Hi guys,

I've been doing lots and lots and lots of reading and research to get the best picture quality and not spending insane money. So I ended up buying a 40" LCD Samsung (LNT4053H) and Philips HTS3555 HTS. I understand the this TV doesn't have 1080P (just 720P) and Philips only upconverts up to 1080i and all that stuff. I don't have HD cable/sat so don't expect the good quality on my cable, but SD cable does look good on this TV. Anyway, the thing that's been bugging me is that I connect the Philips to this TV using high quality HDMI cable, but the picture looks aweful. Lots of white dots in the back ground when viewing dark background. Thought something is wrong with the cable, so I changed to diff. cable and same thing. Thought something wrong with HDMI port, so I used component video instead and same thing. Thought something wrong with the DVD player itself, so I changed to diff. DVD player is also same thing. Now what got me is that when I used S-Video cable, the picture look at least 3 times better (though still not what I expect to get out of this setup). I adjusted everything from the DVD player side to TV to get the best picture out of it and no diff. My question is if the S-Video output nice picture, then HDMI and Component should be at least even (if not better) right? Why is it worse? Has anyone have any insight of what the problem might be? or experienced the same problem? Really disappointed b/c of the result. If you can shed some light, I'd really appreciate it.

Thanks in advance guys.

[David Mackenzie]

It sounds like a problem with your TV to me. Do these white dots in the background show up on all discs, and over the player's on screen menus?

Thanks for responding. Well if it was the TV, then would the picture look really good with S-Video input? I mean excellent compare to other S-Video inputs I have.

[David Mackenzie]

Yep, possibly. HDMI and Component signals will likely end up being processed by the same "part" of the TV.

I just happened to read the "What are the best settings for...." that you wrote and I have to say I am impressed. I haven't tried anything yet, but just look at the work and the afford that you've done to put this together for users like us is just awesome. THANK YOU. I'll try that when I get home.

[David Mackenzie]

No problem - also be sure to check and see if the interference you're seeing appears over the DVD player's setup menus (while not playing a disc) or if it's only related to film playback.

Will do. Got a crazy question for you. I watched a movie last night and at first the picture wasn't good, but after 30 minutes, the picture looked pretty good and clear. Is it possible that the TV has to be warmed up before it's producing the nice picture or my eyes got used to it? I do notice this a lot that the picture gets nice after the TV has been on for awhile.....Just curious if that was the case...

[David Mackenzie]

An LCD TV's backlight takes a while to reach maximum brightness. When I first turn my own TV on, it's incredibly dim at first but reaches comfortable viewing brightness after maybe 5-10 minutes. That might explain what you're seeing.

Lyris,

You're the man. I went home last night and used your guide to adjust the picture and it looked much better....The picture looked better and crisper than ever, but for some reason my eyes got tired (blurry)...Could be because I got a bad night...Anyway, but you're absolutely right with everything you said. Currently this is my setting (and this is just using eyes, not hardware, software, or tool).

Contrast: 80
Brightness: 45
Sharpness: 90
Color: 55
Tint: 50
Backlight: 5
Digital NR (Noise Reduction): off
Active color: off
DNIe: on (I left this on since it does make the picture brighter and clear w/o cranking up the backlight).

I think the problem I had before (lot of whitedots) was because the backlight was cranked up to 10 and contrast was 100 (out of the box setting). Thanks a lot. I now learned a lot more about these settings. Not really sure about Active color. The definition says “If you turn on this option, the colors of the sky and grass will be stronger and clearer for a more vivid on-screen picture”, but it doesn’t really make any difference, so I left it off.

I am clear on the brightness, color and backlight now. I know that I need to work on adjusting the contrast and sharpness level, but w/o tool, it’s really hard. Is there any tip on those.

Really appreciated the good work.

[David Mackenzie]

Contrast (aka White Level) is a bit trickier... I think the example I used in that on-the-cheap guide of mine was, look for details like clouds and make sure they don't look "over-exposed" and scorched white.

As for Sharpness, you want to minimise edge ringing (where fine details look as if they're glowing) but maximise detail. That can actually be quite hard to explain/understand but pause a DVD and have a play with the setting.

[Bolander]

The latest issue of Home Cinema Choice includes a free copy of the THX Demo disc. This has version 2 of the THX Optimiser which you should find helpful to fine tune the settings for your display.