ISF CALIBRATION?

[InVeNtOr]

has anyone done this to their plasma or lcd tv? best buy pushes this down your throat and gives you all kinds of reason why to do it. i have seen the tv that they calibrate and then it uncalibrated. they are next to each other, i see differences, and the temp of the screen is less too. is this some type of elibrate scam? i asked Star power about it, they do it too, but said you need to wait at least 90 days before doing it.

if you had this done, please chime in and let me know if it's worth it.

thanks again...

[JJkizak]

What is ISF Calibration?

JJK

[Brac]

How much do they wat to charge you? Will they redo it if settings get changed?

I use DVE (Digital Video Essentials) a dvd. there is also Avaia (sp) either one can be had for around $30. Then you own it and use it when ever you want, even do TV's for your friends.

I have also used a spyder, but ther aren't cheap.

[InVeNtOr]

BB wants $300 and Star power wants $400. it's something that can't be don't by a disk, or at least thats what i am told. they bring over some type of divice and change settings that you can't get to.

[Brac]

Settings you can't get to sounds like a scam, but I'll let others chime in.

[Brac]

and BTW I would'nt want to buy a TV that had settings I could only change for $300.00

[InVeNtOr]

yea, i don't understand the "settings" portion, but it has to deal with how the manufacture set the tv up in the first place. basically they set it up so when you walk by it "catches your eye." i know when they do the calibration the tv uses less power and that helps prolong it's life.

i am still waiting for people that have had this done.....by the looks there isn't many....

[Brac]

most TV's out of the box are "hot" it is a simple matter of on a shelf next to 50 other sets with sun shinning on them, they want it to stand out.

This "catch your eye" should not be how your tv is set. It should be set accurately, using test paterns and filters.

[skonopa]

I've not done this myself, but I have talked extensively with a guy that used to do it around here in the Fredericksburg area (in fact, I was going to have him do mine, but he pretty much sold off his equipment and quit by the time I wanted to do mine).

First - "ISF" is the Imaging Science Foundation - This is a certification group for certifiying calibration techs. There are some standards as to how colors should appear on a TV set in a consistant way. This outfit offers seminars and certification to technitions so calibrations are done to these standards (or at least as close as the given TV set will allow - of course, higher end/better quality TV sets will perform much better in this regard).

As for the 90-day wait that was mentioned - that is to allow the TV to "break in" and allow it to "settle", especially with something like a plasma set, or in my case, the cathode ray tubes in my high-end Mitsubishi rear projection set to allow the phosphers to appropriatly get "burned in" (if that is the correct term, as I am going off of pretty old memory - it has been a few months). If they perform a calibration to soon, it could get messed up sooner due to the unit having not "settled" itself.

As for the "hidden settings", every modern TV has these hidden "maintanence' settings. If you got a digital TV, it has these hidden settings. From what I was told, the reason why they are hidden is that there is a real potental to really mess up your TV if you are not careful with these settings, such as blowing out a CRT, or causing the picture to get so messed up that you are no longer able to view it properly. I don't know exactly what these settings are, though (I tried "googling" my model TV (Mitsubishi Diamond Series WS-55813) to see if there was a way to at least access these setting and look what they are, but I guess as they say - curiosity can kill the cat - maybe better off leaving well alone).

The ISF calibration also goes way beyond what you typically can do with a "setup DVD", as the technitions use specialized calibration equipment and training. This stuff does not come cheap (from the local tech I was talking to, just the equipment was some $10,000, and add to that another $5,000 or so worth of seminars and training to get the certification). That is why it costs some $300 to have this done.

Is this a scam? Not in the very least - there can be a real improvment to the picture as well as it does help extending the life of your TV. Granted, is it worth the $250 to $300 to have this done? That is your call. If you spent a lot of money on your TV and plan on keeping it for many years, then what is another $250 to have it properly calibrated? Obviously, it may not be worth it to do it on a $800 32-inch LCD panel, but it may be on a high-end $6,000+ 65-inch plasma display (hell, if you are going to pay that much for a TV, they ought to throw in the calibration for free! If you are looking at getting somthing like that, may be worth bargaining for - kinda like getting the first few oil changes for free when buying an automobile which I managed to finagle out of the local Saturn dealership a couple of years ago!) Personally, I may still have somebody come out and do mine. I've spent well over $2,500 for this TV and that was nearly 3 years ago, and I intend to keep it for a very long time (figure at least a good 10 years, if not longer - still very happy with the picture on this thing!), so it may very well be worth it to me.

At the very least, it is indeed worthwhile to at least attempt to calibrate your TV yourself with a setup DVD. Even a modest investment of time and money (hell, even that ISF outfit sells a setup DVD for about $30), will result in a much improved picture and help extend the life of your TV.

EDIT! I found this Review on Audioholics for my particular model of TV and it sounds like this unit really shines when properly calibrated. I may go and have it done to see for myself. I've only done the basic calibration, pretty much by eye and with a setup DVD.

[popbumper]

Hard to follow Skonopa's detailed message, but I will say this. In 2002, I purchased a 46" Sony RPTV for $1300. A friend of mine who was also into pinball (and ultimately opened his own home theater install gig) suggested ISF calibration, and told me he would charge a mere $150 for it.

Not believing it would make a difference (you know, like changing caps in a crossover), the guy came over and visited one evening for about two hours. He accessed the service menu (through proprietary info he had), and started looking over some very cryptic sub-menus which, if you did not know what you were doing, would pretty much debilitate the TV operation.

He also brough a calibration DVD, a "suction cup" that he put on the screen (to read light levels), and a laptop computer, and set the proper grayscale, contrast, blue/red/green saturation, and the 5400K scale.

Afterwards, I was (as was my wife) simply AMAZED at the differennce; colors were very natural, blacks were deeper, light tone was wonderful, and flames - yes flames - "jumped" out like never before. I put it like this - in scenes from say, LOTR, when they carried torches, the ONLY red to be found was in the fire, and nowhere else. It's like, the calibration completely "cleaned up" the picture and made colors appear as they SHOULD, without bleed, distortion, or overabundance. From the box, the colors were vivid and bright, but never defined; the calibration really made everything "true".

FWIW, the process is really, really important, and does for your video setup what we all strive for in our audio setups - ACCURACY and CLARITY.

Chris

[Brac]

I would be inrtested to know what the "hidden settings:" do, as I am pretty fimilar with the logic behind calibration.

That being said I have a frind with a spyder, which is the suction cup thing hooked to a laptop that was mention, in one of the glowing reviews of ISF.

As I haven't much info about what he does with it, I will call him today and add his thoughts, We have talked about the spyder abit, but he never mentioned any hidden settings. But like I said I'll give him a call.

BTW guys that were "really impressed with the difference, did the tech start with a "disk" calibrated TV, or one "off out of the box? (not being a jerk, I realy want an answer)

Cause most are impressed with the difference from a disk calibration.

[Brac]

As a side note, some brand of TV's have very limited setting menu's and more options would be welcome, hidden or not, LG for example.However at the other end of the spectrum, Panasonic commerical monitors (what I reccomend) have every thing in their menu you could ever want, I don't think there is anything not in the menu, and yes you could really screw it up if you did'nt know what you were doing. But consumer TV's and commerical monitors aren't really apples to apples.

My big question is if only they can calibrate a TV properly with a suntion cup thing, does that that mean that no where in the world is a properly calibrated Projector? You could suction cup it to the screen but would'nt that put the light on the wrong side........

[JJkizak]

Why should I have to pay $300.00 for something the factory should have done for nothing? When I ran the AVIA dvd on my Sony 46XBR2 every test came out perfect with the exception of deep blacks. The automatic Digital alignment at the end of the assembly line with equipment much more expensive than $10,000.00 should align the HDTV in seconds to perfect. Not a big mystery to me.

JJK

[CECAA850]

I had my Pioneer ISF calibrated after 100 hours or so. It looked great out of the box and even better after tweaking. When the ISF calibration was complete, it was taken to another level. Kind of like a good crossover upgrade on a speaker. It was definately noticeably better. The colors were spot on, especially yellows. Flesh tones were more real. There's not a device or disc made that can match the work of a calibrator with years of experience under his belt and 20 to 30 thousand dollars of equipment. The guy I used travels the country on "tours" and has done literally countless displays. He's never seen one spot on from the factory or one that was as completely accurate as his settings by using a calibration disc. He'll give you before and after graphs to prove it. Highly recomended if you are a critical viewer. It will most likely make your set last longer also as most sets have the contrast set too high.

[CECAA850]

I'm not entirely sure if I'd let one of the big box stores near my set unless I had references from that particular calibrator. They don't give me a lot of confidance when I'm in the store and I know more about their gear than they do.

[InVeNtOr]

do you two guys have a number to a tech that i can call? if he is willing to do it for the same price i would be very interested in doing it.

thanks in advance.

[CECAA850]

do you two guys have a number to a tech that i can call? if he is willing to do it for the same price i would be very interested in doing it.

thanks in advance.

W. Jeff Meier

jeff@accucalhd.com

832-659-1832

He's in different parts of the country at different times of the year. You'll have to see when he'll be near you.

[Canadian_Dude]

The reason the TV's are so far off some times is beacuase the manufacturers want the tv's to look best in the stores, where poeple compare them. But, our home settings are very different than the stores. Also the color blue is very eye catching and appealing so TV manufacturers like to boost the blue levels so their TV catches your eye better. But 300 bucks to calibrate seems too much.... I remember seeing those spider colorimeters for like 200-300 for a cheap basic one. With a little time resarching you could do a pretty good job with one of them.

[JJkizak]

CECAA850:

I find some of your statements very hard to believe knowing that electronic color monitors are at least 10 times more color sensitve than the human eye. My Kodak Ecktachrome test print also matches what I see on my HDTV, but those are my eyes doing the comparison. If your man was in my living room I would not let him touch my TV with a ten foot pole. And my TV is only 8 bit. In fact, I wouldn't let anyone touch my TV and in fact no one does.

JJK

[CECAA850]

I find some of your statements very hard to believe knowing that electronic color monitors are at least 10 times more color sensitve than the human eye.

Color sensitivity and color accuracy are two different things. Personally I believe my eyes. Having before and after graphs of Gray Scale, Color Temperature, and Gamma only confirm what my eyes tell me. Even someone with no knowledge of calibration can look at a TriStimulus chart and see how much more accurate the colors are before and after calibration. Bottom line is that if you're happy with the way your set looks, then that's all that's important.