DVDO iScan VP30
If you remember back to the early days of the show, you may remember an interview we did with Phil Trubey, a man who had created an incredible home theater at his house near San Diego. We asked Phil if he had any advice for those looking to build a home theater, and he told us not to forget the video processor. In his opinion, it was one of the most easily overlooked items. You spend all your time and effort selecting the right display, be it a front projector and screen, a rear projection set, or a flat panel. Then you select an audio processor, amplifier and speakers. Once you're there, you add content, like a DVD player, a video server (Phil had the Kaleidescape) and a television source. But what about the video processor?
We've had a chance to use the DVDO iScan VP30 for the past couple weeks. It is a high resolution video processor and A/V switcher that, according to DVDO, sets a new standard for up, down, and cross converting all your video sources. As far as features go, it has:
- ABT's Precision Video Scaling II technology: 10-bit Scaling, Enhanced Sharpness Control
- Motion and source adaptive video deinterlacing for NTSC (3:2 and 2:2 pulldown; video) and PAL/SECAM (2:2 pulldown; video) sources
- User defined output resolution from 480p to 1080p
- Analog HD Transcoding and Processing
- ABT's RightRate High-Performance Framerate Conversion
- Advanced Source Transition Management provides seamless transitions between source types
- 10-bit, 300 MHz instrumentation-quality DACs, with up to 10x oversampling and 2X oversampling for 1080p
- ABT's Precision AV LipSync intelligent digital audio delay technology to match Audio & Video timing
The VP30 provides just about every input and output you can image. Inputs are composite video, s-video, component video, analog RGBHV, SDI and 4 HDMI, along with analog and digital audio inputs. The output options are HDMI, analog RGBHV or YPbPr, and a digital audio out, for those not using HDMI.
So what does it do? It cleans everything up and gives you the best possible display. We all know the TVs and projectors we own are capable of so much more than just displaying the content we feed into them. If you've ever seen a 30 Mb high definition loop, you'll know what we're talking about. The DVDO does it's best to present the content in a way that takes full advantage of everything your display equipment can do. And in our opinion, it does just that. Standard definition looked much better on every TV we tried it with. The film processing worked wonders to smooth out movies that had noticeable motion artifacts before. Of course, High Definition always looks good, right? The HD we saw with the VP30 inline looked more like the 30 Mb loop and less like an over-compressed, potentially good, show.
We also added the optional de-interlacing board and software. With this add on, we got a bunch of new processing modes and test patterns. Most people will never use the test patterns, or if you do, you'll use them once to get your display set up, and never touch them again. But, they're nice to have in your back pocket. The de-interlacing card worked great for DVD performance. In most cases it was tough to see an improvement from the standard, unmodified VP30, but in other cases we could really tell it was there.
So the VP30 does exactly what it's supposed to, and does it very well. But at $1999, who, and what, is it for? If you spent $8000 on your new car, it may not make sense to upgrade to $10,000 tires, but if you spent $100,000 on the car, you may spend a lot more than that on upgrades. If you have a home theater like Phil Trubey, a video processor isn't really optional. You need to make sure you get the full value out of your investment. There are a lot of video processors available, and the VP30 performs as well as many that are much more expensive. When you compare the field, the VP30 is actually a great value.
Of course, if you only spent $2000 on your HDTV, $2000 for a video processor is probably overkill. But if you're in the market, don't overlook the VP30.
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