[mythtv-users] New 50" Plasma, setting Myth for it?

[Simon Hobson]

Jean-Yves Avenard wrote:

>  > Hmm, the more I'm finding out about this HD stuff (and HDMI), the less
>>  impressed I'm getting. Unless I'm missing something, the 'standards' result
>>  in you playing a DVD (for example) and the DVD player images the video at
>>  (say) 1366x768. Your TV then takes this image and re-scales it to introduce
>>  overscan - even though it's panel has a native resolution of 1366x768.
>
>Since when does a TV upscale to "introduce" overscan ?
>
>where is that coming from ?

Take one 26" TV, hook up a computer with DVI (via an HDMI port), and 
set computer to 1366x768 (or more likely 1360x768). I gather that on 
most 26" sets won't have an option for 1:1 mapping between input and 
display pixels (aka full pixel mode) and will therefore :
chop off the outside of your image leaving less than 1366x768 pixels, 
and then re-scale the smaller image left to fit on the 1366x768 panel.

Thus, on a set that doesn't have full pixel mode, you cannot display 
an image that has not been re-scaled by the TV. That might not matter 
too much on action material, but it makes reading text on a computer 
desktop look pretty horrible.

That's using a digital input. VGA is better (if you can get closer 
than 1280x768), but starting with digital, converting it to analogue 
to pipe it down a bit of wire, and then converting it back to digital 
again seems rather stone age to me.

Josh White wrote:

>Why would you by a TV for use as a monitor?  You can get a 26" 
>monitor for much less than a 26" TV (at least at the Best Buy I was 
>in last weekend in central NY), and aviod the trouble with the "HD 
>stuff" in general.

But they have ridiculously high resolutions - 40% more than on a 26" 
TV. The reason I'm specifically looking at TVs and not monitors is so 
that I can get a large display & relatively low resolution without 
all the artifacts that result from running an LCD panel at other than 
it's native resolution. Yes, I had considered monitors - and if they 
didn't look (relatively) crap at lower resolutions then that's what 
I'd have done ages ago (actually it would have just been a new iMac).

Since my mother's eyesight is getting poor, the image has to be very 
clear to start with. Before I borrowed a 26" TV she was talking about 
giving up.

Mike Perkins wrote:

>Buy a TV/monitor which has a VGA input - then you can treat it as a 
>monitor. No overscan, just fake up a mode line which matches the 
>exact resolution of the hardware, and you're good to go. Although - 
>occasionally the EDID sent out by the TV lies, so be prepared to 
>dump it and use your own.

Well I'll be giving it a go, but the only TV I've had available so 
far seems very happy to just flash up a message about "unsupported 
mode" and turn off. My new one arrived today, so I'll be having a 
fiddle tomorrow evening.

-- 
Simon Hobson

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