Official Pioneer 4360/5060/Elite Experiences, Set-up, Questions & Pictures Thread!!! - Page 176

Originally Posted by newlinux

Sorry to read this. That's really the same thing that happens to me sometimes, until I unplug it. there must be something buggy in some of the sets. I think you should give pioneer a call, especially if you like picture in picture. Can you get OTA ATSC (digital stations) still?

Now my guide listings don't work... ):

Originally Posted by Saluki

I do get OTA digital stations. I am guessing (hoping) that the next DVR I get will have a built-in PIP function to make the PIP more useful.

Even if I could get my set-up working via ANT A, I would only be getting the unencrypted cable channels right? Based on what I read on my local HDTV thread, it sounds like that would be a veery limited set of channels.

Originally Posted by newlinux

Yes only unencrypted, unless you got a cable card, which is what I use sometimes.

Originally Posted by Saluki

What's the typical monthly tab for a cable card?

Originally Posted by Saluki

I also called Pioneer tech support & he suggested that I try ANT B since I "would only receive analog cable signals if not going through a cable box". Is that correct?

I also called Charter & a cable card is only $1.50 per month & can be self-installed.

If I am understanding this correctly, assuming the ANT B option works, these are my PIP options:

- PIP via ANT B with limited, unencrypted analog cable channels
- Service call to repair apparently faulty media box tuner & then use ANT A in conjunction with a cable card for wide selection of digital channels (including HD?)
- Hold off until my next generation DVR which would hopefully include built-in PIP functionality that would do away with the need for the TV tuner

Do I have this straight?

Originally Posted by Saluki

I wonder if this would be as simple as a media receiver swap-out or if they would have to take the display & box "to the shop". I can't imagine life without my girl.

If my next gen DVR does in fact have built-in PIP functionality, do you see a case where I would have a need for the TV tuner?

Originally Posted by Saluki

I just want to clarify something.

If I were to go the cablecard route for PIP, I would still be hosed without my tuner functioning properly correct?

Originally Posted by a_ok2me

Not sure if people have noticed something similar, but I've had my 1130 for a year and it seems to have lost some brightness and it's harder to see the picture in the daytime.

Also, as I was watching baseball, I noticed pink bats and thought something was wrong with the color as it is harder to see the true color and detail in the daytime. Fortunately, the bats are indeed pink for Mother's Day. However, it is still hard to see in the daytime. Maybe I'm imagining the loss in brightness.

Originally Posted by Schteevie

when you make a post like this, you should include your settings, and hour meter readings, otherwise, there is no info for anyone to respond to.
for instance, if you have had your TV set on "torch mode" and put 3000 hours on it since you got it, then it would make sence that you could notice some fading...

I however, have had my 4360 set conservatively for the past year, and have 950 hours on it.
(power save 2, contrast is at about 28 and brightness at +1)
I haven't noticed any loss in picture quality

Originally Posted by a_ok2me

From a mathematical standpoint, it would make a difference. But, I'm not sure how it makes a difference from a perception standpoint. For example, if you're used to brightness +2 and suddenly have to use +1, it's noticeable.

In any case I'm using:
PURE
contrast 40 (default)
brightness -2
color +20
tint & sharpness 0 (default)
standard energy save (default)
~5hrs/day

Originally Posted by CHolleman

for anyone that knows, does the 4360 have rectangular pixels? thanks.

Originally Posted by EWL5

The 4360 has a native 1024x768 pixel structure which would be 4:3 ratio if the pixels were squares. To fit on a widescreen, they would HAVE to be rectangles.

Current 50" non-1080p Pioneer plasmas have a 1365x768 pixel structure, which is a 16:9 ratio (pixels can stay as squares).

Originally Posted by CHolleman

damn. i'm looking at trying my hand at building an HTPC, but i've read that rec. pixels can cause issues. should have bought the 5070

Originally Posted by newlinux

I built an HTPC (linux - Mythtv) and it did take some tweaking to get the picture just like I want it with the 4360. On the other hand, I have another HDTV with rectangular pixels with a similar HTPC and it didn't take much at all. One thing i did noticed that may be related to the rectangular pixels (and I'm just guessing about this) is that when I was using the VGA port (now I use a DVI->HDMI cord) and had the resolution set to 1024x768 whenever there was abrupt movement in DVD or HD playback there would be little freezes in the picture, like stuttering, but only on video, not audio. When I changed the resolution to 1280x768 this went away. This was the case on both TVs (both have a native resolution of 1024x768, but support 1280x768 through VGA). I thought it was always better to send the native resolution, but in this case it wasn't... Could have been the video cards or something else I guess but still odd to me.

Originally Posted by CHolleman

how would you rate the PQ you were able to achieve with the HTPC and 4360? if i can achieve DVD quality, i'll be happy. HD/BR would be nice down the road, but we'll see what happens. what were your system specs?

EWL,

why'd you give up and how far did you get?

Originally Posted by CHolleman

how would you rate the PQ you were able to achieve with the HTPC and 4360? if i can achieve DVD quality, i'll be happy. HD/BR would be nice down the road, but we'll see what happens. what were your system specs?

EWL,

why'd you give up and how far did you get?

Originally Posted by EWL5

Way back in Oct 1998, DVD as a format was maybe a year old already and I figured the least expensive way to get into the game was to buy a PC with a DVD-ROM built in. As you can imagine, it was maybe a a 1x or 2x DVD-ROM and DVD burners were either non-existent or super expensive. That first PC was a Dell Pentium 2 450 Mhz. I think it came with a TNT videocard and Turtle Beach soundcard which had surround sound. I hooked up 3 sets of minijack to RCA connectors to a Sony boombox which had 5 speakers (not your typical boombox, eh?) DVD movies were a blast but watching a widescreen on a 17" monitor sucked. The sound was bigger than the picture!

Originally Posted by EWL5

Not long afterwards, I read online that some people had this crazy idea of hooking up their PC to the TV in the living room. Since my current setup was nowhere near the living room and TV's with VGA connections are nowhere as abundant as they are now, I decided a new setup was in order. Fast forward to 2004: I purchase a custom ordered Cyberpower PC with AMD AthlonXP 3200+ w/1GB RAM, 2 120GB sATA HD in RAID 1, ATI Radeon 9800XT, and onboard 5.1 surround decoding. I already had a Sony 32" CRT HDTV that had both component and DVI input. I was scared out of connecting my PC to the DVI port on the TV from the manual and possibly damaging a $1400 TV! The only other route was component so I bought ATI's VGA to component dongle. The image was blurry but I was getting HD resolutions on the TV from the PC! I played around with WMVHD demos but they were nothing more than mere toys. Playing Unreal Tournament 2004 and Half Life 2 in widescreen was a blast and the image quality is probably on par with current next gen consoles. The sound was piped via SPDIF to an Onkyo 601 receiver and Polk Audio surround speakers. The following factors are ultimately why I gave up on HTPC:

1) Noise - I had tons of fans in my PC case and the best videocards need HUGE fans, unless exotic methods like water cooling are utilized.
2) My PC chassis did not look like it belonged in the living room. I know Shuttle makes slim form factors and so do others but upgradeability is usually an issue.
3) I purchased a cordless Logitech desktop set and reliability was spotty. This can be a great liability during a first person shooter session.
4) I discovered true home theater and found dedicated devices to be better perforrmers overall and the increased cost was overlooked due to increasing income.

The future is home integration and the PS3 sits on my BDI stand. I guess I have a HTPC, sort of...

Originally Posted by CHolleman

wow, thanks for all the replies guys. i have quite a few DVD's that i don't have space for so i thought it would be much simpler to back them all up on the HTPC along with my extensive collection of MP3's and CD's. that way, i can box up all my CD's and DVD's and have everything contained nicely in one unit in the HTPC. good for parties with the music and easily able to watch movies when I want to. cost savings isn't important to me as much as space savings. living in a townhouse doesn't leave much room for huge libraries of DVDs and CD's.

Newlinux- well i'm glad to see that your setup produced good PQ. i didn't want to go to the expense and hassle of building an HTPC if i'm going to get crappy PQ. did you have problems with overscan?

Originally Posted by newlinux

Minor overscan issue at first, But Mythtv allowed me to easily move the picture to compensate. It really is identical in PQ to to all my other good sources. I had some tearing at first too, but I was eventually able to get rid of that as well.

I watch all of my recorded tv through HTPCs. I have all of my music and videos stored on hard drives (close to 350GB worth) around the house and the HTPCs allow me to access them from anywhere, and now I never pull out a CD or DVD. The HTPC in the main room (with the 4360) is bookshelf size and integrates nicely with my other components and is quiet (a necessity - It only has a CPU fan. You actually don't need that powerful of a video card for HD, but you do need it for todays games, which I don't play). It only has room for two PCI cards, but I actually don't need much room for expansion because I have many other computers on the network around the house that I can expand and access. I kept it pretty cheap as I build a lot of my computers with used parts. It has replaced my DVD player and DVR (except for premium HD stations). If I didn't watch any premium stations I wouldn't even have a cable box.

It's pretty well integrated - I control it, like all my other components, with a Harmony remote.

However, for those that don't want to go through the hassle of building and tweaking an HTPC I might suggest just using a computer to store media and going the playstation 3/xbox 360 route mentioned earlier, or a HD network player (I have a zensonic z500 networked DVD player which works quite nicely as a frontend in place of an HTPC. There are quite a few other options) that can access the media over the network. Network players weren't enough for me because I wanted a PVR that I could schedule recordings on and stream them anywhere in the house and schedule recordings over the web and a few other features. But the zensonic was almost plug and play...

My system turns out to be a distributed mixture of network devices, HTPC backends, and frontends with access to all my content anywhere in my house (even the laptop runs mythfrontend to access all the recordings, and the network DVD player can play all the music, videos, and recordings from the HTPC PVRs.)

Originally Posted by EWL5

newlinux, your setup sounds like how I would have arranged my home had I not abandoned HTPC. Unfortunately, I still do play the occasional PC game and that kind of kills the silent HTPC. Actually, one very important reason why I stopped HTPC that I failed to mention was playing around with the Powerstrip timings to match my TV. I never could get rid of overscan entirely. Have you tried feeding 72Hz to your Pioneer or is that not allowed?