I got a Pioneer DV565 from Richer Sounds yesterday. I have a Beko 28" widescreen TV and a £50 IXOS scart cable. The colours and depth are really beautiful. However, I'm having some problems with the image:

1. On R1 discs there are these noticeable small, horizontal bands across the picture. They make edges fuzzy and spoil light areas of the picture.

2. On both R1 and R2 discs light areas sometimes seem a bit noisy/flickery.

3. Also on both R1 and R2 discs I'm getting blemishes on the picture, similar to what you see on cinema screens. When the colours are light dark, splodges/hairs appear, when the screen is dark there are little specks of white. GRRRRR!

It is such a good DVD player apart from these image problems, which is infuriating because without them it would be just what I want. I didn't have any of these problems with my old LG DVD5083. Is there a way to get rid of these problems or should I take it back?

I wanted to upgrade my LG, which I was using for CD as well as DVD, and debated between getting a single more expensive DVD player like the Pioneer, or splitting my money between a cheaper but still better DVD player and a separate CD player.

If I have to end up returning the Pioneer, what would people advise me to do on a budget of £200-300, get another DVD player, or a DVD player *and* a CD player? (I rank music listening just as important as movies, so want as good a performance from both as possible for the money).

One more question, I have a cheapish coaxial interconnect for digital out between my DVD player and amp. Would I notice a difference if I upgraded to a £30-ish coaxial cable?

[chris]

Maybe try it on another TV and see if it still happens.
If it does then you know it is the player.

I don't have another TV, but I hooked up my LG again, and it now seems to have the "cinema blotches" too. So that's obviously not the Pioneer's fault, it must be the disc or the TV. Has anyone else ever had the cinema blotches, or know what might cause that to happen? Could it be from an unclean disc?

[Taz69]

Have you got a Friend that has a Branded TV, i'e Panasonic, Toshiba etc that you could try your pioneer and scart lead on to see the difference, as my friend had a Beko or Bush TV for a while and when playing DVDs was never happy with the quality until he managed to get hold of a 28" Panasonic TV second hand and was blown away by the results.

Just a thought.

Taz

I don't know anyone nearby who has a branded TV.. but from what you say it sounds like the TV should be next on my upgrade list. I don't know about getting a Panasonic though, I've read on the forums that lots of people have had trouble with the Pioneer DV565 on Panasonic TVs.

[MunichMag]

How do you rate the CD playback on the 565, Europop? I want to upgrade from the PS2 I'm currently using to play DVD's, and my CD player has died, so I'm considering getting one and using it for both CD and DVD as you do, as . Not had a chance to go and test one in a shop yet though.

[GAmbrose]

I recieved mine yesterday but think I might have made a bit of a mistake.

I knew it only did NTSC progressive scan, but presumed it would play PAL discs as PAL interlaced. However, when set to 'progressive' mode it actually converts PAL to NTSC 60hz so the picture is noticable juddery and not very nice to look at on my 42" Plasma. Which means whenever I watch a PAL disc i'll have to change the settings back to Interlaced, which will be a pain in the arse quite frankly.

Wish I had gone for the more expensive 686 now, that does PAL progressive scan aswell

Gary A

[anand01]

Hi.

Got hold of a 565 this week, using it with a Panasonic TX28PL1. I got the horizontal banding problem as described by others when viewing R1 NTSC discs via RGB scart.

However, I switched over to S-Video, and tweaked the player's output levels a bit, and the picture quality is superb. Much better than my old Pioneer 535, and the problematic Limit 900SE I tried.

On the sound quality front, with DD5.1/DTS its the best I've heard so far. With audio CDs, the Cyrus tuning of the Limit makes it the clear winner.