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Magnavox 537, 535, 533, 515, 513, 2160A, 2160, 2080 & Philips 3576, 3575 - Page 64

post #1891 of 23914
10/1/08 at 6:54pm
If ANY of you guys using your 75 or 76 with an antenna have gotten a "cannot dub to DVD" icon on one of your recording's thumbnails, would you tell me, and maybe let me know what channel it happened on (including what network, if any, the channel's an affiliate of)?

Thanks.
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post #1892 of 23914
10/2/08 at 7:32am
Quote:
Originally Posted by flamike View Post

when I was trying to find the correct amount of attenuation I saw pixilation by weakening a channel too much and by too strong an ota signal, in both cases the pixilation looked the same. I could only tell by what I was doing with the attenuators. My problem was: I'm close to Tampa the signals are strong but not equal among the channels

Gotta ask...what's the differance between pixilation and MACROBLOCKING? I was thinking they were the same but evidently not!
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post #1893 of 23914
10/2/08 at 7:51am
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by gce View Post

Gotta ask...what's the differance between pixilation and MACROBLOCKING? I was thinking they were the same but evidently not!

"Pixilation" is a stop-motion effect like used in shooting animated objects, so on a TV, you see image edges repeated.

"Pixelation" is visible pixels most often seen in low rez images or greatly enlarged pics.

"Macroblocking" is the appearance of small blocks of a digital image on a TV, usually randomly occurring and spaced in one or more areas of the pic. A digital TV signal is sent in macroblocks with instructions for assembly and display.

Wikipedia says this on macroblocking: "This effect is also referred to as microblocking, tiling [2], mosaicking or pixelating." This shows that people tend to use the same word for different pic defects?

I'll have to check my recent posts and make sure I've been using the correct words!
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post #1894 of 23914
10/2/08 at 9:23am
Quote:
Originally Posted by gastrof View Post

If ANY of you guys using your 75 or 76 with an antenna have gotten a "cannot dub to DVD" icon on one of your recording's thumbnails, would you tell me, and maybe let me know what channel it happened on (including what network, if any, the channel's an affiliate of)?

Thanks.

I've gotten it on Fox (5.1 here) and ABC (7.1). Strangely, it's not the same show every time. It happened on Kitchen Nightmares once or twice, and House once. It did not happen on either of this week's version of those shows. On ABC, I got it once on a college football game
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post #1895 of 23914
10/2/08 at 9:27am
Quote:
Originally Posted by subeluvr View Post

What a remarkable lack of foresight. It hadn't occurred to me that any of these devices that get their time correction from analog PBS stations will be lobotomized in 2/09.

I understand that time signals will be provided in certain digital OTA transmissions but the 3576 can only be set to search analog channels for correction signals.

Way to go industry... that's planning ahead!

Well, at least they left us the ability to set the time manually.

If you live in the Northern VA area, all of our PBS stations stopped broadcasting time signals several months ago. I guess they wanted us to feel the pain early. It really is a pain to keep the clocks correct on all of my old devices (2 Panasonic DVRs and a combo DVD/VCR unit).
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post #1896 of 23914
10/2/08 at 9:49am
Quote:
Originally Posted by wajo View Post

"Pixilation" is a stop-motion effect like used in shooting animated objects, so on a TV, you see image edges repeated.

"Pixelation" is visible pixels most often seen in low rez images or greatly enlarged pics.

"Macroblocking" is the appearance of small blocks of a digital image on a TV, usually randomly occurring and spaced in one or more areas of the pic. A digital TV signal is sent in macroblocks with instructions for assembly and display.

Wikipedia says this on macroblocking: "This effect is also referred to as microblocking, tiling [2], mosaicking or pixelating." This shows that people tend to use the same word for different pic defects?

I'll have to check my recent posts and make sure I've been using the correct words!

Ok, I guess that clears that up! Like I posted before I get like blocks of pixels in parts of the screen for a sec. and then they go away. I did try the un-screw the cable for a weaker signal thing, but that made it worse. It seems to have gotten better as of late so I guess it is a Cable Company problem and not the 3576.
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post #1897 of 23914
10/2/08 at 1:03pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Kelson View Post

You are OTA. Have you ever considered you may have FM interference from a strong FM station which can interfere select channels. Take a visit to fmfool.com and find out what FM signals are strong and close by. You may actually need an FM trap. If you are over-driving the tuner the signal meter should be pegged at 100%. Are you seeing that.

I don't have a meter on the 3575 but in another room i have a converter box with a meter and no channel is over 90%. By the way I didn't know the difference between pixilation and macroblocking. In my case I am refering to parts of the picture looking scrambled and sometimes momentarily freezing and dropping out sound
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post #1898 of 23914
10/2/08 at 1:37pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by subeluvr View Post

Just noticed that the manual for the 2160 does not list "DL" under playable media while the Philips 3576 does.

An oversight in the manual or does the Maggie 2160 NOT play "DL" DVDs?

I just got off the phone with a CSR at Philips-Magnavox (who seemed technically challenged) and she said the 2160 will not play DL DVDs but the Phillips 3576 will.

I can't believe the Maggie wouldn't but can someone that owns a 2160 check it out?

I thought all DVD players can Play DL, just not all can
Record DL.
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post #1899 of 23914
10/2/08 at 3:20pm
Thread Starter 
FYI: Be aware that unfinalized DVD+R discs act differently than DVD-R discs in multisession recording between this DVDR (3575/3576/2160) and DVD-Video DVDRs (Pio, Panny, Tosh?, etc.)

Unfinalized DVD-R discs recorded/dubbed in a DVD-Video DVDR with space left on them CAN'T be recorded/dubbed in this DVDR ("disc error" will show).

However, unfinalized DVD+R discs recorded/dubbed on a DVD-Video DVDR with space left on them CAN be recorded/dubbed in this DVDR. Whatever space was taken up with DVD-Video recordings will be unavaliable, and those title(s) will never show up in this DVDR. Only the title(s) recorded in this DVDR will show and be playable.

Probably not a very useful piece of info, but never know, some people might have some older, unfinalized DVD+R discs layin round or ready for discard that could get a new use, at least for "tests"?

For people with multiple Philips/Magnavox units, which are Philips +VR based machines, DVD discs can be interchanged between machines if you set Recording > Make Recording Compatible ON. In fact, having that menu item virtually assures that your machine is +VR based, no matter what brand name it uses.

For more info, see "Recording to DVD in Multiple Sessions"..."Option 1" in this help file.
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post #1900 of 23914
10/2/08 at 3:50pm
Stil haven't forgotten about this, still have the drive and 3575H but unfortunately I got thrown into exile due to Gustav and Ike... I'm in a place south of NOLA at the mouth of the MS River and we had a little situation down here that sort of threw my life into chaos and uncertainty for awhile...

Will hopefully analyze and attempt to upgrade the 160 DB series drive to the 300GB / ST3300820ACE drive within the next couple of weeks.

Have you heard or seen any information of anyone doing this yet?

I'm curious as to what format the stock drive is in, I would think first it would be FAT32.


--BurntPixlz
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post #1901 of 23914
10/2/08 at 4:03pm
Almost certainly a proprietary system.
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post #1902 of 23914
10/2/08 at 5:19pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Chuck44 View Post

I thought all DVD players can Play DL, just not all can
Record DL.

Not true. Any player will play a commercial dual layer DVD which is pressed. Burned media is different and requires the player be designed for it. I have a couple older players that will not play +DL media. Only way to know for sure is to try it.
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post #1903 of 23914
10/2/08 at 5:38pm
I stand corrected.
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post #1904 of 23914
10/2/08 at 10:37pm
wajo:
Get your CFO to rework the budget -- the 2160 is back in stock at walmart and I just ordered it to get ahead of the crowd. Maybe its DVD will work on my, if you'll pardon the expression, DV10.
Stressbox getting unstressed
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post #1905 of 23914
10/3/08 at 7:07am
Thread Starter 
New month, CFO just bought FOOD again!
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post #1906 of 23914
10/3/08 at 7:07am
I am trying to display of images (jpegs) from USB. When I see those on my LCD TV via HDMI, the images are cut about 12 pixels from each side.

This is true even when I play DVD.

Is this the artifact of my TV or is it due to 3575 ?
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post #1907 of 23914
10/3/08 at 7:25am
Thread Starter 
When I play my jpegs taken in a Casio 7MP digital camera from a USB stick, they play in the OPPOSITE aspect than the one I set on my 3575. That is, if I set 3575 Aspect to 16:9 Wide, they play in their normal aspect of 4:3 (pics are shot in 4:3).

When I set 3575 Aspect for 4:3 LB, they play stretched WS (obviously stretched to fit 16:9 screen).

Also, my 1080p LCD only gives me options for ITS aspect depending on what I'm playing, and with my 4:3 jpegs, it only gives me WS and Normal (4:3) settings. On the TV's Wide setting, my 4:3 jpegs look normal, but on the Normal TV setting, they get squished... when 3575 aspect is set to 16:9 Wide.

Confusing, but it appears you should try both DVDR and TV aspect to see how your particular jpegs play back best?
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post #1908 of 23914
10/3/08 at 7:52am
Thanks wajo for quick reply. My problem is not aspect ratio. When I play pics, I need to put TV in 4:3. I get pic with correct aspect ratio and without black bands on top and bottom. My problem is that the pics are cut off about 5%.

After posting the question above, I did more gesearch (google research: just coined this word). I found that almost all TVs HDMI input do 5% overscan of HDMI source. Some TVs have option of switching it off some don't. Some have DVI option which do not do overscan. Some has neighter. Mine has DVI input setting. When I go back home today, I will try DVI and see if the pic is still clipped 5% from all sides.

Over scan may be one of the reason which I do not get as good a picture on HDMI from 3575 as I get when I tune 1080 channels directly on 1080p TV.

Well I will do some more experimentation and report here later next week.
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post #1909 of 23914
10/3/08 at 9:09pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by wajo View Post

FYI: Be aware that unfinalized DVD+R discs act differently than DVD-R discs in multisession recording between this DVDR (3575/3576/2160) and DVD-Video DVDRs (Pio, Panny, Tosh?, etc.)

Unfinalized DVD-R discs recorded/dubbed in a DVD-Video DVDR with space left on them CAN'T be recorded/dubbed in this DVDR ("disc error" will show).

However, unfinalized DVD+R discs recorded/dubbed on a DVD-Video DVDR with space left on them CAN be recorded/dubbed in this DVDR. Whatever space was taken up with DVD-Video recordings will be unavaliable, and those title(s) won't show up once recorded with this DVDR. Only the title(s) recorded in this DVDR will show and be playable.

Probably not a very useful piece of info, but never know, some people might have some older, unfinalized DVD+R discs layin round or ready for discard that could get a new use, at least for "tests"?

For people with multiple Philips/Magnavox units, which are Philips +VR based machines, DVD discs can be interchanged between machines if you set Recording > Make Recording Compatible ON. In fact, having that menu item virtually assures that your machine is +VR based, no matter what brand name it uses.

For more info, see "Recording to DVD in Multiple Sessions"..."Option 1" in this help file.


Thanks, wajo, for the great explanation. BTW, I got my 2160 on Tuesday and tried out the 'Make Edits Compatible' option. I already had burned one title on a DVD+RW on my 3575, then recorded Knight Rider on the 2160 HDD on Wednesday night. Took the DVD+RW from the 3575, put it in the 2160 and did a 24x high-speed dub. That's right - 24x - as opposed to the 12x on the 3575. It worked just like you said! AND, I was still able to swap it back to the 3575 to dub other titles. With both machines, I'm in AV heaven.
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post #1910 of 23914
10/4/08 at 6:21am
Just ordered 2160 from Walmart. Waiting for shipping info., will report back. Have some DVR items I want to put on DVD and some Beta and VHS tapes to do same with.
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post #1911 of 23914
10/4/08 at 6:39am
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by stump69 View Post

Thanks, wajo, for the great explanation. BTW, I got my 2160 on Tuesday and tried out the 'Make Edits Compatible' option. I already had burned one title on a DVD+RW on my 3575, then recorded Knight Rider on the 2160 HDD on Wednesday night. Took the DVD+RW from the 3575, put it in the 2160 and did a 24x high-speed dub. That's right - 24x - as opposed to the 12x on the 3575. It worked just like you said! AND, I was still able to swap it back to the 3575 to dub other titles. With both machines, I'm in AV heaven.

Thanks for the great info... 24X high-speed dubs with the 2160 is a very nice difference to know about! If I could ever get my CFO to stop wasting money on FOOD and GAS, I'd be enjoying the dynamic duo myself!
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post #1912 of 23914
10/4/08 at 7:46am
Thread Starter 
With stump69's report that the 2160 does a faster high-speed dub (HSD) than the 3575/3576, I'd like to add some 2160 HSD total times to the chart in the HSD help file.

I'd appreciate anyone doing HSD with the 2160 to provide data I can add to that chart. The easiest way to do that might be to use the chart already in the help file and add your 2160 info... altho I'll be glad to get info any way that's easiest for you... just need the four categories in the chart.

Here's the chart from that file:

Disc. . . . . . . . .Title(s). . . Rec. . . .75/76 Dub. . . 2160 Dub
Speed . . . . . . .Length . . . Mode . . Time (min.). . Time (min.)
1-16X -R/+R . . .2:00:46 . . .SLP. . . . . 10. . . . . . . .
1-16X -R/+R . . .2:02:53* . . SP. . . . . 34. . . . . . . .
4X -RW. . . . . . .2:02:53* . . SP. . . . . 25. . . . . . . .
1-2X -RW . . . . .2:02:53* . . SP. . . . . 25. . . . . . . .
2X -RW. . . . . . .1:59:53 . . . SP. . . . . 25. . . . . . . .
1-4X +RW . . . . .1:59:?? . . . SP. . . . . 21. . . . . . . .
4X -RW. . . . . . .1:00:00 . . . HQ. . . . .26.5. . . . . . .
Other 2160. . . .
Other 2160. . . .
Other 2160. . . .
*Same title dubbed to diff. disc type/speed. STILL NEED A TIME FOR 8x DISC!
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post #1913 of 23914
10/5/08 at 11:53am
wajo: My 2160 is due this week and in planning ahead I'm thinking about how to connect it. I have basic cable and the coax goes to the ant in of the 3576 and the ant out goes to the TV ant in.
I expect to change that so the cable coax goes to the ant in of the 3576 and the ant out of the 3576 goes to the ant in of the 2160 and the ant out of the 2160 will go to the ant in of the TV.
Is this the way to do it and will I be able to record different programs on each recorder simultaneously?
In setting up programs to record for the coming week I have program conflicts/overlaps and with the two recorders I hope to be able avoid this problem.
Stressbox
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post #1914 of 23914
10/5/08 at 11:59am
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by stressbox View Post

wajo: My 2160 is due this week and in planning ahead I'm thinking about how to connect it. I have basic cable and the coax goes to the ant in of the 3576 and the ant out goes to the TV ant in.
I expect to change that so the cable coax goes to the ant in of the 3576 and the ant out of the 3576 goes to the ant in of the 2160 and the ant out of the 2160 will go to the ant in of the TV.
Is this the way to do it and will I be able to record different programs on each recorder simultaneously?
In setting up programs to record for the coming week I have program conflicts/overlaps and with the two recorders I hope to be able avoid this problem.
Stressbox

Having my 3575 and Pio 640 in line is ideal for us and each can record separately, so no problem there.

The only unknown is if there'll be any effect from connecting two AMPLIFIED coax passthrus in line and possibly "over-drive" the digital tuners, which can cause blue-screen, tiling, etc... as I've posted on a lot lately.

IF you see any "unusual" pic effects, you can use a good-quality splitter (5-1000MHz) with one leg to each unit, but I'd try the inline first. Before I went to a splitter, I'd also reverse the order of units cuz that'll be a good piece of info for others who are lucky enough to have the "dynamic duo." AFAIK so far, no one has tried both units in different orders JFTHOI?
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post #1915 of 23914
10/5/08 at 4:01pm
wajo::
Thanks. we'll see what happens.
Also, in line with your posts about scanning for channels with the 3576 I noticed when I programmed a digital channel 89.4 to record using the timer, I got nothing. My TV picks up that channel but the 3576 apparently does not. I went to DTV on the remote and input 89.4 but it didn't appear. I went to a 98. channel which showed and used manual preset to add it and the subchannels also appeared. But after that those channels no longer show -- they don't "take". The 3576 carries all the analog channels okay but when switching to DTV it shows a few and they seem to show up erratically. Any thoughts about this?
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post #1916 of 23914
10/5/08 at 4:23pm
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by stressbox View Post

wajo::
Thanks. we'll see what happens.
Also, in line with your posts about scanning for channels with the 3576 I noticed when I programmed a digital channel 89.4 to record using the timer, I got nothing. My TV picks up that channel but the 3576 apparently does not. I went to DTV on the remote and input 89.4 but it didn't appear. I went to a 98. channel which showed and used manual preset to add it and the subchannels also appeared. But after that those channels no longer show -- they don't "take". The 3576 carries all the analog channels okay but when switching to DTV it shows a few and they seem to show up erratically. Any thoughts about this?

Unfortunately, this sounds like the dreaded "blue-screen" effect in a basic (analog) cable system... Philips calls it analog interference.

One other thing could be a strong digital signal that gets amplified by the 3576's amp'd coax circuit. A simple "test" for this is to unscrew the incoming coax on the top coax connector of the 3576 until the center wire is no longer fully seated and the nut is hanging by one thread or so. Then see if an already tuned digital channel that's now "disappearing" reappears and stays around like it should.

Try that first cuz other than that, you don't really have other cableco "tricks" at work, like switched digital video since you don't have a box and your TV gets a stable digital signal.

When you get your 2160, I'll be really intersted to hear if it does or doesn't have the same digital tuning problem you're exp. w/the 3576!
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post #1917 of 23914
10/5/08 at 10:37pm
It never dawned on me to hook the 2160 and 3576 to the cable in series so I gave it a try. CATV to 2160 to 3576 to TV. So far so good. It allowed me to go from a 4 way to 3 way splitter
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post #1918 of 23914
10/6/08 at 2:09am
Quote:
Originally Posted by wajo View Post

Having my 3575 and Pio 640 in line is ideal for us and each can record separately, so no problem there.

The only unknown is if there'll be any effect from connecting two AMPLIFIED coax passthrus in line and possibly "over-drive" the digital tuners, which can cause blue-screen, tiling, etc... as I've posted on a lot lately.

IF you see any "unusual" pic effects, you can use a good-quality splitter (5-1000MHz) with one leg to each unit, but I'd try the inline first. Before I went to a splitter, I'd also reverse the order of units cuz that'll be a good piece of info for others who are lucky enough to have the "dynamic duo." AFAIK so far, no one has tried both units in different orders JFTHOI?

Based on the fact that both these machines have the amp'd RF connection, I went with a splitter from the get-go, but still can't keep the digital channels on either machine. The brand new 2160 picked up a boatload of digital channels from the Comcast analog cable feed, but they all disappeared the next day so that when I had a timer recording scheduled on DTV 9.1 (CBS in Washington, DC), it didn't record and posted an E40 error. After that, I've been unable to get the DIGITAL channels back at all, even going back to factory presets and leaving the unit unplugged for a while. When I do an 'analog/digital' channel scan, it goes through all 125 analog channels then hangs up - displaying only a black screen with the DTV 1.1 and 'now scanning'. The analog channels are all fine.
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post #1919 of 23914
10/6/08 at 6:38am
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by stump69 View Post

Based on the fact that both these machines have the amp'd RF connection, I went with a splitter from the get-go, but still can't keep the digital channels on either machine. The brand new 2160 picked up a boatload of digital channels from the Comcast analog cable feed, but they all disappeared the next day so that when I had a timer recording scheduled on DTV 9.1 (CBS in Washington, DC), it didn't record and posted an E40 error. After that, I've been unable to get the DIGITAL channels back at all, even going back to factory presets and leaving the unit unplugged for a while. When I do an 'analog/digital' channel scan, it goes through all 125 analog channels then hangs up - displaying only a black screen with the DTV 1.1 and 'now scanning'. The analog channels are all fine.

The "E40" is a program overlap... from the manual:
"E40 Some portion has not been recorded because of program overlapping. Recording did not start at the start time."

That doesn't explain the digital channel disappearance.

I think you had a 3575 first and it apparently worked OK since you described some recording you'd done with it, and the 2160 worked OK when you first got it, correct?

Now, I'm thinking the addition of the splitter might be involved, so try going back to just the original 3575 with NO splitter. Do an Analog/Digital scan and see if things hold as they did before. Maybe use a diff. cable also, and make sure all connections are tight?

If that works, add the 2160 inline, no splitters, and see what happens with its channels. See Kansas-Tom's post below and try his order: 2160 to 3575?

Digital channels can go blue-screen from a signal that's too strong or too weak.
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post #1920 of 23914
10/6/08 at 6:47am
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by Kansas_Tom View Post

It never dawned on me to hook the 2160 and 3576 to the cable in series so I gave it a try. CATV to 2160 to 3576 to TV. So far so good. It allowed me to go from a 4 way to 3 way splitter

Thanks for posting this since the question on how best to set the dynamic duo up is important info to know.

Are you on cable or antenna?

If cable, what cableco and service level (basic, ext. basic, digital, etc.)?
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AVS › AVS Forum › Video Components › DVD Recorders (Standard Def) › Magnavox 537, 535, 533, 515, 513, 2160A, 2160, 2080 & Philips 3576, 3575