I have a Sony 57 inch widescreen TV KP57SW500 I believe. I also have the Sony HD-200 box. My local channels 11 and 13, NBC and ABC sometime have bars on the left and right. I know this is normal for some signals but somtimes the bars are about 1 inch wide on each side; and fluctuate in size from time to time during broadcasting from 1 inch to half inch. This happens when watching the news or certain shows. Some times however it fills the entire screen; like The Practice, or Threat Matrix. Just wanted to know if this was normal......
Joined: Aug 23, 2002
Posts: 2623
From: Houston, TX
Posted: 2003-10-13 14:00
Hi, since I live in Houston, I can answer your question:
On your screen, the true HD program like "The Practice", or "Threat Matrix" fills your 16:9 screen. No problem.
SD 4:3 program, like what you see on Ch 2, 20, 26 and 39, should have 2-inch bars on each side. Normal.
What Ch11 and Ch13 do is something often called a "14:9" mode. They will crop and stretch their SD 4:3 program a bit, so that they will fill the screen of those with 16:9 TV (like you) a little better, and without having to use the zoom modes on your TV.
These are 4:3 SD programs, and not HD. And the two channels use different methods to achieve this. ABC crops the top and bottom of their picture, and then zoom in a little to form this "psuedo-widesceen" or "14:9" mode. If you watch their news or SD sports program, you'll find that the box score and news ticker in the top and bottom cropped.
Ch 11 doesn't crop the picture as much, but they stretch the picture horizontally a bit. If you look at David Letterman closely, you'll find his head wider and rounder than he actually is.
The PQ quality of either channel SUCKS big-time when they use this stretch mode. I have emailed to both, and neither has responded to me why they are doing this.
ESPN-HD also do this "stretchy" thing on their channel when the material is 4:3 SD. People hated it, and refuse to watch it in HD.
Damn, everything you just laid out I have seen as well! Thanks, really appreciate the info! I thought there was something wrong, but your right on the money. Why the hell do they do it? Like you said, it truley "SUCKS". PBS looks awesome though, everyday, all day, every program. 13 really sucks though they do cut off the picture; ticker line in the news etc. Good deal, thanks again for the reply..
[ This message was edited by: fusion on 2003-10-13 15:32 ]
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Posted: 2003-10-13 13:51
