DIRECTV black bars on the side of pictures (letterboxing?)

[GOSTATE820]

I Have had HD for about a year now, and just bought a new Plasma TV. Why when sometimes I watch ESPN2 I get black bars on the side of the screen. Some say it means the show is not in HD just digital picture, others say because it's not being broadcast in 16:9 so the bars go there so the picture is not way out of wack. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
Tommy

 

[danel-ksc]

Just from my personal experience, I get the "bars" on HD channels when the broadcast is not in HD. Most of the time the commercials are not HD and up come the "bars".

 

[GOSTATE820]

Makes sense, So then if it is not being broadcast in HD then why is the picture quality better with the "bars"than if I was to switch over to the standard definition of the same channel. It's all very confusing to me !!!! Thanks,

 

[Bob Nielsen]

When an HD station airs 4:3 content (and most HD stations do) they will add the bars on the side to fill out their 16:9 format or they will stretch the picture to fill the screen with a distorted picture. The 4:3 content may or may not have good resolution but most of the time it will be 480i upconverted to 720p or 1080i, depending on the channel. Sometimes these bars are black but sometimes they are red, blue or whatever (again, depending on the channel).

 

[Spize]

When an HD station airs 4:3 content (and most HD stations do) they will add the bars on the side to fill out their 16:9 format or they will stretch the picture to fill the screen with a distorted picture. The 4:3 content may or may not have good resolution but most of the time it will be 480i upconverted to 720p or 1080i, depending on the channel. Sometimes these bars are black but sometimes they are red, blue or whatever (again, depending on the channel).

And sometimes they put an annoying moving graphic in the bars...

This is normal, especially on ESPN when they are broadcasting a non-major event and don't want to risk the expense of lugging around a bunch of HD equipment for the division 2 college women's ping pong pre-season tournament semifinals... or on sportscenter when they are using clips from a local Non-HD broadcast game.