NTSC on PAL players?

[The Belgain]

I have a JVC TH-A35 standalone DVD-player/surround setup. When I try playing NTSC SVCDs or DVDs I've created, they play but slightly jerkily. It seems like it's playing it at the PAL rate (ie speeded up slightly) then stopping for a split second to let the audio catch up or something. Is this a standard problem?

Do PAL players outputting to a PAL TV have to output at 25fps? Shouldn't they just play the video speeded up (since this is exactly how PAL video is created anyway)? Is there any way to fix this on hardware players, or do I have to do an NTSC --> PAL conversion before burning every time?


edit: Feel free to move to a more appropriate forum if necessary

[SeeMoreDigital]

This is a common problem.

Your NTSC DVD's run at 30 frames per second. But your PAL TV likes to accept 25 frames per second.

That said, many modern TV's can accept both NTSC and PAL signals so if I were you I would have a look in your DVD players setup menu to see if you can set your player to output NTSC!

Also check the back of the DVD player to see if there is a PAL/NTSC output switch.

Good luck. Cheers

[The Belgain]

Ok, I'll have a look at this, thanks. If not, then I guess it isn't really all that much of a problem doing an NTSC --> PAL conversion. The only problem is really that encoding is slower due to the higher number of pixels.


edit: By the way, is there any risk of damage to the TV if I set NTSC output, and it only accepts PAL?

[Kika]

All PAL-Players are able to Play NTSC-DVDs. Some of them are outputting PAL - this results in jerkyness, some are doing a Conversion to PAL60 - your TV must be able to show that, and some Players are doing no Conversion - you get a NTSC-Signal from them.

Look at you Manual, some Players can be switched between several Playback-Modes. My Afreey (a Sampo-Clone) provides all the three Modes, my Denon plays NTSC as NTSC or PAL60.

By the way, is there any risk of damage to the TV if I set NTSC output, and it only accepts PAL?

No, you will only get a B/W-Picture or a "running Picture". I think, you will switch off the Player fast enough to prevent any Demage... ;)

[digidragon]

I'm in the UK and I've got a widescreen TV which seems to accept pictures from a NTSC DVD (the player is set on auto).

But the TV seems to squeeze the picture so that it's a bit narrower and taller. I can notice that the top of people's heads are cut off, for example.

But PAL DVDs are fine, and if I play the NTSC DVD in PowerDVD I can see the top of the heads that the TV cuts off.

Is there anything I can do about this, or is it just the way my TV (a Philips) handles NTSC signals?

[SeeMoreDigital]

Originally posted by digidragon
I'm in the UK and I've got a widescreen TV which seems to accept pictures from a NTSC DVD (the player is set on auto).

But the TV seems to squeeze the picture so that it's a bit narrower and taller. I can notice that the top of people's heads are cut off, for example.

But PAL DVDs are fine, and if I play the NTSC DVD in PowerDVD I can see the top of the heads that the TV cuts off.

Is there anything I can do about this, or is it just the way my TV (a Philips) handles NTSC signals? Well, that's not right. Not right at all!

Your Philips widescreen TV should cope fine with an NTSC input - however you might have to manually set the screen to 16:9.

Have you checked your DVD players output settings to see if you can 'force' NTSC or PAL60 output?

To test the ratio of the 'on screen' image, set your TV to auto, spin an 2.35:1 widescreen PAL DVD. And mark the position of the black bands on your TV screen with a pencil or crayon. Then do the same again with an 2.35:1 NTSC DVD.

What DVD player do you have?

Cheers

[digidragon]

Thanks for the reply.

I only have one NTSC DVD at the moment (Femme Fatale) but it is full 16:9 (no black bars).

My DVD player (an LG DVD5083) has PAL, auto and NTSC output settings. I've tried both the NTSC and auto settings, but the NTSC DVD plays the same on both settings.

The TV switches to its "widescreen" automatically, but there is no 16:9 setting as such.

[SeeMoreDigital]

Originally posted by digidragon
The TV switches to its "widescreen" automatically, but there is no 16:9 setting as such. All widescreen TV's will allow the user to manually adjust the screen aspect ratio.

You only have to walk into any of our country's 'box shifter stores' to see this. As they love to set all the TV's to display a 16:9 image, regardless of the source!

I've even found cases where SkyDigital installers have not bothered to set their Digi boxes to output 16:9 when connected to a 16:9 TV - Such is the state of our country obsession into buying new technology and not having it set up properly by so called, professional installers!

Anyway, please check that your TV is set to 'auto aspect' ratio. And your DVD player is set to recognise a 16:9 TV!

Cheers

[digidragon]

I know exactly what you mean - you'd think it wouldn't be too difficult these days to find a 16:9 source to show, but they still insist on stretching 4:3 pictures.

Anyway, I meant that the TV switches into widescreen mode by itself, not that I don't know how to maually switch it - I just don't need to. It has a 16:9 zoom setting, which is meant to get rid of black bars at the top and bottom (which I never use).

The DVD player is definitely set to 16:9 output, and the TV definitely switches to widescreen when the DVD plays, so I'm sure I've done everything correctly. But it doesn't look right.

[SeeMoreDigital]

Ahh well in that case....

Can you check your NTSC DVD.

Do you know if it's '16:9 widescreen' ie the image has been encoded on an 16:9 anamorphic frame. Or if it's '4:3 widescreen' ie the image has been encoded on an 4:3 frame?

Also what is the aspect ratio of the DVD image 1.77:1 or 1.85:1?

If it's 1.77:1, you may well be missing a bit of both the top and the bottom of the image. This will be due to how the TV is set up at the factory, in fact it's quite possible that you may be missing around 16 pixels of image (overall) and why many DVD are framed at 1.85:1 and not 1.77:1.

Cheers

[digidragon]

On checking the DVD in PowerDVD it shows:

Video Attributes:
Video compression mode: MPEG-2
TV system: 525/60 (NTSC)
Aspect Ratio: 16:9
Display Mode: Only Letterbox
Source picture resolution: 720x480 (525/60)
Frame Rate: 30.00
Source picture letterboxed: Not letterboxed

There are no black bars, so it seems to be 1.77:1.

[SeeMoreDigital]

Originally posted by digidragon
On checking the DVD in PowerDVD it shows:

Video Attributes:
Video compression mode: MPEG-2
TV system: 525/60 (NTSC)
Aspect Ratio: 16:9
Display Mode: Only Letterbox
Source picture resolution: 720x480 (525/60)
Frame Rate: 30.00
Source picture letterboxed: Not letterboxed

There are no black bars, so it seems to be 1.77:1. OK, if nothing is mentioned on the DVD's packaging, while playing the DVD in PowerDVD, try turning up the brightness.

If your DVD is 1.85:1 you will see a very, very narrow 'off black' band between the image and the main black band. If you don't see this, your DVD is 1.77:1 and will explain why you can't see the top and bottom of the DVD image on your TV!

Cheers

[digidragon]

Well there are no black or off-black bands at all - the image fills the entire area of the PowerDVD window, so I guess that must be the reason.

Thanks for your help.

[SeeMoreDigital]

No problem.