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Owners Tweaks & Settings Sony KDSR-50/60XBR1

356K views 2K replies 358 participants last post by  vegasmach1 
#1 ·
I'm a proud owner of a 60" SXRD and would like to start a new thread to discuss settings, and tweaks. Please don't post questions that are off topic. There are two other threads to discuuss other issues and to comapre different sets, etc. I would like this thread to be mainly for owners to discuss how to get the most out of our new sets.


Thanks you.
 
#102 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by Desert Heat /forum/post/0


I set up my DVD player last night (Toshiba 4800) using Avia. After much back and forth I have decided that the 480i PQ looks better on this set than when I have the player set to progessive. This is interesting to me as I remember when I first bought this DVD player and mated with an older Hitachi HD RPTV, the progessive mode was clearly the better PQ. Must have something to do with how the SXRD de-interlaces the picture. I now want to purchase the Oppo DVD player as from reading in this forum the 1080i seems to be the best choice for this display.


I don't have the settings written down but from memory.....the brightness was set to like 13. The picture setting close to max...I think 60 or 61. This was difficult to set becasue using the Avia patterns I could not find blooming or white crush oon the pattern even when tunred up to max......anybody casre to elaborate on this? Should this be set much lower than where I have it?

Color and Hue were right on target straight out of the box. I turned sharpness down to around 17. Iris on 2. Advanced iris off. Color temp set to normal.


PQ is very good on 480i, however I feel there is still room for improvement. Even on normal color temp there seems to be a slight red push, although I olny see a 5% push on the Avia pattern. Anybody know how to fix this?


I would like to get the DVD PQ closer to the HBO HD feed that I see for movies like i Robot. These seem to be more 'crisp' than my current DVD PQ. I will start buy upscaling 1080i with the Oppo player and go from there. Could other SXRD owners share their settings and any tips/tricks to getting the DVD PQ more 'crisp' like the HBO HD feed??

No matter what you do with it, DVD starts with a 480i signal and will never look as sharp as HD (720p or 1080i). The Oppo will probably look better with an upgraded 1080i signal, but it is on the margin--not significantly different. That is what I have found with my Denon 2910 which uses the same deinterlace/upconvert chip as the Oppo.


Yes, picture/contrast will not "bloom" on these sets. I set mine on the Sony "dot" which was "58" for 1080i input. Your brightness seems very low; although between Avia and your viewing of the picture; presume it is at least close. Believe the Sony "dot" is around "38". I used DVE and I believe my brightness is "38". I like DVE better for brightness and contrast; but prefer Avia for color settings and checking the color decoder. Which brings me to your 5% red push on Avia pattern--which I wouldn't personally worry about. Even the Avia disk says you should lower color, if required, to get red within 15-20%.
 
#103 ·

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


i have the same "issue" with convergence....its only on the right sde , center is perfect and left side is almost perfect, the cyand and magenta are just a tad more noticible on the right on either side of the grid lines....i just refused to drive myself insane with this kinda stuff, the picture is still STUNNING 10 feet back.

Absolutely correct! I'm definitely not a technical type; but I'm sure Sony has developed "acceptable tolerances" for this issue; and I presume they are tested before use. Doesn't mean a problem won't slip out; but it shouldn't happen. I'm sure it would be impossible for any set to be 100%--it's like trying to get to infinity. Think of the 2 million pixels on each of the three color wafers (or whatever we call them). Then position the three on top of each other and "fix them in place". Any variance, no matter how small (e.g., 1/1000th the width of a human hair), will result in color outside the white lines, even if it is so small that we can't see it.


Bottom line: If it doesn't affect the picture we see from our viewing position, why worry about it!
 
#104 ·

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


Absolutely correct! I'm definitely not a technical type; but I'm sure Sony has developed "acceptable tolerances" for this issue; and I presume they are tested before use. Doesn't mean a problem won't slip out; but it shouldn't happen. I'm sure it would be impossible for any set to be 100%--it's like trying to get to infinity. Think of the 2 million pixels on each of the three color wafers (or whatever we call them). Then position the three on top of each other and "fix them in place". Any variance, no matter how small (e.g., 1/1000th the width of a human hair), will result in color outside the white lines, even if it is so small that we can't see it.


Bottom line: If it doesn't affect the picture we see from our viewing position, why worry about it!

So true. I have some minor convergence issues on the top and bottom, but I can only see them when I stick my face 2-inches from the TV. If I'm back even just a couple feet, I can't see any issues. My normal viewing distance is a close 9-feet (I love that movie theater feeling), and the convergence looks perfect from there.


This is an issue where you need to be practical.
 
#106 ·
I also lowered my brightness to 15, and it does make a huge difference on SSE.


For TV viewing:


Iris 2

Advanced Iris High

Picture to 41.

Color is on the dot, but I lowered the red gain and bias a notch or two,

Sharpness 20


These settings seem to produce a great picture that has good contrast, good shadow detail, but that isn't too bright. These TVs can be extremely bright if you want to set them that way.


If you're watching a really dark program, you can hit the gamma corrector to low. But, this seemed quite watchable to me.
 
#107 ·

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


However the minor convergence problems does lower the overall effective picture resolution. It may not be the same problem but I found fringing around bright objects on the demo sets I viewed.

More likely, this was due to the Vivid setting, and all the enhancements set to On. I found that this causes edge distortion.


The owners thread (and my own experience as a result) suggests you get a much better picture in Pro mode, and turning off all the enhancements. The extremely minor convergence issues have no noticable effect of picture clarity or focus.
 
#109 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by Marc Alexander /forum/post/0


Based on the pictures posted, I doubt these minor convergence issues effect PQ noticeably at a proper viewing distance. Watch some HD Tennis, that is sure to reveal a problem in PQ if one exists (I believe UHD replays US open regularly).

Except UHD is HD-lite (1080x1280), so who knows what DirecTV has done to distort the picture already, and what happens when the HD Tivo tries to turn it back into a valid HD resolution.
 
#110 ·

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


No matter what you do with it, DVD starts with a 480i signal and will never look as sharp as HD (720p or 1080i). The Oppo will probably look better with an upgraded 1080i signal, but it is on the margin--not significantly different. That is what I have found with my Denon 2910 which uses the same deinterlace/upconvert chip as the Oppo.


Yes, picture/contrast will not "bloom" on these sets. I set mine on the Sony "dot" which was "58" for 1080i input. Your brightness seems very low; although between Avia and your viewing of the picture; presume it is at least close. Believe the Sony "dot" is around "38". I used DVE and I believe my brightness is "38". I like DVE better for brightness and contrast; but prefer Avia for color settings and checking the color decoder. Which brings me to your 5% red push on Avia pattern--which I wouldn't personally worry about. Even the Avia disk says you should lower color, if required, to get red within 15-20%.


Yes, I would think a 13 brightness would be too low however, when I check black level on Avia that is where the left black bar completely disappears. I will try to get a hold of DVE and check it again with that. How do I know if my dvd player is passing BTB signal?? Is there something I can check in the dvd player menu? I wonder if that might be the problem?
 
#111 ·
Actually it's 1280x1080, but you probably knew that already? That resolution doesn't really have anything to do with the quality, it is the bandwidth (or lack thereof) that is allocated which is an issue. The pixels in 1280x1080 have to be non-square pixels, otherwise the aspect ratio would be hosed. Perhaps it yields a better PQ when overcompressed than the original 1920x1080. But, maybe you should ask Dish and Voom, because they are doing the same thing on some channels.
 
#112 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by c.kingsley /forum/post/0


Actually it's 1280x1080, but you probably knew that already? That resolution doesn't really have anything to do with the quality, it is the bandwidth (or lack thereof) that is allocated which is an issue. The pixels in 1280x1080 have to be non-square pixels, otherwise the aspect ratio would be hosed. Perhaps it yields a better PQ when overcompressed than the original 1920x1080. But, maybe you should ask Dish and Voom, because they are doing the same thing on some channels.

It's not just the resolution, it's that DirecTV is taking a 1920x1080 picture and turning it into a 1280x1080 picture. In that process, who knows what they screw up, including color, edges, etc., as that's not just a simple process of removing pixels.


Plus, the non-standard HD resolution means the HD Tivo has to do a further transformation into a standard HD resolution, and who knows what happens in that process.


Remember, from 1280x1080 to 1920x1080, the HD Tivo needs to add 50% more resolution/pixel information. It's likely a lot of strange things are happening as a result.


Your best bet to judge HD picture quality is a 1080i OTA signal, not a DirecTV HD-lite picture.
 
#113 ·

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


It's not just the resolution, it's that DirecTV is taking a 1920x1080 picture and turning it into a 1280x1080 picture. In that process, who knows what they screw up, including color, edges, etc., as that's not just a simple process of removing pixels.


Plus, the non-standard HD resolution means the HD Tivo has to do a further transformation into a standard HD resolution, and who knows what happens in that process.


Remember, from 1280x1080 to 1920x1080, the HD Tivo needs to add 50% more resolution/pixel information. It's likely a lot of strange things are happening as a result.


Your best bet to judge HD picture quality is a 1080i OTA signal, not a DirecTV HD-lite picture.

This whole conversation is off topic, and has been debated ad nauseum in the HDTV Programming and Hardware forums. There are a lot of non-techical opinions on this issue, but I have to disagree with you. The only quality degradation on DirecTV is from a lack of bandwidth. You would be hard pressed to prove that transmission of 1920x1080 (square pixels) in a 1280x1080 format (non-square pixels) results in any loss of information. All of the Voom channels on Dish network are in 1280x1080. Voom has been touted as "reference quality." Do an Internet search for square and non-square pixels. It is in the MPEG and WMV specs.


Also, pointing people to OTA as a reference is not correct, either. Many OTA channels have subchannels, and as such they are no longer allocating full bandwidth to their signals.


To sum it up: The quality issues on DirecTV are as a result of insufficient bandwidth. The 1280x1080 (while potentially a contributing factor) is certainly not the root of the problem. If they transmit 1280x1080 non-square pixels at 19Mb/sec and 1920x1080 square pixels at 19Mb/sec you would never be able to tell the difference, because the EXACT same amount of picture information is there, it is just being transmitted in a different format. The reason this whole HD-Lite term was coined is because of insufficient bandwidth, which causes pixelation anytime large portions of the screen require updates.


The pixels are not square. Even though it is 1280x1080 it still has to be widescreen. If it were not, you would see the stretch, because 1280x1080 with square pixels is basically 4:3. DirecTV can't just magically create information that isn't there, it would have to be stretched to fill the screen. And this is where the confusion comes from. 1920x1080 = 1280x1080, but the 1280 lines are 50% wider due to non-square pixels. Why does DirecTV do this? Who knows, maybe they are able to compress it better that way, I don't know. But I do know that DirecTV is not the only player in the business doing the same thing.
 
#114 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by c.kingsley /forum/post/0


This whole conversation is off topic, and has been debated ad nauseum in the HDTV Programming and Hardware forums. There are a lot of non-techical opinions on this issue, but I have to disagree with you. The only quality degradation on DirecTV is from a lack of bandwidth. You would be hard pressed to prove that transmission of 1920x1080 (square pixels) in a 1280x1080 format (non-square pixels) results in any loss of information. All of the Voom channels on Dish network are in 1280x1080. Voom has been touted as "reference quality." Do an Internet search for square and non-square pixels. It is in the MPEG and WMV specs.


Also, pointing people to OTA as a reference is not correct, either. Many OTA channels have subchannels, and as such they are no longer allocating full bandwidth to their signals.


To sum it up: The quality issues on DirecTV are as a result of insufficient bandwidth. The 1280x1080 (while potentially a contributing factor) is certainly not the root of the problem. If they transmit 1280x1080 non-square pixels at 19Mb/sec and 1920x1080 square pixels at 19Mb/sec you would never be able to tell the difference, because the EXACT same amount of picture information is there, it is just being transmitted in a different format. The reason this whole HD-Lite term was coined is because of insufficient bandwidth, which causes pixelation anytime large portions of the screen require updates.


The pixels are not square. Even though it is 1280x1080 it still has to be widescreen. If it were not, you would see the stretch, because 1280x1080 with square pixels is basically 4:3. DirecTV can't just magically create information that isn't there, it would have to be stretched to fill the screen. And this is where the confusion comes from. 1920x1080 = 1280x1080, but the 1280 lines are 50% wider due to non-square pixels. Why does DirecTV do this? Who knows, maybe they are able to compress it better that way, I don't know. But I do know that DirecTV is not the only player in the business doing the same thing.

That is the most bizarre logic I've heard in a while. This is not a Chicken/Egg scenario.


#1 - DirecTV was broadcasting source material in 1920x1080 for quite a while. It looked great at the time.


#2 - Once bandwidth became an issue for DirecTV, they downrezzed the HD to 1280x1080. The bandwidth constraint is what forced them to downrez, to save bandwidth.


#3 - A 1080p television has discrete pixels to display every pixel of a 1920x1080 signal.


#4 - Downrezzing a 1080i signal to 1280x1080 means, at a minimum, on a 1080p TV, that you will have noticable reduced resolution.


#5 - Downrezzing a 1080i signal to 1280x1080 means you are removing pixels. And you can't just pluck them out, you have to smooth the picture, re-sharpen edges, etc. That is you have to mess with the source picture. This often results in a picture that looks worse on a 720p set since the source material had been messed with, not just scaled.


#6 - Keeping the same resolution and reducing bandwidth means you increase compression, and likely show compression artifacts, but you still maintain the resolution. Reducing the resolution means you are reducing picture quality, period.


To argue that this is solely a bandwidth issue is not rational. It all starts from the resolution of the source image. If you keep the resolution the same, then yes, bandwidth is the next issue. But if you reduce the resolution, that's guaranteeing a worse picture.


And very few OTA networks are recompressing their source feeds. There are some, but most just pass on the network feed. Subchannels by themselves don't mean they need to recompress, as they have a lot of wiggle room.


Bottom line:

1 - DirecTV is both reducing bandwidth and reducing resolution of their HD source material, resulting in an inferior HD picture (hardly reference).


2 - OTA HD feeds are rarely recompressed, and far superior to all DirecTV HD channels.



And I'd love to see any sources you have that say a 1280x1080 signal is "reference" since it's not even a valid HD resolution. Perhaps it's reference for Dish, but it's not even close to reference HD.
 
#115 ·
Bottom line: You don't understand what a non-square pixel is. The main issue is bandwidth.


I don't disagree with the fact that DirecTV has PQ issues. You're totally confusing the issue. I'm just saying that DirecTV isn't the only game in town doing it. 1280x1080 is contributing to the lack of pristine HD, but it is the re-encode at a 10-12Mbps data rate that is what is REALLY compromising the picture. The same amount of picture information is contained in the 1280x1080 signal. They've been practicing this technique on DVDs for some time. How do you think those DVDs get "enhanced for widescreen TVs?" They pack the same amount of picture information on a disc with the exact same resolution, and yet it can be reproduced on a digital display in perfect 2.35:1. They use non-square picture aspect ratios. But, there is no point in clogging this thread up anymore with such useful details.
 
#116 ·

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


I've never noticed SSE on my set (despite reading the descriptions, I'm probably too dumb to know what I'm seeing) so I can't help with that issue.


Regarding the sound. I presume you're trying to get sound for programming that entered via either the cable or antenna coaxial input. Otherwise, I would go direct from the component (cable box, satellite box, DVD playet, etc.) to your receiver. Another possible issue, if you are getting the signal from a DVI output and using a conversion cable to go to the HDMI input on your TV, you will need to use analog audio cables because the original DVI output has no audio signal. Finally, I would go through the "trouble shooting" steps contained in your receiver manual (e.g., have you selected the proper input for your receiver).


Thanks for the reply rlb.
The more I read about SSE, I don;t think that is what I am seeing. I might be seeing the Matte screen, just not sure. I lowered my Brightness and that really didn't effect it, so that is why I am thinking its not SSE.


As far as my sound I connected my cable box with a HMDI to HMDI and I do have it on the right input and still no sound. I have never tried to get a tv to send out sound before to my reciever. I checked to make sure the optical and RCA sound out on the tv where connected right, so I'm dumbfounded. Only thing I can think of is there is something wrong with my TV's opitical sound out or something wrong with my optical sound in on my Reciever. Oh well, at least the TV's Speakers sound good



Thanks again for the advice!!!!
 
#117 ·

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


As far as my sound I connected my cable box with a HMDI to HMDI and I do have it on the right input and still no sound.

If you have the 8300 box (TWC - Scientific Atlanta), you have to activate the audio on the HDMI output. However, after you do, no digital audio is output from the optical out. Also, from your set to the receiver, if the audio is analog, it will not be sent through optical.


Good luck.
 
#118 ·

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


As far as my sound I connected my cable box with a HMDI to HMDI and I do have it on the right input and still no sound. I have never tried to get a tv to send out sound before to my reciever. I checked to make sure the optical and RCA sound out on the tv where connected right, so I'm dumbfounded. Only thing I can think of is there is something wrong with my TV's opitical sound out or something wrong with my optical sound in on my Reciever. Oh well, at least the TV's Speakers sound good



Thanks again for the advice!!!!

If I understand correctly, you are going HDMI from your cable box to the TV and then taking the audio from the TV and sending it via optical and/or RCA analog to your receiver. You have said that the optical isn't working. How about the analog?


By the way, using your configuration will not allow any dolby digital (DD) for cable programming. HDMI into the TV is limited to two channel/stereo. Therefore that is all you have to send back to the receiver. In this case, optical digital provides little advantage over the analog cables (although optical could carry DD for direct antenna/cable coaxial input into the TV).


Is there a reason you aren't sending everything optical from the cable box direct to the receiver? This retains any available DD and probably eliminates your current problems.
 
#119 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by CCsoftball7 /forum/post/0


If you have the 8300 box (TWC - Scientific Atlanta), you have to activate the audio on the HDMI output. However, after you do, no digital audio is output from the optical out. Also, from your set to the receiver, if the audio is analog, it will not be sent through optical.


Good luck.


I have a 8000HD and it has no problem passing analog audio over the optical plug. Is this no longer fixed in the 8300, which I should be getting soon.
 
#120 ·

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


I have a 8000HD and it has no problem passing analog audio over the optical plug. Is this no longer fixed in the 8300, which I should be getting soon.


Quote:
Originally Posted by ccsoftball7 /forum/post/0


Also, from your set to the receiver, if the audio is analog, it will not be sent through optical.

My comment above refers to the TV optical to receiver.
 
#122 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by CCsoftball7 /forum/post/0


If you have the 8300 box (TWC - Scientific Atlanta), you have to activate the audio on the HDMI output. However, after you do, no digital audio is output from the optical out. Also, from your set to the receiver, if the audio is analog, it will not be sent through optical.


Good luck.

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


If I understand correctly, you are going HDMI from your cable box to the TV and then taking the audio from the TV and sending it via optical and/or RCA analog to your receiver. You have said that the optical isn't working. How about the analog?


By the way, using your configuration will not allow any dolby digital (DD) for cable programming. HDMI into the TV is limited to two channel/stereo. Therefore that is all you have to send back to the receiver. In this case, optical digital provides little advantage over the analog cables (although optical could carry DD for direct antenna/cable coaxial input into the TV).


Is there a reason you aren't sending everything optical from the cable box direct to the receiver? This retains any available DD and probably eliminates your current problems.

Thanks again for the replys guys
You guys rock, I got it working by going strait from the cable box directly to the receiver. Still not sure why my tv won't send any sound over HMDI or RCA to the receiver though. The speakers are turned off. The reason I did want to do it that way is because I have about 4 different things connected to my tv and figured it would just be easier to send all sound from the tv out to the receiver, since I don;t have enough room to plug them all into the receiver directly. Is there an splitter for the optical? Cause I have like 3 components that can send optical to the receiver and only 1 input on the receiver, everything else is the R and L channel of the RCA plugs. (yes I know if thats the case I should get a new receiver, but I just spent a butt load of money on this tv and stand and the wife would divorce me if I brought up buying a new receiver lol)


Thanks again guys, my listening experience is so much better now
 
#124 ·

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


Thanks again for the replys guys
You guys rock, I got it working by going strait from the cable box directly to the receiver. Still not sure why my tv won't send any sound over HMDI or RCA to the receiver though. The speakers are turned off. The reason I did want to do it that way is because I have about 4 different things connected to my tv and figured it would just be easier to send all sound from the tv out to the receiver, since I don;t have enough room to plug them all into the receiver directly. Is there an splitter for the optical? Cause I have like 3 components that can send optical to the receiver and only 1 input on the receiver, everything else is the R and L channel of the RCA plugs. (yes I know if thats the case I should get a new receiver, but I just spent a butt load of money on this tv and stand and the wife would divorce me if I brought up buying a new receiver lol)


Thanks again guys, my listening experience is so much better now

Do a google on "optical switchers". There are many possibilities on "pricegrabber", etc. Good luck. Definitely understand the wife factor.
 
#125 ·
Would like to hear from someone with a Oppo dvd player or any dvd player for that matter on how you set up the picture. Right now I have mine on neutral, with brightness at 14 picture on 59 color 31 hue 0 sharpness 24 gamma correct off black extender off everthing else on low including the advanced iris. Looks good in my viewing conditons (total dark) like this however maybe a tad soft and a slight red push although better after I reduced the R- bias in the advacned settings in pro mode
 
#126 ·

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


Unfortunately, there are so many god damn threads about the SXRDs that it almost makes sense to post settings to the pertinent (if any) threads. I don't know why the "SXRD Oct/Nov" thread is still going...the set is here! We have an owner's thread (that has been neglected by Bombthroat...faq???) and a tweaks thread that's all over the place. It's frustrating as hell to try to find any information amidst the dozen or so threads and useful comments/posts get lost in the shuffle without exploration or answer. The result is that people start new threads that ask the questions that don't get answered in the main threads...either out of frustration or lack of patience, which then makes it even worse because there's yet another SXRD thread to pour over (can you say redundant?) covering the same info as the other threads. I don't know what the solution is, but it might start with the 2 basic threads...owners and tweakers. There'll certainly be some overlap with just two threads, but it must be better than 6 or 7 or 8 current SXRD threads...



J.


Feel free to create a FAQ and post it in the owners thread any time you want.
 
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