[astroglide]

i'm replacing my gf's sony htib with an onkyo ht-s660 5.1 and a separate dvd player, later moving the tv to (probably) a samsung rp-dlp set.


my questions are regarding the dvd player itself. bear in mind i would like to, as always, spend as little as possible on this (think $200 or less?).


1: does it even matter if i buy a progressive scan player if i buy a good hdtv set? couldn't i just use its de-interlacing? why wouldn't i?


2: why is everyone so interested in dvi/hdcp/hdmi capability for a 480p signal? should i be interested as well?


3: black or silver? it seems some is available as both, some not. i'm concerned about matching, and it would seem that black is easier to match across vendors than silver.


lord knows these are probably dupes but the popularity of this forum makes searching a chore. a wiki-based faq for questions like these would seem to be a good idea.

 

[CobraKahn]

DVI


If you are going to buy a digital TV like the Sammy, you need a DVD player with DVI output. The reason is that DVI is a digital connection. Component, S-Video, etc. are all analog connections. If you use a regular progressive or non-progressive DVD player with an analog connection like component, then the DVD player must convert the digital signal from the DVD into an analog signal to the TV, and then the TV converts it back to digital and then upconverts it. The conversion to analog and back introduces all sorts of noise and artifacts best left undone.


Using component with a digital TV is like using RCA connections between your DVD player and your digital recevier for the sound. You can send the digital Dolby Digital signal to the receiver to be decoded, or you can let the DVD player downconvert it to regular analog two channel encoded dolby pro logic, send that to the receiver, and let the receiver turn it back into digtal to be decoded. You just lost the whole point of Dolby Digital 5.1 and turned it into regular old analog Pro Logic. Why would you do that? You would not - you would use a digital audio connection. Same here.


DVI allows the DVD to take the digital signal off of the DVD player and send it digitally and pristine to the TV for the best possible picture. The difference is dramatic. You can send a 480p picture and let the TV upconvert - or let the DVD player upconvert to 720p and the TV just shows what it gets.


See any post by Arungupta and follow the links explaining this in more depth. I just received mine last night and the difference is huge.


Buy the Bravo D1 from V Inc. for $200. or wait for the D2 in March for $250. Or for any of the new Samsung DVI players ini Q3 2004 whcih will be comparably prcied. also Panasonic and others will jump in by year's end.

 

[astroglide]

thank you for your reply. any comments on black vs silver from you? i'm assuming the prog/non-prog is a dead issue because most of the dvi players will probably be prog.


i've heard nothing but bad news about the bravo d1, so i'm unlikely to buy it. perhaps the d2, but i still don't see what it is about a 480p signal that could serious stress a 4-foot component cable. most hdtv is still done with component and it looks great, needing much more bandwidth. it just seems to me that while dvi is technically better if it's being chosen on image quality alone i would have to question it because of how low-end a dvd signal is in the grand scheme of things.

 

[CobraKahn]

Black vs. silver is a personal choice.


The issue is digital vs. analog. Component is analog and DVI is digital. The picture on a DVD is painstainkingly encoded from the analog film source to MPEG 2 for highest quality using hundreds of thousands of dollars worht of equipment and the best technicians. If you use component connections, you are converting all of this work back into an analog feed, and then leetting a $200 processor in yoru TV convert it back to digital, throwing away all o0f their work. Compoponet is fine for an ANALOG HDTV like CRT which NEEDS an ANALOG SIGNAL anyway. That is why most HDTV has historically been component.


With a DIGITAL TV, the signal is never analog, and if you put it into analog, you are substantially degrading the signal. Why does this matter in "only" 480p? Because the HDTV needs to upconvert 480p to 72op. It needs a clean digital signal to do this well. OR the DVD player can convert the 480p and feed the TV digitally upconvetrted 720p. A DVI DVD player does not send a 480p signal. It sends a 720p signal to the TV. Everything stays digital and clean thus a MUCH better picture. If you think it is "only" 480p - then you have never seen a DVI equipped DVD player connected to a good digital TV. The experience is near HDTV quality.


If you are talking about an analog CRT or a regular SD TV I would agree. A digital TV is a whole different animal and you will suffer serious picture degradation if you do not get a DVI equipped player. Please go read the posts from Mr. Gupta. If you do not get a DVI player, you are wasting your money on the digital TV, and I would serously consider a much cheaper CRT if I were you. On a digital TV, a $200 DVI DVD player will outperform a $2,000 progressive component output DVD player. Why? Digital vs. analog. Digital will always win no matter how much money you spend on the analog output.


Again - it would be like connecting your DVD player to your dolby digital receiver with analog RCA cables. It would work, but you would have wasted your money on both as you get no value from the DD feed.

 

[astroglide]

i understand the value inherent in digital vs analog, it's just that i (perhaps erroneously) assumed that dvd just isn't heavyweight enough of a signal to make it matter.


on black vs silver i'm curious about mfr trends, is everything going toward or away from silver? it seemed like stuff was all black in the 80s/90s and is heading silver now.


i have an ancient apex i could use to hold me over until the d2 is released...

 

[CobraKahn]

Most stuff is still black. Some manufacturers are trending to silver. There will always be black alternatives. All of my equipment is in a closet so I do not care what color anything is!

 

[astroglide]

thanks again for your insight.


i can see now that the samsung dlps appear to employ the 'best' faroujda (sp?) chip. why would one need or want progressive with that?

 

[CobraKahn]

Again - you do not want "progressive" - which generally refers to an analog component connection - you want a digital DVI connection. The TV cannot fix the problems introduced by generating an analog signal.


There are processors whcih can deinterlace the video in the DVD player and there are similiar processors in the TV. You should use whichever one does the better job. The only way either will do a good job is by sending the results from the DVD player to the TV digitally - over DVI.