Denon 3910 Owners Thread - Page 5

Greetings,



Both Audio and video are equally important for me. This is why I stated that even though the apparent layer change and slow search mode chapter access is an annoyance, it is not a deal breaker for me. The unit has plenty of positives which make it worth the minor annoyance.

I must say that I have become spoiled. Let's see, my first progressive scan player ( Toshiba SD5109, $1000 msrp ) had the dreaded Chroma upsampling error quite badly. My second DVD player, a Pioneer Elite DV-38A ( $2000 msrp ) had it's layer change that seemed to take forever, although I loved it's picture and feature set. The Denon DVD 2900 was not perfect in terms of features, however it offered the best video playback of any player I owned before it. Prior to the 2900, each unit I had had it's share of imperfections, which I happily lived with. I did so because overall they each offered picture quality which at that time was great.

I have to say that the 3910 really should not have any problems that the 2900 does not. In spite of that though it offers a step up in terms of image quality. For those who have not experienced that, I cannot comment.


Regards,

I've been waiting to see some comments on the audio of the 3910, and it sounds very positive. Now you know what it was like when us 5900 owners first played some Hi-Rez audio. And you guys get that astonishing sound for $700 less MSRP. I'm jealous.

Jim

Franchot,
Can you give me some examples (DVD timestamps) where you see this? I picked up the 3910 tonight and didn't see any evidence of edge enhancement. So far I'm not really impressed with the 3910. At 480p via component I can't tell any difference on test patterns and viewing DVDs between the 3910 and my Panny XP30. DVI from the 3910 was looking good until I put up the Avia Y/C delay test pattern. 1080i, 480p, and 720p all have noticeable Y/C delay in order of increasing magnitude. 1080i was borderline, but 1080i didn't look as good as 480p component wrt ringing in the DVE resolution patterns around the text characters - could be my display not handling 1080i as well for some reason. At 720p, there is a solid black shadow on the left side of the red columns. I can make the same thing happen at 480p component my using the players chroma adjust and moving one "tick" (I forget what direction). 480p component Y/C looks ok at 0 (default). Also, chapter access is SLOW. When I click on a test pattern name in the menu, it takes a few seconds to begin displaying - very frustrating. On the positive side, what little viewing I did with sound coming from i.Link was fine - no dropouts. I'm still impressed at how well my trusty ole XP30 stacks up with these newer players. The 10.5 had slightly better PQ, but I'm not convinced it's worth it to me for the difference in price. Too bad the 10.5 has the DVI clipping bug. Unless by some miracle or hidden setting the chroma delay I see can be fixed, I'll be taking the 3910 back this weekend.

larry

I was playing "Baadasssss!" which I had rented and it looked poor. (I'm not talking about the scenes which were copying/mimicking the film "Sweet Sweetback's...) I switched to "From Hell" and that looked poor, also. So, I recalibrated my TV by eye using a paused shot from "From Hell" and came up with a more pleasing picture. I went into the Picture Setup menu of the Denon and zeroed everything out except adding one click to Hue and Mid and High Sharpness. That seemed to help things. I went back to "Badasss!" and it was significantly better. The dark scenes were nice and detailed and the color banding was minimal. Edge enhancement was still there, but not to such a strong degree.(Maybe the DVD has edge enhancement or maybe my TV introduces it or maybe a combination of both.) I finished up with a b&w Three Stooges short from a recently released DVD which had remastered and cleaned up the shorts. That looked good.

Wish I hadn't been spoiled by the Onkyo's ease of use, better build quality, and vibrant picture when viewing films. (Actually, I'm beginning to see how nice the Denon can be. But the Onkyo is more expensive for a reason.)

Jim-

The audio performance of the 3910 is outstanding. I've spent much more time with the audio end of it than the video end, although we've managed to squeeze in the episodes 3 & 4 over the last few days (unreal PQ!). I've played many of my SACD's and DVD-A's as well as a barrage of stereo CD's and the 3910 has performed incredibly. Multichannel is absolutely immersive, but what amazes me is the 2-channel performance. The separation and clarity are much better than my 45a (which I've been A/B'ing with via my 3805). Now I just need to upgrade my surrounds to the ADP-470's!

Jason

Greetings,


Jason, have you noticed layer changes on your 3910 while watching either of the Star Wars DVD's?


Regards,

Only once, and it was very brief. Nothing like my 45 which seemed to take forever.

Jason

I noticed the layer change during Star Wars IV also. It was very brief and my processor didn't lose sync on the audio.

Greetings,

Thanks guys. I just wanted to ensure that I was not experiencing something others were not.


Regards,

With the same 8mb buffer as used in the 2900 - why is the layer change suddenly noticable?

Greetings,


THAT John, is the burning question.




Regards,

Possibly the fault of the disc and not the player. Do you notice it in another player, same disc?

Jim

Yes, that's what struck me most about the 5900, the MCh sound was great but the Redbook stuff was what got my attention the most.

Jim

Greetings,



I noticed it on SW Episode II AOTC, chapter 28. It occurs right in the beginning as Jango Fett's ship is flying toward the plant below. My 2900 never exhibited the layer change before. I have run the same scene many times because I use it as a demo. I have checked it five or six times to ensure it was not a hiccup etc. and it happens in the same location every time.

I was also watching SW Episode V TESB and noticed the layer change ( although I did not note the chap/location.

I don't believe that this is disc related, but I wish that it was.


Regards,

FWIW, thedigitalbits.com reports a defect in SW IV that causes a freeze up at what they suspect is the layer change. I'd hate to think the 3910 is getting a bad rep on the layer change due to a defective DVD. Can anyone confirm layer change problems on other disks?

MiD

Could someone verify that the 3910 outputs DVD-A out via HDMI, but not SACD? And is it possible that SACD could be output via an upgrade in the future? How would this upgrade be performed?

Thx,

Oh come on. Why should this be any different than all of the other times and all of the other hardware. Each person's perception is the world's reality is it not?

The 3910 DOES have a visible layer change.

I had posted layer-change related observations if anyone is interested:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showt...51#post4358551

Any idea what could be the cause, considering that Denon's previous models (2900, A11) didn't suffer from this in spite of having the same 8MB buffer?

Yves

Please... I'd like to think one's perception of reality has some basis in fact. To that end, what's the problem with this pursuit?

Cheers!

Thanks for the dose of reality Kris!

So would I though the odds appear fairly small at times. I think you missed the smiley face or at least its meaning.

Sorry Charles, macro-blocking problems obscured your smiley face. Imagine those odds!

Regards,

MiD

I've sent my 3910 in for an SDI modification, and plan to couple it with the iScan HD+ SDI input sometime in October.

When I get it all set up I will write up a quick comparison of the SDI route vs. the DVI 720p route (which to my eyes has the best picture of the 3910 settings on my 1366X768 plasma).

Cheers,

-Adam

Greetings,

I have a front projector with a 1366X768 resolution as well and the 720p setting via DVI looks best for mine too.


Regards,

1. The buffer is 8 Mb
2. 1 sec of vid and audio would be roughly (6000Mb/120 min of film / 60 sec/min = 0,8 Mb/sec) 0,8 mb so the 8 mb buffer should hold about 10 seconds of video and audio. That must mean it "pre-reads" 10 seconds into the buffer so when a layer change takes more than 10 seconds **** happens.
Could it be that the buffer stores the recalculated image (after DPIC and so on) and the enhanced pic uses more space/bandwidth (if converted to rgb before storing to buffer it defenitely will but im not so deep into the electronics of the 3910 that i could tell).

But I mean 10 seconds to change layer - that is A LOT of time IMO!!!!

regards
boogieman

Greetings,



I have gone back and forth with mine as well. I have found the same results, 7.5 IRE and " Enhanced " black level via DVI. I have an LCD front projector and of course a good balance between white level and black level settings is challenging. I have found with the 3910 that I need to bump the black level ( brightness ) down a few more notches than I did with my DVD2900. The white level ( contrast ) stayed essentially the same.

FWIW.


Regards,

When you guys set "Enhanced" black level, do you see "blacker than black" bars in DVE and "whiter than white" box in the Snell&Wilcox test pattern in DVE?

larry