[mythtv-users] TV Overscan

[Dick Steffens]

On 02/12/2014 06:51 PM, Eric Sharkey wrote:
>>> There are possibilities with adapted modelines, but that takes a lot
>>> of testing and trial and error.
> I would try to avoid that method if you can.

My wife prefers that I not fuss with stuff that might damage the TV, so 
I probably won't play with modelines.

> If the TV is doing
> overscan, you're never going to get a good picture by tweaking the
> video card output.  The best you can do is compensate by shrinking the
> image down so that when the TV blows it up you don't lose the edges,
> but you definitely will lose sharpness by this.
>
> I'm sure you've read your TV's manual:
>
> http://service.us.panasonic.com/OPERMANPDF/TC42PX14.PDF
>
> Page 47 discusses the aspect ratio options.  The settings here should
> adjust the overscan, using either JUST or ZOOM.  You may need to play
> with it a bit to get it just right.

I have done that. We've been using FULL and H-FILL, but I will give JUST 
and ZOOM a try.

> If that doesn't work, then I would suggest you try switching to
> feeding the TV with analog VGA.  Usually TVs do not overscan video
> from a VGA input and the image quality of non-overscanned VGA is
> actually much higher than overscanned HDMI.  If you can't find any way
> to turn off the overscan, it's a simple option.

I tried using the PC input, which is a VGA port. The color was 
unacceptably different, and the resolution was not so good. As others 
have noted it's fixed at 1024 x 768. We prefer what we get with 1280 x 720.

Thanks for the hints.

-- 
Regards,

Dick Steffens