I purchased a DVD that states: Widescreen Format (Aspect Ratio 1.85.1) I'm unable to get 'widescreen/letterbox'. The movie shows up full screen or a 'stretched' view. All other movies I've purchased I'm able to program the playler and get the widescreen version. How can I adjust the player to get widescreen? Thanks, Mary

It does, but it says Automatic. It is a budget unit that costs 20 bucks at Walmart.

• Auto, 16:9 pillar box, 16:9 pan and scan, 4:3 letterbox, 4:3 pan and scan, 4:3 full, 16:9 widescreen

https://www.google.com/search?q=Ematic+AT103B+Digital+Converter+Box+aspect+ratio

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Aspect ratio.

Why are you using 4:3 letterbox? It might be the default aspect ratio but widescreen tvs should be set to 16:9 aspect ratio.

Hi Anthony,

You're describing what is called letterbox and pillerbox. Letterboxing is when there are two horizontal bars - one at the top and one at the bottom of the screen with a wide picture between. Pillerbox is when there are two vertical bars - one on the left edge and one on the right edge of the screen with a tall picture between.

The settings on your TV (and on your cable box, satellite box, DVD player, etc.) tell the TV how to display a picture that will not fill the screen completely. If the program source (an older video-taped TV show, non-widescreen version DVD, etc) was not originally "shot" or saved in widescreen format, the TV offers you a choice on how to display the image. They ask if they should stretch or zoom to fill the screen (and you have to deal with the skinny / tall images or lost portions of the picture); or maintain the aspect ratio (not stretching or zooming) by leaving a part of the screen blank (grey or black) by inserting bars left and right or top and bottom of the screen.

Start out by telling the devices that send pictures in a format that matches you TV's screen ratio. I am assuming you've got a wide screen HDTV which would mean it should be set to "16 x 9" (a.k.a. 16:9) ratio display. If you have it set for 4 x 3 (a.k.a. 4:3) you should change it. Look for a setting on your TV that asks about stretching, zooming, etc. as this will be an issue when receiving picture from an off air antenna on your house when a TV station is airing an older, non-wide screen format TV show or movie.

TV signals provided by Cable TV or Satellite provider must be HDTV type signals. If you have the standard TV service (non-HD) no picture sent by them will ever fill the screen. This is because Standard Definition TV (SDTV) is not capable of those types of signals. You will have to bump up your subscription to HDTV service to get full screen pictures.

I hope this helps!

With the player in STOP mode, or without a disc inserted, press DISPLAY on the remote. Then press either the UP or DOWN arrow keys (on remote) to scroll down from LANGUAGE setup to SCREEN SETUP, then highlight the aspect ratio which best suits the connected TV, in this case 16:9 widescreen (according to the manual the default aspect is 4:3 letterbox). Once you have made the change, exit the setup. It should remember the setting you have made.

Pages 26 to 27 of the owner's manual illustrate the setup procedure for this model DVD player.

NOTE: some DVDs may be encoded as 4:3 titles, hence you will see black borders at the left and right sides of a widescreen TV. Not all DVD movies are encoded in the 16:9 aspect ratio.

However, you can check your player's setup menu just to be sure.

The aspect ratio on your DVD player is not set correctly. Look for a SETUP button on the remote control, there should be something like "QUICK SETUP" or something similar on the setup menu, if not then go to the menu that has the aspect ratio settings listed. Change your aspect ratio to 16:9 WIDESCREEN, and this should solve your problem. Your aspect ratio is 4:3 which is for a regular TV, if the images (especially people) look real skinny and tall on your TV then your aspect ratio is not properly set. Good luck to you!

Are you referring to the black bars that show above and below the movie? That's normal, it's called widescreen aspect ratio.

If you don't like that, you want to buy/rent fullscreen movies.

Widescreen is 6:9, fullscreen is 4:3. (Square versus rectangle)

If you go into the dvd options dialogue, you find there a DVD aspect ratio option. This option lets you determine if a slide show on the DVD is displayed at 16:9 (widescreen) or 4:3 (standard) aspect ratio.
Alternatively: go into your settings and set 4:3 Pan & Scan or from 4:3 PS to 4:3 LB whichever your aim is or well whichever aspect of a movie you want to see.

If this helped please rate :)

Sorry, you didn't provide enougb information for anyone to accurately answer your question. The most important thing you omiited was the nature of your video source. If anyone does answer this, I assure you it will be a wild guess. Here's my wild guess:

Your HDTV has a widescreen aspect ratio of 16:9. For every 16 units of width, there are 9 units of height. That ratio matches the exact ratio used in widescreen television broadcasting. However, most feature films (movies) on DVD have an aspect ratio of 2.35:1 or even wider than that. These films will display with horizontal black bars at the top and the bottom, so that you can see the full image. Unless you choose to use one of your TV or your DVD player's options to zoom or crop the image, the bars are 'correct' and there's nothing wrong.

Another possibility is that you have not configured your video source, such as a DVD player, to 'know' that you have a widescreen TV. Nearly all DVD players ship configured to output using a NON-widescreen aspect ratio, so you must adjust this setting using your player's setup menu. The same is true for most cable boxes and satellite receivers.

Finally, just because your TV is widescreen, the video source itself may not be. Most standard-definition broadcasts are NOT widescreen, for example.

If you re-post your question with adequate information about which video source exhibits this problem, I'm sure you will get much more specific and helpful answers.

Hi pooing stone,

You may sometimes find that even with a television referred to as “widescreen,” widescreen movies still have letterboxing.

This is likely because the movie you are playing is still in the ratio used at a theater. While most televisions are 4:3 for the more square-type or 16:9 for widescreen, a theater screen is much wider still. Unless the movie has been reformatted specifically to 16:9 for your television, you will either see letterboxing or lose portions of the picture by zooming in.

If a movie is available in several ratios, I suggest thinking of all the options before buying. Although purchasing a movie reformatted to 16:9 will prevent the black bars, purchasing it without any reformatting of the size will prevent you losing part of the picture.

FYI: It is very common with Blu-Ray Discs that widescreen means original size, not 16:9.

Thank you,
Jason,
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