4:3 to 16:9 aspect ratio

[houghton19]

Hi guys, Im just after a little bit of advice please, Im running live tv threw WMC 7, most channels are 16:9 which is great, but my wife has Baby tv on for the baby while shes pottering about the room doing jobs, This is pretty much the only channel that shows on my tv as 4:3, so my problem is, is there any way i can stretch just that 1 tv channel??? I can sort it by going to Zoom 3, but then have to change back if you change channel (too much work for a woman haha) but i also dont want screen burn from the bars and like it in 16:9.

thanks in advance.

Tim.

[volfan6415]

Someone can correct me if I am wrong but it has been my experience that media center remembers the zoom setting on a per channel basis.

I am assuming of course you are setting the zoom in media center and not via your tv,

[barnabas1969]

That's what I was thinking too. But, maybe it remembers it by aspect. So, if the 4:3 video image is being transmitted at 16:9 (with the black bars actually in the video transmission), then Media Center would think it is a 16:9 source.

If you can't solve it, you can change the color of the side bars in Media Center settings. I set mine to a medium gray to prevent screen burn.

BTW, you didn't mention what type of TV you're using. You probably already know this, but screen burn is only a problem with plasma and CRT TV's. It doesn't affect OLED, LCD, or DLP TV's.

[richard1980]

but it has been my experience that media center remembers the zoom setting on a per channel basis.

WMC only remembers the following zoom settings:

1. There is a single zoom setting for content with a resolution of 720p. All 720p content will share this single zoom setting.
2. There is a single zoom setting for all content that is not 720p. All non-720p content will share this single zoom setting.

[houghton19]

I Have a plasma cant afford a new one. It doesnt burn bad tbh, it does go after a few mins, just dont want any perm damage.

baby tv is SD, but if i turn over to sky sports 1 HD (or other channel) sometimes seems to be saving it and other times if i go to ss1 i have to resize ?

thanks

[holidayboy]

I struggle with this issue as well.

Some days swapping to a 4:3 broadcast will auto zoom, other times it will not. (I set zoom to original (0 in regedit which is 1 in the MC UI)).

Vista Media Center seemed to cope better with this (at least for a lot of the stuff I watch - way too much old school Star Trek!). I can't honestly remember, was it on a per channel basis back then, rather than content type?

[CyberSimian]

You probably already know this, but screen burn is only a problem with plasma and CRT TV's. It doesn't affect OLED, LCD, or DLP TV's.

Oh yes it does! (Is it pantomime season yet?)

I have a Toshiba LCD TV dating from 2006. When I first started using it with Windows Media Center, I did not understand how to adjust the HTPC to make the image fill the screen whilst avoiding significant overscan. So for quite a few months I ran the HTPC with approximately a one-centimeter blank strip on all four sides of the screen (i.e. image smaller than screen).

Eventually, I discovered "custom screen sizes" in the Nvidia Control Panel, and I created a custom screen size that fitted the screen exactly, with one or two pixels of overscan on all sides. However, I was aghast to discover when listening to a radio programme broadcast via DVB-T that the screen now shows lines on all four sides, where the edges of the image previously resided.

On Vista Media Center, MC displays a plain blue screen with the words "Digital Audio Broadcast" when playing a radio recording, and this makes the damage done to the screen noticeable. The damage is clearly visible, but it is so slight that one does not notice it when viewing normal TV programmes; only if a programme has a lot of constant tone along one edge does the damage become visible. Nevertheless, it disproves the assertion that LCD screens do not suffer from burn-in.

(Note: Windows 7 Media Center does not display a plain blue screen when playing a radio recording -- it displays a black screen, so this problem would not be so easily noticeable using Win 7.)

-- from CyberSimian in the UK

[CyberSimian]

Vista Media Center seemed to cope better with this (at least for a lot of the stuff I watch - way too much old school Star Trek!). I can't honestly remember, was it on a per channel basis back then, rather than content type?

As a Vista MC user, I never ever adjust aspect ratio -- Vista gets it right every time! (Of course, I am one of those weirdos that prefers to see cars and bicycles with circular wheels, rather than with elliptical wheels.)

One of the surprises that I had when I first tried Win 7 MC was its predilection for displaying a channel in the wrong aspect ratio. It was only later that I discovered that the aspect ratio needs to be set once for each channel, and thereafter MC should remember the setting. However, there was a post elsewhere that suggested that the aspect ratio setting was reset when (in the UK) the "red button" services were used (solution: disable the red button services). See this thread:

http://www.quantexzone.com/index.php/gu ... t-channels

-- from CyberSimian in the UK

[barnabas1969]

Pixels on an LCD panel can get stuck, but they do not "burn". It is very, very, very unlikely for a still image to cause pixels to get stuck on an LCD panel.

[Mike88]

As a Vista MC user, I never ever adjust aspect ratio -- Vista gets it right every time! (Of course, I am one of those weirdos that prefers to see cars and bicycles with circular wheels, rather than with elliptical wheels.)
-- from CyberSimian in the UK

I belong to the same club & also like round wheels.

[holidayboy]

^ +1 !

[barnabas1969]

Nah... oval wheels are the new fad.

[volfan6415]

After watching mythbusters I really want some square wheels

[barnabas1969]

After watching mythbusters I really want some square wheels

Yeah, they were smoooth at 60MPH.