720P.


Remote is improved from A1, it is more like a regular DVD remote, but its buttons are small and there is no way you can see what they are in the dark.


Just my observations so far.

Kris, Can you explain to me in laymen terms what you mean by "720P is not inverse telecine from 1080P. So this player is not doing the right conversion from the source to 720P. So anyone with a video processor capable of inverse telecine 1080i de-interlacing should take advantage of it even if you are outputting 720P."?
 
#99 ·
CUE doesn't really bother me that much. Actually, I wouldn't be using this player for SD DVDs anyway.


For those with HD-A1 audio lag issues, please be sure to tell us if the A2 has the same behaviour on the same discs.
 
#100 ·

Quote:
Thanks. That sounds like a big problem IMO, hopefully it is correctable with firmware. This shouldn't affect VC1 encodes, though, right?

The Toshiba HD-A1, Toshiba HD-A2, Samsung BD-P1000, Panasonic DMP-BD10, and Sony BDP-S1 all suffer from CUE (Chroma Upsampling Error) with their current firmware version.


It's not specific to the A2 by any means, although it would be nice if Toshiba could get that fixed.
 
#101 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by BuGsArEtAsTy /forum/post/0


CUE doesn't really bother me that much. Actually, I wouldn't be using this player for SD DVDs anyway.


For those with HD-A1 audio lag issues, please be sure to tell us if the A2 has the same behaviour on the same discs.

Sounds like the CUE bug is in the VC1 interlaced code only. I wonder just how noticable it is during normal viewing.
 
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