The Official Kd-34xbr960 Thread - Page 252

That same set sold for $100 by me a month ago

http://orangecounty.craigslist.org/ele/2727491746.html

They refuse to take the post down but I emailed them and the TV is sold.

I am currently buying the XBR970 for $50. Just waiting to borrow a truck to go pick it up. I don't see anyone in their right mind paying $450 for your TV or anything close to it.

I have a Sony 34XBR800 and my old non-HD DVD player recently broke, so I picked up a Toshiba BDX2150 Blu-ray player. However, the picture is pastel colored and the graphics all fuzzy. Is the xbr800 (1080i) incompatible with a 1080p blu-ray player? I have everything running through my Denon AVR-1910 receiver via HDMI now (except the HDMI to DVI for the TV connection). I think I had this same problem briefly with the old DVD player via component cables when one of the was loose, but I checked all my HDMI connections and they are secure. Does anyone have any idea what is wrong, or is the TV just incompatible with 1080p? I would think the Denon would downscale to 1080i. I tried various settings from Auto to 1080i and 1080p on my Denon input. I tried playing both a Blu-ray and a regular DVD with the same results. I also plugged the Blu-ray player into my LAN via ethernet cable to make sure it upgraded the BIOS as necessary. My Motorola Comcast DVR works fine with it by setting the DVR to 1080i in the menu.

The XBR800 (and all sony crt's) is not compatible with 1080p. Be sure to also set-up the blu-ray to output 1080i in HDMI before sending it to your Denon. Also try connecting directly the blu-ray to your TV. HDMI rarely has problems with color so its most likely either a bad set-up in your blu-ray or the denon doesnt downconvert correctly to 1080i for your TV.

I also set up the Blu-ray to output 1080i in HDMI. I'll try connecting it directly to my TV.

The Denon has a scaler that down converts to 1080i, 720p, 480p, and 480i resolutions. I tried setting the HDMI port that my DVD was hooked up to for scalar off, auto-scale, and 1080p.

When I was messing with it this morning after sunrise so I could clearly check and see that the connections behind the components were tight, the DVD player displayed what looked like a "No media present" message whether I put in a Blu-ray or regular DVD, then wouldn't shut off. Hopefully it was updating the PROM - I left it on and will see if it shuts off (without having to unplug it) when I get home tonight.

The XBR800 has no HDMI input. It only has DVI input, along with component video input. So how do you actually have your Denon connected to the XBR800? Component video, or DVI? You'd probably have to have an HDMI-to-DVI cable if you're going out of the Denon from one of its HDMI ports?

I assume from your discussion that you have the BluRay player connected to the Denon via HDMI.

Yes, the Sony HD CRTs do NOT support 1080p. You MUST set the BluRay player to output 1080i. I'm not sure if "auto" would detect that the display can't accept 1080p, although the intermediate Denon AVR can... but you might as well just set the BluRay player to 1080i and be done with it.

The "pastel" coloring is generally an issue with the green component video connector, but don't know.

I myself went with a component video connection to my cousin's XBR800 after I tried the DVI connection (from his SA8300 DVR) and the colors were also very off. This "1st-generation" HDTV from Sony may just have had a crummy DVI design.

You're not going to get 1080p anyway, and you want to be able to watch 1080i BluRays and other content. Just use component video to the XBR800 from the Denon.

Also I'd suggest trying component video from BluRay to Denon, to keep it all analog and let the player create those signals. That way the Denon has to do nothing but pass it along, and you don't have any issues with HDMI-to-component conversions.

For sure I'd try avoiding the DVI input on the XBR800 and see if that helps.

DVI to TV as I mentioned previously.

Unfortunately, there is no component output on the Blu-ray, just HDMI. I really hate how most new Blu-ray players are HDMI only as they won't be usable with older TVs and at nearly $50 these days, there is no reason to buy a non-Blu-ray player.

The only glitch with the DVI loop is that it causes my DVR to revert to unwatchable DVI mode and I have to go through a long PITA process to reset it to HDMI every time I turn the TV back on even though it is going to my receiver before the TV. This is actually a bug with the Denon, but being grey market purchase, could not get warrantied for PROM reprogram. Otherwise the HDMI to DVI works fine.

Yes, I noticed the green component cable coming loose used to cause discoloration with my old DVD player since the green and blue outputs were switched around, forcing me to mangle the (3 or 5 attached) cables just before the attachment points.

If I can't get the issue resolved before the 24th, I'll return the player. Fortunately I bought it at Best Buy and not online. Unfortunately, the main competitor, a Panny, doesn't have digital sound outputs. I listen to CDs quite a bit and hate having to turn on the TV just to listen to audio. Another gripe is with DVD players that don't have track/time displays on them - I hate having to turn on my TV in my office bedroom just to see what track it's on.

I understand the attraction of a $50 "commodity" (like a cheap toaster or coffee maker), but sometimes "you get what you pay for".

For a variety of reasons I decided to go with what I feel to be the best valued (but not dirt-cheap) all-around best "universal player", in the Oppo. My model was their first, BDP-83, but they've got a range of products now... including more expensive versions. You could certainly find one used probably in the $350 range.

But if you want to future-proof yourself, and invest in something now that will work for you in the future (e.g. if you ever go with a new HDTV, say possibly in the 3D-world), Oppo's got it all. Current BDP-93 is $500. Component and HDMI, optical/coax, audio out over HDMI, etc.

Here's PC Mag's list of the 10 top-rated players, from cheap to high-end.


Anyway, if you want to use your XBR800 for BluRay, I'd honestly suggest trying component video and not DVI.

The Blu-ray player had turned itself off by the time I got home last night. I turned it back on after turning on the receiver and TV and after a few minutes it froze on the initial screen of a non-Blu-ray DVD. Neither the remote control buttons nor the player front panel buttons worked - I couldn't even turn it off! After a long time, I unplugged and replugged in the power cord and it worked ok after that. I can't understand it freezing up like that as it shouldn't have been trying to retrieve BD Live data or anything. I discovered a "Deep Color" setting (that wasn't available in the Quick Setup Settings menu, but the regular settings menu), and this solved the pastel/hazy display problem. Apparently the xbr800 isn't capable of handling "deep color". After that, the regular DVD as well as a Blu-ray DVD played fine. It works with the video setting on either "HDMI Auto" or "1080i", but I chose to leave it on 1080i since I don't know if the auto setting is down converting lower than 1080i. I also turned off my receiver's HDMI scaler to minimize the amount of processing, but may do some experimenting later to see if it's scaler is higher quality than the DVD player's. Surprisingly enough, the Blu-ray movie was not that much more astounding than the upscaled regular DVD - I suppose the Sony's line doubling and player upscaling of 480p minimize the difference between that and 1080i. I did notice the blacks weren't quite as black and slight fuzziness on the regular DVD concert.

I will report back if the player freezes up again, but might just turn off the "always allow network access" setting since I have no USB stick connected to download any BD Live content and only currently have 1 Blu-ray DVD.

DSperber, thanks for the PC Mag reviews. In my haste to replace my old broken DVD player, prior to purchase, the only recent reviews I could find were Consumer Reports which had minimal content. I think this basic budget player will do for now as I rarely have time to watch an entire DVD in one sitting. I have no need for WiFi, don't need to watch online content (and don't see a need to outside of a PC), and don't care to have to wear another set of glasses for 3D.

"Deep colour" describes a colour gamut that is a billion colours or greater. This presents two issues, circuitry in these old televisions probably do not explicitly support this kind of a signal, and additionally it is problematic as being a CRT, its analogue output does not have any technical limitation on the infinite waveforms that can describe the colours it can possibly be made to reproduce.

So to my understanding you really should not need deep colour at all for these kinds of CRT sets.

Last night I played a CD and then turned off the TV, still had audio, then unplugged the digital audio coax cable and still had audio, so I suppose audio-only works through HDMI and digital audio outputs are not necessary even with DVI as part of, although outside the loop (a digital or analog audio connection direct to my receiver [instead of looping back via the TV audio in/outs] on my bedroom system was necessary to hear CD audio with the TV off with component and coax connections).

The TV has nothing to do with sound coming from your AVR receiver, if you have your player connected to your AVR. The sound is coming from the speakers/sound system which is connected to the AVR and presents whatever audio is feeding the AVR, and has nothing to do with what video you see on the TV. The TV is strictly for displaying video sent to it by the AVR from whatever video source(s) signals feeds the AVR. You could totally disconnect the video cable from AVR to HDTV and still have sound. (To use an old analogy, it's just like how you could turn off the TV and still record a program on a VCR placed between the wall antenna/coax and the TV.)

There is no audio delivered over a DVI cable (going from AVR to the HDTV). Unlike an HDMI cable a DVI cable it is strictly for video. If you wanted to hear sound from your HDTV speakers you'd need to add a secondary audio cable from AVR to the HDTV, either an optical digital one (if the XBR800 supported digital audio input which I don't believe it does) or at least an analog L/R-stereo red/white audio cable. This 2-channel analog cable would actually be fine, since the XBR800 only has two speakers anyway.

But otherwise, in your setup the HDTV is strictly for video. The AVR and connected speakers are for audio.

So, if your BluRay player [source device] is connected to your AVR via either (a) HDMI, or (b) component video + optical, then you have both audio and video always being delivered digitally to your AVR. If your HDTV is turned off that has zero impact what got delivered to the AVR from its source devices. And eliminating any output video display device by turning it off does not prevent the AVR from continuing to distribute audio to its conncected speakers from any AUDIO-source. Your BluRay player is both an audio and video source... via (a) HDMI, or (b) component video + optical.

Not surprised about finding little difference between upscaled DVDs and blurays. Don't know about the 800 but the 960's line doubler is outstanding. I dub films from HD stations onto DVD-R using a highly rated Panasonic recorder using the flexible recording mode for maximum picture quality. Yes, there is a difference between the original 1080i source and 480i down-converted recording dubbed through s-video cable and then up-converted to 1080i but on a comparison scale of 1-10, I would rate the recording about an 8 - not bad for a blank DVD costing maybe 35 cents. On our 32 inch LCD it looks about a 6.

Don't worry about the deep colour mode - the human eye can only see up to a certain amount of colors and all those advertised on bluray and flat panels go beyond the range of our eyeballs. Often, these additional enhancements (including more than three primary colors) usually distort what the actual color is supposed to appear as.

After six years of pretty much daily use, I replaced my 960 today with a newer and much larger (over 300% larger screen size) set for our "main television". Now that the day has quieted and everyone else is in bed, I've been reflecting on what a great set it was (is).

Oh well... as the saying goes, time stops for no one. Our basement game room, which is truly more game room than it is home theater, will be getting a fine set as its first 16:9 tv, right next to my 15+ years old 35" tube 4:3 Proscan.

I placed a Vizio 32" XVT323SV on the floor, in front of and below the XBR960N, for watching broadcast TV via antenna.

My BluRay player is connected to the XBR960N. So if I only play discs once every week, the XBR960N only goes on once every week.

I am keeping the XBR960N forever. The BluRay version of Wall Street 2 has extra material in the back, and one of them is a tour of downtown Manhattan. That segment looks superb on the XBR960N.

Hi Robin,

I believe as the screen becomes larger, some of the HD resolution is bound to be lost. For example, the original factory settings for our overscan were way off causing us to lose some of the information on all four sides. With the aid of a swatch pattern I was able to adjust the service settings and in doing found the picture to be sharper because the picture had been slightly stretched. Thus a small amount of picture quality has to be sacrificed for want of a larger screen.

Also, flat screen technology still cannot match the deep blacks and contrast of a CRT which results in a more detailed picture with depth perception.

But that doesn't mean one still cannot enjoy the picture quality of a new larger screen, only that that modern technology be it Plasma, LCD/LED or DLP still has it's short comings.

I totally agree with both of these statements. Even six years ago, some of my friends had started going with LCD or Plasma sets (hmmm, I think they were out then but much more expensive, of course) and many had rear-projection big screens and didn't understand why I wanted an "old CRT" type tv. I never regretted my choice but having 3 teenage sons now, who are into watching sports on TV, has pushed me into "needing" a bigger set.

As for the new technologies, I admit I'd have hated to lift a 70" CRT onto my stand... if I could have even found a stand strong enough to hold it. (In fact, I'm not looking forward to carrying the 960 down to our basement game room.)

@Freeze Time, I was able to sell the set for my asking price. Guess the market varies depending on your location.

-R

Actually, due to the price factor, we lucked into the 960 back in July, 2005.

At that time the more expensive and larger Plasmas and LCDs were taking over and companies were pushing flat screens onto the consumer, implying that CRTs were inferior to these new technologies. We all know now that was a lot of BS but the trick was referring to CRTs in terms of 480i, not 1080i. Of course a high definition flat screen would look better than a standard definition tube set but they conveniently failed to mention that CRTs could handle high definition as well, thus misleading the public into thinking HD only meant flat panel.

The trend to flat panels was not to be stopped but am so glad our financial restraints caused us to "settle" for this gorgeous CRT instead of believing that misinforming hype. Even though I knew the 960 was a top rated HD monitor I still thought it wasn't as good as the flat panels until my eyes convinced me otherwise, first by finding this forum and then seeing the difference in picture quality for myself.

Again, not a knock on flat panels as this is more a defense of CRT.

So ive realized 34" is just too small for my movies and have spent the last few weeks shopping for a new TV. I dont know if its just me or what, but many many newer TV's look much better than my old 960. I realized, no matter what size TV I get, it will always become small to me.

I didnt want to worry about lag and super crappy SD viewing. So since my 960 is still working pretty good, here was my solution.

960 for daily TV, SD and video games use. Epson 8100 projector with an 130" image for movies, sports, and video games. Pic looks pretty washed out because it was taken with full sunlight, but you get the idea.

I was all but ready to dump the 960, but nothing compares to it for SD use and old video games.

Wow, that is really big. Took me a few minutes to realize that was the 960 underneath it being dwarfed. And with that setup you've got as large a split screen system one could ask for.

Because I make a lot of DVD-R recordings I need to zoom the picture for anything recorded off a HD station since otherwise it would be played back window-boxed.

I used to have my DVD recorder's HDMI output set to fill the screen and then used the 960's vertical expand to get the correct aspect ratio for those wider than 4;3. I recently noticed, however, that the recording appears a bit sharper if I leave the recorder's HDMI output set to "normal" and use it's own zoom output, thus keeping the 960's picture size at the standard "full". So by having a zoomed output going into the 960 instead of depending upon the 960's various zoom features my DVD-Rs (and non-anaphoric commercial ones) do look even crisper.

I have the Panasonic EZ-28 DVD recorder connected to a DVR via s-cable and use the Panny's flex mode to useas little recording space as possible, I would say a film off a HD station down-converted for recording and then up-converted for playback (despite this multiple processing) looks like an 8.5 compared to the original source's 10 on the 960. These same discs played back via HDMI at 1080p on our 32 inch LCD appear good but the picture quality is not like it is on the 960.

Another reason why this old CRT technology set is still the greatest. If it does have to be replaced, I will have to accept the picture quality on these recordings to suffering just a slight bit.

I've come across a Loewe ACO9383 38" widescreen CRT for $60. I currently have a Panasonic CT-34WX50 34" widescreen CRT.

Hard to find info but the Loewe appears to be ~2002, only one component input, a VGA input that may even be required for HD (?), and 220 lbs. Spectacular PQ at its time, may have had reliability issues (?) if I trust the blogs, and a curvy tube.

For OTA tuners all I have are converter boxes. I have a Sony Blu-ray player but I read there may be some issue getting HD (1080i) on component connections with some disks and a similar issue holds for DVDs.

Since I hate to use up my 'lifting help quota' should I hold out for one of the Sony HDMI ATSC Super Fine Pitch CRTs?

Selling our KD-XBR960 - turning to the darkside and buying a 55" Panasonic Plasma. So if you are in the area, come by and pic it up for $200. No issues - great picture and flawless cabinet - includes remote and manuals. Thanks

Sergio
sgmeza@sbcglobal.net

My xbr960 is now gone.... Picked up a new LCD 40" TV at the Sony Outlet today.

Pains me to say it, but I think the PQ on the new ($377) set is better than my ISF-calibrated 960.

If anyone lives in the Salt Lake valley, I donated my KD-34XBR960 to the 7th East and 21st south Deseret Industries last Saturday, so it should be available to pick up there sometime soon (if not already). The thought of having the TV sit in our living room for weeks until some joker responds to the online ad and comes and gives a lowball offer -- along with wanting something extra -- was too much to deal with!

I am really sad that it's gone though. I ordered mine before it came out (after wanting an XBR910 for years), so I had it for nearly 8 years and it always was a great TV! With it gone I'm down to two CRTs now: my trusty Sony 19" GDM-F400 and a Panasonic 13" BT-H1390Y.

@LiquidSnake

I have an XBR960 which I have always loved but it is due for retirement soon, mainly because of space constraints.

I am curious, and always have been about one thing... So when you say "its analogue output does not have any technical limitation on the infinite waveforms that can describe the colours it can possibly be made to reproduce."

Are you suggesting that this set might be able present colour precision greater than 8-bit?

I know this set has a 10-bit comb filter but I don't think that is relevant (but have never been able to get anyone, including the Japanese designer of this set, to really explain things adequately.

I know the HDMI port in this set is only 8-bit.

A color grader I talked to over on Creative Cow suggested it might just possible be capable of 10-bit, providing I used the component inputs, going from SDI to component via a little converter box made by AJA.

In case anyone was wondering why I am bumping this very old thread about this very old TV, well 'retirement' means that i am considering using it as a client monitor for my own (soon to be 10-bit) video editing projects. Using the CRT for color rendition and an LCD for pixel accuracy. Not Hollywood, just to give me a better idea. I have the set anyway so why not use it.

Hello everyone, I recently bought an XBR960 on Craigslist for $150 and removed the anti-glare coating (which was a pain to do).

I use the TV for playing PS3 games and occasionally watching a Blu-Ray movie, and I was just wondering if it's really bad to always have this television set to Vivid mode instead of Standard, Movie, or Pro.

Vivid just looks the best to me, even though it's a little exaggerated and whites tend to seem a bit "neon" because of this. The other modes are very dim and dull in comparison to Vivid (I wish there was a middle ground between Vivid and Standard).

Reason I'm asking is because I heard Vivid mode could hurt the picture tube in the long run. Thanks in advance for the help!

My 960 died last Feb 17,2012. Cause of death-- the 6-7 red blinks. I knew it was bound to happen sooner or later because on cold days when I turn it on it needed a couple of restarts to get it going. Anyways, I did lots of research and was able to find all the info I needed here, of course. It was the 2 IC chips MCZ3001DB that needs replacing. Cheapest for US vendors that time was $14-$15 a chip with a socket--ebay. I decided to get the one coming from China for $15 +$2.50 SH for 5 chips--ebay. Then I bought 2 sockets from RS for 59 cents each. Ordered it 2/19 and got it 3/7. Desoldered the 2 chips out of the board and soldered the sockets in. Pressed in the new IC chips and BINGO! My 34XBR has been resurrected! Repair cost $35.--5 chips, 2 sockets, desoldering rod, magnifying glass.

Meanwhile, as I was waiting for the chips, I decided to try out a plasma tv from costco the Panasonic TC-P60S30 floor model for 900 + tax with 2 year warranty/90 day return. Man! plasmas sure have changed some from the last time I tried it 8 years ago. Picture looks good. Test drove it with some action dvds and blue rays, OTA signal and it sure performed well. Only gripe is that it has 920 hours of display time in costco warehouse-3 months in display. And a couple of seems to me a dot scratch on the screen. I did not want 3D so I got this lower model vs the TC-P60ST30 3D for $1200 + tax which I was thinking of getting first. Anyways, this is just as good I think for less. And the picture is really good.

The size of this 60" plasma sure makes my 960 look tiny now. Although certain things like the tv speaker is better on the 960. Tweeking the remote and the tv options the 960 has a couple of better options as well. But size sure matters in this case. And the pictures good enough for me to keep. Now I am trap in the middle. But my 960 has no other place to go but the spot where it is in right now--living room. And thats where I was hoping to put the plasma as a replacement if I wasn't able to fix the 960. Had no plans on buying a tv and I was just trying it out but now it seems that I might keep this plasma. Its gonna be my first one if only I can figure out where else to put the XBR....

Vivid was the so-called "torch" mode that stores would set the TV to so it would stand out in a fully lit department store. Since the showroom sets were on all day every day, it would really shorten the life of the tube. The phosphors on the inside of the tube only have so many good hours, and maximum brightness accelerates the aging process.

Theoretically, vivid will age the tube faster, but in your case you aren't leaving it on all the time. If that's how you like the picture to look, I wouldn't worry too much about it.

Yes, don't use the Vivid mode at all - it is so high in contrast that it will shorten the lifespan of the tube. Best to use PRO.