Ayre DX-5, Owner'S Manual

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Again, this distorted image is unacceptable. A few
high-quality standard video displays will allow for
the vertical size of the picture to be decreased,
restoring the proper image geometry. But since
nearly all standard displays lack any type of aspect
ratio control, this capability is instead built into all
video disc players.
By selecting 4:3 Letterbox for the TV Aspect Ratio
setting in the On-Screen Setup Menu (see page 68),
when a widescreen disc is played the player will
automatically squeeze the image vertically to restore
the correct geometry while adding black bars at the
top and bottom.
Additional Factors
So far everything has been relatively
straightforward. However, there are a few more cases
to consider that introduce some complexity to the
situation.
Very Wide Films
Many films are made with aspect ratios even wider
than 1.85:1, such as 2.35:1. Even on a widescreen
(1.78:1) video display these films would be distorted
if they were simply allowed to fill the screen.
Instead thin black bars are added to the top and
bottom of the image on the disc itself when the
transfer from film to video is made.
On a widescreen display these thin black bars are
perfectly normal and there is no distortion of the
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