HD Advisors by the Dozen

[Attebery]

http://www.highdefdigest.com/news/sh...the_Dozen/2733

[GardenVariety]

Regarding the "stuck pixels" it may also be dust blobs...

[comixguru]

Originally Posted by GardenVariety

Regarding the "stuck pixels" it may also be dust blobs...

Definitely. Much more likely dust blobs than stuck pixel.

[thebatman355]

the person asking about the hdmi switcher. I got one for like 50 bucks or so 4 in 1 from monoprice. It was a fine switcher. I didn't need it anymore so I gave it to a friend.
you can find monoprice one online.
Jacob

[BullRay]

Q: Is there a BD burner for a PC that will burn 1080p from my Canon EOS 5D Mark II that will play on a Playstation 3?

any BD-burner will do, unlike with DVD there are no competing standards that could make it incompatible. the software for the encoding/authoring of the discs structure is where the errors could show up if you would want to make it into a "real Bluray" video disc.

also, the PS3 (like many other Bluray players) can play a format called AVCHD, that is commonly used in cameras. (don't know if your is one though, but any format can usually be converted) this format could be read directly from memory card or DVD of the camera, thus making the need for a Bluray disc unnecessary, for shorter home videos at least. (a standard single layer DVD should hold about 40min of pretty good quality AVCHD)

[Josh Z]

Good call on the dust blobs. I've updated that answer.

[joeymac]

I have yet to see any digital display (LCD, DLP, LCoS, or even Plasma) that can achieve the inky, almost total darkness generated by an analog CRT display with a pure black frame on screen. Plasmas come the closest (especially the Pioneer KURO line), but you'll always see some light output. In the worst cases (many LCDs), blacks are really just dark gray.

You need to check out a locally dimming LED-LCD. They are completely off for the black parts of the image... so they emit zero light when at black. Much darker than a CRT.
If you look at the numbers. A CRT can only get to around 0.3 cd/m2.

- Even a good traditional LCD get to 0.05 cd/m2 these days.
- A budget LED/LCD goes down to 0.01 cd/m2.
- The 9th gen Kuro is 0.0031 cd/m2.
- A higher end LED/LCD will emit 0 cd/m2 and appear completely off, even in a pitch black room.

I think you are looking at CRT's with rose tinted glasses, they weren't as black as you remember.

[Ace_of_Sevens]

Definitely agree about CRTs. It always bugged me they couldn't go all the way black. I've got a crappy Westinghouse TV now, but my next TV will be an LED/LCD for this reason.

[Biggiesized]

While a raster 0 IRE image on a KURO may not be completely black, throw up an ANSI contrast pattern and you'll swear the black parts are. The KURO will destroy any television in on screen contrast.

[joeymac]

Originally Posted by Biggiesized

While a raster 0 IRE image on a KURO may not be completely black, throw up an ANSI contrast pattern and you'll swear the black parts are. The KURO will destroy any television in on screen contrast.

Nope. It's pretty simple. Locally dimming LED TV's are off when the screen is black.. you can't emit less light than none. Now the Kuro will have more detail in the dark parts of the image as the LED/LCD will have a sharper fall off. So the Kuro is better in that respect...But that's different from the 'depth of the black'. LED-LCD can't be beat.

Don't get me wrong. I'd take a Kuro over any LED-LCD.. they have a much better image. That's a no brainer. But the fact remains that "off" is the blackest black you can get. Coupled with LCD's are brighter than Plasmas.. the Kuro's contrast ratio won't match that of the top end LED-LCD. Which shows contrast ratio isn't the be all and end all. Where the contrast ratio sits and the flatness of the gamma tracking is more important. Not to mention motion resolution.

[DSquared]

I have a 5 port HDMI switch for sale on Amazon:

5-port Switch

I used it for almost a year and had no handshake problems. My TV was even older (Sanyo 30 inch purchased at Wal-Mart in the summer of 2004.)

[AV_Integrated]

Originally Posted by joeymac

Nope. It's pretty simple. Locally dimming LED TV's are off when the screen is black.. you can't emit less light than none. Now the Kuro will have more detail in the dark parts of the image as the LED/LCD will have a sharper fall off. So the Kuro is better in that respect...But that's different from the 'depth of the black'. LED-LCD can't be beat.

But, there is never a time when a display is fully black. There are no exceptions to this except when there are fades to black. Sometimes, this is not a smooth fade from LCD displays with local dimming. Likewise, their ANSI contrast ratios don't match that of the Kuro, and still they have off-axis viewing issues.

Which is not to diminish their good image, and the extreme improvement which they have put forth, but the ability to completely turn off the backlight is a stage prop to the reality of creating shadow details and providing black levels which are accurate and honest. Likewise, the implications from contrasty scenes being far more than the display is capable of accurately handling has cropped up as an issued for these displays. Image uniformity has been known to suffer.

Yet, at the end of the day, locally dimming LED LCD displays are the cat's nipples for LCD technology.

Not to be confused with plasma technology which has had this capacity for a few years now - and the Kuro line which still just is a cut above all else.

Now, do most consumers actually give a damn? For the most part they don't, but for the price of most locally dimmable LED LCD displays, you tend to be in Kuro territory for pricing, so I'm not sure why anyone would bother unless they plan to just watch black on their TV and don't care about actually seeing what is supposed to be on the display.