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Posted: 03 May 2018, 16:46 

These are from my memory, I might be a off a little bit but this is how it started (give or take). Sony and Philips developed Compact Disc (CD) and Pulse Code Modulation(PCM). Philips developed the hardware which is a 15bit R2R type DAC chip. Sony came up with the 16 bit PCM sampling. The first CD players had to be modified to down sample the data to 15 bits in order for the Philips DACs to be compatible.

The second generation Philips DACs came out soon after and were true 16 bits. In this second generation, TDA1543s came out and still considered one of the best DAC chips ever designed. These chips are true 16 bit and 44.1 Khz. The S/N ratio isn’t great compared to todays standards but you can stack multiple of these in parallel to significantly improve S/N and dynamic ratio. There are current designs which incorporates 10 to 20 of these DAC chips in parallel. Every time you double the amount of DAC chips in parallel, the S/N improves 3db. So typical 4 or 8 per channel is typical for a 6 to 9db improvement on the S/N ratio. Needless to say, these chips are extremely rare and expensive nowadays since they haven’t been produced for decades. That’s why those exotic DACs cost thousands of dollars.

Later in the game, Burr Brown (now TI) came up with their multi-bit DAC chips. PCM63 was the very first great one. It is a 16 bit chip and some found it the most musical chip every made. PCM 1702 later replaced PCM63. It is based on the PCM63 design but now has 20bits. (HLD-X9/X0) uses these chips one per channel). Again, stacking these chips in parallel yields the best results. PCM1704 further improved with 24 bits. Good Dacs usually have at least 8 in total. Acccuphase DAC which cost $20,000 has 16 of them and perhaps the DAC ever design for CD playback.

Early 2000s, chip manufacturers abandoned multi-bit DACs and make only single bit DACs with extreme upsampling. Currently, there is no multi-bit DACs in production. The last one was PCM1704 from 10 years ago. Current ones employs something called Pulse Width Modulation (PWM) and a filter at the end to create a sine wave with a single bit. The sampling rates are generally in megahertz. The ESS chip admin mentioned here is a single bit chip with some insane oversampling. The 32 bit they talk about is theoretical here. It is by no means a multi-bit DAC but its performance is equivalent of a 32bit chip. All incoming signals are converted to 1 bit PWM, which Sony calls it DSD, then runs through a filter to create sine waves. This way the DAC chip does not need ton of resistors to create a R2R multi-bit ladder network and the cost is way down. The quality heavily depend on the software algorithms used and the filters used at the end. ESS DAC chip uses 8 single bit DACs in parallel (in one chip) to further increase the S/N ratio.

To summarize it all:

To have really high S/N ratio, multiple multi-bit DACs need to be stacked in parallel. Multi-bit DACs like PCM1704 costed something like $40 per chip back in the day (way more in the used market now). These chips are single task only, they need other chips to compliment them such as i2s receiver, up/over sampler and digital filter chips. They output current and need analog circuitry at the end to convert to voltage output. McIntosh MDA1000 is a great example. It uses a custom fpga to upsample all incoming signals to 24bit 768 Khz, uses 8x PCM 1704 in parallel, an excellent current to voltage convertor and am analog smoothing filter. Probably the best DAC ever built along with the Accuphase DACs. These are extremely expensive electronics, just the parts alone are worth a thousand dollars. With the cosmetics, support, r&d and other costs included, these companies charged $8,000-$20, 000 for these DACs.

Now the ESS chip is around $35-60 and it does all that in one chip. Oppo uses two of these. One for the stereo output 2x4 DAC chip configuration and another chip in 8x1 DAC chip configuration for its 7.1 output.

I will write some more later but enough for now I think.

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Posted: 09 May 2018, 18:20 

Some chicken and eggs

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Posted: 21 Sep 2018, 01:58 

Lumagen radiance 2144.

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 Post subject: Re: Searching for a 2144
Posted: 03 Oct 2018, 18:26 

I think you should contact Jim directly and negotiate the price and shipping. I believe the shipping cost is just an estimate. I am not financially afliated with Lumagen, I have no influence or cut in the price. I just do my best to help people. Mention that you got his contact and this information from me. I will also tell him that you will be contacting him. He is very friendly and reasonable. My name is Mahir. His email is jim@lumagen.com. Let me know how it works out.

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Posted: 30 Dec 2018, 06:50 

The way electronics are now I feel they don't last as long.

Only option I can offer is the cheaper one if it dies fast or if you get the more expensive of the ones you are looking at look into getting it fixed.

Sony has always been an issue, but you could possibly look into a part to replace??? Sometimes this is an easy fix for a board or something on newer sets.

I don't want to try to repare it for now, because if I loose my screen, I will have nothing for the next months to see movies...^^
After buying a new one I will try to fix it myself. For now Sony told me it could cost between 25000 yens and 80000 yens to repare it. Then I prefer buy a new screen.

Thank you everyone for your advices !
- I will wait for 6 month for gather money.
- If, during these 6 month I can find a very good condition Kuro for less than 100.000 yens, and if I can check it myself (not on internet), I will take it.
- else, I will take a new screen. I will search about Panasonic also, thank you nissling. Substance, if you says that OLED is not a good idea for dithering, LCD would be better ? I am also concerned about burning on OLED, because hald of my movies are in 4/3 size...


Oleds aren’t true 10 bit displays. To make the illusion they do dithering and other tricks. Some do it better some do worse. On modern material like bluray, 4k etc. it’s unnoticeable. On old stuff, it’s possible only I see it. I have yet to see anyone who is more critical than me on video.

Pros are way too many. Save up your money and get an Oled. You can fix dithering with Lumagen(and many other things).

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Posted: 13 Mar 2019, 09:43 

Smaller values favores video mode deinterlacing and larger values favores film mode deinterlacing.

You need to understand, film material is already progressive full frames later to be interlaced into two fields (even and odd lines) due to the limitations of NTSC. In film mode, deinterlacier finds the matching fields and combines them. It’s a simple operation but cadence needs to be picked correctly for it to work. Technically all film footage should be 3:2 cadence but anamollies exists between edits and film/video mixed footage (tv series, anime, etc)

Video is shot on video cameras which capture images in fields. There are no two matching fields to combine. Deinterlacer double these fields to make up a full frame using interpolation. Basically assumes the missing lines.

I mentioned cadence detection above. When the deinterlacer can’t pick the cadence, it uses video mode (interpolation) even on film material. Typically most deinterlacers will look for 3:2 cadence and if it’s not 3:2, it will apply interpolation to double those fields. Yoi favor video mode in this setting and radiance will revert to video mode more often. This often yields softer picture because you only have half the resolution (one field) to scale up to full resolution. Less combing because interpolation smooths out the jaggies.

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Posted: 25 Mar 2019, 01:14 

My move is June and probably another few months before I put together a working setup. I have a 12x15' storage full of electronics that needs to be moved and setup. Cabling and wiring is probably several miles long. My new place is going to be much smaller (Sqft in LA $$$), I will probably list a ton of stuff for sale in the next months.

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Posted: 14 Apr 2019, 16:48 

Try a cav disc on both of them. 703 might be out of alignment and cross reading on clv discs which causes noise like artifacts

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Posted: 03 May 2019, 14:06 

In a way it's positive that he won't see SW9.

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Posted: 25 May 2019, 21:49 

Yeah, we’re going to need some kind of technical info or this story isn’t of much use. Your friend clearly knew exactly what the issue is, perhaps you can quote him. You’re saying that the TV has a composite video input yet it’s non-functional from the factory. Did your friend build a sync device or an NTSC/PAL converter or flip the pins or what?

I’m sort of surprised Sony didn’t just replace the thing instantly. There’s no reason they should disbelieve your claim and even if they did you guys still have warranty laws over there.

I don’t have any trouble believing that the picture eventually was great. I have a 4K Bravia from 2017 and it is just amazing with LD. People really need to be looking at what new TVs can do before they blow thou$sand$ on boutique boxes. I’m not saying I’ve ever seen those high end scalers in action but I am a total nit picky snob and my main setup is still HD CRT so I’m pretty sure for %90 of LD owners new Sony’s (and probably other makes) will satisfy completely. If I’m not miserable watching any LD setup its probably a good one. :)

Keep telling people current TVs way surpassed almost all of those now obsolete video processors but see many people blow hundreds on them anyway. Expecially those old Faroudja, DVDO and no name boxes are literally door stops now. Unless you have the funds and fortune to find a working Crystalio II or Lumagen Radiance 2144, there is no reason for video processors. They actually degrade video, they are antiquated technology.

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Posted: 25 May 2019, 21:57 

It's a 4 pole 3.5mm headphone phone jack on the TV. Pole 2 has video and Pole 3 has common ground. Pole 1 and 4 have L and R audio respectively. It's a breakout cable not supplied with Sony TVs. it's a composite input and stereo audio on one jack. You don't need an engineer for this.

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Posted: 08 Jun 2019, 04:35 

1- The wrath of Khan
2- The motion picture (I love how grand and epic it is)
3- First contact
4- Undiscovered country
5- Voyage home
6- Search for Spock
7- Final frontier
8- Nemesis
9- Generations
10- Insurrection
11- Star Trek
12- Beyond
13- Into Darkness

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Posted: 14 Jun 2019, 12:49 

Watched I am Mother on Netflix. I really liked it. I generally like these minimalist sci fi films. It is slow, nearly no action and the story is very simple (perhaps stupid too) so it’s not a film for everyone. If you liked Duncan Jones’ Moon, you will probably like this one too.

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Posted: 16 Jun 2019, 01:49 

Hi. I have read this thread with intrigue and am interested in procuring a 2144. I reached out to CurtPalme.com and they were very responsive, but basically told me they have no options for getting a 2144. Does anyone here have a lead on a new or used unit? I know that Substance and Admin (Julien) mentioned that they had direct contact to Lumagen (Jim). Any chance one of you can help me with getting info on a 2144? I am trying to build a setup with an HLD-X0 and really need the 2144 to make it right. Thank you in advance for any help.

Mike


I can get you in contact with Jim. They take trade ins towards their new 4K models time to time. They refurbish these trade ins and offer for sale but typically not listed anywhere. I also use a HLD-X0 with my 2144 and haven't seen better picture from LD on any other setup.

You can email Jim@lumagen.com and mention my name Mahir Derman. PM me your full name to me and I will email Jim to look for your email. I don't make any commissions or benefit from this in any way. You will find 2124/44 owners very friendly and helpful. We will help you with the setup and tweaks later on your journey.

Like audioboyz mentions, your "only" other option is CII if you can find any. CII can be a tad sharper in the expense of combing artifacts. Also it would be solely for LDs as the rest of the hardware is pretty antiquated for anything newer.

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Posted: 23 Jun 2019, 01:35 

Moebius also designed the spacesuit used in Alien.

So both Geiger and Mobius worked on Alien? that's completely awesome!


I recommend watching Jodorowki’s Dune for how that team came up together for Dune but later used on Alien. Ridley Scott was hired after Jodorowski has been dropped off to direct Dune but later replaced by David Lynch. Scott took Giger, O Banon and others to work on Alien.

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Posted: 02 Jul 2019, 11:50 

Not to threadjack, but WTF does this have to do with TV on LaserDisc?
Who knows.
I think this is why it got jacked in the first place :lol:

Did Voyager ever get on Laserdisc or did it stop with DS9? getting slightly back to the topic but these threads... :lol:

First 5 seasons of voyager and ds9 were released in Japan. 60 episodes of ds9 were released in the US. There is a “captains” themed set in the US, also released in Pal in Europe, which includes one episode from tos,tng, voy and ds9. That is the only Voy episode for the US region on LD.

Voy and Ds9 didn’t make it to Blu-ray. There is one ds9 episode as an extra on the tos season 3 Blu-ray set. Tos Blu-rays allow you to watch the series with original and enhanced special effects. Tng Blu-ray are only available in enhanced special effects.

If you want the original effects and original soundtrack in lossless mono (dolby surround for tng) then the Lds are the best way to watch them. All st lds look phenomenal for ld btw. Blurays have the original soundtracks as well but only in lossy dolby digital 2.0.

If you don’t mind the new remixed 5.1 soundtracks then Blu-ray are the best. The enhanced effects are very well made and don’t freak you out like in star wars se.

They are also available on prime and netflix from the same masters as the Blu-rays but the lossy nature of the streaming puts them even a step less than the lds.

Lds are super expensive though. You can probably find good deals on Japanese sets but shipping will cost an arm and a leg. Blu-ray sets are like $10 a season nowadays.

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Posted: 19 Jul 2019, 14:08 

You made me power up my LD setup after like a good 8 months of no use :)

Here is my current setup:

HLD-X0(composite) - Radiance 2144(genlock auto) - Radiance 4449 (9Ghz input, 18 Ghz output, genlock off) - Sony XBR-A1E 65” OLED (18 Ghz input)


I used Star Trek : Borg Collective, disk 2 for the test.

I played the disc for 20 mins uninterrupted to warm up the system then tried pause, FF and RW.

Pause and play immediately works perfect, video resumes with sound. If I pause and play several times repeatedly then I lose the signal for a second or two (black screen) then video and sound resumes.

FF and RW works fine if I click the button for a second or less ( a few frame FF or RW), if I hold the button down for more than a second for continuous FF or RW for many frames) then I lose the signal up to 3 or 4 seconds (black screen again) then video and sound resumes normal. My player is single side only so I can’t test side changes.

I turned off genlock on 2144 (4449 was already off). I tried the same test above and lost picture after a couple seconds of FF and it never resumed again, I had to power cycle the 2144. I tried genlock on 4449 and 2144 and it was the same outcome.

I recommend genlock auto on 2144 for sure. 4449 genlock on or off didn’t change anything. I keep mine off.

To be honest, I never really used FF or RW ever before. I simply start the disc and play to the end. With the above settings, losing the picture for a second while FF and RW isn’t bad in my opinion.

ADV7800 chipset in 2144 already has a frame based TBC, weak, poor time base, nonstandard signal support. Adding another device wouldn’t help it. The issue is in the dropped frames that occur during FF and RW which cause clock changes on the HDMI. Up to a second FF and RW seems to be within the compensation of the genlock function on the 2144 but not anything beyond.

I and some others had issues on 4449 on earlier firmware with genlock(which was ported from the older Radiance), especially on Sony Tv/projectors ( and some other brand). Newer 4K displays with HDMI 2.0 are a lot more picky with the clock changes and have difficulty handling dropped frames which causes these clock changes. Lumagen rewrote the genlock code on the 4xxxx models to handle this and it works great now.

For 2144 to work right with the issues you are having, they would likely have to re-write the genlock for the older Radiance units. I can tell you this is extremely unlikely to happen. The new Radiance Pro and older Radiance units are on different codes, it isn’t easy to port codes between them. It would take major effort to write new code for 2144 and it makes no financial sense on a discontinued product.

Try genlock auto on 2144 and report, let’s go from there.

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Posted: 27 Jul 2019, 00:16 

Twice a year barnes and noble and criterion online %50 sales, that’s 4 sales a year. Just buy it in one of these sales and it will be $100.

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Posted: 06 Aug 2019, 04:15 

Highly dependent on how revealing the rest of your setup is. The player alone isn’t worth it.

I would start with the best display you can buy. Oleds are the way to go on modern displays and last generation pioneer or panasonic plasmas for used stuff. A modern Oled will also benefit any other format you may watch. The infinite contrast is simply amazing.

If you can add a Lumagen Radiance 2144 or Crystalio II, you might like the video on any ordinary player. Radiance will improve all other source excluding 4K, CII is antiquated and good for LD only.

You can always take it further with a hld x0 and reach LD nirvana but as I said upgrading others components will probably give you more improvements than the player alone and they will benefit all formats.

I know these aren’t cheap but the last %10 improvement is always an exponential cost add on.

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Posted: 13 Sep 2019, 11:57 

Oh boy

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Posted: 21 Sep 2019, 13:25 

Refund their money and they keep their discs. That simple. Then you hope that they will again buy from you in the future.

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Posted: 22 Sep 2019, 15:04 

Correct. I agree with everyone above. Buyer b is a thief. His dignity and honor is worth $150. For $150 he will make us talk s**t about him.


I meant the seller should ask for %10 less for the inconvenience. Buyer B should pay that. Rein o is right, you should expose him so we know.

Julien you did nothing wrong. You couldn’t have known this. I don’t believe buyer b will pay so unfortunately seller will come to understand this.

Seller should have asked the items to be returned to him, inspect then ship to the right buyer after clearing the money. He sounds like a honest man and went to enthusiastic about fixing his mistake. It is sad the buyer b doesn’t have the same class.

I would say buyer b name goes to cavaet list.

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 Post subject: Re: HDVS Demo disc on eBay
Posted: 04 Oct 2019, 19:48 

If the seller had the player for sale along with the disc then there would be a lot of interest. I got into HD-VMD discs at one point. I am sure most of you have no idea what these are. No they are not UMD discs for the Sony PSP. Believe it or not, HD-VMD was a third option while Blu-ray and HD-DVD were in war. They used regular DVD technology with more layers to make the cost low. There were 2 models released and about 20-25 titles before the format died. I missed out on one auction for a player and about 8-10 titles. I won the second auction which only had 2 titles included. I don’t remember what I paid but it was a couple of hundred or more for both auctions with many bidders. Since then these players showed up for sale many times with no discs included and they all failed to sell even for $25. You got nothing to play it on, it has no value. The same for the players, no discs to play then no value. I have been looking for these discs for over 5 years now and so far found none.

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Posted: 25 Oct 2019, 16:46 

I think you are a little confused. DVDO was owned by Anchor Bay Technologies for a while and at that era they made consumer video processors. All DVDO products use ABT chips for this purpose. Faroudja also handled their processing in house. So all their products use FLi chips.

Pms (crystalio) and lumagen use of the shelf parts and build their products. That’s why you will see different parts on different products.

All these were talked about and discussed many times. I will repeat the summary one more time here.

Lumagen 2124/44 and Crystalio II vps-3300/3800 are the only video processors that will give you the next league performance. Your image will significantly improve. Even with less than 20/20 vision eyes you can tell the difference. Lumagen 2144 is virtually noise and artifact free. It is much purer and truer to source. CII can be adjusted to be noticeably sharper in the expanse of artifacts. It is older and buggier. The hardware is too old for anything remotely modern like Blu-rays.

Other video processors(including older Lumagen) will need 20/20 vision to tell subtle differences if any. You can use other processors to improve certain areas but not all like the above two. Lumagen processors will give you the absolute best scaling and color correction (if you have tools to calibrate). Dvdo vp20 and onwards will give you the best progressive scan image on video material but terrible in scaling.


All Faroudja and other video processors should be avoided. All dvdo vp20 and older should be avoided. They are simply too antiquated. They don’t do any processing right except maybe aspect ratio management. With these not only you won’t improve your image but actually you will lose resolution. They simply bob and weave deinterlacing lines. This will work on static images but will cause loss of resolution on motion. Faroudja shut down way before per pixel adaptive deinterlacing so none of the Faroudja stuff has decent processing per today’s standards. Dvdo vp 20 and higher got abt102 chip which has per pixel adaptive deinterlacing. (Optional on vp20 and 30, std on 50).
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