Widescreen or not?

Still in the set-up menu you should now programme in your screen shape – do you have a widescreen 16:9 or traditional 4:3 TV? If it is 4:3 you have a choice on how it displays widescreen broadcasts – most programmes from major broadcasters are now in widescreen.

You can choose ‘centre cut-out’, sometimes called ‘pan and scan’. This mode fills the screen but you lose some of the picture at the edges.

Or you can choose ‘letterbox’ mode. This shows the whole width of the picture but to do so has to reduce the size leaving black bars top and bottom of the screen. The ‘centre cut out’ is what most people go for unless they have a very big TV screen.

Some of the products on test have a 4:3 compromise mode – a bit centre cut-out and a bit letter-box. See the detailed test reports.

If you want subtitles you will need to activate them and, with some set top boxes, even choose what language – Welsh and Gaelic may be an option when they are broadcast.

Finally, use the set-up menu to confirm that any auto-update feature is switched on. Some boxes are fixed on auto-update so you don’t have to set this. It ensures that your box receives any updates from the manufacturer – to solve software problems or introduce new features.

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