Sony Bravia Autodim Workaround?

D. I. M.

Hello everybody,

I’m new on this forum. I’ve had this problem for a long time, been waiting for a software update that would fix it but now I’m really beginning to feel that since my Bravia is five years old now (the exact model is KDL-32BX300) Sony aren’t going to do anything about it. It seems it only happens in 4:3 mode, but 16:9 is obviously not a solution since I don’t want to mess up the image ratio. I realize this issue has been documented in old threads but I was wondering if anyone has found a fix/workaround for this ominous »feature»? I’ve tried fiddling with the settings but nothing works. If the autodim is only present in 4:3 mode I was wondering if there might be some sort of converter boxes that would output a 4:3 AV signal as 16:9 with black borders around it so I could set my TV on 16:9 without stretching the image, but even if there were I would need at least three of them because I have three gaming consoles connected to the television (PS2, N64 and a Famiclone). Games like Silent Hill and Resident Evil are impossible to play and even on the dark levels of Mario it is an annoyance. I’m at a point where I’m seriously considering buying a new television just to get rid of this bullshit feature but I’ve heard that Samsung are doing it too and besides it’s the only fault I’ve ever found in this television, otherwise the picture is perfect. I can’t even give it to my mom who doesn’t play games because she watches a lot of detective shows on DVD. It’s inexplicable how much technology has progressed lately and yet they’re making us deal with these kinds of idiotic defects that were never present in CRT.