All right, hopefully this is the proper place in this forum for a thread such as this, but here goes.
Recently on another forum someone asked about the quality of 1080p over component video and I chimed in with my experience, which I can state very simply: it works, however there is a faint ghosting to it. I did caveat my statement as being my own experience, appropriately enough. However, I have two plasma TVs that I've seen this issue with, and seen similar issues with at least 5 other setups.
I would also like to make clear that I understand the following already:
1. That 1080p via component is a more recent addition in the past few years,
2. That some HDTVs still sold today do not support 1080p via component,
3. That many-or-most older HDTVs did not support it in years past,
4. That more and more sets are supporting 1080p via component now,
5. And that both the PS3 and XBox 360 have had very functional 1080p via component for quite some time now.
In other words, I get that situations can vary, and that you should make certain that your set in question actually supports 1080p via component from the manufacturer before making a blanket statement. Some consumers will have the opportunity to use 1080p this way, and some won't.
However, after seeing this issue with my own plasma sets, I went to HDMI for the latest consoles and never looked back, mostly due to the issue that I noticed as soon as I attempted 1080p via component. I tried higher quality cables, I tried Monster cables, I tried monoprice cables, I tried brand-x cables, I tried cables that came with OEM equipment. I tried with switchboxes, without switchboxes, through HT equipment, and directly to the TV. I still had a very faint ghosting/blur to the image. This just grated on me, so I left component behind. At 1080i there was no issue, at 720p there was no issue, at 480i/p, there was no issue. Switching a source to 1080p gave this issue. Seeing it on other person's TVs, it only stood to reason from my observation that 1080p has issues with component cables.
As I had solved my problem by ditching component cables for 1080p use however, I didn't really waste a great deal of time pondering over the matter afterwards. Until last week of course, at which point the chorus of chants that perfectly functional component cables, equipment, and TVs should operate a 1080p signal perfectly just started to grate on me as well. So I started trying to google for some solid information on how it is that my experience happened to be as it was.
The best information that I have found so far, is here:
This is intriguing stuff to me, having always been interested in image quality at the screen, and as it turned out, the plasma screens that I have actually have BNC connections for component. The above poster went on:
This all certainly seems plausible. I've dealt with cables for many broadcasts, composite, component, or even audio, of varying quality and quite frequently, when I had issues with a particular cable, it wasn't a crimp in the cable itself but soldering work or frays and such nearer the connector, under its hood. But I wondered just where he got some of this information from, with respect to RCA's bandwidth limitation and so forth. But the big idea behind this information would seem to confirm what I had seen, that the cabling is fine but that the connection is behind the times. After all, it is pretty old.
However, I'm not sure if this final post was meant to invalidate this or, what, as it seems to be worded rather densely.
So just when I've stumbled across what seems to be "the answer," I'm not so certain. Does this make sense to the more technical minded here? I can't honestly tell if the second poster is saying "no, because analogue signals are half the pixel rate, component is fine for 1080p," or if he is agreeing with him and tacitly referring to the 1080i figure, and chiding the exotic cable [strike]rip-off artists[/strike] manufacturers for their high bandwidth claims. Somehow just seeing these figures it seems a little surprising that anything beyond 480p works properly without ghosting over component cables. I would sit down and try to work out the math on this myself but I am just not sure where they are getting this from.
Last minute edit: I also understand that AACS limits BluRay to 1080i over component as a matter of content protection but that is also beside this issue, I am just trying to isolate a specific reason why 1080p would ghost/blur at all via component.
Recently on another forum someone asked about the quality of 1080p over component video and I chimed in with my experience, which I can state very simply: it works, however there is a faint ghosting to it. I did caveat my statement as being my own experience, appropriately enough. However, I have two plasma TVs that I've seen this issue with, and seen similar issues with at least 5 other setups.
I would also like to make clear that I understand the following already:
1. That 1080p via component is a more recent addition in the past few years,
2. That some HDTVs still sold today do not support 1080p via component,
3. That many-or-most older HDTVs did not support it in years past,
4. That more and more sets are supporting 1080p via component now,
5. And that both the PS3 and XBox 360 have had very functional 1080p via component for quite some time now.
In other words, I get that situations can vary, and that you should make certain that your set in question actually supports 1080p via component from the manufacturer before making a blanket statement. Some consumers will have the opportunity to use 1080p this way, and some won't.
However, after seeing this issue with my own plasma sets, I went to HDMI for the latest consoles and never looked back, mostly due to the issue that I noticed as soon as I attempted 1080p via component. I tried higher quality cables, I tried Monster cables, I tried monoprice cables, I tried brand-x cables, I tried cables that came with OEM equipment. I tried with switchboxes, without switchboxes, through HT equipment, and directly to the TV. I still had a very faint ghosting/blur to the image. This just grated on me, so I left component behind. At 1080i there was no issue, at 720p there was no issue, at 480i/p, there was no issue. Switching a source to 1080p gave this issue. Seeing it on other person's TVs, it only stood to reason from my observation that 1080p has issues with component cables.
As I had solved my problem by ditching component cables for 1080p use however, I didn't really waste a great deal of time pondering over the matter afterwards. Until last week of course, at which point the chorus of chants that perfectly functional component cables, equipment, and TVs should operate a 1080p signal perfectly just started to grate on me as well. So I started trying to google for some solid information on how it is that my experience happened to be as it was.
The best information that I have found so far, is here:
This is intriguing stuff to me, having always been interested in image quality at the screen, and as it turned out, the plasma screens that I have actually have BNC connections for component. The above poster went on:
This all certainly seems plausible. I've dealt with cables for many broadcasts, composite, component, or even audio, of varying quality and quite frequently, when I had issues with a particular cable, it wasn't a crimp in the cable itself but soldering work or frays and such nearer the connector, under its hood. But I wondered just where he got some of this information from, with respect to RCA's bandwidth limitation and so forth. But the big idea behind this information would seem to confirm what I had seen, that the cabling is fine but that the connection is behind the times. After all, it is pretty old.
However, I'm not sure if this final post was meant to invalidate this or, what, as it seems to be worded rather densely.
So just when I've stumbled across what seems to be "the answer," I'm not so certain. Does this make sense to the more technical minded here? I can't honestly tell if the second poster is saying "no, because analogue signals are half the pixel rate, component is fine for 1080p," or if he is agreeing with him and tacitly referring to the 1080i figure, and chiding the exotic cable [strike]rip-off artists[/strike] manufacturers for their high bandwidth claims. Somehow just seeing these figures it seems a little surprising that anything beyond 480p works properly without ghosting over component cables. I would sit down and try to work out the math on this myself but I am just not sure where they are getting this from.
Last minute edit: I also understand that AACS limits BluRay to 1080i over component as a matter of content protection but that is also beside this issue, I am just trying to isolate a specific reason why 1080p would ghost/blur at all via component.
