I know these units are overkill to stick in a chain, purely to watch Laserdiscs. I've already had the "riot act" read to me on another forum (unsolicited and without any knowledge of my my budget, interests or intentions). But these are the only units consistently recommended as the best for laserdisc viewing.

My LD player is the Panasonic LX-900, the display is a Vizo 4K V505-H1 (yes it's a cheapy 4K, it's in my game room for casual watching if I don't wanna impose on the missus in the living room ;P ).

I also have a Radiance XE-3D which provides a noticeable (but not great) improvement to LDs.

This is my current chain:

LD >> XE (composite) >> Display

In my limited knowledge of the subject, here are my 3 options for a chain:

LD >> Crystalio >> Display
LD >> Crystalio >> Radiance XE (scaling, CMS) >> Display
LD >> 2124 >> Display (I don't think the XE needs to be involved in this chain, but please advise)

Would any of those examples provide a noticeable improvement (i'm not looking for 4K quality here) to the set up I already have (LD >> XE >> Display)?

If so, considering I can get the Crystalio for almost 1/2 the price of the Lumagen, which one would be the better bang for the buck?

Looking forward to your expert observations and suggestions.

Well in my humble opinion it would definitely have to be your third option, but the best member to advise on this is undoubtedly @substance - hopefully he’ll be along shortly to give you far better guidance than I can. Whilst its a 2144 that I currently use I find all formats benefit from passing through the Lumagen and not exclusively just LD.

Having compared both and if I had to choose only one I prefer the Crystalio II over the Lumagen (I owned 2144 not 2124 but same thing just 4k output). My reason is I like a touch of added sharpness which the C2 can do with the built in Faroudja True Life enhancement. In my opinion without this LD just looks dull and lifeless. My friend substance will surely chime in and tell me I'm wrong lol, he prefers a more natural picture to the artificial Faroudja enhancement so lots of this will be preference.

If you think you are being extreme my setup is actually best of all worlds (and also gets lots of hate lol) -

Eval Board (comb filter from 2124) 480i -> Crystalio II (deinterlacing, NR, and Faroudja enhancement) 720p -> HTPC w/ MadVR doing NGU (A.I) upscale to 4096x2160p feeding my JVC RS-2000 with panamorph anamorphic lens.

This is a good update to my old old posts.

I had looked for the best possible LD playback many years ago, tried several players and video processors and I have settled to Pioneer HLD-X0 as the ultimate player, Pioneer CLD-97 as the best dual sided player (I have the McIntosh clone) and Lumagen Radiance 2144 as the best video processor.

Since then I have not spend any time exploring (cheaper or otherwise) alternatives. I have often talked about the chipsets and technologies used in the equipment I tested. Some of the forum members took my (and their own )findings and went much further. They found (again cheaper or otherwise) alternatives with similar chipset or technologies.

Peter spent a lot of time in this and went beyond where my research ended. While I still believe my setup can not be bested, I have an open mind to other alternatives. For those who visit my old posts should also look into newer posts from Peter and others.

Closing the update here and back to answering your question. I will go with Lumagen Radiance 2124 for two reasons and these two reasons stood out to me immediately when I compared the two. I sold both of my Crystalio IIs soon after I got my first 2144 and never looked back.

1- The comb filter in the Crystalio II is very good but produces check-boarding artifacts. Although minor, once I knew how to spot the artifacts, my eyes were always drawn to them. Lumagen Radiance 2144 comb filter is artifact free.

2- Lumagen Radiance 2144 uses the revised version of the Gennum VXP chip in the Crystalio II. Both versions fail to stay in film mode where they should. This creates progressive scan artifacts. In an effort to fix this, Lumagen added a separate film mode which totally bypassed the Gennum VXP chip and handled the deinterlacing in the FPGA. This FPGA film mode produces the best deinterlacing for film material. PMS abandoned the video processor market a couple years after they released Crystalio II and never produced any firmware updates to fix the deinterlacing bug. Crytalio II also includes a Faroudja FL2312 chip which you can select in the menu for deinterlacing. This is an older chipset and failed all my deinterlacing tests but passed few. If you can live with some progressive scan artifacts, it has the nice bonus of DCDi enhancements. DCDi adds a nice touch of sharpness to LD (only in custom mode where you dial in settings yourself). I do agree with Peter on this. It really works for LD and probably only one to do so. But for me it wasn’t worth giving up the artifact free Y/C separation and the deinterlacing in the Lumagen Radiance 2144.

Note: 2124 and 2144 are identical except 2144 has the newer HDMI chipsets which has enough bandwitdh for 4k60 in 4:2:0.

Note 2: My current setup is Pioneer HLD-X0 -> Lumagen Radiance 2144 (scaling to 1080p) -> Lumagen Radiance Pro 5348 (scaling to 2160p) -> Sony XBR-77A9G 77” OLED TV.

Man, guys, thank you so much for the concise opinions/observations and for some of the more "technical" information.

@laserfanhld-gb, I was leaning that way also (and may still go that route), just gotta see what kind of deal my friend can give me (he owns a business that installs/maintains the video solutions in the casino sportsbooks here in Vegas, but also does high-end theater install for consumers. He has access to all manner of equipment and is obviously willing to cut me a deal since we go to church together also and his and my wife are besties). I've asked his opinion on the matter, but he seems to have become numb and indifferent and just tells me to pick the one I like and/or can afford. :\

@pbiancardi, yeah, I thought I was crazy! LOL! Your observation of the "added touch of sharpness" that the Crystalio can provide has basically tipped the scales for me. This is exactly what I am looking for, but didn't know which unit would (if any) could provide that. Thank you so much for thinking of mentioning it! I was leaning heavily towards the 2124, regardless of the price, but now I am super-curious about the Crystalio.

Aaaaaaand... @substance. It becomes immediately obvious, after doing a Google search for "best way to view LDs", that your knowledge is very respected (I love that "Always trust substance" thread. LOL).
I understand that sometimes you have to make a compromise, and your balanced view on the two units is ENORMOUSLY appreciated. I probably don't have as discerning and eye as you, but I know what you mean that, once you notice something, it's almost impossible to "un-see". I'm going to have to see if I can finagle a preview install of the Crystalio to see how distracting this artefacting can be. If it's too much, then I will have to forego my personal preference of a "touch of sharpness" and go with the 2124. If not, then the Crystalio it is.

I know the 2124 will provide a much improved experience no matter the material, but I'm just not that big of a videophile. I just want to squeeze a better picture out of my LDs, which is why I said "strictly for Laserdiscs". Obviously, the improvement it would bring to my entire little set-up would just be massive frosting on the cake...I'm not going to deny that.

Whichever way you eventually choose to go, please keep us informed of the results you achieve

My lumagen 2144 and stay in film mode for sure (compare to Crytallio), but the film mode has deinterlace faults in nearly all movies.
That's why I always use it in Video mode. Which gives better result than Crystallio in my opinion, but not so far. (espacially if you watch anime, the crystallio has a super render.)

Alrighty. So my buddy is going to hook me up and try to dig up both a 2124 and a Crystalio so I can try them both and he'll just try to sell the one I don't chose. Awesome!

He already got a hold of a Crystalio and set it up for me. No fancy 12hr tweaking session or anything. He just set up some basics.

Ummm...WOW! I know most of you guys have already experienced the improvement a unit like this can provide, but this was my first.

Long story short, I tested with the Blade Runner Director's Cut LD and the improvement was more than subtle. I actually stuck the DVD (NOT THE BLURAY) from my bluray set and played it on the second input of my TV and flipped back and forth. The picture quality was almost identical (to my eyes). I called my wife in to tell me which one was the DVD and which was the LD and, interestingly, what she mentioned was that she couldn't believe that one of them was the same LD she's seen before. She was quite impressed by the improvement also.

I guess I will to fiddle around quite a bit to get that "added touch of sharpness", which I'm not seeing now...not that I'm complaining.

All I can say is that, if the 2124 provides an even better picture, I would be floored.

When you do try a 2124, just be sure to have Mrs Technomancer standing close by with the smelling salts then!

You're lucky your wife takes an interest. Mine usually walks past the telly just as the words ZOMBIE HOLOCAUST or whatever appear on the screen in giant letters, shakes her head and simply says "For f**k sake..." before walking off.

WOW I'm not alone, I don't do as many Zombie Holocaust films but its sort of the same.

ROFL!!!!!

Well, that certainly sounds promising! Can't wait to see if he can find one soon.

You guys are killing me with the wife stories. I actually mentioned what she said because she's generally more like what you guys describe, although she does try to show some interest in my hobbies. She just looked genuinely impressed with the improvement. But yeah, now she's asking me if I plan on turning off the LD player or just running into the ground in short order.

Once you decide which you like better I know a guy giving a sick deal on $99,999.00 worth of LDs, I can totally hook you up....

Even at a 99% discount, I couldn't afford it. LOL. Unless he sells some individually.

On a side note, referring to Crystalio settings for LDs, I saw on another post that you offered to send a member "what we arrived at years ago as the best". It said to contact you through FBook, but I don't have an account on practically any social media (too much digital AIDS in those crap holes). Any chance you could kindly post them here, or send me a PM?

Thanx