Sony Kvhr Owners Using Via Htpc Or Pc's?

[nikko1974]

Hi,

I'm having a horrid run with a new HTPC I've recently put together and been attempting to run through my Sony KVHR32M31...therefore am trying to find other KVHR series owners to get feedback from on their settings.

I've been using the very popular HTPC motherboard choice, the Asus M2NPV-VM - which comes with a 'HDTV' out riser card and an onboard NVidia 6150 GPU.

SO first I tried using component video as the connection - the flicker was horrible at 1080i and REALLY hurt your eyes, at 720p it was also very hard on the eyes. I also got a jaggy signal distortion on the left of my screen.

So I was recommended to try using a VGA to RGBHV cable...which I purchased for $60 (the Crest one).......but am finding I get horrible overscan on the XP desktop and am unsure what resolution levels to run.

Have been told that the screen has a weird native resolution of 1440 x 1080 or so - am basically TOTALLY confused.

So would LOVE any KVHR series owners giving some advice on how they run their HTPC's or just PC's through their KVHR.

Thank you VERY much in advance.....

Nikko

[Widescream1503559516]

For what its worth, I'm running my Sony/HTPC 1280x720 at 60Hz. I do get overscan on the desktop, but I'm not too worried about that as I only use the Sony for viewing DVD's etc.

I have played with the service menu of the Sony to minimise the overscan but haven't been completely successful, an I have mucked up the geometry a little so I don;t want to fiddle with that anymore. Whilst viewing video files with Theatertek and PowerDVD looks great, the picture is a bit off centre (overscan above and below is minimal) but it is not really that noticable except when viewing the credits.

To overcome these limitations I use Zoomplayer most of the time, as I can resize and place the video on the Sony's screen where ever I like. It's a bit of a cop out but it does the job.

[Owen]

Sorry to hear that you are still having problems mate.

I don’t think you are doing your self any favours using a board with integrated graphics.

I have had trouble with video systems with double the power that you have, but it should still work.

How does the Sony perform with a normal HD STB?

See if you can get one to test with, so you know what to expect from the PC output.

If it works ok, the PC should also work.

Flicker is a fact of life with most CRT’s, especially at 50Hz. 60Hz is normally the highest refresh rate supported at HD resolutions and its better then 50Hz.

100Hz operation is normally only possible with 576i input.

As for overscan, well TV’s are supposed to overscan, it’s a designed in “feature”.

You can make adjustments in the service menu to reduce or eliminate it or use the overscan correction function in the video drivers to remove it, or a bit of both.

If you run the HDTV wizard in the nVidea drivers you should get an industry standard 1080i or 720p output from the PC that the TV should accept without issue. If this is not the case, I’m not sure what to suggest other then custom timings in the drivers or with the aid of Powerstrip.

Remember that the Sony is a TV and only expects standard 576i, 720p or 1080i input signals.

A custom resolution (overscan corrected desktop) can be defined within those industry standard timings to reduce overscan and adjust size and picture position, but that is NOT the same as selecting a different resolution in the normal PC way.

A custom desktop is a resolution within a resolution so to speak. The timings seen by the TV must always be standard 576i, 720p, 1080i, but the active picture area (resolution) within that overall resolution is flexible.

For example a common setting setup for 1080i is to use a standard 1920x1080i output with a 1776x1000 desktop resolution within it to reduce overscan.

If you can adjust the picture size in the service menu to reduce or eliminate overscan, life is a lot simpler.

I have a Rank Arena 86cm CRT running on a HTPC via VGA, but the Rank is very flexible and behaves like a multi sync PC monitor, and supports all sorts of resolution - refresh rate combinations.

It is running 1366x768i at 100Hz, which matches the real usable resolution of the display and is flicker free.

Unfortunately I don’t think the Sony is so flexible.

[nikko1974]

For what its worth, I'm running my Sony/HTPC 1280x720 at 60Hz. I do get overscan on the desktop, but I'm not too worried about that as I only use the Sony for viewing DVD's etc. n I have mucked up the geometry a little so I don;t want to fiddle with that anymore.To overcome these limitations I use Zoomplayer most of the time, as I can resize and place the video on the Sony's screen where ever I like. It's a bit of a cop out but it does the job.

Hi Widescream, yes well I think the overscan will more of a problem for me as the HTPC is primarily used for everyday TV use....so I don't fancy loosing so much of the picture, which I guess I would?

Hmmm yes, sorry I've no desire to head into the dreaded Sony Service Mode - I have watched it being done and it was all bloody double dutch to me and then some!

[nikko1974]

Sorry to hear that you are still having problems mate.

Haha that makes 2 of us - thanks though

I don’t think you are doing your self any favours using a board with integrated graphics.

Hmmmmm well I'd be happy to buy a dedicated GPU - I only went this this motherbaord as it was so highly recommended at xpmediacenters.com.au. THOUGH I am not sure if the GPU processing power of the onboard 6150 is the problem - more so just finding the RIGHT connection and choice of resolution/Hz etc.

How does the Sony perform with a normal HD STB?

The Sony is perfect with the Teac DVB800 HD STB - I've had them both for around 2 years, never a hitch at all - watch everything at 1080i no problems.

As is often posted about them the picture quality is superb.

Flicker is a fact of life with most CRT’s, especially at 50Hz. 60Hz is normally the highest refresh rate supported at HD resolutions and its better then 50Hz.

Yes, I know but the 'flicker' that I was getting using component video via the HDTV riser card wasn't this - it was a jaggy, pixelation that was moving up and down the left of the screen - was a synch issue I think.

Also the picture was also just INCREDIBLY harsh on the eyes - both my wife and I commented on it and I was literally in pain from it - thats never happened with the HD STB.

You can make adjustments in the service menu to reduce or eliminate it or use the overscan correction function in the video drivers to remove it, or a bit of both.

Well I don't want to head into the SONY service menu - and the NVidia overscan facilities only come up when you use component video connection - but the picture quality is not as good in this as it is using VGA - RGBHV.

If you run the HDTV wizard in the nVidea drivers you should get an industry standard 1080i or 720p output from the PC that the TV should accept without issue. If this is not the case, I’m not sure what to suggest other then custom timings in the drivers or with the aid of Powerstrip.

As mentioned I can ONLY run the HDTV wizard using component video cabling and both 1080i and 720p through component video give pictures that have that JAGGY pixeling up the left and are VERY harsh on the eyes - colours also appear bled out.

If you can adjust the picture size in the service menu to reduce or eliminate overscan, life is a lot simpler.

I've really no idea how to begin with this and would not want to stuff it up so I can't even have the fallback position of just using the STB, which is what I do at present.

Thanks for your help...I guess I'll pluck up the courage and try again - though don't hold that much confidence - is so disappointing.

[visions]

Hi Nikko,

I replied to your thread in the Digital TV Tuners forum.

Anyway, this is what I wrote:

I have the HR36 - the 86cm version of your set.

I spent many, many months till I got a picture I was happy with.

My pc setup is similar to yours except I have an ATI card (old Radeon 9800).

I started off using a vga-->rgbhv cable and that gave a good picture but the overscan was bad and I could never get it right using either Powerstrip or the ATI Catalyst software.

Then I discovered a patch that fools the Catalyst software into thinking that the official ATI component dongle is connected so now I just use a vga-->component cable and I run 1280x720p resized to 1152x648 which totally eliminates overscan and gives a good quality picture. I can also do 1080i resized to 1776x1000 (I think) which also eliminates most of the overscan but I find Windows too hard to use at that res.

I have been using this setup for about a year now and I am happy with it. I might actually go back to the RGBHV cable and have another go with that to see if I can get a better picture...though to be honest my current setup is very sharp to my eyes so not sure how much better the RGBHV could be.

One thing that helped me a lot during the setup was having a second pc - I plug my laptop into my router and VNC into my HTPC. Then I can stuff around with the display settings as much as I like and am still able to see what is going on even if the picture drops out on the tv. Using this setup saved me a lot of time and hassle.

The only downside to all this is that I can't see any BIOS screens or anything when the PC starts up so anytime I need to make changes to the BIOS (which admittedly is hardly ever) I have to plug in an s-video cable.

I know you have an nVidia card but hope you found this somewhat helpful.