Setting up new tv?

[LDB]

We got the LG B4 48" from Best Buy. It has a really nice picture and is bright. It doesn't use the entire screen though. Watching recordings of old 70's/60's shows it has a ~4" margin all the way around. Watching current stuff it uses full width but ~3" black band top and bottom. Went to Settings--Picture--Aspect Ratio and the only options are 16:9 (current setting) and Just Scan Auto.

I presume if it was full screen height there would be picture cut off on each side. When compressed to show the full width of the picture it has blank space top/bottom.

Any secret settings I should know about? Thanks for any/all information/education.

 

[dogememe]

What are you using to watch these recordings and how is it plugged in? Like, are these DVDs you have on a DVD player connected with HDMI, or streaming from some online service through the smart TV platform or...? Because depending on your source media, your playback device, and how it's connected, you may not be able to resolve this

 

[Analog-1]

Because depending on your source media, your playback device, and how it's connected, you may not be able to resolve this

He could do low level zoom and likely fit the screen. Those shows were filmed before HD tv's and large screens were ever thought of.

 

[ARCOgraphite]

Make sure your cable box is set to 16:9 and 1080i (or p) and upscale low res to Full if an option. Also "AUTO" on the T.V may do it if an option..
Also your Blueray/DVD should be set to Full or 16:9 and same with any streamer stick set to Full/ or 16:9 and same interlace as the TV.

Just going by memory. I will have to look at my cable box and TV options.

Takes me 2 weeks of fiddling to get a natural looking picture from a new T.V or plug in player/streamer. Out of the box, most TVs the contrast is too high, whites blown out, colour over saturated black/ grey scaling too black. Looks like a video game with sports. The added back lighting adjustment on my little Samsung really threw a monkey wrench into my setup. Now my picture looks better than anything at 10 feet except a nice premium OLED. It great to have the dithering effect of old eyes - and ears! Makes good low-end tech quite acceptable

 

[loneryder]

The tv is showing whatever it is fed.You can use the zoom feature but it will cut off part of the picture. Make sure you have a good quality cdmi cable rated for 48gbps. They usually cost a little more.

 

[LDB]

We are semi-Luddite. We have Xfinity and it is watching DVR from that. We don't have any blu or green or other rays or anything else, just the cable from the Xfinity box to the set.

 

[ARCOgraphite]

We are semi-Luddite. We have Xfinity and it is watching DVR from that. We don't have any blu or green or other rays or anything else, just the cable from the Xfinity box to the set.

Me too are you paying for HD? Are you on HD? The old shows are 4:3 so there will be black bars left and right but full height.

It appears You have some setup to do. Head to the Gear menu and looks at picture sub menues

but first

Ill take a look at my settings.

Do you have that medium sized black xfinity box with just the blue light strip below the power switch?

I have to go into mine to reset the optical digital audio out to 2 channel PCM mixdown as I am going to an integrated Arcam sa10 amp and willing to try optical Toshiba link S/P dif again. This option always sounded bad in the past versus in cable box analogue mixdown analogue out, My TV is older and does not have HDMI ARC for a good quality hardwired digital audio interface.

- Arco

 

[LDB]

No, we don't have HD. Yes, our box is just with the blue light. I have no clue what that last paragraph says.

 

[vavavroom]

Not that again. Why is it so hard to understand that a screen can, without cropping the image, only be full-screen when the image aspect ratio of the recording system matches the aspect ratio of the screen?

Movie aspect ratios vary widely. TV screens have a singular aspect ratio. Movie theater, at least the better ones, were once masked off with curtains in the horizontal plane.

TV programs and TV movies were once produced in 4:3. That's why traditional TVs had 4:3 screens. A movie shot in a wider aspect, say 1:1.85 or 1:2.35 resulted in either

Letterboxing - a full width image on the screen with the top and bottom NECCESSARILY masked off. Pillar boxing is when a movie is masked off in the horizontal to fit the full size image on the too-wide screen.

or

A cropped image on the screen with a large section of the image missing from the horizontal view.

When movie rental tapes became popular, two even more idiotic solutions were forced on the clueless masses.

We got the LG B4 48" from Best Buy. It has a really nice picture and is bright. It doesn't use the entire screen though. Watching recordings of old 70's/60's shows it has a ~4" margin all the way around. Watching current stuff it uses full width but ~3" black band top and bottom. Went to Settings--Picture--Aspect Ratio and the only options are 16:9 (current setting) and Just Scan Auto.

Your TV may not have a proper letterboxing (image width maximized for wider image aspect ratios) / pillarboxing (image hight maximized for narrower image aspect ratios) option but only the dumbed down version of combines letter and pillarboxing. Another example of reduced quality and 99% of people will neither notice nor care. Most people put even up with image aspect ratios squeezed or stretched to fit their screens. Most people even accept pan-and-scam even if half the picture is missing.

 

[ARCOgraphite]

No, we don't have HD. Yes, our box is just with the blue light. I have no clue what that last paragraph says.

So just basic cable. I didn't know xfinity offered non-HD channel packages in the 21st century since tube TVs are all gone.\
If they upcharge for that they are criminals.

So, to verify the cable box setup:

Hit the xfinity horizontal button in the middle of the remote

arrow over to a "gear" icon and select that

arrow down to the devices option and select it

then pick Display option or Picture options

it should show a pictogram of your devices as connected ( the TV talks to the cable box and ID's itself )

make sure it is set to 1080 p If not arrow to the right of the current choice and more options will be shown.

Mine states 1080p on the device chain pictogram and state. Highest available resolution.

Next make sure zoom is OFF for now.

exit out of the menu by pressing the big left arrow on remote (located to the lower left of the 4 center navigation arrows)
________________________________

An important thought just came to mind. Go Back to basics. Back to the beginning.

How is your TV connected to the cable box?

If it is anything other than a HDMI cable you will have a junk image (in other words a 40 year old, 1984 vintage low-res image)

So, if you are using RG6 with an F connector - you got garbage video

If you are using Composite Video (the yellow coloured RCA plug and wire - more junk image display capability

So, what you got? HDMI or bust!

 

[skyactiv]

@LDB, Hopefully the cable company has pass through in which you can simply connect the coaxial cable from the wall straight into your TV without it going through a cable box first with no scrambling. If so, you should get your local affiliate HD channels without upgrading to a HD cable box. I would do that, set your choice to cable, not antenna and do a channel scan.

Most cable companies do pass through on local HD channels on basic cable like NBC, CBS, PBS, Fox, ABC...

You're doing yourself a huge disservice having an OLED and only inputing SDTV.

 

[LDB]

Ok, I did find it at 16:9/720 and reset it to 16:9/1080 (best setting). And that was their annotation. So far, so good. We'll see what happens now.

 

[ARCOgraphite]

Ok, I did find it at 16:9/720 and reset it to 16:9/1080 (best setting). And that was their annotation. So far, so good. We'll see what happens now.

Good. are you connected with HDMI ?

 

[LDB]

Good. are you connected with HDMI ?

Yes, it has one cable with a D connector for the HDMI port and one coax cable with the antique screw on connector. Both come from Xfinity equipment.

 

[loneryder]

The tv is showing whatever it is fed.You can use the zoom feature but it will cut off part of the picture. Make sure you have a good quality cdmi cable rated for 48gbps. They usually cost a little more.

Typo.....HDMI cable.