Hi all... After a while, I convinced myself that even if the device didn't suffice for home theater use, a format converter and multiplexer might be a nice thing to have, bought the device and have to say that I became quite happy with it
Unfortunately, I've been unable to test downscaling with native 1080i/p input yet, so I cannot say anything about it. But've used it to upscale the input from my DVD player and my DM800 (576p) to UXGA and 1080i . This works pretty well, without any noticeable distortions/effects that I'd see and that'd bother me (If you'd like me to test for specific stuff, tell me what to look out for, and I'll try to check it out
)
Sometimes, the device's got problems to catch the UXGA output from my Zonbu (Ubuntu Hardy) correctly... resulting in an improperly scaled image... I've mailed Spatz about it... maybe they can provide me with a reliably working mode line.
Basically, there are only two things I'd like to see changed about the device from the usability point of view:
- There doesn't seem to be a default ouput resolution set at startup(?) and thus upon the first start, my screens remained blank and the device kept on rebooting, giving me a slight rush of adrenaline, until I fiddled with the remote and set an output format.
- There seems to be no way of choosing the ouput resolution without the remote... so the use of the device really depends on a functioning remote.
(Mailed these as feedback to Spatz, too. So maybe they'll fix that in future revisions, heh
)
My setup:
DKDigital DVD-338 Marantz SR4001 (*1) [YPbPr from the DVD-338 proved too crappy (multiple shadows in the image), Marantz signal working perfectly fine]
Dreambox DM800 (*1) [Note: While it's officially not supported, the upscaled 1080i resolution was caught over DVI, but downscaling to UXGA looked odd on MultiSync (heavily distorted in the horizontal outside the center) Spatz Digiscale ->Ouput (*2)
(*2) NEC MultiSync LCD2080UX
(*2) NEC 6PG
Conclusion: I'm using the device on an almost daily basis with all input/output devices given above, and it works reliably... there are certainly better (and more expensive, heh
) devices out there, but this one's a handy, well-priced, very portable device. If I find the working modeline mentioned above and if there are no surprises when I'll try native 1080i/p input over the component interface, I'll be perfectly happy with the device.
Cheers.
P.S.: Got a prompt response from Uwe on my feedback (while writing this posting
). Let's see whether we'll get the issues resolved.
