Q&A # 259 - October 19, 2001

Staff

Q I just bought my first 36 inch Widescreen HDTV, a Sony EH36M31. These are made in the UK by Sony for the Australian market. I have a Marantz DV 18 DVD player connected to it. I cannot understand why some anamorphic DVDs are still playing with black bars on the top and bottom. This happens on the "wide mode"of the TV. Whereas other anamorphic DVDs play in the full 16:9
format without any black bars at all. All my DVDs are Zone 1 or a few Zone 4 , but all in anamorphic format. Can you suggest anything for my dilemma?

A This happens when you are playing a movie that is 2.35:1 ("Panavision"), because 2.35:1 is a higher aspect ratio than 16:9 (1.78:1). Even 1.85:1 movies will have little black bars. However, the black bars are smaller than if you were watching the movie on a 4:3 TV. The occurrence is normal. There is nothing wrong with your setup.

Q I have a Denon DCM-370 CD Player with HDCD decoding. The unit has a digital output that I would like to use to take advantage of the superior DACs in my receiver. If I do this, will I lose the HDCD resolution?

A Not if your receiver has HDCD decoding capability. If it does have it, there should be a logo on the front of the receiver that says HDCD. Otherwise, yes, you will lose the HDCD resolution. Some jitter reduction boxes and all up-samplers will strip the HDCD data, so even if your receiver has HDCD, you will not hear it because the info is gone.

Q Just read your latest Q/A about the SCART "cable". The SCART connector has 21 pins that have a bi-drectional audio and video connection (i..e, SCART->S-Video is not the same as S-Video->SCART). The SCART connector has composite in/out and stereo in/out. Regarding higher end video, the SCART standard specifies either RGsB (sync on composite) or S-Video (Y/C). The same pins are used, so the connector can be an either RGsB or S-Video, but not both. Component is completely unsupported by SCART - and so, what you really need for component input to an HDTV is a converter from Component -> RGsB, not just a cable. The guy should either get a new DVD player (progressive, this time) or see if his unit accepts SCART/S-Video input, in which case, he will need an SVideo->SVideo cable.

A Thanks for the info. Here is a link to a Scart supplier in the UK so that our USA readers can see what they look like and what the connections are used for: http://www.eworld.contactbox.co.uk/data/pinout/scart.htm.

Q Samsung raises the bar by taking any standard video and up-converting it to a progressive scan, "flicker free", 480p display. I may expect too much, but I am not happy with picture quality on my HD set TSL 3293HF. I have a digital satellite receiver (DirecTv) and over 90 signal strength, but the picture looks detail-less, soft, and when I turn up the sharpness I can't get more detail. It looks like Hi-8 tape recorded to VHS. I didn't try a progressive scan DVD player, only interlaced. "12 Monkeys" looks sometimes posterized and pink in shadows, but the picture looks more detailed than DirecTv. I couldn't compare this TV with others when I bought it, so I don't know if this is normal for HDTV without an HD source, or is it just bad TV?

A Part of your problem stems from the fact that satellite programming is not all that good. They have to squeeze lots of channels into limited bandwidth, so the data rate for each channel is not as high as it could be. This reduces the picture detail, and when your TV tries to up-convert it, the algorithms cannot create detail from a lousy source. That is why your DVD image is better. There is more detail in the source. The posterization may be in your DVD player rather than the TV, but it is difficult to say without testing. Pink in the shadows could be from poor contrast in the projector, if it is a rear projection TV. LCD panels don't have as good a contrast ratio as CRT projection TVs, so I suspect your model must be an LCD rear projection TV. That does not mean it is a bad TV, just that technology is not perfect just because it is sophisticated. DLP has better contrast, but is more expensive, and still is not as good as CRTs. You should have a contrast ratio of at least 1000:1 for a good picture. LCD projectors are often in the 200:1 range. We will be talking about this in an article on the new front projection TVs shortly.

Here are some examples to show you what posterization looks like. On the left are the normal pictures, and on the right, the posterized versions. Note that the colors make abrupt changes rather than having smooth gradations. This is much more posterization than you would get with a projection TV, but it gives you an idea of what to look for. Look for it in shadowy areas of the picture. It is a problem with digital projectors (LCD), not with CRT projectors. Note that even the normal picture of the sunset on the bottom left has some posterization, due to artifacts produced by saving the file as a gif, rather than as a jpg. This is more like the amount you might see in an LCD projector situation.

 

Q I live in Prince George's, Maryland. Here, the cable company is still using a dual line cable A & B. I'm not using the cable box, but all of a sudden there is a lot of snow across the picture. I have an HDTV and thought that something was wrong with the TV, but I went upstairs, turned on the set, and had the same problem. The cable company has changed some stations around. What can I do to get rid of the snow that's coming across the picture? I'll be going to Digital TV within the next six months but until then I'm stuck with a bad picture.

A If it occurred suddenly, then a connection in your cable wiring probably went bad for some reason. It could be the connection at the telephone pole, but also could be one of the junctions somewhere between the pole and your TV wall jack. When wiring a house, the cable company will use a junction if the run of cable is too short. Call the cable company. They are responsible for delivering a good signal to your home

Q I currently own a Sherwood Newcastle R-945 A/V receiver. I would like to upgrade by purchasing a five-channel power amplifier from either Parasound, Arcam, B&K, or Rotel and use the receiver as a preamp. Will I notice a increase in sound quality if I go with one of the five-channel amps?  Budget wise, the Parasound 855A looks the best, but I have concerns with 85 watts/channel output. Do all of these amps sound similar or is there one you would recommend over the others? I am looking at the amps from each of these manufacturers that have wattage outputs similar or slightly greater than my Sherwood.

A Yes, even with just 85 watts per channel, the outboard power amps will give you a better sound because they have larger power supplies. However, you might consider getting a three-channel power amp with more power (say, 200 watts per channel) and using it to power the front three channels, with the Newcastle's amplifiers driving the rear channels. Later on, you could get a two-channel amplifier to even things up all around. This will give you a system that should be able to handle more of the action movies sound tracks.

Q My 1989 Technics SL-P555 CD player is failing. I have heard that many of the current crop of players have lousy analog sections and just don't sound all that good.  I was looking into A Marantz CD-5000 but reviews claim it has no bass. Can you recommend a couple of the better units in the under $400 range? Is the Technics worth keeping alive if not prohibitively costly? I don't want to take a step backwards.

A It is time to get another CD player. Today's players have 24/96 DACs which go way beyond the 16/44.1 DACs of 12 years ago. The problem is the cheesy op amps that the manufacturers use in the output stage of DACs. They are a little better than they used to be, but they still have odd ordered harmonics. The op amps have lots of gain, and this is necessary because the voltage coming out of the DAC chip itself is too small. The op amps are also cheap and just snap right into the circuit boards. It is a shame, but that is the way things are. So, the op amp output has significant gain, but its ability to drive a low impedance input on a preamp is limited. If your preamp has low impedance, this could give you the weak bass you mentioned. For $400, I would suggest a used player, or perhaps one of the last year's models that are on sale at various places. You could find a $699 player on sale for $399. That is your best bet. In the meantime, I sure would like to see a DAC using single-ended class A triodes as the output circuit, with NO op amps in the signal path.

Q I am trying to match an old (15 years old) pair of speakers (SM100 with propylene-coated woofer and PolyCell tweeter) to a center and surround speakers. All of them will be driven by Harman Kardon PA5800 amplifier and Marantz AV550 preamp.

A You need to take them to a speaker dealer and have them set up your speakers with their various products for comparison. Even if your speakers are neutral in tonality, it is important to listen to the others, because many of them are not neutral.

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