Upscaling (1080p) DVD player running DVDs at half resolution

[King Mustard]

I have a Xenta VT-S205 1080p upscaling DVD player.

It was purchased in December 2013 for £15 from Ebuyer.

It hasn't been used in many years.

I plugged it in today (via. HDMI) into a Samsung UE46ES5500 TV (a 2012 model). I've also tried two other HD TVs.

All DVDs appear extremely pixelated. As in, below the standard DVD-Video resolution of 576p. They appear to be playing in half resolution.

There aren't many settings to change but those that do exist are all set correctly:

• ■Aspect Radio: 16:9
  ■View Mode: Original (not Pan & Scan or Zoom)
  ■TV System: PAL (I tried NTSC, just in case)
  ■Video Out: HDMI
  ■HD Resolution: 1080p (I've tried 1080i also)

Anyone heard of anything like this happening before and what could be causing it?

 

[13thmonkey]

bad cable?

 

[King Mustard]

bad cable?

Sorry, tried various different HDMi cables.

Added it to the post.

 

[americanaudiophile]

I think the problem is that modern TVs won't do 1080p when connected with component video. Component video connectors were removed from all disc players after a certain time. HDMI has much stronger copyguard protection so the downgraded the component output.
Doesn't really matter as the upscaler in the TV is almost surely better than the one in the DVD.