SKY 16:9 Letterbox

I recently saw the light and got rid of the mess that NTL call a TV service and went over to SKY.

I have 1 SKY+ box which is connected to my widescreen TV and a standard SKY digibox which is connected to a smaller 4:3 TV.

I couldn't find any info about how to switch my 4:3 TV to 16:9 letterbox. I phoned SKY and they said that this isn't possible?! I found that quite hard to believe!! Is it true that the SKY box can't put a 16:9 image into letterbox for 4:3 TV's?!

Goto Services > System Setup > Picture Settings and set Picture Format as 4:3L

Sky won't know anything. They install the eqiupment and leave it in 4:3 & composite, even if you have a widescreen set.

You can only set the Digibox to one output at a time.

If you set the SCART up as 16:9 for the widescreen tv and the RF to 4:3L - then the following will happen:

If you select channels from the main Digibox then the widescreen tv will be correct but you'll get a squashed picture on the 4:3 tv.

If you use an RF link and change channel via that - then you'll get 4:3 letterbox on both tvs.

You can not set up the Sky box to give different formats to different tvs at the same time.


Sky CS were correct - you can not have both true widescreen and 4:3L for different tv's from the same digibox (unless you are using SkyHD via HDMI or DVI).

he said his widescreen tv is connected to a sky+ box

he wanted to set the normal box to show letterbox on his 4:3 screen

I can see that now I've re-read it.

It is worth mentioning that some tv's will do 16:9 switching via SCART - which will not distort the picture as much as 4:3L will.

Some lines appear missing in the 4:3L mode.

NTL are just as bad. I've been to a friends house tonight and she has Sky and a Widescreen TV, but Sky was set to 4:3 Letterbox which is damn right more bizzare.. I'm surprised how people don't notice this sometimes.

It's such common beelife that short, fat people is normal with widescreen, that people aren't going to notice. I think a public awareness camapign, like the ones getitng people to go digital, is in order.