I recently bought the DVE HD-DVD set-up disc during the DDD 20% of sale. I put it in today and I am now utterly dumb-founded on what I need to do to maximize my settings. I go to the tests section and they show the patterns, but i have no idea what I need to do with my television controls to optimize my picture. Everything looks pretty good, but I bought the disc to make it look as close to perfect as possible. I am just frustrated because I don't really know what to change with each selection. If anyone could give me some advice or ideas I would greatly appreciate it.

I just got it too... did a little research on the net, turns out the directions are on the sd side. So, what I did is calibrate by standard DVD player first, so I know how to do it. Then I did the HD player.

There are some good threads on this on AVSFORUM. And yes, it works! : )

You can download the pdf for the hd dvd side here:
http://www.videoessentials.com/dvehd/index.html

Joe Kane makes a nice ref disc, but ease of use is not his specialty.

Definitely true, I have the regular SD version, and it took me a good 15 minutes to figure out how to get to the section with the instructions and test screens.

Also don't care for all the extra technical details, I just want to calibrate the set, not learn all the inner workings etc.

Made me wish I'd paid extra for Avia which I had rented years ago and found much easier to use than DVE.

The Video Essentials HD DVD is much better laid out and easier to use than the SD DVD version, but unfortunately it's lacking the instructions for how to do anything. For those, you have to flip over to the confusing SD side of the disc and spend a couple hours getting lost in its infuriating menus.

Avia is better organized, yes, but even it has its share of navigational problems. For ease of use, the best calibration disc I've ever used is the Sound & Vision Home Theater Tune-Up DVD, which was made by the same people as Avia but has the clearest, simplest, most informative design, and is one of the most affordable calibration products to boot.

Yeah, I've never hard of that one. I did get DVE for $13 from the DDD sale, and now that I know how to use the title feature to just jump to the test screens (and know how to use them) I'm fine with it.

Was just a bitch the first time because of the terrible menus and all the extraneous tech info.

All you have to do is pop in the SD side of the disc first. It does a pretty good job of explaining what to do.

Once you know what to do, use the HD side.