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Last night, SWMBO commented on the poor quality of dark scenes in some movies.
I suspect it's simply the way the movies are mastered on the original DVD since the crappy picture varies quite a bit from movie to movie. However, I'm willing to consider it may be the video card.
I currently use a GTX-1050 (2gb ram) in the home theater box. Would a video card with more RAM resolve the problem we're seeing? If so, I'm looking at getting a 1050ti (twice as much memory as the current card, and still doesn't need an external power connector).
".45 ACP - because shooting twice is just silly" - JSOP, 2010
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You can never have too much ammo - unless you're swimming, or on fire. - JSOP, 2010
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When you pry the gun from my cold dead hands, be careful - the barrel will be very hot. - JSOP, 2013
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Before spending money on new hardware, try downloading some calibration software for the display. Assuming you (or SWMBO  ) aren't colour-blind, you should be able to ensure that your screen is giving you the best picture that it can give.
Win10 has built-in calibration software; I assume that similar software is available for Linux.
(You can also spend money on external calibration hardware, if you've got money to burn)
Freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two make four. If that is granted, all else follows.
-- 6079 Smith W.
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I don't think it's a matter of calibration. The TV is a fairly new 75-inch 4k unit, and the 1050 video card has HDMI 2.0.
Non-video stuff looks fine, and even HD youtube stuff looks good. I still think it's just poor mastering of the movies (most look fine), but SWMBO doesn't seem to be convinced. Like I said, it only happens on dark scenes - you can even see the pixels changing their blackness for given scenes (this is why I think it's the way the movie was mastered).
I was just wondering if more RAM would mitigate it. I don't want to get too much video card because of heat issues (that's why I picked the 1050 to begin with instead of the 1050Ti). Hell, I don't even want to replace the existing card if I don't have to.
Before you ask, when I rip movies to a hard drive, I do not use any compression (to save space on the drive).
".45 ACP - because shooting twice is just silly" - JSOP, 2010
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You can never have too much ammo - unless you're swimming, or on fire. - JSOP, 2010
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When you pry the gun from my cold dead hands, be careful - the barrel will be very hot. - JSOP, 2013
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Have you tried fiddling with the TV's settings to help with this? I would think you will have more luck with the TV settings than with buying a new video card, after all digital is digital if you know what I mean.
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The TV itself is fine. HD and 4K stuff from the DVD player, and TV shows (over our satellite connection) look good. None of them play through the HTPC box though. I'm thinking the standard def movies being stretched over a 75-inch screen could be a factor. That's why I was asking.
".45 ACP - because shooting twice is just silly" - JSOP, 2010
-----
You can never have too much ammo - unless you're swimming, or on fire. - JSOP, 2010
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When you pry the gun from my cold dead hands, be careful - the barrel will be very hot. - JSOP, 2013
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John Simmons / outlaw programmer wrote: I'm thinking the standard def movies being stretched over a 75-inch screen could be a factor.
That could be the TV's interpolation/smoothing to reduce pixelation.
Large black areas are also problematic when the TV is set to adapt to ambient lighting. You might try turning that off and see if it has any effect.
Software Zen: delete this;
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I think you hit on it with your last paragraph. I had forgotten about that but I have seen it cause problems in the past.
"They have a consciousness, they have a life, they have a soul! Damn you! Let the rabbits wear glasses! Save our brothers! Can I get an amen?"
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These are DVDs and not blue-ray, correct? If you are watching DVDs, then this is probably more due to the resolution SD trying to be interpreted to HD. DVDs are only capable of 720 x 480 pixels per frame (SD). If the system is trying to compensate and go to HD, the system will try to replace missing pixels with colors of existing pixels resulting in darker than normal dark scenes. That also may explain why the results are inconsistent from movie to movie. I don't believe this is a hardware issue, but more of a configuration issue.
When you are dead, you won't even know that you are dead. It's a pain only felt by others.
Same thing when you are stupid.
modified 19-Nov-21 21:01pm.
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Donathan.Hutchings wrote: more of a configuration issue.
But where? I have no idea where to try to fix this.
".45 ACP - because shooting twice is just silly" - JSOP, 2010
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You can never have too much ammo - unless you're swimming, or on fire. - JSOP, 2010
-----
When you pry the gun from my cold dead hands, be careful - the barrel will be very hot. - JSOP, 2013
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I found this page:
https://lifehacker.com/how-to-get-better-picture-quality-from-your-home-theate-1700412363
I'm going to try these settings and see if it helps (CP's automatic URL formatting doesn't seem to be working today).
".45 ACP - because shooting twice is just silly" - JSOP, 2010
-----
You can never have too much ammo - unless you're swimming, or on fire. - JSOP, 2010
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When you pry the gun from my cold dead hands, be careful - the barrel will be very hot. - JSOP, 2013
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Cool. I found this page as well, but not sure if it will be of any help. How do I setup my NVIDIA based graphics card to work with my HDTV?
I've run into problems like this before with my home built HTPC. It was either the graphics driver settings or the DVD-player (software) settings.
When you are dead, you won't even know that you are dead. It's a pain only felt by others.
Same thing when you are stupid.
modified 19-Nov-21 21:01pm.
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I would advise you to pay special attention to the part of the article regarding "RGB Limited" vs. "full-range RGB". Back in the day, television signal black levels rode at something called "setup" ( 7.5 out of 100 IRE or 16 out of 255 levels in digital terms). The purpose was to keep the video signal from interfering with retrace blanking levels, horizontal sync and other TV stuff. A black level of 0 came to be called "negative black". Anyway, flash forward to today, many devices automatically compensate for this archaic "setup" by raising black levels going from digital to analog and pushing them down going the other way. Sometimes, this will happen unnecessarily and sometimes it can happen more than once. This results in either super-crushed, murky-looking blacks or, alternatively, smokey, grey-looking blacks, lacking detail in both cases. This might be what you and SWMBO are experiencing.
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I have Directv at home and I see this often in broadcast movies. I have attributed it to digital artifacts from the compression. This connection goes from the satellite tuner to a receiver and then to a TV so there is no computer involved, per se. I don't think you will see any difference with a different video card. As an experiment, try to play the movie through a different TV and video card and see how it looks. Then try a different monitor with your existing computer and card and see if that is any different. In other words, try swapping one component at a time and see what changes. If nothing ever does then the issue is likely in the movie itself.
"They have a consciousness, they have a life, they have a soul! Damn you! Let the rabbits wear glasses! Save our brothers! Can I get an amen?"
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Did you know that "Swmbo" means "Swimwear" in Zulu?
- I would love to change the world, but they won’t give me the source code.
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Put some foil between the antennae or smack it on the side. This fixed things in the olden days. 
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Nice "Rumpole of the Bailey" reference. But I do wish all of you posters would stop using acronyms. It does not take much longer, and is better communication.
By the way, I used to watch that show all of the time. I strongly recommend it.
Stamp out acronyms.
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I suspect the problem with dark scenes has numerous factors. Others have commented on settings and video quality, to which I can't add anything relevant.
However, I upgraded my video card in 2017 to play Skyrim -- my old card (basic card, ~$60 USD) was not handling the job and the play was jerky. I upgraded to a better card with more RAM and faster components -- the difference in Skyrim was remarkable.
Of greater substance, I also noticed that my system, overall, was faster and the display was crisper. At first I assumed it was the RAM (which does make a difference), but later research appears to indicate the higher quality (and speed) components are the real game changers.
One article (on Tom's Hardware, IIRC) said that RAM was not the problem -- unless you don't have enough. If an application requires 2 GB of VRAM, adding 10 GB won't make any difference. But if you have 1.5 GB, it will.
Unless you're doing highest end gaming, no need to buy the best card. I purchased the previous year's "very good card" at a considerable discount off the original price, and have been pleased with it.
I expect that if you're watching movies, a 4 GB card is sufficient. Please note this is a personal opinion that I cannot directly back up with hard facts. If you buy a new card, you'll need to do some research -- anything I researched is 1.5 years out of date.
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BryanFazekas wrote: I expect that if you're watching movies, a 4 GB card is sufficient.
I have a 2gb card.
When I was gaming, I was constantly chasing hardware (never using the best, but always at least 1 step behind the current "new thing" because prices were lower). I got to the point that I was no longer interested in chasing the hardware, and so I stopped gaming. I was just wondewring if changing to a video card with more RAM would address the issue. When we had a smaller TV (55 inches) with my current video card, I don't recall there being this problem. With a larger TV, I'm sure that it would magnify problems that may have gone unnoticed before.
I'm going to try the adjustments I found to see if we can mitigate the issues we see - I really don't want to just throw money at it unless there's a guarantee that it would fix the problems.
".45 ACP - because shooting twice is just silly" - JSOP, 2010
-----
You can never have too much ammo - unless you're swimming, or on fire. - JSOP, 2010
-----
When you pry the gun from my cold dead hands, be careful - the barrel will be very hot. - JSOP, 2013
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John Simmons / outlaw programmer wrote: When I was gaming, I was constantly chasing hardware (never using the best, but always at least 1 step behind the current "new thing" because prices were lower).
Some years back I worked with a younger, single guy who was into gaming. He purchased the newest video card every 6 months ... something like $600 to $800 a pop. All the video cards I've purchased in my life add up to what he spent on 1 card.
My current card works quite well so I'm not chasing hardware. I'm also not buying newer games to avoid that treadmill (Skyrim with mods is plenty to occupy the down moments when I really have no interest in thinking).
My guess is that a card with more RAM than 2 GB will make a difference, but that's just a semi-educated guess, based upon personal anecdotes and your comment about having a larger TV. Not that you need my agreement, but it makes sense to try adjustments first. You can always buy a better card later.
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I think the TV plays a part.
My Sony 4k monitor / tv is "blacker" than the 2K HP monitors.
The Windows settings for HDR and WCG content target a specific "monitor" / tv; not the display card.
LED is "brighter" than LCD (IMO), etc.
"(I) am amazed to see myself here rather than there ... now rather than then".
― Blaise Pascal
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Reduced a 7.5 hour data pull/import SQL job from 7.5 hours to 20 minutes.
".45 ACP - because shooting twice is just silly" - JSOP, 2010
-----
You can never have too much ammo - unless you're swimming, or on fire. - JSOP, 2010
-----
When you pry the gun from my cold dead hands, be careful - the barrel will be very hot. - JSOP, 2013
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And staff now hates the new guy.
"It is easy to decipher extraterrestrial signals after deciphering Javascript and VB6 themselves.", ISanti[ ^]
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Everyone seems happy (on the outside, at least). It was an onerous operation that we had taken steps to do once a week until someone complained that they needed the data refreshed every day. Me and a DBA sat down and started looking hard at what was going on, and that's when I noticed that we were pulling almost twice as many records as we needed to.
I'm a hero today, but tomorrow, I'll revert back to being the FNG. Glory only lasts until the next bug surfaces.
".45 ACP - because shooting twice is just silly" - JSOP, 2010
-----
You can never have too much ammo - unless you're swimming, or on fire. - JSOP, 2010
-----
When you pry the gun from my cold dead hands, be careful - the barrel will be very hot. - JSOP, 2013
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They all now need to work on their things to make it faster. How can they, even remotely, like you?
"It is easy to decipher extraterrestrial signals after deciphering Javascript and VB6 themselves.", ISanti[ ^]
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