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Invelos Forums->General: General Home Theater Discussion |
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SONY KDL-32XBR4 set-up questions |
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| Author |
Message |
| Registered: March 19, 2007 |  Posts: 302 |
| | Posted: | | | | Got this monitor last week and set up the TV on the weekend. It's just great out of the box but it's disconcerting to deal with Comcast cable and the image aspect ratios shifting depending on the station source - quite a change from analog CRT broadcasts all these years.
I plan on calibrating the KDL-32XBR4 in the near future. I'm anticipating the Avia II Guide to Home Theater in the next month or so. I have the previous edition but I don't believe it's that helpful for LCD panels from what I gather. In the meantime I will just eyeball it unless a better solution presents itself.
My understanding over the years is that one should ideally turn off as much video processing and enhancements as possible and set much of one's settings at standard or neutral. There are a mess of video features on this baby that I'm unsure of. An "educated eye" so to speak would be a BIG help. Please let me know what you think about the features below:
1. Picture Mode: which is best for normal tv broadcast viewing - Standard? How about DVDs - Cinema (seems a bit muted) or standard? Vivid is OUT THERE! I use Standard now.
2. Manual says PIP and P&P available on this model but no button or menu choice I can see. Admittedly, this manual is also for the KDL-40D3000 but it makes no specific reference either way for both. What gives?
3. Backlight: what is best setting here (range 1 - 10) I have a (5) now.
4. Noise Reduction & MPEG Noise Reduction. In my previous TV I turned off the noise reduction but the MPEG feature is new to me. Are either of these worth my time?
5. Advanced Settings:
A. Black Corrector
B. Advanced Contrast Enhancer
C. Gamma
D. Clear White
E. Color Space (Wide or Normal?)
F. Live Color (Active when Color Space is Wide)
Any further information on these and what might be optimal settings?
6. Sound Mode: Dynamic or Standard (best for dialog per manual). I'm using a full 5.1 Klipsch system but looking for best settings when just using monitor's speakers.
7. S-Force Surround & Sound Booster - Surround is questionable for news and talk shows. Sound Booster not bad. Comments?
8. Screen Settings: I prefer undistorted images so Normal for 4:3 signals and Full for 16:9. ** To have the TV auto select for these choices for each channel tuned in, would I select Auto Wide to ON and 4:3 Default to NORMAL? **
9. Motion Enhancer (motion flow) & Cinemotion: Haven't been able to give these a workout as yet. I wonder what would be a good test source (TV or DVD).
Are these features good? I'm a heavy film and tv show fan. Manual suggests either Cinemotion to Auto1 or Auto2 (motion flow disabled?). What would be the best combination of settings here?
10. Power Saving: Utilize instead of/or with Backlight adjustment?
11. Light Sensor: Turn ON or leave off? I have controlled lighting to some degree and even with a deskside lamp on to the side I see no issue - a big improvement over my CRT, which I had to watch for screen reflections.
Anyone who owns one of these super monitors and/or has some experience or knowledge in this area, I would greatly appreciate the advice and comments here.
* If there are too many for you to deal with just concentrate on the more critical features - thanks! |
| | Registered: March 13, 2007 | | Posts: 2,694 |
| | Posted: | | | | Quoting Chazcdc54: Quote:
Got this monitor last week and set up the TV on the weekend. It's just great out of the box but it's disconcerting to deal with Comcast cable and the image aspect ratios shifting depending on the station source - quite a change from analog CRT broadcasts all these years.
I plan on calibrating the KDL-32XBR4 in the near future. I'm anticipating the Avia II Guide to Home Theater in the next month or so. I have the previous edition but I don't believe it's that helpful for LCD panels from what I gather. In the meantime I will just eyeball it unless a better solution presents itself.
My understanding over the years is that one should ideally turn off as much video processing and enhancements as possible and set much of one's settings at standard or neutral. There are a mess of video features on this baby that I'm unsure of. An "educated eye" so to speak would be a BIG help. Please let me know what you think about the features below:
1. Picture Mode: which is best for normal tv broadcast viewing - Standard? How about DVDs - Cinema (seems a bit muted) or standard? Vivid is OUT THERE! I use Standard now.
2. Manual says PIP and P&P available on this model but no button or menu choice I can see. Admittedly, this manual is also for the KDL-40D3000 but it makes no specific reference either way for both. What gives?
3. Backlight: what is best setting here (range 1 - 10) I have a (5) now.
4. Noise Reduction & MPEG Noise Reduction. In my previous TV I turned off the noise reduction but the MPEG feature is new to me. Are either of these worth my time?
5. Advanced Settings:
A. Black Corrector
B. Advanced Contrast Enhancer
C. Gamma
D. Clear White
E. Color Space (Wide or Normal?)
F. Live Color (Active when Color Space is Wide)
Any further information on these and what might be optimal settings?
6. Sound Mode: Dynamic or Standard (best for dialog per manual). I'm using a full 5.1 Klipsch system but looking for best settings when just using monitor's speakers.
7. S-Force Surround & Sound Booster - Surround is questionable for news and talk shows. Sound Booster not bad. Comments?
8. Screen Settings: I prefer undistorted images so Normal for 4:3 signals and Full for 16:9. ** To have the TV auto select for these choices for each channel tuned in, would I select Auto Wide to ON and 4:3 Default to NORMAL? **
9. Motion Enhancer (motion flow) & Cinemotion: Haven't been able to give these a workout as yet. I wonder what would be a good test source (TV or DVD).
Are these features good? I'm a heavy film and tv show fan. Manual suggests either Cinemotion to Auto1 or Auto2 (motion flow disabled?). What would be the best combination of settings here?
10. Power Saving: Utilize instead of/or with Backlight adjustment?
11. Light Sensor: Turn ON or leave off? I have controlled lighting to some degree and even with a deskside lamp on to the side I see no issue - a big improvement over my CRT, which I had to watch for screen reflections.
Anyone who owns one of these super monitors and/or has some experience or knowledge in this area, I would greatly appreciate the advice and comments here.
* If there are too many for you to deal with just concentrate on the more critical features - thanks! First thing to do is read the manual for the thing as many times as necessary to understand what the various functions are for and how you set them. Even if you're experienced with this stuff, manuals are not always (probably more often than not) written in proper English and translations can be wrong or misguided in subtle ways. Secondly, if you aren't sure of what a particular things is for or what it does, don't fool with it. Set everything to the defaults and try to observe how they work. Start with one feature and tinker with the settings to see how it varies. A lot of the stuff, as you've no doubt figured by now, depends on what the input is as to how it works. Such settings are generally best left on AUTO unless you have a really good reason to change them. Third, set things for YOUR preferences once you know what they do and how to set them. You mentioned Cinema mode. Remember that TVs operate at 30 frames per second, but movies are at 24 fps. The Cinema setting optimizes things for the 24 fps of movies. Another thing to remember is that the brighter you make things on screen (the Vivid setting for example) adversely affects the life of the LCD itself. On your backlighting, set it as low as you can and have a normally lit picture. I've found that turning down room lighting so its about the level of a nightlight lets you lessen the backlighting on the TV itself, and also allows you to have nice, bright color rendition without having to go to the Vivid setting. LCDs run hotter the more light they generate, and heat affects their lifespan. Run cooler, last longer. Fourth, I would set the sound for simulated surround so you don't have to constantly be changing as shows change. You will adjust to it quickly and not even notice the difference after awhile. Same goes for the format setting. Normal 4:3 will give you pillar bars on each side of the image. More and more channels are showing their stuff in a widescreen format though, so I've just set mine so that it stretches the 4:3 horizontally to fill the screen but not lose any top and bottom content. It makes things a bit shorter and blockier, but I don't have to change the format back and forth all the time anymore, and again, you don't notice it after awhile. If you don't mind losing the crawl bar at the bottom or having CC stuff clipped off, you can set it at full width, and allow the top and bottom to be trimmed off. That preserves the proportions, but you lose some of the screen image. I found that not being able to see captioning was an annoyance, so I just left it on the stretched sideways mode. That's my experiences with an LCD widescreen over the last month or so. Hope it helps some. | | | John
"Extremism in the defense of Liberty is no vice!" Senator Barry Goldwater, 1964
Make America Great Again! |
| | Registered: May 19, 2007 | Reputation:  | | Posts: 5,918 |
| | Posted: | | | | It looks like the manual covers two models (common practice) and they don't state which feature is available for which model. Looks like PIP isn't covered on yours. |
| | Registered: March 19, 2007 | | Posts: 302 |
| | Posted: | | | | Thanks for taking the time to read and respond Rifter, but I have to say I was hoping for at least some pointers on this model. As I said I have gone through virtually all of these features and cannot be sure in many cases whether there is an improvement or not. I don't have that "educated eye."
Re-reading a manual or section is often fruitless. If they don't make it clear the first time or use terms and functions that are not clear to begin with, one can get lost FAST.
The defaults are often way off to my viewing - too much contrast and brightness, sharpness, etc. Why the manufacturers continue to set these "default" for showrooms is beyond me. Clearly, monitor calibration is something they have little belief in as their defaults have been far off in my past experience for optimal settings.
Lowered backlighting makes sense to me but how far? With a range of 1 - 10 I have it midway at 5. The Power Saving feature might take it further and how much do these levels help black level I wonder?
I can't stand distorted images as a stretch or zoom seems a poor remedy for shallower aspect ratios. I just hooked up my TiVO Series 2 box. I have comcast analog cable with no box. I find the blasted image comes on stretched across the screen for ALL channels. I can't get the Sony to restore to orginal aspect maybe because the cable signal is being tuned through the TiVO. It doesn't recognize the digital channels the raw cable feed I'm getting hooked directly to the TV either.
Am I screwed until I get a HD TiVo or HD cable service box? I'm a real newbie in this area. I will be getting Verizon FIOS HD TV service later this fall when they set up in my township.
Any folks out there new SONY owners? Your input is appreciated. |
| | Registered: March 13, 2007 | | Posts: 2,694 |
| | Posted: | | | | Quoting Chazcdc54: Quote:
Thanks for taking the time to read and respond Rifter, but I have to say I was hoping for at least some pointers on this model. As I said I have gone through virtually all of these features and cannot be sure in many cases whether there is an improvement or not. I don't have that "educated eye."
Re-reading a manual or section is often fruitless. If they don't make it clear the first time or use terms and functions that are not clear to begin with, one can get lost FAST.
The defaults are often way off to my viewing - too much contrast and brightness, sharpness, etc. Why the manufacturers continue to set these "default" for showrooms is beyond me. Clearly, monitor calibration is something they have little belief in as their defaults have been far off in my past experience for optimal settings.
Lowered backlighting makes sense to me but how far? With a range of 1 - 10 I have it midway at 5. The Power Saving feature might take it further and how much do these levels help black level I wonder?
I can't stand distorted images as a stretch or zoom seems a poor remedy for shallower aspect ratios. I just hooked up my TiVO Series 2 box. I have comcast analog cable with no box. I find the blasted image comes on stretched across the screen for ALL channels. I can't get the Sony to restore to orginal aspect maybe because the cable signal is being tuned through the TiVO. It doesn't recognize the digital channels the raw cable feed I'm getting hooked directly to the TV either.
Am I screwed until I get a HD TiVo or HD cable service box? I'm a real newbie in this area. I will be getting Verizon FIOS HD TV service later this fall when they set up in my township.
Any folks out there new SONY owners? Your input is appreciated. Welcome to the world of digital TV!  Most of the these TVs are similar in function, though the method of accessing certain things may vary from brand to brand and model to model. I've played with several different makes and models and most are more similar than not. So, it's just a matter of getting to know how your particular one is set up and how it works. Defaults are generally set to the mid-range position on almost everything. Defaults are usually close to what most people will use, but not necessarily. That's why some programs let you alter the default settings to what you like and then save those settings as the new defaults. Best I can tell you here is set things to what looks good to you. You have to watch it, so you have to decide what works and what doesn't. The problems with aspect you are having is because the Tivo unit is stripping out the control signals the TV is expecting that it needs to alter the aspect ratio on the fly. Get a splitter for your cable input and run one side to the TV direct, and the other to the Tivo. You also need a digital signal for the auto aspect circuitry in the TV to work right. So, you do need the HD cable box. When you watch a Tivo-recorded show, you'll most likely have to set the TV to 4:3 standard. I use a PVR TV tuner card in my PC rather than a Tivo, but I'll have to replace that with one that does actual 16:9 format (in addition to DVD editing software) to get around that problem on my setup. One step at a time, though, right?  The backlight thing is one you'll have to tinker with. I set mine by turning the room lights down to "barely able to see" level, then turning down the backlight setting to 0. Start watching and adjust it as needed till you get to your comfort level. Took me three or four sessions before I got it right where I wanted it. I noticed too, that under normal room light, if the backlight is too high, the screen picture was way too bright and "poppy" especially with bright colors and scenes. I know you want to hear from another Sony user, but that really won't be all that much better than what I'm telling you, since your perceptions of what you see are unique to you, and his will be unique to him, etc. Hang in there, you'll get the hang of it. | | | John
"Extremism in the defense of Liberty is no vice!" Senator Barry Goldwater, 1964
Make America Great Again! | | | | Last edited: by Rifter |
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Invelos Forums->General: General Home Theater Discussion |
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