Dishnetwork no widescreen?

[GnatGoSplat]

I put my DP301 receiver in 16:9 widescreen, and noticed no difference. Not even on the movie channels.
Are movie channels only broadcast in 4:3?
Would it be pointless to buy a 16:9 widescreen TV if all I use is Dishnetwork?

Are all movie channels 16:9 widescreen on a 6000 HDTV receiver?

I need a bigger TV and am debating between 16:9 and 4:3.

[Mark Lamutt]

The 16:9 setting doesn't do anything. All standard def channels are broadcast in their original 4:3 aspect ratio. Some of the SD channels are letterboxed, but still 4:3. The HD channels are all 16:9, but keep the SD material that is shown on the HD channels is still 4:3. All HD material is 16:9 (with some of the movies shown OAR at 2.35:1 as well).

[Mike123abc]

16:9 Wide screen is "new" to cable/DBS. As the high definition channels start rolling out, it will become more and more common. Right now HBO/Showtime/Discovery/CBS and soon the new HD-NET/ESPN-HD will all have HD channels in wide screen. Unless you get a HDTV reciever you will not see these channels and your selection of 16:9 will be very small (some channels like Sci-Fi will show letterboxed stuff).

[GnatGoSplat]

Thanks for the replies. So if I buy a widescreen TV today, it will still be 4:3 (letter boxed on the sides) no matter what, correct?
And also the majority of movie channels even with the 6000 HDTV receiver are not available in HD wide screen? How about PPV?

[Mike123abc]

Well the next TV I buy will be wide screen. I am getting OTA HDTV too now. Also watching DVDs is much nicer in the wide screen, and when they finally get the HD-DVD out it will look good too. The only problem during the transition with Tube or Plasma TVs is the potential for burn in either on the sides of a 16:9 or top and bottom for the 4:3 sets.

[Ken_F]

Gnat,

HBO has a HDTV channel, as does Showtime. On HBO HDTV, virtually all of the movies are widescreen; on Showtime HDTV, most movies are also widescreen. Cinemax HDTV is coming in a few months, and virtually all of its movies will be widescreen too. On Discovery HDTV, and the upcoming Hdnet Entertainment, Hdnet Movies, and Hdnet Sports channels, all the content is widescreen. But for the most part, you only get widescreen on the HDTV channels, not every channel just because you have a HDTV receiver.

[bolco]

You can "stretch" the 4:3 picture out to fill the entire widescreen using features on your television. This will avoid the bars along each side. Currently the E* receiver function does nothing.

[DarrellP]

My Dish 3000 that I bought back in 97 had this feature, before widescreen TV's were even on the market.

[GnatGoSplat]

Thanks for the replies. It sounds like if I buy a widescreen TV, I'd really need the 6000 receiver to take advantage of it.
I wouldn't want to stretch a 4:3 picture to fit, because it would mess up the aspect ratio and make people/images look wide & fat.

I don't know that I can afford both the 6000HDTV receiver AND a widescreen HDTV set, so I might just buy an inexpensive 4:3 non-HD TV for now.

[Cyclone]

You would not need a 6000 to take advantage of a 16:9 TV (unless of course you wanted HDTV Programming). But there are even SD programming that is shown in 16:9 format. You'll see them with letterbox bars at the top and bottom of the screen.

My 16:9 Panasonic has a "auto" mode. I will switch between 4:3 SD and 16:9 SD Full screen modes. There are a lot of 16:9 TV comercials out now.

I can confirm that the 16:9 vs 4:3 setting does not do a damn thing on either my Dish 4900 or 6000 STB receivers. Both have been connected to my 16:9 TV.

I would be nice for a wider Program Guide when in 16:9 mode.

[GnatGoSplat]

Hmmm, I can't recall ever seeing anything letterboxed with my DP301 receiver.

[Mark Lamutt]

ER, The West Wing, Stargate, Farscape, Angel, The Sopranos (in SD), Enterprise are all current shows that are shown in letterbox format.

[tnsprin]

Although currently few and far between, there have been a few broadcast that actually set the 16x9 flag for non-hdtv broadcast. All HDTV broadcast should be setting this flag.

The ones I have noticed happen to all have been local stations ( in my case from NYC).

Tim

[ibglowin]

It only took me 2 months after I bought my 60in Sony Grand Wega to go out and get a 6000 receiver. DVD's were great but having the ability everynight of the week to watch something in true HD is pretty spectacular and makes the TV investment all that much more worth the while. If you get sucked into buying one of these because of the awesome picture you see in the showroom beware, you won't be happy when you fire it up and start watching anything in SDTv.

[BobMurdoch]

My Sony Widescreen TV has a setting called Wide Zoom that gets rid of the letterbox bars while cutting off a very small portion of the right and left sides of the picture. I watch just about all of my SD programming with this setting (except for ticker channels such as ESPNews and CNN)

[Mark Lamutt]

So do I, Bob. I've grown to really like the Sony WideZoom setting.

[Jerry 42]

Many 16:9 sets have built in modes that allow you to view the SD in the 16:9 frame if you want. Some options on my Pioneer Elite are "Standard" 4:3 and 16:9 natural wide or cinerama wide or zoom 1 or zoom 2 - your choice.

It does seems a little pulled at first, converting 4:3 to 16:9 but it does fill the screen. HD of course is 16:9 and HD channels will grow. Buying a 16:9 set now is like an investment in the future.

[DarrellP]

Boomtown and Crossing Jordan are also shown in Letterbox format.

Go here (http://www.widemovies.com/lbx.html) for what's on in Letterbox.

[srrobinson2]

My Dish 3000 that I bought back in 97 had this feature, before widescreen TV's were even on the market.

The widescreen feature on the older receivers is only for the on-screen guide display. It has no effect whatsoever on the video content.

[Cyclone]

Geeze, bring this thread out of the grave.

The widescreen feature on the older receivers is only for the on-screen guide display. It has no effect whatsoever on the video content.

I have a 16:9 TV that widescreen feature does not even effec the on screen guide. It does nothing.

[fslove]

You can "stretch" the 4:3 picture out to fill the entire widescreen using features on your television. This will avoid the bars along each side. Currently the E* receiver function does nothing.Actually the Dish 6000 CAN do a several stretch modes. It offers I beleive three stretch modes in HD and Four modes in SD. So you can have the 6000 set to HD mode and stretch 4x3 content to fill the screen of a 16x9 HDTV.

[Lyle_JP]

HBO's "widescreen" on its HD channel is often not as widescreen as it should be. They still pan and scan 2.35:1 films down to 16:9. As I understand it, Showtime does not engage in this practice on their HD channel, making it truly widescreen.