Lip Sync Problems with New Digital Displays?

An anonymous reader writes "With all of the new digital TV displays flying out the door, its easy to to think that life is good on the road to high definition. But, as Audioholics reports today, cheaper displays are using inexpensive processors that result in video delays of up to 60 milliseconds (that's about 2 frames of video). This means that the video processing (deinterlacing, video scaling, etc) delays the picture so that the audio is out of sync. Add to this inherent delays in some LCD and plasma units and the problem can be more than a little noticeable. As of right now only a few manufacturers are building audio lip-sync delay into their products to compensate."

Ah, that explains it.

[grub]

I was wondering why Ron Jeremy's tongue was trailing behind the licking sound.

Aaah...

[Doomrat]

Really? Damn. I was beginning to wonder why everything on T.V. was a badly dubbed German show.

All right!

[SCSi]

Now the lips in my old gozilla movies will be in sync! Deaf people everywhere are rejoycing!

ah

[pizza_milkshake]

so *that* explains the lip sync problems in those old kung fu flicks.

"What is that you say?"

[Neil Blender]

"Let's Fight!"

<mouth keeps moving for several seconds>

Oh, wait. Those kung foo movies were always like that.

Big deal...

[tinrobot]

I only watch 1960's Italian westerns and old Godzilla movies. Who knows, it might actually help.

Re:Big deal...

[prescot6]

I only watch 1960's Italian westerns...

Italian westerns? Ohh, you mean easterns...

This could be fun.

[dawg ball]

The audio delay should be user configurable. We could turn boring stuff into something that's really funny. Almost as good as playing the old VHS backwards!

Re:All right!

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, those movies featuring rogue spyware programs smashing Tokyo buildings are pretty cool.

So much for live tv

[BMonger]

So that means that a plasma TV is going to be 60 ms behind my neighbors old CRT TV? No thanks. I need my reality TV as it comes, not later than my friends...

just put your speakers 60 feet away

[coult]

But, there is the delay from the sound traveling from the speaker to your ear (roughly 1 millisecond per foot of distance traveled). So one solution is simply to put the speakers about 60 feet away.

Re:There is an upside

[WwWonka]

I watched an old Kung Fu movie on one of these, and the words matched the lips!

...if that wasn't impressive enough, I just watched a "live" Britney Spears concert where the words matched HER lips!

Then again who is really watching her lips while she sings. ;-)

Re:Ah, that explains it.

[Anonymous Coward]

Ron Jeremy is a personallity on FoodTV. He specializes in ice cream, thus the licking joke. I don't really see why anyone would want to watch such a fat man lick things but hey, to each his own.

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[account_deleted]

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Workaround exists!

[3Suns]

There's no reason to build expensive circuitry to correct the problem. You can use the laws of nature to resynch your video!

For a video lag of 60 milliseconds, you only need to step back 20.4174 meters from your TV before the speed of sound will correct the synchronization problem.

The Neurochemical Fix

[Scott Baio]

I find that if I get ever so slightly drunk, the delay in my mental processing of the auditory information compensates nicely.

Re:why do companies do this?

[lildogie]

It also explains why drummers keep creeping up the tempo.

Well, you see, these displays are SO BIG...

[dpbsmith]

...you can just view them from sixty feet away and the video delay will exactly compensate for the speed-of-sound delay. No problem.

And if you can afford one, you probably have a living room that big.

Excuses, excuses

[JediTrainer]

Any bets that they're just trying to build in delays to prevent more 'wardrobe malfunction' fiascos?

My hunch is that they delayed the video on purpose, but forgot to touch the audio.

:)

Re:This will hurt video games

[zulux]

So what will happen?

It's not a problem! It'll just make Halo play like Myst.

Re:Ah, that explains it.

[The Ultimate Fartkno]

Previous poster is full of it! Ron Jeremy is a California-based businessman who's known for his length of service and enormous gifts in his industry.

He's known to be a bit underhanded though. He's given the shaft to *hundreds* of co-workers.

Tivo sometimes does this

[teamhasnoi]

Occasionally when I un-pause my Tivo, the audio and video don't line up exactly. It's one of those things you don't notice immediately, but it lends an air of sinister uneasiness to atmosphere of the show.

Kind of like taking too much cough medicine before a job interview.

Very noticable example

[entrager]

If anyone wants to see the real thing in action, just tune in to the Britney Spears concert that has been airing on ShowtimeHD. Her lips are definately out-of-sync with the music.

Re:Ah, that explains it.

[Anonymous Coward]

do you know what mecca is? clue: its not a person

Britney

[raider_red]

I've seen this problem. I noticed it during the Britney Spears pay-per-view concert. Sometimes it seemed like her lips weren't even moving at all, but she was still singing.

So much for "live" television

[pmbuko]

I personally couldn't stand it if my neighbor (with a standard CRT television) found out who the big winner of American Idol was 60 milliseconds before I did!

Turn System!

[zanderredux]

There's a solution, though. Make all games work according to the infamous FinalFantasy fight-in-turns system!

Can you imagine how GranTurismo would be in a move-in-turns scheme?

Well, that might do the trick...

[mistermark]

After various setups I now have a nforce2-motherboard with SoundStorm onboard(A7N8X-E Deluxe) to do on the fly AC3-encoding so I only have one cable running from my HTPC to my stereo(and yet be able to switch between mp3/divx/tv/dvd etc.)... Only thing is, when I watch live television, this conversion (stereo-2ch-analog -> AC3 -> analog) comes with a little latency... I've been thinking if how I could get some latency in the videosignal, but it seems there's an answer now :-) (and when you wonder why I don't just skip the AC3-part, it saves me a pre-amplifier as now I'm able to plug in my AC3-decoder straight into my amps...)

Not originally from this planet, eh?

[Kozar_The_Malignant]

>I don't understand why they couldn't have anticipated this problem before they shipped the TVs, though. Isn't that what QA is for?

Dilbert: We have a serious flaw in our product that can be corrected with a cheap, quick swap-out of the Model 9 Frammish Board with the Model 9A. You want me to recall all 495,000 units that have shipped to our value-added resellers and make the change, right? Remember, I told you about this six months before any of these units shipped.

Pointy-Haired Boss: Noooo. Let's wait and see how many retail customers call and complain. We'll send some minimum wage guy out to swap out the card for the one's that somehow manage to call us.

Re:Well, you see, these displays are SO BIG...

[wildsurf]

...you can just view them from sixty feet away and the video delay will exactly compensate for the speed-of-sound delay. No problem.

Yes, but by the time you move sixty feet away, the light will lag by forty additional nanoseconds, which forces you to have to move further away still... so they can never be in sync. It's the Zenith Paradox.