HD LCD TV.....in black and white?!

DrZiplock

A little help would be appreciated if a few of your folks could spare it...

A day or so ago I went out and purchased this fine TV. This is the first TV I've bought in 6 years or so. It's replacing an old Sony Wega 20inch.

Now, I get it home, take it out, hook it up...great. TV looks great and the cable guys are coming over in the next few days to swap out my digital cable box for an HD upgrade.

Here's the issue...

The DVD player on my home theater system is old (6 years as well). It doesn't do the fancy pants component video. Either a one line video out (hello there yellow wire) or S-Video.

I went to watch a DVD last night and much to my dismay...it will only register in a very sloppy black and white. I get that I may have to bite the bullet on this one and head back to the store to get myself an S-Video hook up because the player is old school.

However, what the hell am I supposed to do with the Wii? It's the same audio/visual hook ups as my DVD player...

What am I missing? What other parts do I need to make my pretty new TV do more than just be a TV?

Ganluan

First off, you should definitely get the component cables for your Wii. This will allow you to display in 480p (and this works for Gamecube games that support it as well), and give you a much cleaner picture. The Wii looks pretty shitty with the regular cables on an HDTV.

As far as the black and white, it could be a problem with the composite inputs on the TV itself, or the player itself. If you hook the Wii up to it, is it displaying in B&W as well? If so, it's either a menu setting you need to change for the composite input, or you may need to return the TV.

Good choice on the TV by the way!

DrZiplock

You'll have to forgive my utter lack of knowledge for this kind of stuff...

Alright...component cables for the Wii. I have a set of component cables, I think...(green, blue, red, etc..?). Currently they are sitting on my floor looking expensive. Though, it sounds like you're saying there are Wii specific component cables to go get. I'm just using whatever was in the Wii box.

As far as I can regarding the black and white... It's happening because I'm only using one video line from the DVD player or the Wii to the TV, and that's because I don't appear to have any options to do otherwise (save for S-Video on the DVD player)...which still leaves the Wii stranded in B&W land.

Thanks for the help, and yea..I'm pretty psyched about the TV even with the current issues.

Balefuego

you can't hook up composite video to component hookups. It sounds like that is what you are trying to do, the tv should have a seperate composite in.

And yeah there are component cables availible for the Wii which will let you take advantage of the progressive scan.

Ganluan

Balefuego wrote: »

you can't hook up composite video to component hookups. It sounds like that is what you are trying to do, the tv should have a seperate composite in.

And yeah there are component cables availible for the Wii which will let you take advantage of the progressive scan.

Yeah, this sounds like your problem. Here's the deal:

Composite input typically has 3 colors, Yellow (the picture), Red and White (Stereo Sound).

Component has 5, Green/Red/Blue (the picture), Red and White (Stereo Sound).

If you try to plug the yellow picture cable from your DVD player into one of the component inputs, you'll be missing colors completely, which will cause what you're seeing.

Your TV should have composite inputs, which will have the 3 I mentioned above. You'll just want to plug the yellow input into one of them.

As far as component cables, unless something changed they aren't provided with the Wii, but you can order them from Nintendo or buy them in stores like Best Buy. They are specific to the Wii because they need to connect to the Wii's proprietary A/V jack.

Oh and by the way, unless you're going to replace your DVD player I'd definitely get the S-Video cable anyway. It's a big jump in quality over composite.

Balefuego

yes, stryker's post is far more helpful

DrZiplock

Apparently the TV has 2 composite in hook ups.

So I'm thinking that I just missed them while I was looking on the back of the TV and that if I hook the Wii and the DVD player up to them, I should be good to go (for now). Looks like I'll be heading home at lunch to test that theory.

I'll certainly be taking a look at the component Wii cables, thanks for the info. TV also has a "game mode" or whatever..I'll play around with that too.

What really sucks is that all this hooking up and such has made me take note of how fucking old my DVD player is and that I should really replace it. Ugh.


Edit: Alright, just read over what was posted. I really must have just missed the composite or wasn't paying attention when I was hooking it up. There is one (it appears) on the side of the TV, but I couldn't select it as an input option. Hmm..

Either way, I'll be screwing around with it in the next few hours.

Much appreciated, Gentlemen.

Balefuego

does your TV have an HDMI port? If so I would reccomend some sort of upconverting DVD player along with a cheap HDMI cable from monoprice.

That will let you upscale your regular DVDs up to 720p.

DrZiplock

It does. 3 HDMI inputs to be exact. That was exactly what I was thinking regarding the DVD player.


All of this seems very "in for a penny, in for a pound". Buying the one thing leads to me having to buy an ass load more.

For the moment I may just get the Wii component cables and an S-video cable for a few bucks. Let the bank account cool off a bit before I start swapping out the entire home theater set up.

Ganluan

As far as not selecting Composite as an input, I know on my TV that if you don't have the cable plugged in, it skips over them while toggling through available inputs. That's probably why you didn't see it.

You should definitely try the Wii on Composite and then get the Component cables, you'll be amazed at the difference. Just make sure when you get the component cables, you go into your Wii settings and change it to Widescreen mode and 480p instead of 480i.