# Solved: HDTV: Why am I suddenly getting a smaller picture with black bars on all fou



## wgreene

Just recently I noticed that widescreen DVD pictures no longer fill the width of my screen. Similarly, 4:3 DVD pictures no longer fill the height of my screen. In other words, in both cases I'm now seeing a smaller picture than before, a picture _entirely_ surrounded -- that is, on all four sides -- by a black border. Normally, of course, widescreen DVD pictures, regardless of their aspect ratios, should fill the width of a TV screen, and 4:3 DVD pictures should extend fully from top to bottom.

Never before have I had a problem with DVD pictures fitting the screen. I'm currently watching a live broadcast of ESPN HD and there is no problem at all with the picture fitting the screen. As I said, the problem only occurs when I play DVD's of _any_ format. (For what it's worth, my HDTV is a five-year old Samsung P5685W DLP TV, and I'm playing my DVD's on a SONY PlayStation 3.)

I figure there must be a very simple solution to this problem. Perhaps it's merely a matter of changing a setting. In the meantime though, I've become frustrated trying to figure out how to fix it. Using my Samsung TV remote, I went to Picture>Size and got only two options: Wide and 4:3. Whenever I view the smaller widescreen picture and select 4:3, the widescreen ratio remains correct. So, naturally, when I select Wide the widescreen picture distorts.

I would greatly appreciate hearing from anyone who might have the answer to my problem.

Thank you.


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## telecom69

With Dvd's, I would think its down to what format they were in when made,there are usually quite a number of screen settings you can use on your tv to get one that suits ...

Wondering if its anything to do with the fact they are being played back via a playstation instead of a dvd player ? it is just a thought by the way ....


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## snakeeyes072

I run into this issue alot at my job, mostly with cable boxes though. 

It usually has to do with one of two things. The TV or the input device.

When you are watching television programs are they being being sent to your TV over Component cables or HDMI, same question for the PS3.

Also, have you noticed a correlation between the recent PS3 update and the change in video playback? If you have, the update may have reset the up-scaling option in the PS3's DVD settings.


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## Ratboy

wgreene,

According to the manual (if I got the right one) for your set, when connected to Component 1 or 2 you will only get the choice for *Wide* and *4:3* picture sizes (see image below).

If snakeeyes072's suggestion doesn't fix the issue and if your PS3 is connected to *Component*, try *AVIn* or *HMDI* instead to get more Picture Size options (i.e. Zoom)










http://www.crutchfield.com/S-iI6LlT...g-HL-P5685W.html?tab=other_items&viewAll=True


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## wgreene

Thank you all very much for your suggestions.

My cable television programming is being sent over a component cable. My PS3 is connected via HDMI, which offers me only the 4:3 and Wide options.

Regarding the recent PS3 upgrade, my unit has never been connected to the Internet, and I haven't tried to upgrade it using any of the three available methods.


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## JustinPS

Your PS3 has many options for viewing DVD's as well, including overrides for playback size. Go to the Settings menu option on your PS3's main page, and go to BD/DVD Settings, and see if there are any options there. Also look at the Video Settings in the Settings menu.

Sorry I can't be more specific, but my PS3's been broken for a few months now and I've forgotten what the exact options say


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## wgreene

JustinPS said:


> Your PS3 has many options for viewing DVD's as well, including overrides for playback size. Go to the Settings menu option on your PS3's main page, and go to BD/DVD Settings, and see if there are any options there. Also look at the Video Settings in the Settings menu.
> 
> Sorry I can't be more specific, but my PS3's been broken for a few months now and I've forgotten what the exact options say


Thank you very much for the advice. I'll give it a try.


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## wgreene

wgreene said:


> Thank you very much for the advice. I'll give it a try.


Well, now I'm _really_ confused!

I played around with the PS3 settings in hopes of solving my problem. Unfortunately, all that was to no avail as the problem remains.

When I inserted the brand new _Gone with the Wind_ Blu-Ray (4:3 format), once again I got the smaller picture which does not extend to the top and bottom of the screen. However, when I inserted several older 4:3 format DVD's, they all displayed the correct, larger picture. Why would that be? Especially since all 4:3 films, _including_ the new_ Gone with the Wind_ play perfectly in my bedroom on my Vizio HDTV and Samsung Blu-Ray player!

All widescreen DVD's, Blu-Ray and regular, also play correctly in my bedroom, but they still don't play properly on my Samsung TV and PS3 in my living room. I find it odd that the Warning and Menu screens display fully, top-to-bottom, but when I press Play the movie reverts to the smaller picture format.

As I mentioned before, this problem arose only a few days ago. Before that, all widescreen DVD's displayed properly in my living room. That's what I find baffling. I figure it ought to be easy to get back to the proper screen setting.

In the meantime, I hope I haven't gotten my PS3 Video settings out-of-whack. Maybe there's a way to return them all to default. Perhaps it's worth it to go back and fool around some more with the settings. Maybe I'll get lucky yet. It still seems to me that a setting must be wrong, either on my PS3 or on my TV. Anyhow, I'm certainly not gonna give up trying.


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## wgreene

I just tried three more 4:3 Blu-Rays and none of them filled the screen from top to bottom. Therefore, it's obvious that the problem with 4:3 ratio DVD's is only with Blu-Ray. The standard 4:3 DVD's I've tried have all displayed properly.

On the other hand, as I mentioned earlier, all widescreen DVD's, both Blu-Ray and standard, are problematic.


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## wgreene

Hallelujah! It's working now!

I fiddled with the Blu-Ray settings again. This time I went to Display Settings>Video Output Settings and accepted 1080i, and now all is back to normal. I guess that somehow the setting had inadvertently been changed away from 1080i. Does anyone know how this could have happened? Anyhow, the important thing is that everything is back as it should be. Thank you all for your help!:up:


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## snakeeyes072

Just saw you got it working. No Problem!


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## wgreene

snakeeyes072 said:


> Just saw you got it working. No Problem!


:up::up:


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