Full Aspect/Anamorphic Resolution Problem with R10 on CRT RPTV

[mdv]

Hi. I have an R10 DTV Tivo on a 16:9 Toshiba CRT RPTV. I previously had an Ultimate TV DVR on this TV and when that unit was set for 16:9, letterboxed/widescreen programming (i.e., Sopranos, Fox Movie Channel, etc.) would properly display using the TV's "Full" aspect setting, thus maximizing the resoluton. However, with the R10 set to 16:9, the screen displays a letterboxed image in the 4:3 aspect, forcing me to use the TV's "Zoom" aspect setting, which severely reduces the resolution. When I change the R10 setting to 4:3, there is absolutely no difference from the 16:9 setting when viewing letterbox/widescreen programming. Is this a problem with my R10, or is this just "the way it is" and I should just lament that my Ultimate TV could produce a better picture on widescreen programming?

Any help is much appreciated!

Mark

[rminsk]

The 16:9 option on the R10 only works when DirecTV has tagged a program to be 16:9. DirecTV has not used this tag for several years and when they did it was only for a few pay-per-views.

[rlj5242]

UTV and my old E-86 receiver would automatically recognize letterboxed programs and stretch them to fit. DirecTivos do not have this feature. I don't miss it since I use my TV's stretch mode to do the exact same thing.

-Robert

[rminsk]

would properly display using the TV's "Full" aspect setting, thus maximizing the resoluton.BTW, how does this maximize the resolution? It is the same video signal being scale.

[mdv]

The 16:9 option on the R10 only works when DirecTV has tagged a program to be 16:9. DirecTV has not used this tag for several years and when they did it was only for a few pay-per-views.

I'm not sure that's correct. Without getting technical (because I wouldn't get it right anyway!), in plain English, here's what I observed:

With my old Ultimate TV DVR set to 16:9 in accordance with my 16:9 TV set and with my TV set to "zoom" (which essentially blows up the picture to fill more screen), or any "stretch" mode (which does exactly that - i.e., stretch a 4:3 picture), when a widescreen show was on air (i.e., Sopranos on HBO or letterboxed movies on various channels), the picture would stretch vertically, making people and objects look unnaturally tall/thin. If I then changed the TV's aspect ratio to "full," much like with an anamorphic DVD, the picture would compress to the correct proportion and resolution would increase (this is exactly what happens with an anamorphic DVD playing on a 16:9 set on the "full" setting). I was experiencing this right up until I disconnected the Ultimate TV in December 2005 (3 months ago).

Now, with all of the above being the same, except that now I have an R10 Tivo DTV DVR which is also set to 16:9, when I have the TV aspect set at "normal" (i.e., 4:3), I have a letterboxed image in the 4:3 screen ration with gray bars on the side. To see it without the gray bars on the side, where I used to set the TV to "full," I have to use the "zoom" setting which zooms into the image essentially blowing it up like a photo making the picture look more pixelish (for lack of a better term). If I switch the TV to the "full" aspect setting as I used to with the Ultimate TV, the picture distorts into stretched, fat people which obviously looks horrible. I'm the kind of person who likes to watch stuff in the correct aspect (i.e., if it was produced for 4:3, I use the "normal" setting), so I rarely use the "stretch" modes which, to my taste, look unnatural.

With the Ultimate TV box, I really only had to use 2 settings - "normal" for everything except letterboxed/widescreen programs for which I could use "full" which properly displayed those programs on my 16:9 screen. Now, to see letterboxed/widescreen programs on my R10, I have to use the "zoom" setting which removes the gray bars, but blows up the picture so much that resolution suffers.

This is similar to a problem in the early DVD days when letterboxed movies weren't "anamorphic" or "enhanced for widescreen." In those situations, you needed to set the TV to "zoom" to maintain the correct aspect ratio and fill your screen.

Thus, I have to believe that the ability of my old Ultimate TV box to process a widescreen program image was superior to that of the Tivo box, which is unfortunate.

It's a peculiar problem and I wasn't sure if anyone else had similar enough circumstances as me to have experienced this. Reading Robert's reply above, it seems he knows what I'm talking about, but either he doesn't mind the aspect being slightly compromised by the "stretch" modes, or the resolution being compromised by the "zoom" mode. I, however, am really bummed out because I want the best of both worlds - proper aspect and max resolution. I could go back to using the Ultimate TV, but with an HD Tivo in my other room, I don't want to have to pay for both Tivo and Ultimate TV services in the same house! Maybe I need to write a letter to one of the HT magazines and see if one of their technical writers can figure out whether there's a solution.

Mark

[rminsk]

I'm not sure that's correct. Without getting technical (because I wouldn't get it right anyway!), in plain English, here's what I observedThe DirecTiVo has always used the DirecTV 16:9 bit. I have never used a UltimateTV before. It may have ignored the DirecTV bit and went ahead and unletterboxed things for you.