I bought a Sony S360 BD player through Amazon to have BD playback capabilities. My old DVD player is a Panasonic S50 series upconverting DVD that I've owned for 3 years.

While Blu Rays look great, I primarily watch DVDs (Widescreen TV series like Stargate Atlantis) and the picture quality looks horrible compared to my S50. It almost looks as if the picture is merely a stretched version of the DVD. The colors are pretty off, etc. Even my wife, who's far from picky on picture quality, said that she could see the difference.

Most of the reviews that I have seen for the S360 suggests a fairly decent upconversion. I saw a couple reviews to the contrary on Amazon. I'm therefore guessing that there must be something I'm doing wrong about my setup.

The one thing that could be a problem is that I am routing the BD player not directly to the TV (a 46" Toshiva Regza 120Hz LCD), but through the built in receiver in my Sony HT-IS100 sound system. Also, interestingly, The TV lists the HDMI output as a Regza Link (even though none of the components is Toshiba). So it seems to me like somewhere in the link between BD->Receiver->TV somebody is sending mixed signals or messing something up about the config. Nevertheless, the TV reports that it is getting 1080p from the receiver.

I would appreciate any help or tip with this. I don't want to have to add my old DVD player back to the cabinet and then manually switch the HDMI cable to the receiver if I want to play blu rays.

Thank you!

Have you tried connecting the player directly to the tv to see what the picture looks like? That would be where I would start.

I just got an S360 over the weekend, and I will agree that the DVD playback isn't very good.

Just from the DVDs I've watched, "Watchmen Ultimate" in particular, the picture seems darker, drabber, and softer than on my 1080p Toshiba DVD recorder. (Both are directly connected to the television with identical HDMI cables.)

The one area where the S360 beats my Toshiba in DVD playback is that it can output 4:3 material at 1080p with sidebars, and it deinterlaces as well. (Which is essential for Fox TV DVD shows like Buffy and X-Files.)

I should compare my 360 with my 350 and see if there is a difference.

I use a Phillips upconverting DVD player for DVDs, so I have no idea how the DVDs look in the Sony BD players.

I've mostly been watching recent seasons of Stargate Atlantis which is widescreen (And should have been BR quality). I should see how ancient shows like Seinfeld are upconverted.

I would have thought everyone got upconversion by now

I tried direct hookup to the TV - no difference.

I tried reconnecting my old DVD player, and now it looks like crap again. Maybe it always looked like crap and I wasn't paying sufficient attention. I haven't watched enough BRs on my Sony to be spoiled by BR quality, so I don't know.

Anyway, thanks for the tips folks.

I have a SONy and think my Toshiba HD player does a nicer job of upconversion