# R16-300 bad picture on HDTV



## willis3 (Feb 2, 2007)

Ok I just bought a HDTV, wow the picture is really bad. It look good on the old CRT.. 

I have it connected by S-Video as the r16 doesn't 
have component or hdmi... Is this just something I have to deal with until I upgrade to HD?


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## RAD (Aug 5, 2002)

willis3 said:


> Ok I just bought a HDTV, wow the picture is really bad. It look good on the old CRT..
> 
> I have it connected by S-Video as the r16 doesn't
> have component or hdmi... Is this just something I have to deal with until I upgrade to HD?


Yep, SD on HD sets look like garbage, the HD can just show how bad a SD picture looks. If you're close to your local stations you might want to hook up an over the air antenna so you at lease get the local stations in HD.


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## BattleZone (Nov 13, 2007)

CRTs inherently help a low-res signal look better, so you don't notice how little information there really is in an SD signal. Plus, I'll bet your HDTV is much larger than your old CRT, so that small amount of information has to be stretched across a much larger area.

If you think SD looks bad now, wait until you get used to watching in HD and then have to go back...


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## RobertE (Jun 10, 2006)

For me SD on a HD set looks ok on the small range (up to 22"), poor but tolerable on mid range (22"-32"), and absolute crap on larger (32"+) sets. Thats just my personal viewpoint. Yours may shift higher or lower.


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## litzdog911 (Jun 23, 2004)

Proper adjustment of the HDTV's video settings using a video calibration DVD (Avia, Digital Video Essentials) can help somewhat.


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## ndole (Aug 26, 2009)

Unfortunatly the problem is your video source. No matter how you connect an sd feed to an hdtv (of a certain size +) its going to look just awful. The good news is with the launch of D12 theres newver been a better time to upgrade


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## ThomasM (Jul 20, 2007)

I've noticed that the SD picture on an HDTV set varies due to several things.

When I bought my HDTV last summer, I knew I would be watching a lot of SD programming so the ability of the TV to display SD with reasonable quality was a must. When I went to the TV dealer I was shocked to find that all the TV sets were being fed by a DirecTV HR21!! It was early on a Monday morning so the salesman told me I could play with the HR21 all I wanted and observe the result on all the TV's on the wall-so I did.

ALL HDTV's look great when receiving a true HD signal (which is why most stores feed them with a Blu-Ray DVD). But when you switch to 480p that really separates "the men from the boys". I couldn't BELIEVE the difference in picture quality among all the different sets. I just thought the only thing you needed to have is the screen size you wanted and the brand you liked. WRONG!!

I was going to buy a Toshiba 42" set priced at around $700. The picture looked AWFUL in 480p. I noticed a Toshiba REGZA 42" TV nearby had a much, much better SD picture-and it was also much, much more expensive. ($1100). Guess which set I bought? Yup, the more expensive one and since I have to sit and watch it every night I'm glad I did.

After I got the TV home I hooked it up to the S-VIDEO output of an R15-300 because that was the DVR already at that location. The picture was OK but I wondered how much better it would look if connected to my R22 using an HDMI cable. WOW!!!! What a difference! And I still don't have HD from DirecTV for that very reason.

I'll bet you bought one of the lower-cost HDTV's after seeing the HD picture in the store. If so, you are kind of stuck with fuzzyvision until you pop the $199 and commit to 2 more years of DirecTV.

Live and learn as they say!!!


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## ThomasM (Jul 20, 2007)

ndole_mbnd said:


> Unfortunatly the problem is your video source. No matter how you connect an sd feed to an hdtv (of a certain size +) its going to look just awful. The good news is with the launch of D12 theres newver been a better time to upgrade


Spoken like a valuable DirecTV employee...


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## sigma1914 (Sep 5, 2006)

ThomasM said:


> I've noticed that the SD picture on an HDTV set varies due to several things.
> 
> When I bought my HDTV last summer, I knew I would be watching a lot of SD programming so the ability of the TV to display SD with reasonable quality was a must. When I went to the TV dealer I was shocked to find that all the TV sets were being fed by a DirecTV HR21!! It was early on a Monday morning so the salesman told me I could play with the HR21 all I wanted and observe the result on all the TV's on the wall-so I did.
> 
> ...


Buying a HDTV and not watching HD on it is a waste of money.


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## ThomasM (Jul 20, 2007)

sigma1914 said:


> Buying a HDTV and not watching HD on it is a waste of money.


You are correct. If I could have bought another tube-type SDTV I would have as I was perfectly happy with my 18 year old 31" Magnavox until it blew out. Spending money to fix it would have also been a waste of money.

Tell me where I can buy an SDTV nowadays, please.


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## sigma1914 (Sep 5, 2006)

ThomasM said:


> You are correct. If I could have bought another tube-type SDTV I would have as I was perfectly happy with my 18 year old 31" Magnavox until it blew out. Spending money to fix it would have also been a waste of money.
> 
> Tell me where I can buy an SDTV nowadays, please.


Ebay? Craigslist?


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## Kansas Zephyr (Jun 30, 2007)

ThomasM said:


> Tell me where I can buy an SDTV nowadays, please.


Wal-Mart

They have some SD DTVs...but they are smaller screen sizes.

http://www.walmart.com/browse/TV-Vi...tab_value=All&waRef=500921.4293823456&depts=T


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