[richierich]

It seems the price of AV gear has become very affordable, combined with the holiday sales that are going on , I just bought my first HDTV. I got the Toshiba 42HL167 (42 inch LCD) from circuit city for $1199.99. I also added a Toshiba HD-A3 HD DVD player to go with it. Like all newbies I have some questions. I thought I could post them here and get your opinions.

1. What is the best way to calibrate the TV ? I just ordered the HD DVD essentials calibration DVD from amazon, but the reviews are not very good it seems. How did you calibrate your TV when you got it ?

2. When I play a standard DVD in the HD-A3 player , my tv screen reads it as playing at 1080. Shouldnt it read 720 since it obviously a standard Disc ?

3. My reciever (Denon AVR 3805) does not have a HDMI input. Therefore, I connected the DVD player to TV with an HDMI cable (for video, of course) but I have the DVD audio connected to the reciever via opt out (Tslink cable/ ?). This seems to work fine except when I start a movie I have audio coming from the TV. I know why this is the case, but is there a way to have the TV sound go mute when I start a DVD. Its going to drive me crazy if I have to adjust the TV sound 10 minutes into every movie because I forgot to mute the TV.


4. When I get a hi def cable box from the cable company, will the connection to my TV be an HDMI cable ?

I have some more questions but I will ask them later. All and any help is appreciated .