1080P, what's the meaning?

[MasterDisaster]

today we hear a lot of talks about 1080p, the ps3 is capable, now x360 is capable too, but what really means 1080p for the graphical POV?

We all Know the hardware limits inside the next(actual)gen consoles, 8 ROPS, different approach to Frame Buffer, 128 bit bus memory....

so what I ask to debate is:

a) Is 1080p a better choice over 720? (Es. which have less aliasing, 720p 4x MSAA or 1080p without AA?)
1080P = 2.073.600 Samples (Pixel)
720P 4x MSAA = 3.686.400 Samples

720P 4x MSAA seems almost double than 1080P

b) Is 1080p a way to limit aliasing when HDR is turned on without using NAO32'ish routines (Es. we can't on a consoel GPU run 720p antialiased + HDR FP, so we'll go with 1080p without AA + HDR)

c) Is resolution the only factor? will we have 1080p 16 color-bit over 720p 32 color-bit games?

I really think that 1080p is not more than a PR words, not better than when the people says that a console was powerful because of its bit (Es nintendo64 is more powerfull of xbox1 because this is a 64 bit console), but take this as my personal opinion.

I just wonder how many of this 1080p-games will have 24-16 color-bit, and how many of this will be without AA at all.

 

[.Melchiah.]

I really think that 1080p is not more than a PR words, not better than when the people says that a console was powerful because of its bit (Es nintendo64 is more powerfull of xbox1 because this is a 64 bit console), but take this as my personal opinion.

Just PR words?

Marvel: Ultimate Alliance:

The PS3 game looks sharpest of all, running at the incredible 1080p resolution.

http://ps3.gamespy.com/playstation-3/marvel-ultimate-alliance/737765p2.html

Call of Duty 3 hands-on:

In addition, the PS3 room had three screens outputting at 1080p, which looked simply awesome.

http://uk.xbox360.ign.com/articles/737/737755p1.html

 

[MasterDisaster]

Just PR words?

don't take two words out of contest, read the whole post, I've explained my thought

 

[PeterT]

I guess I'm a bit biased as a PC gamer used to playing at 1920*1200, but IMHO 1080p is clearly a great option to have. Some games may not need many alpha-blended particle effects, or have scenes that cause much overdraw. In those games - ie. in ones that are not primarily fillrate/bandwidth limited - it makes perfect sense to render at 1080p. I don't see how anyone could construe that as a bad thing. Examples of this type of game would be tennis or golf.

The point of contention seems to be the cases where games are purportedly "downgraded" to support 1080p. Some people are completely against this in all cases - personally I'd happily trade some effects and/or shader complexity for improved image quality, but every console shot released with barely trilinear filtering on ground textures reminds me that I'm in the minority there

Anyway, we have a gazillion of threads on this already, don't we?

 

[.Melchiah.]

don't take two words out of contest, read the whole post, I've explained my thought

You said 1080p is as irrevelevant as whether a console is 32 or 64 or 128 bit, and 1080p clearly isn't irrelevant. You only need to look at what people, who have seen 720p and 1080p side by side, have to say.

 

[EricVonZipper]

Well as I've stated before, The PS3 might be CPU or I/O or GPU bound. Having such bottlenecks may allow certain developers to up the resolution with little drop in frame rate. If your game is running 70fps at 720p and 68fps @1080p why not make your publisher(Sony) happy?

 

[MasterDisaster]

Well as I've stated before, The PS3 might be CPU or I/O or GPU bound. Having such bottlenecks may allow certain developers to up the resolution with little drop in frame rate. If your game is running 70fps at 720p and 68fps @1080p why not make your publisher(Sony) happy?

mmh I don't know any game that is cpu-limited or gpu-limited all the time, and I'm talking of pc games
in console world, doesn't exist at all this kind of situation because all is developed to be balanced for a closed box.

and in the case of PS3 I think that it's easy that Cell stalls waiting for RSX, not viceversa.

 

[V3]

mmh I don't know any game that is cpu-limited or gpu-limited all the time, and I'm talking of pc games
in console world, doesn't exist at all this kind of situation because all is developed to be balanced for a closed box.

and in the case of PS3 I think that it's easy that Cell stalls waiting for RSX, not viceversa.

It can be CPU limited or GPU limited for different frame, but as long as each frame is finished on time (while being either CPU or GPU limited) to achieve target frame rate of 60 fps or 30 fps it should still be good. So even if 1080p makes it more GPU limited, as long as it achieves target frame rate, it should be done.

 

[Guden Oden]

Do we HAVE to discuss WHY, can't we just agree it's better to have more options compared to not having them?

So what if it isn't a smart choice for every, or even most games. Doesn't mean it can't work (great) in some games.

 

[SugarCoat]

In terms of pure TV image IQ you want

contrast ratio > color saturation > color accuracy > resolution

1080p is quite possibly one the easiest and dumbest things to explain to Joe Average which is why it gets the most time in the lime light. Hey afterall 1080 is a bigger number then 720.

"its 1080P for my tv? omgz, must be super superior, things look AMAZING!!"

no. Its also incredibly hard to tell the difference between the two at normal viewing distances because its not a computer monitor and a 1080P tv is usually quite a bit larger which takes away a little of the "wow thats an improvement!" factor and adds its own placebo effect of bigger is better. Now if you want to talk about equal size screens and sticking your face 18 inches away from the screen, then sure, its going to be noticable. This is the distance of the people making comments of 1080P are at so how credible are they? How many people you know are going to sit face to face with their tv too? Sit in a chair 10-15 feet away from the same screen with the same game displaying 1080 and 720 then get back to me on this wonder of the world you suddenly dont see anymore.

I want to slap people who are bending over backward with 1080P glorification but i know its one of those things you can try to explain to someone until the end of time and they'll keep believing what the PR says. Here specifically i'd problably just end up getting a bunch of bad rep points .

As Guden said more options is certainly better but 1080P itself is not worth the attention its getting nor is it worth the current premium most TVs have with coming equiped to output a true 1080P picture. Because of these two reasons i'd easily call 1080P the most overblown effect/option discussed this console generation, and we're only about a year into it! But i'd bank that its going to be this way for the entire way through.

 

[PeterT]

I want to slap people who are bending over backward with 1080P glorification but i know its one of those things you can try to explain to someone until the end of time and they'll keep believing what the PR says.

I really don't get this kind of reaction. Perhaps I frequent the wrong circles, but I think I've seen more "OMG 1080p is useless PR!" posts than I've seen ones that unconditionally praise it. Both are completely wrong of course.

I think we should really just stop it at Guden's observation, which we can hopefully all agree on and which I'll quote here for maximum exposure

So what if it isn't a smart choice for every, or even most games. Doesn't mean it can't work (great) in some games.

 

[SugarCoat]

I have not seen nearly enough people saying the difference of 1080 isnt massive and its more of a PR thing, maybe you frequent more forums cause i really dont, especially console based ones (i already cringe when i come into this section). People asking about TVs here, some threads get posted about 1080P games, even some of the posts in this very thread all-be-it outwardly labeling the comments as PR, seem to show the same thing and thats "1080P must be better cause its higher right, and thats all that matters?" Only more often then not its stated rather then asked by someone who doesnt know what they're talking about. Cant count how many times i've seen someone come to the conclusion that the PS3 is a far superior console in terms of power cause it can and will do 1080P in some games. Thats the effect that i'm seeing quite a bit.

 

[Powderkeg]

Just PR words?

Marvel: Ultimate Alliance:



Call of Duty 3 hands-on:

Put the 360 version on and scale it to 1080p on any 1080p television. Site at normal viewing distance.

Can you actually tell a difference then?

 

[Bad_Boy]

Put the 360 version on and scale it to 1080p on any 1080p television. Site at normal viewing distance.

Can you actually tell a difference then?

Are you talking about 720p upscaled to 1080p vs native 1080p?

If so, then by all means there should be a difference, obviously nothing game changing or earth shattering, but there should be a sharper picture displayed (if your tv accepts the 1080p signal). I've seen a 1080p setup show an upscaled 720p source vs a native 1080p source and I could tell a difference (yes @ normal viewing distance on the same tv). But again nothing huge, but there was a difference if thats what you are asking.

My next setup will be 1080p (samsung 56" DLP to be specific, coming from a 720p tv) so I can't wait.

 

[dangerose]

MS got hell for their HD Era crap that forces all games to run at 720p and now Sony does the 1080p dance. These guys are only fighting for the biggest e-news not what best for consumers and developers.

 

[Guden Oden]

Apparantly it offends quite a lot of people for some reason that Sony pushes 1080P hard. I really don't get that. I mean, why do you care? I find this irrational reaction more annoying and irritating than the (few) people who get overly excited about 1080P. It's like, 1080P is apparantly "too much", or something, like there's some invisible boundary somewhere between 720 and 1080 vertical lines. Well, Maybe 720P is a bit too much as well then, who says THAT is the ultimate arbitrarily picked resolution?

I don't have a 1080P TV. Yet I think it's cool the option exists. Why can't you guys simply chill, instead of causing such a damn ruckus over what is essentially nothing important at all. You don't have to celebrate Sony's accomplishment or anything, just don't get your panties in such a fucking bind, it's pathetic.

 

[Rangers]

Just PR words?

Marvel: Ultimate Alliance:



Call of Duty 3 hands-on:

I really think these are upscaled to 1080P unless proved otherwise.

If they're not, why not make them at 720P and give us better graphics than the 360 version? Especially considering how few people have 1080P TV's.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

I don't have a 1080P TV. Yet I think it's cool the option exists. Why can't you guys simply chill, instead of causing such a damn ruckus over what is essentially nothing important at all.

But...but...you don't understand the importance! We gamers are being ripped off and royal screwed by the evil Sony! By forcing 1080p, just to sell more HD TVs (it's like all they care about is making money), they're depriving the rest of the world of better graphics. That's an infringement of my GOD GIVEN HUMAN RIGHT TO THE BEST PER PIXEL SHADING AT THE RESOLUTION I VIEW A GAME IN! Whether the 1080p games look good or not is besides the point. By looking at the numbers, I can tell that at a lower resolution, I'd get more quality per pixel. Surely that's enough to make anyone mad? I know my 97 year old gran's furious that she'll be getting less than half as many shader ops per pixel at 1080p than 720p! And if she dies of a heart attack, I will being suing Sony for doing this to her.


('He's gonna blow! Run for the hills!" )

 

[MasterDisaster]

I see that my first post was misinterpreted,

I'm thinking that some games will go in some different IQ setups just to use 1080p

thinking of a game that runs
60 fps or 30 fps @ 720P 32 bit color depth 4x MSAA

can run with less samples (imho worse overall aliasing quality)

60 fps or 30 fps @ 1080P 32 bit color depth without MSAA
60 fps or 30 fps @ 1080P 16 bit color depth 2x MSAA

also the shaders have to work in a extra 40% pixel area, and this is not trivial, so in 1080P we can see less shaders loads than a what it's possibile on a 720P rendering
also RSX it's based on G70, so is there possibile that some devs will use low precision modes (16-24 bit) against full 32?

and all of this for what?
just to use the number "1080P" for PR purpose?

1080P without AA is a lot worse, from an aliasing point of view, than a 720P 4xMSAA, it has half the samples information on screen, 2 milions against 4 milions

when you work with a closed box, you have always the same resources, if you do something, you'll have to pay the price with this resource, there's nothing free

 

[SugarCoat]

Apparantly it offends quite a lot of people for some reason that Sony pushes 1080P hard. I really don't get that. I mean, why do you care? I find this irrational reaction more annoying and irritating than the (few) people who get overly excited about 1080P. It's like, 1080P is apparantly "too much", or something, like there's some invisible boundary somewhere between 720 and 1080 vertical lines. Well, Maybe 720P is a bit too much as well then, who says THAT is the ultimate arbitrarily picked resolution?

I don't have a 1080P TV. Yet I think it's cool the option exists. Why can't you guys simply chill, instead of causing such a damn ruckus over what is essentially nothing important at all. You don't have to celebrate Sony's accomplishment or anything, just don't get your panties in such a fucking bind, it's pathetic.

....i think i'm the only one whos made a complaint about an overactive PR campaign. I dont understand where all these other people are since you're now the second one to make that comment. And i dont mean to pick on Sony, as all TV manufacturers are doing it, and i'm sure MS will too very very soon, but they're the easiest. Lets not forget they were proposing/touting TWIN 1080P output for a single PS3 back in E3 05 before they knew what the hell they were doing! Its a main capability over the Xbox360 that they make sound like so much more then it really is, so i cant help myself.

I prefer boxers, dont bind.