I need some help. As I'm sure all of you know, most all DVD players, including the one I bought 7 years ago have component video out. (RGB) However when using these ports to hook up to an HD TV, the picture looks terrible. My question essentially is, can you watch true HD from a standard DVD without using an upconverting DVD player? Does true HD exist on standard DVD? I just bought the 'Planet Earth' DVD's, looking for that ultimate HD experience and was let down immensely. Is HD-DVD and BluRay the only means of getting True HD DVD picture? And if so, are they worth the investment now? I would hate to purchase one only to have that one phased off of the market. Any help on general DVD video content and playback in regards to HD would be great. Thanks all.

Mitch

No, you can't get true HD from a standard DVD player. DVD players with HDMI out, I believe, are the only way to get upconverted signal to feed an HD TV. It upconverts standard def 720x480. As I understand it component out can not be up convert. But, some HD tv's have upconverting circuitry of their own.

I have an upconverting LG DVD player that does a very fine job with movies on my 42 inch Sony. I don't have any Planet Earth DVD's.

As far as Sony's Blue Ray or Toshiba's HD DVD, that is going to be undecided for a while yet. Blue Ray seems to have the advantage because some studios are only offering Blue Ray. BlockBuster announced that Blue Ray would be all that they will carry, except for stores that were testing the market with both and will continue to do so and online. A link http://tech.yahoo.com/blogs/null/30293

Duane

While waiting out prices coming down on 1080p, I bought a 19" 720p LCD 16:9 TV, and component output from my "el cheapo" DVD looked OK from commercial DVD movies (I don't have an HD camcorder yet, either).

I bought a $45 DVD player at Wal Mart that had HDMI and does upconverting, hooked that up to the TV with HDMI cable and the results look significantly more detailed.

That's my temporary "workaround".

Another option although not ideal for many people is actually connect your hd tv to your pc and play your dvd's providing your tv has a vga port and you can get your hands on a vga-vga cable (very cheap). This will give you the resolution your after.