Avia set-up disc

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  • soundhound
    Senior Member
    • Mar 2004
    • 815

    Avia set-up disc

    I just leeped into the rptv water with a Toshiba 46H54. @ best buy w/ hd dtv in it looked beautiful. The one out of the box running on non hd dtv is not bad, I also bought best buy ht set-up disc. They have 1/2 dozen video setups, the color patterns being a piece of cake, the ones for contrast, sharpness, and brightness are not so straight forward. I picked up the tv last saturday, have changed the settings 6 times, and am unsure if they are where they would, could, or should be. I am obsesing over trying to locate Avia ht guide. Is this the best set-up disc out there, covering all makes? Or can someone suggest something that works best for Toshibas, Thanks, Bob :roll:
  • JonMarsh
    Mad Max Moderator
    • Aug 2000
    • 15254

    #2
    The AVIA disk is very recommended, but you may have some test patterns handy and not even realize it! MOST THX DVD's have a chapter set with test images, including calibration images for brightness and contrast, and the typical SMPTE color and gray scale test images.

    Now, with brightness, the trick is having a DVD player which will pass below black, so you can adjust it so that the below black bar just dissappears, but the main black and first gray bar are discernable separately.

    With Contrast, you're looking at the upper end of the scale (yeah, that's sort of counter-intuitive naming, isn't it?), and for a CRT TV, you want to set the max contrast low enough so you aren't driving your tubes and power supply too hard- this is usually done with a special pattern with white line in black field continuing to black line in white field; there should be no bending in the line or "blooming" in the white line; usually this means turning contrast down to somewhere in the 70-80 range, (out of 100 full scale), but this can vary with the set.

    Sharpness you're looking to avoid having overshoot or ringing on fast transistions, so usually a special pattern with black line transistions is used, and you turn down sharpness until you don't see any shadow or ghost lines, but you still have good definition on the test pattern lines. Set's may be setup so that mid line in the sharpness control is roughly flat, or they may have so much HF boost built in (for "extra detail" on the showroom floor), that you have to take sharpness almost all the way to zero before the picture is truly natural and the upper range video response is "flat".

    Enjoy your new Toshiba!

    ~Jon
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    Comment

    • aud19
      Twin Moderator Emeritus
      • Aug 2003
      • 16706

      #3
      Generally the discs sold by stores aren't the most helpful... If you can still return it, do it.

      Otherwise either Avia or Digital Video Essentials will work best. I believe you can buy both from their respective web pages or do a Google search and you'll find many places selling them online. I believe Amazon.com sells them or Deep Discount DVD is another good place to check. You can also but them at local shops but many places will have limited or no stock. Personally I haven't tried Avia but quite like DVE.

      Generalized rules for setting Contrast, Brightness and Sharpness:

      Contrast = White Level. Basically you want to set this as low as possible but high enough so that white still looks white. Setting it appropriately low will extend the life of your set and give you the best picture out of your set. Depending on ambient light you may be have to set the contrast higher to compete with ambient light from windows etc. Note you will have to double check both the contrast and brightness after making any changes to either as they affect each other.

      Brightness = Black level. Try to set it so that blacks look black but you can still see detail in shadows and dark grey areas. For example a black/dark grey coat should have varrying levels of black, grey, shadows, reflections etc to add to the depth of the picture rather than looking like one flat black blob without setting it so high as to get rid of deep inky blacks where appropriate. The Matrix, Underworld etc would be good DVD's to check your black levels.

      Sharpness. On 99.9% of displays the best level for sharpness is at zero or it's lowest possible value. Sharpness basically adds high frequency noise to the video signal which can only degrade the picture. It basically adds gross detail to the picture at the expense of fine detail. A very bad, bad, naughty thing :lol: You should also turn off any SVM or other supposed "picture enhancements" as again they only add unwanted information to the original signal. Sometimes, for a very bad cablevision feed for example, you may find improvement from a "noise reduction" feature. That is about the only "picture enhancement" you should ever have on and even that should never be on for DVD or HDTV/DTV sources.

      Jason
      Jason

      Comment

      • aud19
        Twin Moderator Emeritus
        • Aug 2003
        • 16706

        #4
        Jon!, You're always sneaking in ahead of me! : (Maybe I should learn to type faster :lol: )

        Jason
        Jason

        Comment

        • soundhound
          Senior Member
          • Mar 2004
          • 815

          #5
          Cool, thanx again guys, I watched a dvd last nite with the thx test patterns and it was easier to understand the goal than with the b.b. version. For the record my dvd player is a Denon DVD-900, I also have a Phillips DVDR-985 burner, I will have to play with stuff a little to see which is better there, b-4 I go take a plunge on a Denon 2900.

          Comment

          • aud19
            Twin Moderator Emeritus
            • Aug 2003
            • 16706

            #6
            Just FYI, Denon has new players coming out this Sept. Check out this link:



            Jason
            Jason

            Comment

            • soundhound
              Senior Member
              • Mar 2004
              • 815

              #7
              I broke down and ordered Avia from wal-marts web site. I searched all the consumer electronics stores, and book stores in the twin cities east side and no one had the Avia on the shelf possibly due to release date. The picture on the Toshiba is warming up quite nicely even on standard dtv. After 3 mos I was able to quit the calibration of my Rotel gear, so am sure once I get Avia, a new denon 1910, I will set-up a couple more times and that will be that, Thanx again guys, Bob

              Comment

              • glangston@socal
                Member
                • May 2004
                • 77

                #8
                Avia disk

                Got mine from Hollywood Video, a chain of DVD stores. They have a couple of stores near Madison but didn't check any further.

                Comment

                • soundhound
                  Senior Member
                  • Mar 2004
                  • 815

                  #9
                  Recieved avia over the weekend, much better investment than the bestbuy set-up. More indepth, easier to follow objectives for the novice. Also, thanx again for the Denon 1910 heads up, ordered yesterday from ultimatelectronics in Woodbury for 249 + tax, will be in store next monday..... :T

                  Comment

                  • aud19
                    Twin Moderator Emeritus
                    • Aug 2003
                    • 16706

                    #10
                    Sounds like your on your way :T

                    Jason
                    Jason

                    Comment

                    • soundhound
                      Senior Member
                      • Mar 2004
                      • 815

                      #11
                      My new Dennon DVD1910 is 2 wks over due. Anyone get one yet? I ordered through Ultimateelectronics 3 1/2 wks ago, they told me it would be in on the 16th. Now I guess Dever doesnt have them yet. Just wondering if anyone has one yet and how they like it? Thanks in advance, Bob

                      Comment

                      • steffche
                        Junior Member
                        • Sep 2004
                        • 10

                        #12
                        Hi guys,

                        My first post in this forum. Recently purchased a Philips 42" plasma and only yesterday received my copy of DVE. I found the DVD very interesting, but had difficulty in setting the contrast, which seems to be a common problem....or so I have read. Has anyone got a simple method that can be used?? Or any one else with a philips 42" plasma that can quote their settings, so I have some kinda reference?

                        Many thanks!

                        Comment

                        • aud19
                          Twin Moderator Emeritus
                          • Aug 2003
                          • 16706

                          #13
                          Quote from above:

                          Contrast = White Level. Basically you want to set this as low as possible but high enough so that white still looks white. Setting it appropriately low will extend the life of your set and give you the best picture out of your set. Depending on ambient light you may be have to set the contrast higher to compete with ambient light from windows etc. Note you will have to double check both the contrast and brightness after making any changes to either as they affect each other.

                          Brightness = Black level. Try to set it so that blacks look black but you can still see detail in shadows and dark grey areas. For example a black/dark grey coat should have varrying levels of black, grey, shadows, reflections etc to add to the depth of the picture rather than looking like one flat black blob without setting it so high as to get rid of deep inky blacks where appropriate. The Matrix, Underworld etc would be good DVD's to check your black levels.
                          Oh and :welcome:

                          Jason
                          Jason

                          Comment

                          • aarsoe
                            Senior Member
                            • May 2004
                            • 795

                            #14
                            steffche

                            You dont state what model of Philips you have, but you may be experiencing one small "fun" thing that some Philips models have..
                            Dynamic control of picture setting. Basically the plasma changes everything depending on the image your displaying.
                            An easy way to spot it, is to use a test image from Avia and see if it becomes much better after about .5 to 1 second from the time you display it. If so, you have all the dynamic controls on and no matter what you change, the plasma will still adjust to its liking on the next picture..

                            And yes, you can disable it, but I frankly found it to work so good, that it is not worth disabling.

                            Comment

                            • aarsoe
                              Senior Member
                              • May 2004
                              • 795

                              #15
                              Forgot - you should have an option to see all the dynamic changes on your remote. On my remote it is the midle button on the last row from the top - next to the PIP button. But again I dont known your model so it may be different..

                              Comment

                              • steffche
                                Junior Member
                                • Sep 2004
                                • 10

                                #16
                                Sorry about that....its a Philips 42PF9945. I'm interested in what people's opinions are of this model actually. When I bought it I tried to look for reviews on the web, but there weren't any.

                                I know the active controls you're talking about. I have set it to minimum and medium and didn't notice much difference, so I left it on medium. Maximum just makes the picture way too dark.

                                At the moment I have brightness set to 45 and contrast set to 64. I watched Matrix revolutions last night and I am happy with the picture, ie the way it delivers blacks and whites and the color is good too. The thing I don't like is the black bars at the top and bottom of the picture....which have tiny little white spots in them....I would have thought that they should be black. I know I could just turn the brightness down a little to get rid of them, but then that defeats the purpose of using the DVE setups!

                                There were some scenes in the movie in particular the guy with the dred locks (can't remember his name) when he is standing with his back to the screen and his hair goes a little blotchy for some reason. The DVD is a copy, so I don't know if this has anything to do with it, as the rest of the images look really good.????

                                Comment

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