Because the Ayre's 0/7.5 black-level setup switch did not affect the player's analog component outputs (this was before I installed the update), I tried running the component input into a second display device, the Fujitsu plasma. The below-black bar instantly appeared, confirming that a limitation in how the TranScanner treats black-level information was at fault. If you have a newer video processor such as the DVDO HD2, you won't need to use the higher black setting, according to Ayre. Once I installed the firmware update, I ran through DVE again and the picture was much improved. However, to gauge the capabilities of the player without any editorializing from my video processor, I'd have to go direct.

I reconfigured the DX-7 to output progressive RGB instead of interlaced component and hooked it up to the TranScanner's RGB bypass input, which I normally use to pass high-definition content from my set-top box to the projector. While the Ayre has no scaling functions (to 720p or 1080i) beyond deinterlacing NTSC to 480p, it will play PAL-encoded Region 2 DVDs with a deinterlaced resolution of 576p. I had no Region 2 DVDs to try, but the 20% boost in resolution would certainly be a bonus.

Ayre convinced me to bypass the bypass, so to speak, by connecting the DX-7 directly to my projector. Their contention that, even in bypass mode, the power supply of the still active TranScanner could introduce noise into the video image was at least worth investigating. Unfortunately, this purist approach, while potentially more advantageous, is hardly practical as a permanent arrangement in my situation, considering the plethora of video sources that call my equipment rack home. Not all CRT projectors have multiple inputs, since they are nearly always used with outboard scalers and switchers. But the newer digital projectors always provide a variety of inputs. If you're able to run multiple feeds to your projector or other display, that's how you should do it.

The Ayre DX-7 was the first DVD player I'd had with a DVI output, which made it natural for hooking up to the 50-inch Fujitsu plasma. But before I discuss simple viewing pleasures, I'll detail some observations made with the excellent test signals from DVE. In chapter 6, title 12, color bars are presented against a gray background. From the Ayre's analog component progressive output, there was a thin, vertical green stripe only a few pixels wide between the yellow and cyan bars (left to right); it almost, but not entirely, disappeared when I switched to the DVI signal. Alternately, the component image won out on the blue-to-red transition: the DVI signal presented a blue ghost several pixels into the red square, a point not lost on the Leninists in the room. Although the differences at the other transition points were subtle, the DVI output had, overall, finer, more precise color transitions.

Title 13 of DVE is intended to test resolution. In chapter 2, the four corners of the frame have six small boxes with vertical or horizontal alternating white and black stripes. The images were clearly defined with a DVI signal. But this and other patterns lacked resolution in progressive component; the boxes with the narrowest vertical stripes looked almost solid gray. But when I switched the Ayre to interlaced, the perceived differences in resolution from the DVI connection on these patterns was eliminated almost entirely.

As it turned out, the problem appeared to be some sort of incompatibility between the Ayre and the Fujitsu in progressive mode. To check for this, I sent a progressive analog RGB image directly to my Dwin projector (recall, as noted above, that analog component signals are not compatible with the Dwin). Given the unavoidable loss of sharpness that comes from quadrupling the size of the picture from a 50-inch plasma to an 89-inch screen, the progressive circuitry certainly looked fine when displaying the same test patterns as before.[The Ayre's progressive component output also exhibited fine resolution in both my objective and subjective tests on a DLP projector. See the "Tests & Comments" sidebar.—TJN]

Movies and Music
Used as a transport for audio CDs, the Ayre DX-7 was pristine. Feeding the Yamaha processor, the DX-7 produced tight, tuneful bass and a fluid midrange replete with detail. Shawn Colvin's Steady On (CD, Columbia CX 45209) has many fine songs; in "Diamond in the Rough," the deep layering of instruments was clearly conveyed.

I bypassed my video processor and watched a few movies with the Ayre's progressive RGB output connected directly to the projector. I've never been a fan of going it alone on the big screen, but I have to admit that the Ayre's progressive RGB image was excellent. While the scan lines of a 480p image are usually annoyingly visible on a large screen, I wasn't consciously aware of them at any point with these movies. There also seemed to be some minor improvements in motion artifacts during horizontal pans.

My biggest problem with viewing line-doubled images directly vs. going through a more aggressive scaler such as the Dwin TranScanner has always been image saturation. The Ayre is the first player I've seen whose progressive RGB output was sufficiently involving and color-saturated to inspire long-term viewing.

The rest of my projector viewing was through the Dwin TranScanner dialed in to an effective 600p—the golden scan for the Dwin projector's 7-inch CRTs. Before the firmware upgrade, the picture from the player's component outputs had been excessively dark and, worse, uncorrectable. With the firmware upgrade and access to black-level setup, the picture popped to life.

Veronica Guerin (DVD, Touchstone 32056) is a dark movie; the opening scenes in the church and courtroom are great tests of low-level detail. The Ayre passed those tests wonderfully, revealing the velvety detail in a woman's dark shawl and a judge's robes. Although recent Pioneer players offer a host of controls that are totally absent from the DX-7 (you can choose among Cinema, Animation, or Standard picture quality for interlaced output modes only), the Ayre more than held its own out of the box.

I enjoyed the Ayre most from its DVI output. The video tests didn't need to tell me what my eyes already knew: the DX-7 came into its own as the perfect source for fixed-pixel displays. While I leave it to TJN to comment on the Ayre's DVI performance with a DLP front projector, watching Kill Bill, Vol.1 (DVD, Miramax 32210) on the Fujitsu plasma was extraordinary. The fight scene in chapter 3 offers lots of fast-flying fur as Uma Thurman and Vivica A. Fox turn into human Cuisinarts. The Ayre produced smooth, artifact-free motion.

Color saturation in Kill Bill and, most especially, in The Fifth Element (DVD, Sony Superbit 07574), were also superb. While some expressed reservations about DVI's performance early on, many of these problems may have been cases of poor implementation. In my opinion, DVI is the best transmission vehicle available for viewing motion pictures in the home. Any equipment chain that can keep a picture in the digital domain from start to finish is, by definition, superior to anything that dips one's toes into the analog pool.

Conclusions
During a recent trip to Costco, I walked past a boatload of progressive-scan Sony DVD players selling for $79 each, and I thought of all the people I wouldn't be able to convince to at least take a gander at the Ayre DX-7. But if what you want is a great picture—particularly from a DVI-equipped DLP, Sony SXRD, or JVC D-ILA front projector throwing images on an 8-foot-wide, high-end Stewart or DaLite screen—the Ayre DX-7 has got to be on your short list.

If, like me, you have a smallish screen, such as my 78-inch-wide Stewart (I said smallish), and what is still the best display device in the world, a front-projecting CRT, you can experience nonfatiguing, artifact-free, analog progressive-scan video from the Ayre and never have to worry about being left out in the cold when you decide that fixed-pixel displays have finally gotten good enough.