Loss of picture quality through Tivo?

[Murpheeee]

Hi guys,

I just bought my first HDTV, a 32" Toshiba for the living room.
I still have non-HD DirecTV for now and a standard Series 2 Tivo.
I hooked it up as my exactly as my CRT had been, but the picture was pretty crappy.
I thought there was a problem with the TV as I could not get a good picture, no matter how I tweaked the setting - always looked greenish and washed out.

I read that the component cables needed to be a very good connection or the picture could look greenish. I switched to a different cable, which helped, then switched to co-ax, which helped more...but still not great.

Then I decided to try going straight to the TV from satellite box and the difference in quality is marked.

Anyone experience similar issues? Any way to improve this?

 

[Kadarin]

I've had a Tivo Series 3 (HD) for the past three or so years connected to a Philips 42" plasma, and as far as I can tell, there is no loss in picture quality. I am currently using component cables.

 

[sivart]

Hi guys,

I just bought my first HDTV, a 32" Toshiba for the living room.
I still have non-HD DirecTV for now and a standard Series 2 Tivo.
I hooked it up as my exactly as my CRT had been, but the picture was pretty crappy.
I thought there was a problem with the TV as I could not get a good picture, no matter how I tweaked the setting - always looked greenish and washed out.

I read that the component cables needed to be a very good connection or the picture could look greenish. I switched to a different cable, which helped, then switched to co-ax, which helped more...but still not great.

Then I decided to try going straight to the TV from satellite box and the difference in quality is marked.

Anyone experience similar issues? Any way to improve this?

The bolded is your problem.

CRT is 480 lines of resolution.
HDTV is at a minimum 720 lines (maybe 1080)

Take your 480 lines of resolution output from your direcTV box and zoom in to fill the 720/1080 lines of your new TV and you get a worse picture. Just like zooming in on a digital picture on your computer.

You also didn't mention the size of your CRT. If it was smaller than 27" you have a larger height than before. You also didn't mention if you are using stretchy vision on your SD box (I.e. no pillar bars on the sides) -- if so, just more to distort the already zoomed image.

Get an HD satellite and box and you'll be a lot happier.