AV reciever with video upscaling or Dedicated video upscaler for Home Theatre?

[Craignet]

Hi, I am looking to set up a very basic home theatre system and need some advice. I am currently building a HTPC with Blu-Ray player with the Antec Remote case, adding a 2Tb HDD and converting all my DVD's to DivX to watch on the HTPC instead of loading DVD's and storing them around the house (littery taking over the whole house now). I have a very basic 'HD READY' LCD TV (Bush IDLCD32TV22HD), Virgin Media standard definition, and a Wii. Was looking to build the HTPC and connect all devices through an AV receiver with video upscaling to get the most of the TV (native resolution 1366 x 768) , as SD isn't that great. Also was looking at getting the SHARP HTSB200 soundbar to improve the audio. Not practical getting a 5.1 as room is a funny shape and the TV is in the corner. Will be using the Logitech Harmony One remote for all devices except Wii.

Right, now I was looking at getting the Onkyo TX-SR606, which has video upscaling, saw a reconditioned one for £120 but now out of stock. New ones go for around £250 - £300 which is a bit over my budget (£200 max) I'm afraid for what I'm looking for. Could possibly push it to £250 if it was the right product. I have read several reviews and articles and now wonder if it would be worth getting a dedicated video upscaler instead. I've seen the GefenTV High-Definition Scaler, GefenTV Composite to HDMI Scaler, StarTech.com SCART to HDMI Video Scaler, and the 1T-V1280HD Video Scaler. I know there are products out there which are dedicated for this and cost a lot more, however I am on a tight budget. Would appreciate any advice on...

if AV receiver with video upscaling is the best option, which product would suit my needs at the right price, and also would this improve the audio with the soundbar?

If not an AV reciever which upscaler would be best?

I know a lot of people might think,get a decent TV, virgin + HD and blu-ray player with upscaling, but I do have a limited budget and need to make the most of what I've got.

Thanks for any advice

 

[safcalibur]

Hi mate,

Unfortunately for £250 you wont get an amp that does 1080p upscaling. I think most people would agree that the primary function of an amp would be to handle audio. Most amps (esp budget end amps) with upscaling wont do any better a job than most HDTV'a anyway. If the upscaling is important to you then i would recommend getting a dedicated video upscaler. For £250 you could prob get a half decent one, i know they can go up into the thousands!! With something like an upscaler you really do get what you pay for, the more expensive ones will use better proccessors and more accurate pixel referencing than cheaper ones. But an amp with decent upscaling will set you back at least £400. I have the denon 1910 (bought for £430) and it does a very nice job of upscaling my wii imo, but most people will say that even the denons upscaler isnt all its cracked up to be and that its not as good as a HDTV's internal upscaler.

I dont know which one to recommend mate but maybe you could try this forum:

Video Scalers and Video Processing - AVForums.com

cheers

Saf

 

[dwhite]

No AV receiver has the ability to scale to the native resolution of your TV (1366x768), so you will always have the TV upscaling or downscaling any input to it. So if you think your tv isn't very good at upscaling then you can't avoid it doing something with an AVR, a dedicated video processor however may well be able to scale exactly to 1366x768, but not in your price range.

Do you want upscaling or upconversion or both. Upconversion is changing all inputs (composite. svideo, component) to HDMI output. Upscaling is changing the output resolution (480p to 1080p for example).

 

[Craignet]

Thanks for the advice Saf, dwhite I was looking for something which I could input all my devices i.e. Wii (composite), Virgin standard definition(composite) and HTPC (HDMI from graphics card) then output to TV through 1 HDMI cable. I understand that not many recievers will upscale to my TV's native resolution (1366x768) however the closer the better as I've had a few DVD players, one which upscaled to HD (not an expensive one) and it looked so much better than a standard DVD player and Virgin.

Basically just looking to get that type of quality from all my devices.

Also, would I need to get an amp anyway to receive the audio from all devices through the soundbar? Or would that all come from the TV, the TV's audio is rubbish so would the soundbar's be much better if coming from the TV?

As you can probably tell pretty new to all this and want to make sure I purchase the right devices.

Thanks again

Craig