Hardware playback - Resolution / Aspect ratios

[mustardman]

I read with particular interest the thread http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?s=&threadid=55458 (A word on DivX / XviD capable DVD Players).

I have been searching for information on how the hardware players handle content that has been resized. But I have found no information.

For example, a DivX encoded with 1:1 aspect ratio with a resolution of 720x300. Is the aspect ratio kept & black borders inserted at the top and bottom?

What about 720x576 (PAL) with an aspect of ~1:1.06. How is that handled?

Half resolution would be common 360x288 (half PAL DV) or 384x288 (half PAL analog). But what about even weirder sizes, I have also seen 240x384 (which is 2/3 PAL analog)

Does the encoder keep the aspect ratio and keep the original resolution, creating black borders all around? Is the image resized to the entire screen (720x576 PAL)? Is the image resized to fit in the "TV safe" area? What happens to the aspect ratio if any resizing happens? What about images that are *larger* than 720x576 (PAL) - although I've never seen any?

Is this sort of thing part of the 'DivX certification/verification'?

Mustardman.

[zag2me]

A very interesting question, this can get quite complicated as there are so many different variables such as widescreen/Fullscreen tv's, Source aspect ratios, menu's ect so I will describe what happens on my system with the kiss dp-500 hardware player.

28" Widescreen TV set to auto aspect ratio.

Kiss Setup - Widescreen
Widescreen DVD's play with black borders at top and bottom
Fullscreen DVD's play with no borders
Widescreen MP4's play with large black border
Fullscreen DVD's play with

Kiss Setup - 4:3 letterbox
Fullscreen DVD's play with no borders but menu's have black borders left and right.
Widescreen DVD's play with no borders
Fullscreen MP4 play with black borders left and right
Widescreen MP4 play with small black borders top and bottom.

I guess in clonclusion there is still alot of work to be done. We have requested from the kiss developers a verticle stretch function to sort out the widescreen MP4 issue, but other than that you can usually find the right settings depending on source aspect ratio.