Comments on: Why does this movie exist?

By: jason

jason — Sat, 08 Dec 2007 04:25:27 +0000

My problem was a little more serious…I couldn’t view *anything* that had HDCP encryption. Every device I plugged in with HDCP gave me an error and wouldn’t display at all. At first I thought it was my HD Tivo, because it only did it on certain channels (HBO HD), but then I started seeing it on my PS3 so I knew it was the TV.

I had them come in and replace the HDMI board in my television and now all is well. Although it cost an arm and a leg to do which wasn’t fun.

By: mike_ch

mike_ch — Sat, 08 Dec 2007 02:50:18 +0000

HDCP errors? What do you mean precisely? We have HDCP issues going on but I think it’s more related to the cable box, as they started acting wonky as soon as the firmware on it was upgraded a few months ago. IIRC, our DVR was like yours prior to the Series3.

If your problems were like mine (the box would occasionally display an HDCP Error message but just pushing exit would make it go away and things seemed to work like normal) then maybe we need to get ours inspected?

By: jason

jason — Fri, 07 Dec 2007 19:47:50 +0000

Overscan is a problem with all TVs, but yeah, it was an issue for me as well. When I had my TV being repaired (the HDMI plug was burned out somehow, causing HDCP errors)I had the repairmen correct my overscan. Since I was paying a fortune for it anyway, I figured I might as well.

And for the record, I do play PS3 games. I loved Ratchet & Clank in particular. :)

By: mike_ch

mike_ch — Fri, 07 Dec 2007 18:07:42 +0000

Jason, you own a big heavy Sony CRT for your HDTV like I do, right? Have you find that games recently are putting more content (I guess this happens most in FMV/machinima) off the edges into the overscan portion of the screen? I know that flat panels account for almost all HDTVs sold these days, but putting critical information out there out of my view is incredibly annoying. It seems like the message from the game development world is “everyone should go buy a flat-panel if they don’t already have one.”

This seems to be happening more on the PS3 for me, so maybe you don’t experience it as much because I don’t think I’ve ever seen a PS3 game on your Playing list, but it happens everywhere from the web browser (title at the top of the screen cut off) to in game.

It’s actually worse for the PS3 because if you do buy one of the more frequent/inexpensive flat-panels, namely a 720p one, the PS3 can’t scale Blu-Rays from 1080p to 720p, so your HD movies play in 480p with no improvement at all from DVD. So CRT owners can watch Blu-Rays in HD but have difficulty with games which largely max out at 720, and 720 flat-panel owners have difficulty with BR discs. Sony’s answer seems to be “*everyone* should go buy a flat-panel and, to be precise, a 1080p one.”

I dunno. You work in games and have a tube so I thought you might have an opinion on this. It’s frustrating.