Toshiba 51HX93 (originally was: Seating Distance and TV Suggestions)

[Bing Fung]

What should the minimum seating distance be for a RPTV?

I have a limited amount of space in my room. I'm contemplating the purchase of a new 51" TV and I think the maximum amount I have is 8-9 feet.

This is with a CRT TV.

Any thoughts?

What should I buy and why?




Bing

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[aud19]

Hey Bing :)

Check out this link:

http://www.myhometheater.homestead.com/viewingdistancecalculator.htmlGreat page :)

As for recommendations... for CRT I'd say Hitachi or Toshiba otherwise Sammy's DLP (or Panasonic/Toshiba when they come out, if you can wait)

Jason




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[Bing Fung]

Jason, thanks for that link, it was great! :T

So based on that it states for a 16x9 51" TV I should be from 17.8-6.7 feet based on viusal acuity.

RESULTS:
26.1 deg. Current Viewing angle
19.2 Feet Maximum recommended viewing distance
6.9 Feet Maximum recommended SMPTE viewing distance (30 degree viewing angle)
8 Feet Maximum THX viewing distance (26 degree viewing angle)
5.7 Feet Recommended THX viewing distance (36 degree viewing angle)

So I think I can assume 8-9 feet is resonable?? :?

I could wait, but there is this screaming deal on a Toshiba 51X93 right now that has me thinking it's a no brainer and I should just spring for this for the short term...

I did want something that was 720P capable, but in my price range that leaves the Samy DLP or the Sony LCD. Neither of those are perfect and given the price of them, they can not be forgiven of their shortcomings as easily as the $2800 CRT Tosh...




Bing

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[Trevor Schell]

Bing ,,Read my Story about my Toshiba 57HX93.
It's a great set.

I do have a question though..
What are you going to be viewing in 720P?
We have the Bell ExpressVu HD package and most programming
is 1080i, especially the Networks plus we have the Discovery channel.

See here.
http://www.hdtvgalaxy.com/broad.html




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[Bing Fung]

Trev, I'll check it out...

I woul dlike 720P so i can have my PC connected to the set. This way I could port my PC desktop to it at 1280x720 progressive.

Plus 720P is the better option over 1080i. You don't get the motion interlace artifacts. I think CBS is the only station that is providing 720P at this time,however my interest in it is purely on the PC front. Sadly, to get the 720P option I would have to go the DLP or LCD route.

I'm leaning pretty hard towards the 51X93 just because the price is right. It's so cheap it's almosts qualifies as an impulse buy :)




Bing

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[aud19]

$2800 CRT Tosh

Trev, I though you had mentioned somewhere closer to $1800 in TTP...? Or am I just going cooky? :crazy:

Jason




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[Trevor Schell]

Jason,
Bings talking about the Toshiba 51HX93.
The MSRP price is $4,999 CDN and only certain Vendor's
are eligable to sell them.
Our Hi-Tech Audio store in town has them for $2,798 CDN.
That's a heck of a deal. :T
That's the same place I picked up my 57HX93.
MSRP is $5,999 CDN. I only paid $3,249 CDN.

Bing, Those are limited, so that is why you may have to decide real quick if you want one. In fact I wouldn't be suprised if they are gone by now.




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[Trevor Schell]

Bing,,
What should the minimum seating distance be for a FPTV?
So Bing,,
Is that a typo or are you actually looking into FPTV as well.?




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[Bing Fung]

Trev, sorry it was a typo, I ment RPTV... Jason knew that :wedgie:

Thanks for the heads up, I'll give him a call tomorrow about the TV. If they're sold out, no biggie, I'll get something else.




Bing

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[Trevor Schell]

Thanks for explaining that Bing!!
You just made another typo.
You spelt ment wrong. :P




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[Bing Fung]

Thanks for explaining that Bing!!
You just made another typo.
You spelt ment wrong. :P


Trev, :wedgie: :smackbutt: :LOL:

;lx




Bing

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[Trevor Schell]

Bing,,You actually should consider FPTV.
You can watch them while sitting upside down. :P




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[Glen]

Bing.

Have you considered going with a FPTV? You could go with a smaller screen size and save alot of space in your room. With a smaller screen, you'd get more brightness out of the unit - which would make daytime viewing better ( assuming you don't have a totally dark room ). PC hook up would be a snap.

As far as RPTV's go, I have not liked many 16x9 RPTV's. The amount of digital artifacts and garbage you can see in the picture ( from all de-interlacing and conversion that goes on in them ) makes me wonder how the manage to sell any. If you put a 4x3 RPTV next to a 16x9 RPTV playing the same DVD - I'm betting the 4x3 is going to have a better, smoother and more natural look to it. Unless your watching a true hi-def channel, I think most 16x9's look awful.

Now that being said, I did get to spend some quality time with a Sony Wega LCD a couple weeks ago. The out of the box settings looked bad ( but most TV's do anyway ). I did find that the Wega had some user settings a filters you cold turn on the made a huge difference in the picture. It reduced the (what I'd call ) digitization of the picture alot. Instead of having to stand over 10 feet back for it to look good, I was able to get up to about 3 feet before I started seeing them ( thats the best I've seen on a non hi-def 16x9 picture ).

I know you've mentioned black levels as a concern before, but remember - 'true black' can be a realitive term. Something I think is more important is gray scale ( or the degrees of black ). The Sony Wega had hands down the best grey scale I've seen outside of a Lowe direct view TV. What I use as a test for grey scale is the back alley scene in spiderman (or a Sencore Hi-def signal generator - but most people don't have access to one of those :D ). On most TV's its very black and hard to make out alot of detail. The Wega had a very convincing black to it, but more importantly all kinds of detail. I could see details of Peter Parkers face while he's fighting without his mask on, and some very good detail when he ducks and disappears around the alley corner. Every other TV I've seen this scene on, everything was just black. So I guess I'm saying ask yourself if you want to see black, or detail. :D

Lastley on the Wega, they seem to have corrected the problem they had with their light engine - so I wouldn't worry about any premature failures with the unit.

We'll I think I gave you at least 4 cents worth, so happy shopping.

(P.S. email me if you want to know where I get my info from, it might lend some credibility to my opinion :) ).

[Bing Fung]

Well thanks for everyones input.

Glen, the Sony Wegas, look cloudy to me, at times they do look phenominal like during Hidef, but any time a DVD has been played on it, they look as if your looking through haze....

Anyway, no matter for I pulled the trigger on the Toshiba 51X93. They had it delivered when I got home from work.

I just finish calibrating it with Avia. I'm very pleased with it. I just watched Desparado (Superbit), the color is fantastic, the detail is superb. The detail and clarity of image is astonishing!

NTSC looks like crap however. I get my Hidef cable box delivered tomorrow, so i'm looking forward to that.

Anyway, thanks everyone.

And Trev, thanks for the tip on the sale. At these prices the TV is a steal for performance :yesnod: I couldn't pass it up! It's not what I had expected to buy, but life can be like that.

http://www.bingtech.com/tosh.jpg




Bing

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[Glen]

Congrats Bing! :T

Now get some sleep ( I guess I should too :LOL: ).

[Bing Fung]

Thanks Glen, it'll have to do....

Surprizingly it looks smaller in that picture than it actually does in real life.

My custom made Canre Component cords are too short to have the DVD in the rack, I'll have to get a new set of cords for the DVD and the Hidef Box :(




Bing

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[aud19]

Congrats Bing! :)

NTSC looks like crap however. I get my Hidef cable box delivered tomorrow, so i'm looking forward to that. Aaaah good old NTSC :throwup: Some stuff that might help your picture a tiny bit:

Turn off any "Noise Reduction", "Scan Velocity Management", Sharpness and any other so called "Picture Enhancement" feature. At it's best NTSC can look mediocre-good'ish, adding any processing to that just makes it worse IMO.

Jason (Wishing he could afford his cable companies HD box without envoking the wrath of his sweet girlfriend)




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[Glen]

NTSC

Never Twice Same Color

Heard that one in school years back, still think its funny :LOL:

[Trevor Schell]

Anyway, no matter for I pulled the trigger on the Toshiba 51X93. They had it delivered when I got home from work.

I just finish calibrating it with Avia. I'm very pleased with it. I just watched Desparado (Superbit), the color is fantastic, the detail is superb. The detail and clarity of image is astonishing!



Ah! My young Apprentice!
;x( ;x( ;x(
Me thinks you made a good choice :yesnod:

So , How do you think it stands up against the DLP and LCD's that you were sweet on?

Well, I am proud that you went for it.
Glad you and the family have a real nice 16x9 set.
You guys are going to really enjoy that!!
Good Stuff!!!!:T

:party: :party: :party: :party:




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[Trevor Schell]

I just finish calibrating it with Avia. I'm very pleased with it. I just watched Desparado (Superbit), the color is fantastic, the detail is superb. The detail and clarity of image is astonishing!



Just curious as to what your settings came to!!?




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[Eduardo]

Congratulations BING !!!!!

Now lets get together and play some Ghost Recon or PGR2. PGR2 is awesome on a big screen. And the game was developed in WS. :T




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[Bing Fung]

Hey Guys

Jason, thanks. I have done as you said and disabled Cable Clear, SVM...etc. NTSC still looks "the Pants" The Hidef Cable Box ain't all that. I think mine has some issues and they are coming to replace it this morning. It was taking way to long to establish signal lock at times. Plus it was doing flaky things. The Tosh HX series has a built in HD tuner that can grab HD signals via antenna, in areas like Vancouver or Seattle, you could get away with out a HD box 8)

Glen, thats a good one ;)

EJ, I'll have to get set up on that. I need the Xbox HD adapter, Plus I need more Component inputs.

Trev.... What can I say, this TV is phenominal for the price. 8O 8O

I think the HX looks pretty good in comparison to the LCD's & DLP's. In some DVD's the image is so fantastic, like the Hulk. I seen the Hulk on the Sammy DLP and I though it looked great, but even then it still had the deinterlace artificts from time to time. The HX shows no signs of the deinterlace artifacs in any DVD's I have watched. And the Hulk looks much better on the HX than on the DLP. The Black levels of the HX are superiour and amazes me even in comparison to my Sony XBR. The HX seems to have more depth of image than the DLP's or LCD's in my limited comparisions.

All 3 types of sets have their own sets of issues. Each type has it's strengths and weaknesses, however the HX CRT can be forgiven of it's faults given it's low cost of $2800 before taxes. The Sony LCD and Samsung DLP, at around $5000, can not be forgiven as easily. Thats what made my decision for me. I was ready to plunk down full price for the newer tech sets, but in the end it was the image quality that sold me rather than price. Which is funny for I was sure I would not buy a CRT and would have bet soild money that I was going by a DLP or LCD.

Suffice to say if the HX was priced at $5000, I would probably still take the HX over the other sets, however I would probably have waited another half year or so. If all 3 sets were priced at $3000, I would still take the HX.... Wait a minute, in effect I did for price wasn't really the issue (although it did make my choice easier). I wanted the best DVD/HD image for size class independant of costs :) At the Price of the HX, it was a nice stop gap TV until the next gen of HD sets become available. I really wanted one that would do 720P native (PC stuff), but in the end no matter how badly I wanted that feature, it was the 480P DVD image that mattered most. The low price of the HX makes it eaier to justify an upgrade 2-3 years form now. I paid way less for the HX than my 36" XBR (non HD) 8O

The Reds and fire ball explosions on the HX are unbeliveable. In Desparado there is a scene when Antonio and Selma are walking away and the whole background explodes, this is stunning on the HX. On the Fifth Element, Leelu's Hair is totally vivid during the reconstruction scene. In the Jump scene there is a huge depth to the traffic below due to the great blacklevels displayed by the HX. I have watched a few DVD's that I use to consider reference on my XBR, however they just looked average now on the HX. Maybe this is because the XBR was more forgiving than the HX, or because the HX can resovle more imperfections in the film/transfer...

In day time viewing (mid afternoon), the image quality is adequate, but really lacks punch and definition. This is a situation where the LCD's and DLP's may have exceled at. However in a darkened room, the HX is bright enough and actually too bright, I had to turn down the brightness or will have to add a small low watt bulb to the room.

In High Definition Viewing at 1080i, there is too much motion artifacts for my liking. I set the TV to 540p and that fixed it. From what I have seen of Hi-def is it can be stunning at times, yet at the same time, certain areas of the image still look like low def. We were watching a Hi-Def basket ball game. The floor and the fans had the typical HD depth and detail, yet at the same time parts of the net or small parts of the players looked slightly soft or not as focused as the overall image. As well there were times when slight pixelation occured in the image. I'm not sure why this is (it reminds me of compression artifacts when zooming in on digital pictures)... But I have seen this same thing on all Hi-Def sets on show room floors running satellite feeds, so I know it's not just my cable box.. My niece who was over stated that she felt as if she was standing right on the basket ball court. I didn't get that effect, but then I'm more use to good imaging than she maybe is. Jay Leno & the Tonight Show (wt Trump & Orange County Choppers) looked good in Hi-Def. My Whole feeling on Hi-Def is yeah it's good, but's its far from great.... My personal feel of the whole Hi-Def is that every channel should be like this. It's not that its so clear and defined to be amazing, it's just that good old NTSC is just that bad to be embarrassing. I don't know, it's as if I should expect this type of image clarity (hi-def) in this day and age. Hi-def still has kinks to work out in my mind. Especially when I can put in DVD's like the Hulk & Deparado, DVD's with images that are comparible to Hi-Def, and actually are cleaner and crisper if you ask me. Don't get me wrong, I like Hi-Def, and wish all the channels were like the 6 HD channels I get.

I get a new Cable box today, so maybe that will fix some of the issues I'm having. The built in TV guide is a bit flacky so I have disabled it and will just use the cable boxes guide. Plus the HX's TV's guide always uses the Cable Box Line in which is 75ohm. Disabling the HX's TV guide allows me to have the cable feed come through the component cords at all times (Color Stream HD1)

This is the first time I have owned another brand of TV other than a Sony. I have owned 4 Sonys before, and I have to say I'm a big fan of Sonys HMI (human machine inteface). The Tosh is OK, but some things on it just seem illogical, like the Video settings in 2 different areas. Or how the set up windows can not be set to a certain level of transparency so you can still see how its affecting the image. Granted once you enter the actual adjustment levels the setup window is reduced in size, so I maybe I'm just nitpicking. I suppose when you jump from one families HMI to another, it takes some time to get use to it.

Trev, as for my settings, I have tweaked them slightly by eyeball after the calibration. I found calibrated that the image was slightly more saturated than I like in color. I may run the calibration again this week end after the set has had a chance to breakin a bit.

Here are my settings:


Color Stream HD 1 (Cable) Uncalibrated, just set with my eye
-Mode = Preference
-Contrast = 57
-Brightness =41
-Color = 50
-Tint =0
-Sharpness = 43

-Picture size = Full
-Cinenma mode = Film
-Display format = 540p
-Auto Aspect ratio = On

-ALS = Off
-Flesh tone = Off
-Cable Clear = Off
-VSM = Off
-Color temperature = Medium
________________________

Color Stream HD 2 (DVD) Avia Calibrated, then slightly tweaked by eye

-Mode = Preference
-Contrast = 38
-Brightness =46
-Color = 62
-Tint = -7
-Sharpness = 44

-Picture size = Full
-Cinenma mode = Film
-Display format = 540p
-Auto Aspect ratio = On

-ALS = Off
-Flesh tone = Off
-Cable Clear = Off
-VSM = Off
-Color temperature = Medium


Post your setting Trev, so I can try them in my set :)




Bing

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[Bing Fung]

Ohh, one more thing that I wanted to say... Not all programs should be HDTV. I was watching this Seattle News Broadcast where the anchor person was scary looking in HDTV :bluezoned:

Too much detail... Soft focus or regular NTSC would not have revealed how scary they were. :P




Bing

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[aud19]

The Tosh HX series has a built in HD tuner that can grab HD signals via antenna, in areas like Vancouver or Seattle, you could get away with out a HD box I was not aware there was much/any OTA HD available in Vancouver 8O You know where there might be more details on what's available?

In High Definition Viewing at 1080i, there is too much motion artifacts for my liking. I set the TV to 540p and that fixed it. I too find I prefer 540p to 1080i (at least on DVD's). My thinking on this is that as you pointed out you don't get interlacing artifacts. I also believe that due to most CRT sets maximum horizontal resolution of +/- 1280 lines that 960x540 fits withing those capabilities better than 1920x1080. 1920 obviously being a fair bit more than 1280.

Hi-def still has kinks to work out in my mind. What you might be experiencing here could be a couple things. One, your service provider and/or the original broadcaster is using additional compression on it's HD signals to make them smaller enabling them to fit other/more stuff in their given bandwidth at the expense of your HD quality. Two, some of the programs you were watching may have originally started life as SD/ED (480i/p) and have been upsampled to HD (1080i/720p). I've heard good things about the quality of Discovery HD's feed and hopefully if your SP doesn't screw with the signal, that could be a shining example of HD's capabilities.

Jason




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[Trevor Schell]

Bing!
My settings are the same, except my sharpness is at 0
and color is at 60.
I think your problem is the Cable box or whatever it is you have.
Get the ExpressVu Hi-Def Satelite receiver.
The HD channel choices are excellent.
I can say though, that even though not all programs are in HD, the ones that aren't still look stunning on our set, including the commercials.
You can come see for yourself.




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[Trevor Schell]

BTW,,I think Bing likes his new TV :hump:




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[aud19]

Yes Bing. For the love of God man! Turn the sharpness off! 8O

:D

But seriously sharpness, like the rest of the "picture enhancements" add unwanted information to the signal. You want the cleanest, purest signal don't you? Trust me you'll end up with more fine detail in your picture :)

BTW another reason some of the shots in the basketball game may have looked softer is that they use a combination of HD and upsampled SD cameras. So the main cameras are HD and ones like overhead or net cams will be upsampled SD.

Jason




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[Bing Fung]

Bing!
I can say though, that even though not all programs are in HD, the ones that aren't still look stunning on our set, including the commercials.
You can come see for yourself.


I find that hard to believe Trev :roll: These bigger TV's make anything not HD, DVD, or anything less that stellar look terrible. Basically it's enlarging NTSC's 280 lines of resolution (I know NTSC has 480, but actual broadcast is only about 280), which looks like crap. I can't see how that can be stunning. I guess I'll have to see it for my self :wedgie: :smackbutt:

The cable guy came over and tested my lines, he stated that the attenuation was rather high and installed a powered signal amplifier. He also swapped out the box for anotherone. I'm still having the same problems in switching. The Toshiba HX has some problems in the scaler in that I have set my Cable box to 16:9 Wide screen 1080i for HD signals. For 4:3 signals I have set the overide to 480p. What this does is kicks in the TV scaler to upconvert 480i signals to 480p. The problem comes when viewing a HD 540p signal, and then switching to a chaneel that is 480i, converted to 480p. The Tosh, most times locks up and I end up having to reboot the TV (power off/on) This really sucks. The problem is removed if I set the 4:3 to 480i, so basically it's not upconverting.

Jason, I know what your saying about the sharpness setting, but based on the sharpness test pattern, 44 is where the TV should be set. If I run it lower than 44, then the main circle defocuses and white ringing occurs on the right side of the black circle. Any higher than 44 and the left side circle rings and you can start to see the sharpening enhancements.

No the softness occurs in the same scene, same camera, during that basket ball game I watched.

PBS is fantastic, as was Jay Leno and most other programs, but I feel HD still needs kinks worked out. What I see on my set, I have seen on every other HD set in electronic stores. These are sets with dedicated HD Sat tuners for the disply, so I'm sure this is normal...

Sorry, I'm just not as impressed as some of you may be.... That's not to say it isn't clear, for it is. It's just not all that....

I watched the Masters Golf tournement today on HD and that was stunning. I have never seen Agusta looks so beautiful...


Trev, do you have any Pronto codes for the HX? This thing is a realy pain to program. Most of the codes don't work after learning the IR and the HX doesn't have descrete On/Off, which makes my single button start not work at all for my family. I went to remote central and there were no ccf's fo rthe HX93 TVs. There was descrete codes for a HX81 set, but they don't seem to work for the HX93. I actually had to use the Tosh remote and teach commands to another universal remote and then use that universal remote to teach the Pronto. For some reason or another the Tosh remote teaching the Pronto on many buttons didn't seem to work... Wierd




Bing

My Home Entertainment Systems (http://www3.sk.sympatico.ca/fung1/gamerigs.htm)

[Trevor Schell]

I find that hard to believe Trev These bigger TV's make anything not HD, DVD, or anything less that stellar look terrible. Basically it's enlarging NTSC's 280 lines of resolution (I know NTSC has 480, but actual broadcast is only about 280), which looks like crap. I can't see how that can be stunning. I guess I'll have to see it for my self



Bing,,
I think I know why!
First off. The Bell HD dish is OVAL so that it can pic up both the regular
ExpressVu Bird as weel as the HD bird.
On the receiver you have to toggle between the two depending what you want to watch.
We leave it always on the HD bird.
Even though not all programming is in HD, there are only some.
I can say that all programs come in super clear as long as we are pulling in the signal from the HD bird. The HD bird produces a better image whether the programming is in HD or not.
Switching to the regular bird provides a poor picture.
Leaving it on the HD bird is also using the component connection, therefore using the Colorstream input.
Also, we are using Catcable Tigress component cables which are the best I have used to date, bar none!! :yesnod:
You have to see it to believe it!!
Lastly, The Sharpness stays at 0 as Jason mentioned.
Only while watching DVD on an RPTV have I ever turned up the sharpness. My setting then , goes to 25 for Sharpness.

Hope that explains things for you!!




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[Trevor Schell]

As for the Pronto!
I gave that thing the punt a couple of years
ago. Seriously, they are a peice of junk!! :oops:




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[Bing Fung]

OK Trev.... :roll:

I'm using the component cables on my HD box at all times as well, and I can agree that HD Sat maybe be cleaner than the HD Cable box. Still, I find it hard to believe that regular NTSC can be stunning in the least.

I'm using Canare component cables which are aguably some of the best cables and connectors made. Plus they are only 2 meters in length so signal loss is minimized. HD signals are well below 10mhz, so the signal degredation in that short of a run is pretty much non exsistant on a good cord. It's the impedance that matters and the Canre's connectors are one of they only true 75 ohm RCA's connectors around. Canares are on the same level as the Cats. No matter for I have 3 meter Cats coming.

Sorry Trev, I guess I'll have to see your set up to know what I'm missing I suppose....

As for the Pronto, I liked mine until this whole Tosh thing... I can see why you pitched it. It doesn't seem to work well with the Tosh. I think it's Tosh's HMI, it's not as good as Sony's. This whole control thing is stressing me out. I hate the way the HX remote works and how the HMI is designed. If it's in TV mode, and a channel button is pressed, it always switches over to the Ant connection rather than the Component input. I always have to select HD1 Color Stream if I forget the remote is in TV mode.

And whats with not having discrete codes for the power? That is one huge flaw.

My Pronto worked flawless in my old system.

Sorry, I don't mean to turn this whole experience into a bitch fest, but I don't buy into all this as easily. And I'm a nit pick when it comes to shit like this.

At times I just want to go back to my XBR and forget about the HD stuff for now.. On it at least 90 Percent of DVD's looked gret to Excellent. NTSC sucked on it, but it always looked better due to the smaller screen.

The Tosh really reveals good and bad DVD's, which is good, but disappointing too. I have my whole family wondering what I have done :rofl:


If I could only get another 2 feet more of viewing distance, I would be OK, for at 8 feet, I can see all imperfections. When I step back and off to the side further back, the image really cleans up.

HD is great, when I get a good feed, but that's not all time. So quit telling me I have to buy this and I have to buy that... :wedgie: I suppose if I looked at the world through your eyes everything would look great, however they are my eyes, and it is my world... Which is not perfect, far from it, so that weighs into my whole perception ;)




Bing

My Home Entertainment Systems (http://www3.sk.sympatico.ca/fung1/gamerigs.htm)

[Bing Fung]

You know I'm noticing a lot more Red Push in the Tosh than I like. I can't seem to tweak it out no matter what I do.

The colors look oversaturated to me and I can't seem to do anything about it. It's either Full on or all off...




Bing

My Home Entertainment Systems (http://www3.sk.sympatico.ca/fung1/gamerigs.htm)

[aud19]

You might need to get in to the service menu. My Hitachi had ridiculous red-push and a lime-green issue out of the box (anything red looked almost neon :bluezoned: ) For that you may want to contact a pro (You're friendly neighbourhood ISF tech :LOL: ) or try that other bad :evil: forum that I won't mention ;)

Jason




Need a new display? Questions about new display technologies? Visit RPTVs, plasmas, and other monitors (http://www.htguide.com/CFBoards/index.cfm?fuseaction=Threads.listings&forum=41&CFB=1) @ HTguide

[Bing Fung]

Hey Jason, you maybe right... Out of the Box my Sony XBR looked great, however I went into the Service menu and disabled the red push as well, although it was never as bad as this one.


Kate is watching Nemo on the HX right now, That looks fantastic, however it is CG Animation, highly saturated colors always look good for animations.

I find I'm missing the sutble colors of the Sony. I find the more I look at this HX, this probably is something I have become acustomed to after owning 4 Sony TV's and using a Sony PC monitor every day. It is something I'm just use to.




Bing

My Home Entertainment Systems (http://www3.sk.sympatico.ca/fung1/gamerigs.htm)

[aud19]

I could be wrong here but if I remember correctly Sony's tend to push blue a bit too. So having red push now is going to be all that more noticeable as your likley used to a much cooler picture rather than the toshiba's warmer and pushed red.

Jason




Need a new display? Questions about new display technologies? Visit RPTVs, plasmas, and other monitors (http://www.htguide.com/CFBoards/index.cfm?fuseaction=Threads.listings&forum=41&CFB=1) @ HTguide

[Trevor Schell]

Sorry Trev, I guess I'll have to see your set up to know what I'm missing I suppose....


No problem!!
Let me know when is convenient for you!
Just call me the master tweaker!!

:rofl:




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[Pat]

Bing, if you think the set is too warm looking, you can change the color temp to high...that would make it cooler.




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[Bing Fung]

Jason, the Sony XBR only had the red push. I think the Blue your refering to is the "Trinitone" setting which makes the color temp cooler or bluer. I never ran Trinitone.

I talked to the Audio Warehouse and they said they would send somebody out to look at adjustments. I talked to the fellow on the phone as he was trying to set up an appointment with me.. In talking to him I'm not too sure I trust him, so I told him to hold off for now.

Pat, I have tried to set it to a cooler temp, bu tthat really skews everything else., but I'm still working on it.

The Tosh does some funky conversion of progressive signals. I was watching Bad Boys II and in parts of it there was lots of sawtooth deinterlacing going on. I then switched the progressive out put on the DVD off, and the sawtooths went away. I think whats happening is the DVD player deinterlaces and send the progressive signal to the Tosh. The Tosh then further processes the 480p, either scaling to 540p or 1080i. This could be whats creating the sawtooths I was seeing on some DVDs. Surprisingly, if I send the Tosh a non-progressive DVD signal, it looks actually cleaner than if it was progressive on the problematic DVD's.

Can anybody confirm this?

I connected the HiDef box to the TV with a DVI cord instead of the component. It was slightly cleaner looking overall, especially in the non- HD channels. Regular NTSC still look like crap tho :LOL:

Watched the Masters, the Whole Nine Yards, The District in HD last night.. Beautiful! A lot is very dependent on the Channel broadcasting. CBS looks great.




Bing

My Home Entertainment Systems (http://www3.sk.sympatico.ca/fung1/gamerigs.htm)

[Bing Fung]

I read in the manual that any Non-480P signal is automatically scaled to 1080i on the Tosh. You can also choose 540P (which I have).

So that's why my Sony interlace only DVD player still looked so good when compared to the progressive Pioneer, Sony, Toshiba and Panasonic DVD players I tried :roll: I ended up keeping the Panny progressive DVD player as it's image quality was the best I found of the units I tried.

Watched the Matrix Revolutions last night. man what a beautiful looking image. I was constantly amazed at the detail and color 8O

I think I have the TV calibrated to my liking now, which is no where near Avia calibration levels :LOL:

This set kicks ass in light output. It is so bright I actually have to turn it down. I know CRT RPTV's typically lack light output, but not on the Tosh.

I think I needed to settle down a bit and look at the movies more, rather than the TV... Hard to do with a new set.

Revolutions was awesome!

Systems control is still suxs :stupidpc:




Bing

My Home Entertainment Systems (http://www3.sk.sympatico.ca/fung1/gamerigs.htm)

[aud19]

Sounds like your starting to "settle in" with the new set and are starting to just enjoy it instead of scrutinizing it (not that there's anything wrong with that ;) )

Jason




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[Trevor Schell]

Bing, Now that you have had a lot of time to get down
and intimate with your set, you should go take a look at the
HX83 model.
FS had the HX83 for a couple hundred more than what
you paid for your HX93.
Good thing you have a friend like me looking out for you. ;)




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[Trevor Schell]

Bing,,Have your Cable signal feed checked.
I talking with AW yesterday, they said you should have
a very good image on non HD material that broadcast on the HD channels.
Something to look into.
Or just go ahead and get yourself a ExpressVu HD bird. :B

[Bing Fung]

Trev, on the second day of owning the set, I had Shaw test my line. They installed a powered signal amplifier in line. Not much difference.

I don't know about that comment from AW, shaw cable is just crappy period on channels below 50. They are just Analog channels sent to the house digitally. Thae are not capture digitally at Shaws ends in digital :evil:

Are you sure you get 20 HD channels on the Express Vu? They say you only get 10?

[Trevor Schell]

Bing,,,Actually it is 18 channels with the Pay per Views.
Sometimes there are new channels that pop up for specials.
Example CBC will broadcast a hockey game in HD.

[Bing Fung]

Trev, so really HD channels that are available equal about 10? :W (not counting the PPV) Then subtract the duplicate channels and how many do you have? :B

[Trevor Schell]

There is enough to keep my HD needs satisfied for now..:yesnod:
I can't believe how much TV I watch now.

[Trevor Schell]

Bing,,Do you notice a white bar down the center of the screen.
I can only see it during Hockey.
Figured it might be exclusive to TSN,,However I
noticed it as well on CBC the other day.. :confused:

[Bing Fung]

Yes, I'm starting to see it, :cry: however I really have to look for it, otherwise it's pretty invisible to me.

It is during Hockey, however I think it's one of those things that a person has to live with as other Monitors will have it's own sets of issues. Nothing is ever perfect, and it boild down to what you can live with I suppose.

What bothers me more is this scaling lag :evil:

[Trevor Schell]

So True Bing!!
So True!!
BTW,,Don't forget to invest in some
RPTV screen cleaner.
I just picked up the Monster RPTV kit
which includes a spray bottle of cleaner
and cloth.
$30 at FS

[Bing Fung]

Yes, thanks for reminding me Trev :T

You know either I'm getting use to the picture of the Tosh, or it's breaking in. I swear the picture is looking better than when I first got it...

Hockey has been looking good, and if you can believe it, I watched Friends the last episode on a VHS tape that I recorded on a tape that has been recorded over a Million times, and I actually said, "Hey this VHS doesn't look bad..." :confused: :)

[Green Lantern]

:T Bing.... Newbie here... Been lurking for a while Just bought my first RPTV. 57hx93. Hope I have as much luck with mine as you have. I too am a Sony guy. My 32" xbr just hit the wall after 10 years of loyal service. To this day, I have not seen a regular set match the picture quality. I am looking for a good roof top antenna to get OTA HDTV. Any recommendations ? It's tough to get good reception in this neck of the woods since 9/11. I am hooking it up to a Maranta sr7400 and 6.1 Def Tech speakers. I expect to be in Video heaven in a week.

I will report when it arrives.

The Lantern

[aud19]

I'd look at Terk (http://www.terk.com/) first for antenna's ;)

Jason

[Alibaba]

Hey folks, I just purchased a tosh 51hx93 today along with a Denon DVD player, the 2200 model.

I'll report in about a week after I receive it :D

Cheers,
Al

[Bing Fung]

Lantern, congrats on the Tosh, let us know how it works out for you! Sony makes the best direct view CRT's in my opinion, thats what makes them so hard to move away from.

Alibaba, congrats as well. You should like how that 2200 looks with the Tosh. Although the 2200 is pickier in DVD+/- R media, once I seen how good the image and sound was of this unit, I could not go back to anything else I have tried. Now I just use my Xbox to play Backed-up DVD's the 2200 maynot like.

[BlazeMaster]

Hey Bing, glad that u like the Toshiba. Got one question for u tho, since i'm considering getting it myself. How's your experience with the split cabinet design? Did it come in 2 pieces or 1? The reason i like this feature alot is that, when I move it'll be so much easier to move it in 2 piece than 1. Is it easy to put it together or not? Anyone here that has personal experience with the Hitachi models that has the 2 piece design, how's your experience with those? I'm weighing my options between the Toshiba and the Hitachi's comparable models.

[Bing Fung]

Hey Blazemaster. Welcome to the forum. My set came delivered as one peice, as such I haven't had a chance to test the split cabinent.

I suppose it may depend on the size your getting, but my 51" doesn't seem like it would require separation to move anywere. I think it's around 150 lbs which is a lot lighter than my 36" XBR that was around 250 lbs.

[Green Lantern]

I have bareley had to tweak my set out of the box. Colors are great and clarity (especially HD) are terrific. Have you needed to recalibrate yours HX yet ? :D undefined

[Clive]

Mr Blazemaster, the tosh as mentioned before me, gets shipped in one piece, splitting is only recommended (if needed) at the customers' door.

In the box, there is a separate manual the shows you how it's 2b done. NOTE: READ IT THROUGH BEFORE STARTING THE JOB! It is not that difficult but you'll need two people to do it right. Good luck!

[Trevor Schell]

Bing,,How is the HX?
BTW,,Bell has a few more HD channels available now.