LG LGDVB418

[Chris Gohlke]

<div class='os_post_top_link'><a href='http://reviews.designtechnica.com/review2658_main13298_page3.html' target='_blank'>http://reviews.designtechnica.com/review2658_main13298_page3.html</a><br /><br /></div><i>"As the battle lines were forming over future high definition DVD formats Blu-Ray and HD-DVD, impatient home theater enthusiasts have been drawn to standard definition DVD players featuring up-conversion and high definition outputs. These DVD players can convert your standard DVD video to 480p, 720p, or 1080i resolutions for use with your HDTV. The theory is that with some signal processing, the video quality can be improved enough to justify converting to a higher resolution format for compatibility with high definition televisions featuring inputs such as HDMI, DVI or component video. We decided to put the theory to the test with the LG LGDVB418 DVD player."</i> <br /><br /><img src="http://www.digitalmediathoughts.com/images/20050601_2102121.gif" /><br /><br />I'd been wondering whether these up-converting DVD players actually made a notable difference. This review confirmed my suspisons - not really a perceptible difference. But, this is just one review, so have any of you bought an up-converting DVD player and if so, does it make a difference?

[Felix Torres]

I wouldn't base a buy/no-buy decision for any upscaling dvd player based on this review.

Simply put, the display they used is not a true HD display, but rather a 1024 by 1024 ED plasma. Non-square pixels, for starters. Plus, the player upscales to 1080i only, according to a spec sheet I tracked down. Doesn't make much sense to upscale to 1920x1080 in the player just so the display scaler can bring it down to ED for display, does it?

What made me go to the trouble is that my upscaling DVD player does make a difference. Upscaled 1080i DVD don't quite look as good as native 1080 HD but it does look better than native 720p on the same display. So, while I can't vouch for all upscaling DVD players, I do know *some* do make a difference.

[Chris Gohlke]

Which one do you have?

[Felix Torres]

Samsung 941; its last year's model, much like the LG in the review, except it upscales to 720p, 768p, or 1080i using a Genesis Faroudja DCDi chip. Upscaling works like a charm but it a bit finicky as to what DVDs it'll read. Does not seem to much like Philips DVD+ disks at all so the WMA-playback capability isn't much use to me until I upgrade my burner.
&lt;shrug>
I've got two other DVD players around and I expect to get a 360 by next spring so that's not much of an issue. The price was good, though.

[jeff]

If your display has a good built-in scaler, you probably won't see much difference at all. I bought a Panasonic S77 to feed a Sharp Aquos and I have a very difficult time seeing the difference between 480p, 720p, and 1080i through an HDMI connection. None looked quite as good as my new Media Center PC that's running the display at its native resolution over DVI. So I'm probably going to get rid of the Panasonic and just use the PC for DVD viewing.