Please help me with this if you can

[rp1guy]

Bought a new Sony blueray player but it does not work on my 1080p Toshiba TV, it only works in 1080i but it displays in letter box at 2.35:1 ratio. If I had a 1080P that worked would it than be in full screen high def?
If so I'm returning it and getting an upconverter.
Thanks

[JasonR]

https://forum.blu-ray.com/showthread.php?t=16529

Don't DVDs display in their OAR, unless you buy fullscreen edition?

[ZeeMan84]

Well not all movies are 16:9 ratio so you'll see letterbox even in widescreen movies. I'm sure someone more knowledgeable on aspect ratios can help you explain it better but I know for fact not all movies are filmed in 16:9 ratio. Have you watched few BD's before dropping out of Hi-Def format and into DVDs again? Plus Blu-ray player can also function as upconverters too.

[Brian Cash]

Originally Posted by rp1guy

Bought a new Sony blueray player but it does not work on my 1080p Toshiba TV, it only works in 1080i but it displays in letter box at 2.35:1 ratio. If I had a 1080P that worked would it than be in full screen high def?
If so I'm returning it and getting an upconverter.
Thanks

ok im confused you do have a 1080p tv or u dont and most movies you still have the black bars all depends on the movie

[MacDaddyOJack]

I'm not really sure what your problem is, clarify please? Are the black bars on the sides or top and bottom? And what movie are you watching?

[Elandyll]

1080i/p and the aspect ratio are two different things.

The HD signal @ 1920x1080 is what is called a 16/9 Widescreen ratio, or 1.78:1 (in Europe Widescreen = 1.66:1), compared to the more traditional 4/3 ratio, a 1.33:1.

Depending on how your TV treats the incoming signals, HD signals coming from your cable box will look "full screen", 4/3 signals will look like they have black boxes on the sides (or will look full screen, at a loss of quality and picture, if you selected "Fit Wide" or "zoomed").

Films, unless they are re-sized (an abomination, specially for HDM) to a 4/3, will most likely be "Widescreen" (another name for 16/9, which in many cases is also a re-sized version, albeit with less destruction of the original material) or OAR (aka Original Aspect ratio).
Films can be made in 1.66:1 (rare in my experience, except for Direct to Video, Made for TV movies or Animation like Japanese OAVs), 1.85:1 or 2.35:1 (also called Anamorphic, 2.39:1 these days), the bigger the first number the wider the aspect. Cinemascope (rarely used if at all these days I think) is 2.55:1.

So In order what you'll find is

1.33:1 -> "Older" TVs, non HDTV or non Widescreen. Will produce side black bars on a HDTV/Widescreen TV.
1.66:1-> European Widescreen. Non HDTV. Should not produce any black bars.
1.77:1 - > HDTV Widescreen default. Will not produce any black bars.
1.85:1 -> Film format. Sometimes called "Widescreen" on some DVDs. It -will- produce somewhat small bars on top and bottom of a HDTV screen, unless zoomed.
2.35(or 2.39):1 -> Anamorphic Film format. Will definitely produce bars, unless zoomed. Most noticeable, but much much more "viewable" space on a HDTV than when watched on a 1.33:1 (4/3) TV.

If you want more infos, there is a decent article on
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aspect_ratio_(image)

[Luis_A51]

Many Toshiba 1080p Tvs cant actually accept 1080p signals - they only accept 1080i and then the tv itself converts it to 1080p.

As for the aspect ration, its always better to view movies in the original aspect ratio.

[syncguy]

Originally Posted by Luis_A51

As for the aspect ration, its always better to view movies in the original aspect ratio.

Yes, my preference is to watch a movie as it was made and the way the director wanted us to see it. If you try to fit 2.35:1 (scope or anamorphic) movie on to 1.77:1 screen (which is HDTV, note 16/9=1.77), both sides of the movie will be chopped off, which is about 25% of the original content. IMO this is a very sad outcome. I always watch it in the way it was made.

This is my opinion only.

However, there are millions out there don't like black bars on their new HDTV sets and choose to zoom the picture to get rid of black bars and consequently lose about 25% of the original content. (I have many friends who do this but I do not try to forcibly change their mindset and their opinion although I feel sad about it.)

The choices that you have when you watch a 2.35:1 or higher scope movie on a 16x9 (or 1.77:1) HDTV display are:

1) Watch it with black bars in the way it was intended to be watched.

2) Use the zoom function of the TV set or the player to fit the picture to your 16x9 screen and lose 25% of the original content (Some may argue that this will degrade the picture quality. While this is true, I wish to say, if you have a good quality scaler in your TV or externally, the picture degradation is not noticeable from a typical seating distance unless you have a very large screen)

3) Go for a Continuous Image Height (CIH) projection system which would display 2.35:1 ratio on a large scope screen without black bars. This is awesome and you will not turn back once you have seen your favorite scope movie on one of these systems. The scope screen (2.35:1) picture when delivered via 1080p blu-ray is unbelievably beautiful and overwhelming.

4) In some cases you could purchase pan & scan version of scope movies which would fill 16x9 screen and it is a better outcome than zooming a 2.35:1 movie. In this case, the area of the 2:35:1 movie that you see through your 16x9 screen (or window) is dynamic and follow the action. Hence, the possibility of losing active content is low.

5) Stretch or deform the 2.35.1 aspect picture to fit 16x9 screen. Some people do this but this gives me headaches! There are some displays that deform the edges of the picture while keeping the centre close to the original aspect ratio which is better than stretching the entire picture.