PLV-Z4 Tweak Thread - Page 23

It does sound a little strange to push the lens down while moving the dials. From what I gathered, your not pushing the lens in the opposite direction of the way you want to go. Rather, push the lens in the direction you want to shift and then lock. Not sure if I'm gonna try this, I just might live with the drifting.

Finally got my free 92 inch flat white screen from Sanyo [thank you Sanyo].
I have been exploring increased contrast ratios by using a slightly curved high gain 4/3 screen masked to 16/9 [VUTEC, Hollywood, FL]. With a lens iris at -20 or more there are no soft focus corners and the picture is greatly improved compared to a much a much 'flatter' picture using the Draper [Sanyo} screen with super sharp and far brighter scenes allowing reduced "Brightness" and "Manual Iris" settings in the "ECO" lamp mode.
Result is a much higher contrast ratio.
The movies look far better than they did on my former projector ($14,000 Sony D50HTU].

Guys,
I have managed to play with this PJ a little bit (in the free moments between work and new house refurbishing). I have used both Rones settings CC and live versions. Both for me are not acceptable - are too dark and I loose shadow details. How U guys think they are so great.
Maybe this is because of my set up - the source is PC with Gforce 6800 via DVI-HDMI cable. I use the latest drivers. Rone is talking about WMCE and NVIDIAdvdfilters. What is this? How to check what am I using? Eventually where to download and how to install?

WMCE is Windows Media Center Edition. It does not come with any video decoders so he is using the NVidia Pure decoders most likely. It can use any decoders but nVidia pure seems the standard. Neither MCE or NVidia pure decoders are free to download althought the nVidia decoders are cheap ($19.95). What are you using to play the DVD's via your PC? Each software package can make a HUGE difference as well. If you are using XP Pro, Theater Tek is the standard and considered the best. It has been set to ISF standards thus right out of the box is great. It also uses the nVidia decoders. There is also the Zoom player although I found it far less user friendly than Theater Tek or MCE. Another factor is the type of screen you have as well as the room layout, lighting, color, etc.. It's been pretty obvious that sharing settings is really just a starting point and that everyone needs to tweak to their own eyes and environment.

My suggestion is to get yourself the Digital Video Essentials DVD and use that to tweak to your room and how you want it to look.

I have always taken posted settings with a grain of salt.

What I want to achieve is a good black and white picture. I know that it is also ok if my black and white has a slight reddish quality, as well, as my flesh tones and colors will look fine to me. Great black and white will assure great colors.

But if you want more shadow detail, increase the brightness and increase the gamma.

I have found that the color is pushed too hard for most settings so I usually keep it at 0 or +2 at the most.

I also use te color management to tweak all the colors I am not satisified with.

My user settings are all identical, indluding the color management, except for Color and Gamma. User 1 has color at 0 and gamma at 0. User 2 has color at 0 and gamma at +2. User 3 has color at +2 and gamma at +2. User 4 has color at +2 and gamma at +4.

At least one of these settings is pefect for me depending on the source.

Shelly

Konrado, you shouldn't be using anybody's settings for brightness & contrast. Those you should calibrate yourself. Greyscale settings are another matter and that's where Rone's settings are useful. However, variances in lamp performance will skew your results somewhat.

Thanks for yor advices. I am using Power DVD 6.0 for playing movies. Do i need to order the nvidia decoders in such circumstacces?

No, powerDVD has it's own decoders I'm pretty sure, however, to be honest, I wouldn't use Power DVD as it's just not up to snuff video quality-wise. If you can swing the cost, I'd recommend you purchase Theater Tek as it's well worth it. Next to using Windows MCE, it's going to be your best bet. It comes with the newest nVideo drivers as well. Next best would be the free Zoom player along with purchasing the newest nVidia Pure drivers. I found Zoom to be a hassle though so for a 100% user friendly package, you can't go wrong with Theater Tek.

powerdvd is nice in that "not 3 million settings that just lag my computer and irritate guests when i cant get the movie to play" kind of way.

Yeah, I definately understand that. Trust me though, Theater Tek is just as easy if not easier than PowerDVD (I've had PowerDVD and WinDVD etc...), not loaded with all sorts of crazy options and will give you a better picture. It's totally worth it. Download the demo to give it a try.

ok, I will buy theater tek and will try it.
*Is it exactly called Thearer Tek? Is there any best verssion, must have plug inn etc..?

I have 2 more questions:
*I am tempolarly using my z4 with almosy full side lens shift. When I come v. close to the screen s see some lcd panells miscoverage. Will it be fixed if I do zero lens shift in my new home installation?
*with the current set up I have noticed that the left part of the screen has a very slight like a red rainbow effect. Will it also be fixed once I throw the picture on the middle of the screen?

Just download the newest version of Theater Tek from their website. No plug-in's at all.

As with any projector, the more lense shift you use, the more it can negatively effect your picture. Using some shift will not be noticible at all, but if you are nearly 100% shifted, it definitely can decrease picture quality and cause some issues with the colors. Some LCD projectors will have perfect convergence and some will have a pixel or two misconvergence even with no lense shift. It's just the luck of the draw (my red is one pixel off) and a few pixel misconvergence is withing tolerance so there isn't anything that you can do. It isn't noticible unless I'm within a foot of the screen or so. It's possible it will go away without the lense shift or it may not. As for the rainbow effect, that is a DLP issue, not LCD, so it's hard to say what the issue is that you are seeing. Full lense shift can cause some other distortions with color, but it's hard to say with only those details.

I have had my Z4 for 3 days now. So far so good. I am wondering about upgrading to the Oppo 971H and going all digital.

The conditons presently are;


I am using component only from a SA cable box and the Neu Neo DVD both at 1080i output through a Video Storm component switcher.

25' Component cable run

DIY white pearescentl screen (actually works ok)

Room has complete light control


I would like to change to the following setup;

SA cable box and Oppo 971H player to be Monoprice 3' DVI to HDMI cables connected to Monoprice 2x1 HDMI Switcher with a 25' run of Mononprice HDMI cable to the Z4.

Does this sound like it will work?

I am concerned that I may have either cable, switcher or macroblocking problems with Z4/Oppo 971H combo.

I have searched all threads that relate to the Z4 and there are a couple of people using the Oppo with this projector and neither one has commented on problems.

ok guys im new here and i got the z4 yesterday. im noticing some scrolling horizontal lines that go up the picture when i feed it my hdcable through component. its really noticble if the picture is dark. when i feed the other component input with my 360, this doesnt occur...any thoughts or should i get in contact with sanyo

Sounds like ground interference... not a Sanyo problem if it is.

thanks, im gonna try to get a nice powerstrip with coax in and coax out and plug the cable box into it and see whats happening. its got to be the signal because when there is no input the blue screen doesnt exhibit this horizontal noise

You may also be seeing what is known as a "ground loop" probably associated with your house electrical circuits grounding and your cable grounding.

I experienced this on my old projector a BenQ PB6200. If you feed your coax through a filter and that does not stop this, try using an adaptor that is used to plug grounded equipment into older un-grounded outlets (hardware stores have these).

If the horizontal lines disappear using the adaptor there is very good chance it is a ground loop.

This is how I determined that was happening to me, I was never able to cure the problem.

As I understand it, ground loops are caused by two different voltages at the ground itself or possibly some where else in the circuit. They can be very difficult to locate, isolate and correct without experience and instrumentation.

Do a search here and on the internet for ground loops if your filter does not correct the problem. I doubt it is your Z4.

where would i get one of these filters?? what does the adapter look like?

I was referring to the coax in/out on the powerstrip you mentioned.

Is it possibly this problem?

could somebody please link me to some good tips/tweaks to get my Z4 up and running. I will do a basic Avia calib, but need some color tweaks/settings, which mode is best for dvd, etc.....

read the first 6 pages of this thread and you'll find what you need.

nope its like scrolling horizontal lines that go from the bottom up. about 12 inches apart. its only really noticable when the picture is dark. like i said its only when i have my hd cable running to it. i think tonight im gonna hook up my 360 to that input and see if it does it

This is classic visual symptoms of ground loop hum, which is caused by an improperly grounded cable TV system. Good luck getting it fixed. Consider yourself lucky in that your audio receiver isn't picking up the terrible hum. The audio of this problem is much worse than the visual.

My Setting, i used several setting available here and tweaked them for the HD A1 , to my eye it look good

With HD DVD player Toshiba HD A1 in HDMI

Shrapness = 0
Lamp = Low (Eco)
Gamma = 0
Progressive = L1
Lens Iris = -63
Brithness = -1
Contrast = +10
Color = +6
Tint = +6
Red = +10
Green = -1
Blue = -8
Iris = AUTO
Black Enhancement = OFF
Contrast Enhanc = OFF
Trans = OFF
Gain R = +2
Gain G = +3
Gain B = -5
Offset R = -15
Offset G = -13
Offset B = -6
Gamma R = 0
Gamma G = 0
Gamma B = 0

Now use the custom HDDVD test pattern that a user has made here, it's available in HD DVD Software forum and other part

Go to the Color Bar and check the Yellow, it should look Greenish, Use the Color Manager to bring this Greenish Yellow back to 'Banana' Yellow (should be 2 notch down the first one)

Been trying a lot of settings posted in this thread and most of them are pretty good.
However, I seem to have some problems getting brightness/contrast setting correctly. I just can not keep it at those low values people have posted here. If I do I can barely see anything.
Am I missing something? Tried fiddling with the iris and so on but I just can't seem to hit the sweet spot. Any tips? I usually end up with brightness on +15 or something crazy like that.
Using an Oppo 971 if that could matter....

What input are you using? If HDMI, are you at L1 or L2?

Using HDMI and set to L1. L2 seems brighter but from what I have read here that is for pc setups.

Yep that is correct. One thing you need to be careful about is using settings that are intended for L2 with L1. What you will get is a super dark unwatchable screen. I use L1 for my HDMI even from my PC because MCE and Theater Tek are setup for L1, so if I use a bunch of settings from here that are intended to be for L2, I need to totally tweak the gamma, brightness, and contrast.

I think this is probably the issue you are having.

So what exactly IS L1 and L2? What does Enhanced Mode on a DVD player do anyway? Are we talking about passage of 'blacker-than-black' and 'whiter-than-white' signals? ...or is that something else altogether?

On my HTPC, L2 seems to 'brighten' all the dark places... too much so! The dark areas tend to dither and I can never seem to obtain a black like I get with L1 no matter what I do. So, again... What IS L1 and L2 exactly? Anybody here really know?