HDTV Programming problem (1 Viewer)

[Bill Griffith]

I'm new to the HD Cable side of things so I'm wondering what this is all about.

I have acces to only 9 HD channels, 5 local and 4 movie (2 Sho and 2 HBO). I was watching the news before the oscars last night trying to get my picture as good as possible on the HD channel. They were showing some news stuff and I noticed the picture wasn't fitting on my screen. I have never seen this problem before. I tried all four video modes my TV does and nothing. I don't believe its a matter of positioning iether since I was losing picture on the bottom and on the top and on the sides.

I also noticed it was only with some shows as the commercials seem to come in OK, as did the Oscars.

 

[Patrick Sun]

Not everything being broadcasted over the HDTV channels will be in the 16x9 form factor. There is still 4:3 material being broadcast over the HDTV feeds. The feed will have sidebars processed into the video feed for the 4:3 shows (also local news shows).

If a show is "hard matted" for letterbox, but is really inside a 4:3 window, it's going to have black bars all around the video portion. Shows like Angel and Enterprise do this on HDTV displays (both 16x9 RPTVs and 4:3 RPTVs).

 

[Bill Griffith]

Yeah I've seen the bars on the side with the channel and call sign, and that really doesn't bother me, however what I'm trying to describe is something I've never seen before

Normally if your trying to force a 4:3 signal into the "full" display on a high aspect ration TV it just stretches and smooshes the picture. till it fits. This looked like an OK picture but It was cutting off the logo in the lower right and the score in the upper left and the writing was against the right and left edges. The TV should take the signal and make it fit, this is not happening in these cases. The picture is not fitting on my TV screen.

 

[Bill Griffith]

nobody else has this problem of the picture not small enough to fit on the screen?

 

[Patrick Sun]

Sounds like the TV is zooming the image onto the display screen.

 

[BruceSpielbauer]

Bill:

>>Normally if your trying to force a 4:3 signal into the "full" display on a high aspect ration TV it just stretches and smooshes the picture. till it fits. This looked like an OK picture but It was cutting off the logo in the lower right and the score in the upper left and the writing was against the right and left edges. The TV should take the signal and make it fit, this is not happening in these cases. The picture is not fitting on my TV screen.

 

[Bill Griffith]

Thanks Bruce and Patrick.

I will note the channels from now on. I've tried all 4 display settings I have available to me on my 47" Panny. I get the same problem on all of them, even 4:3 mode.

But like I said it's not for every show, mainly the news and most sitcoms, so far. And this is on the same channel.

HBO comes in real nice though

 

[Gene S]

Bill,
What cable box do you have? I have a SA3100HD and it outputs everything to 1080i. I also have a Panny TV and when it receives a progressive or HD signal it locks on the full mode, theres no way to use the stretch or zoom mode when this happens.

Gene

 

[David.N]

yes, this was discuss quite a bit after the last superbowl. Most of us could only see the bottom 1/4 of the game clock. We had no idea how much time was left in each quarter. The image was fantastic, just not "exactly" a good fit on the screen.

 

[Steve Phillips]

My local ABC station crops all non HD programming and I really hate it! Our local CBS station does it right and runs non HD stuff in 4X3 with side bars.

 

[Bill Griffith]

Gene not sure what the model number is. But hwat your describing is exactly what happens to me. The TV seem to be locked at one display now matter what I change the setting to.