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Shaun Orchard wrote:
HD over SCART isn't possible, it's limited to 576i (I don't even think it'd to 576p).On 3 March 2010 17:45, Rob Beard <rob@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:Not had any problems with widescreen switching on any of my kit running via HDMI. I occasionally get the odd issue with HDMI handshaking though (I think it's more the HDMI switchbox I have). TBH it's pretty pointless connecting a HD box to a HD TV via Scart, for starters you won't get HD!I thought it was implied that HD via SCART is not the best choice.
Depends what kit you're using. If it was all SD kit then I'd say RGB SCART or if the TV supports it, Component Video (although I haven't seen any CRT kit which supports component video, I'm sure kit like that is available, maybe on the really high end TV's). If it was SD on an HD TV though I'd still say Component Video or HDMI/DVI (or even VGA) would be an improvement over SCART.However, there's nothing wrong with SCART for SD (because for most people HDMI aspect ratio switching doesn't work - on Sky for example it only seems to be certain Panasonic TVs that it works on) and then manually switching to HDMI when you want to watch in HD (where there should be no aspect ratio issues for obvious reasons).
I remember reading a BBC Blog from one of the technical guys who is involved with the BBC HD stuff. He said about when he picked his daughter up from one of her friends houses, the Dad commented how crap HD was, turns out they'd connected the SCART cable up as well as HDMI and it was going over that!
I think his advice was dump the SCART cable and use HDMI.
Bear in mind that some boxes (I think the Virgin boxes do this) don't actually send aspect ratio switching commands, they just put pillars in and send it as a widescreen image. Far more sensible than Sky's approach.
Pillars? You mean on each side of the picture?I guess that would be okay for a widescreen TV, but would mean a squashy picture in a 4:3 telly (unless the box was set to 16:9). I'll have to have a play with my Virgin box and see what it does.
Even using component video from a HD box to a HD TV can be troublesome nowadays with more and more providers insisting on DRM (which is why generally connecting a Bluray player to a TV via component video will only give you 578p).itBBC HD is low res HD crap :-) Saying that, 90% of the HD stuff I watch is at a lowish (around 10 Meg) bitrate. Occasonally I do watch Blurays which even at 720p look great.Most movie-studio blurays are 1080i if not 1080p, I've found.
Are you sure?I've just checked about 10 Bluray films (have a pile of them to hand) and they are all 1080p Full HD. Even a TV Bluray is 1080p too. Well, I say they're 1080p, the main features are 1080p, some of the special features are 578p and 480p just ripped from DVDs.
From what I've seen of it, I must admit it did look reasonably good, at least a clear improvement over SD on my Dad's 32" 720p TV, I've yet to see it on anything bigger so I can't comment if it looks worse on say a 42" or 50" LCD/Plasma (I don't know anyone with a telly that big!).I don't know much about the whole BBC HD issue (it looks fine to me, but I am not watching via the best monitor), but it would surely (when downscaled) look better than BBC1 simulcasting the same thing.
Rob -- The Mailing List for the Devon & Cornwall LUG http://mailman.dclug.org.uk/listinfo/list FAQ: http://www.dcglug.org.uk/linux_adm/list-faq.html