Widescreen VHS

[Zoetermeer]

Just bought a Sony 34XBR910...I was wondering how widescreen VHS tapes work with widescreen TV's like mine (I haven't received it yet so I can't test this). Say I want to watch the Star Wars special edition, which is VHS and I have the widescreen (letterbox) version--will the black bars still appear on top and bottom? Will I have to use zoom mode for the picture to fill the screen, or will I have these bars even in zoom mode? I thought maybe those bars are part of the image so to speak, since it's not anamorphic.

[57U]

The stretch mode will work just like a non-anamorphic DVD. See the FAQ on widescreen stretch modes. Use the stretch that stretches the image vertically and horizontally. I believe it's called "Zoom" on Sonys. If the OAR was 2.35:1, you'll still have some thin black bars above & below the image. If the OAR was 1.85:1 there will be no bars. (I'm pretty sure SW was 2.35:1 - so you'll still have some black bars).

The quality will suffer since you'll be increasing the picture size by a factor of 2, so you may not like the quality... Remember VHS is only 240 lines.

[Zoetermeer]

That kind of stinks. Oh well, all the more reason to look forward to when they release the originals on DVD...will probably be a while.

[paulszpet]

I don't know about the tv that you'll be getting but VHS tapes look so lousy on my HDTV that they are almost unusable. DVDs on the other hand are beautiful!!!
(Hitachi 65S700)

[57U]

One option to make WS VHS (or WS TV) not look so bad is to use the non-linear stretch (wide-zoom on Sony) to stretch the image. This way you don't increase the size of the image as much, but you do get some distortion. I've found this a "compromize" for some programmes, like Enterprise for example.

[brillski]

I have 46" sonyrptv
My vhs rrecordings look great even from 17" tv in bedroom
I use zoom or widezoom
zoom if letterbox
Comcast digital -hd cable