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I'm not missing the HD channels so much now...a tip to improve your SD

H

happyh

Newbie
I've been missing the HD channels, particularly for golf and other sports.
I have a cheap skybox F5 connected to an expensive 50" Samsung plasma. I was finding the SD broadcasts very grainy and over soft etc.
I have learned that both pieces of kit have a video upscaler to enable the SD signal to be shown. Presumably the Skybox has a cheapo one and the Samsung has a better one?
Anyhow, in the Skybox settings I turned the video resolution to Native Source (ie turned off the upscaling function, it was set to send 1080) so it now sends an SD signal to the TV which itself does the upscaling.
I also went into the TV settings and turned off the picture processing functions such as noise reduction etc.
The picture quality is now loads better! I'm not claiming it to be HD quality but it is much closer and really watchable.
I'm now watching the US open golf, it's lovely and crisp, the graphics clear with no edge effect.(y)
One small downside is that the tv does a half-second pause when changing channels on the skybox from an HD one to an SD one or vice versa while it changes it's processing.
 
I have the f5s / v5s and tried your suggestions. I also had my box set to 1080p/50 but changed it to "by source" as a test. I'm using a panasonic plasma hd ready tv.

Anyway, using the native source setting I'm finding (to my eyes) that 1080i hd broadcasts are probably a bit softer than when scaled by the box to 1080p. I believe however that 576i output natively from the box rather than being scaled up to 1080p is a little easier on the eye.

What should scale better, the tv or the skybox? Any thoughts guys?
 
I also adjusted the settings via m/p then used the video adjust settings with picture in the background so you can get a better idea
 
Edit: nevermind after re reading the post I found it simply to be a loss in translation going from one box to another and original op meant the 'by native tv' option. :P

Nice tip, has worked wonders, sd felt unwatchable at times before doing this.

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Just a quick addition to this :) .

I tried doing 'to source' and found the menu/epg on skybox f5s to be extremely grainey along with it also taking a second or two to change channel due to the black screen on the screen resolution change.

Accidentally went one extra messing about to 'by native tv' and the results are amazing, sd looks original sky quality, channels turn over instantly and the epg looks solid/not grainey, I would advise trying this if you got a decent tv and a skybox f5s, worked for me.
 
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Just to confirm, I get best picture with F5 set to "By Source".
Interestingly I had to do it again last night,I thought the picture was poor and when I looked the F5 was set to 1080 again.I don't think I made that change,I think it reset itself,but I'll keep an eye on it
 
Same here. I've been using "by source" since I stumbled on your 1st posting happyh. By far the best option to allow the tv to upscale sd to it's optimum.
 
Ok here's what to do. This is the best way I have found. This removes the fuzz from Sd channels. Simply change video setting from YUV to RGB. This is really good!
 
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