Somewhat newbie question. Why sometimes are shows in HD have bars on top and bottom?

[CleanAudi]

Ok, two questions here. The first: For example, lets say I'm watching a HD channel, with my HDTV, using HDMI. The zoom settings are on normal, yet the program or movie I'm watching still has black bars on both the top and bottom. I don't get why that is? The video content is def HD but the bars still exist. A perfect example of this is Pulp Fiction. I was watching it on Showtime HD or whatever and bars were still there. My next question, why the hell are NON HD channels with some shows shown with the same black bars on the top and bottom? For example the shows 'Pinks' on speed channel has horizontal black bars on top and bottom even, so even I use the Strech the bars are still there on my TV until I doo a full zoom which cuts half the image off. Setup is: Pioneer Elite PRO-1130HD 50" Dish Network HD ViP-211 Box w/ HDMI Cable Thanks!

[4Rings::G2 boosted::]

while the HD channels are always 16:9, which basically means they are being shot with film cameras and converted to HD for broadcast vs. being shot with HD cameras.

All sd channels are broadcast in 4:3 aspect ratio, no matter what the actual content is, so in order to fit widescreen content the broadcasters add bars on top and bottom, this is called letterboxing. Then your tv adds bars on the sides the fit the 4:3 frame into a widescreen picture. That's what the zoom option is there for, use it to zoom in letterboxed content to get rid of the side and top/bottom bars.

[illbill]

For example, if an HD channel is showing Pulp Fiction and it fills your whole widescreen tv, then they are cropping the picture (this is bad).