Ok, so we recently bought a Pioneer PDP 5051, yeah, same thing as the 50, any ways... I setup the sound system, TV, HD Cable box from Time Warner, all that... For the first day or two, when viewing our cable programs, we were able to select all of the various screen sizes... Now, it's only switching between Wide and Full... I read the manual and it said those are the two options i'll be able to choose from when viewing HD programs... Ok, well, why was I able to switch through Cinema, Full, Wide, 4:3, etc, initially and why can I no longer choose those other options? I've tried everything and still no cigar. Wide and Full sucks... Wide, it warps the screen and Full gives me two letter boxes on the left and right side (up and down, not horizontal). What can I do to switch this around? HDMI Input? Any suggestions would be appreciated.

Thanks,
Europa13

are you trying to watch hd or standard cable?

without knowing more it sounds like the 1st couple days maybe you were watching standard video and now you have switched inputs to the hd (composite) inputs.....

Europa13,

I am dealing with the same concern. Presently I am seeing it with my Samsung 451 and WideScreen LCD tv. But it appears to be a concern with the Pioneer also.

A co worker of mine has Time Warner Digital cable and a Panasonic rear projection tv. WIth this set up the cable box from Time Warner stretches the 4:3 at the click of a button on the remote to fill the 16:9 screen effectively removing the side bars. He says it does not appear distorted- of course it has to be distorted some but it is not an ugly oval shaped head distortion.

I assume when he switches channels to a channel that is in 16:9 he has to cpress the button on the remote a 2nd time to deslect the stretch mode.

-Don B