[t13nif]

I have a new LN40A450 Samsung. I am confused! When i hooked up the tv and my Motorola HD cable box and tried to do a channel scan (with cable box OFF), it didn't find any channels (cable or OTA). With cable box turned on, the Samsung found the cable channels ok (but no OTA). Is there something i am doing wrong? I have HDMI cable.


I've also been told that when watching HDTV, to switch the picture display to "just scan". WHen i have done so, the screen was completely filled by the picture. Lately, when i change to Just Scan, the picture is displayed with large black bands on the side. It displays some HD channels correctly but very few. Am i missing something? I want to avoid Wide Fit as the picture quality is degraded. I know these are probably obvious questions, so i apologize in advance but i really need help. Thanks.

 

[brad1279]



Quote:
Originally Posted by t13nif /forum/post/15448721


I have a new LN40A450 Samsung. I am confused! When i hooked up the tv and my Motorola HD cable box and tried to do a channel scan (with cable box OFF), it didn't find any channels (cable or OTA). With cable box turned on, the Samsung found the cable channels ok (but no OTA). Is there something i am doing wrong? I have HDMI cable.


I've also been told that when watching HDTV, to switch the picture display to "just scan". WHen i have done so, the screen was completely filled by the picture. Lately, when i change to Just Scan, the picture is displayed with large black bands on the side. It displays some HD channels correctly but very few. Am i missing something? I want to avoid Wide Fit as the picture quality is degraded. I know these are probably obvious questions, so i apologize in advance but i really need help. Thanks.

yeah it didn't work for me either, just scan actually is smaller than 16:9, i have mine set to just scan where the picture is smaller then just use the zoom feature on my blu-ray player, i have a sharp bd-hp20u blu-ray player, it looks pretty good, it doesnt stretch the screen like wide-fit does, this is probly the only complaint i have on this TV is no auto-croping, like philips and sony has.

 

[mes444]

If you have an HD cable box why are you scanning for channels. All you do is attach the box to the tv with your HDMI cable and then into your tv HDMI 1 or HDMI 2, or whichever, then you use the source button on your remote and click till HDMI (1 or 2) shows in the upper left of screen. Then you choose all your channels thru the cable box, no scanning is necessary with an HD box.


The HD tier of channels will mostly fill the screen except for movies or some SD material which was originally shot in a different aspect ratio.


Don't use Just Scan for normal tv viewing. What it does is it puts the tv into 1 to 1 pixel mapping which doesn't allow overscan. Without overscan you will sometimes see static lines at the top of the screen, so who wants that. Just Scan is really for computer use as it provides a clearer pic for that.

 

[t13nif]

I was trying to scan for OTA HD channels.


What do i set my TV at to show HD fullscreen? The only one that will do it consistently is Wide Fit, but the quality is definitely not HD. I use Wide Fit for SD channels and it's tolerable. And why would i be able to see an HD program (the news on my local HD channel) full screen using Just Scan before, but now it's showing up with bars on the sides?



And what is overscan? I've never noticed any lines at the top of the screen.

Should i be using Wide Fit on every channel?

 

[fabbas01]

OK, when you say OTA (over the air), are you trying to get those channels through your cable box? If you have hd programing through you cable company then just turn on you cable box and look for hd channels (comcast starts at channel 800). Now if you want true OTA channels, then you need HD antenna (over the air antenna). Use just scan, because that shows you all the pixels, its not zoom or wide. I use 4:3 mode for sd channels, i like it that way.

 

[t13nif]

I mispoke--i have cable but i don't have a cable box per se. My TV is connected to an HDPVR. With my previous TV, i could tune channels with the PVR and also through the TV directly (when the PVR was off). I was trying to set up the new TV the same way, to be independent of the PVR. I also heard that in my area, there are some OTA HD channels, so i thought if i did an "air and cable" scan it would find some. Many of the picture settings on the TV are not available to me because it is in HDMI mode.


The manual for the TV cautions against watching a picture with the black bars, as this could cause burn in. It says that most viewing should be done in 16:9. But when i use 16:9, there are black bars surrounding the entire picture.

Seriously, what am i not getting?