I just bought a Samsung Lcd 550 (5 Series). Can i get a better picture when im watching my cable channels?

Question

I have directv and since i just bought my HDTV i only have directv's dvr receiver. I know i would need the HD DVR or HD receiver and the programming to get the best picture possible on my TV. What my question is, is how come the picture now without the HD receiver doesnt look that good. I know it wont look great but shouldnt it look a tad bit better than it would on a regular television. It looks like I was watching a bootleg movie when im watching a movie on TNT. I know i need to spend the $200 on the HD DVR but not doing it now. Is there anyway i can get a cabel for now to make it look decent? or am I putting the cables in correctly? Please need help. Any serious answer would be appreciated. P.S. all that is connecting my HDTV with the Directv receiver is the monster gold coaxial cable i bought. thanks.

Answer 1

A upgrade in cable would help the image quality.  If your receiver has it I would suggest composite video and stereo audio (red, white, yellow).  This will help a little.  As for your other question a CRT (tube) television will actually reproduce SD programming better as it is the native resolution of the television.

Answer 2

Without HD service, you are only receiving programing that is 480i resolution (approximately 150,000 pixels per frame). Your Samsung A550 is a 1080p HDTV with over 2,000,000 pixels. Your new TV must up-convert from a little over 150,000 pixels per frame to over 2,000,000.  Up-conversion of this magnitude is going to produce a lot of errors and a crummy picture. No cable is going to over come this up-conversion problem, especially a composite video cable. Composite video cables will produce the worse possible picture, guaranteed. Stick with the monster coax cable and upgrade your service to HD.