All 3 options are available now
Pillar Box, Fit To Screen and Zoom is now called “LB expand” which is short for “Letter Box expand”
LB expand is a little less “zoomed” as it was before and is designed not to be used as a default setting but a setting the user manually uses when a programme is on a 4:3 channel and is letterbox (black bars top and bottom)
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Astro has announced that they will be removing the “zoom” option and bringing in a “Fit to Screen” option (same as the stretch).
Update will happen this Thursday morning the 18th of March
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A lot of people are missing the stretch function for viewing SD channels on the latest Astro B.yond software.
I mention in my early post, giving a sneak peak at v1.1s, that you can still get the stretch look by adjusting your TV settings. What I didn’t do was explain how to do it. Nor did I explain that you don’t need to use multiple remotes or have to constantly change the aspect ratio setting of your TV when surfing between SD and HD channels.
Before I explain it. Let me state my opinion that there is no way I will set my TV up to stretched vision. I paid far too much money for an HDTV to then turn around and willingly distort the image. I strongly recommend that you use pillar box when watching SD channels. There I said it.
If you’re still reading you still want to know how to do it, here is what you do.
Step 1.
Assuming that you already have the HDMI cable connected now also connect a component or composite cable to your TV.
Step 2.
Set the Astro B.yond remote to control your TV.
See my earlier post about this and for more info on TV codes see here
We’re doing this step so you can use the B.yond remote to change the AV input of your TV. Don’t forget to then set the volume control after doing this step, just press “ok” and “vol+” till the indocator light blinks twice on the remote.
Step 3.
You can now control the “zoom” or “pillar box” setting for SD channels directly from the Astro B.yond remote control but if your default is now “zoom” you need to change it to “pillar box” as the default. How?
On the B.yond box go to Home>Settings>Installations Settings>PIN (0000) “ok”>TV Settings>Conversion for 4:3 input video>
Select “pillar box” and then press the solid blue button to save. Press the blue B.yond button to exit.
This has just set all SD channels to pillar box and if you want to zoom on an individual channel just press the aspect ratio button on the remote rather then opening the system menu again.
“But I don’t want pillar box” I hear you saying, chill I’ve not finished yet.
Step 4.
Set the aspect ratio on you TV’s component or composite input to what ever distorted image you want. It might be called “wide”,”full” “stretch”, “zoom”,”16:9″ etc. Do this while viewing an SD channel for the best result.
It’s important that you don’t set the aspect ratio to a system wide setting, you only want to control the AR for that input solely. If you don’t do this you will have to constantly change the AR setting of your TV when changing between HD channels and SD channels.
For Sony you need to go to the “video” channel. Menu>Settings>Screen while you are watching that Video input (won’t work if you enter the menu while viewing an HDMI input)
Target Inputs: “viewing only”
Wide Mode: set to your desire
Auto Wide: “off”
I don’t know how to set this on other TV brands? Please leave a comment below for other brands on how to set this.
Done.
To switch to the component or composite AV input use the “AV” button on the B.yond remote, then watch your SD channel in the stretch mode you just set. When you want to go back to viewing an HD channel just change the AV input via the B.yond remote to HDMI.
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