Effects of next gen consoles on you to buy a new HDTV?

[Cyan]

In the other Rock Band games you can actually measure the input lag you are getting. Can you try that with your TV?

Yes, I tried. I used not to trust that method /calibration wizard/ because in my previous TV it gave me crazy readings.

By crazy I mean that the values differed too much to be reliable -even if I had set Game mode on the TV-, I've always understood it as something which wasn't right, so what I did was setting both the audio and video calibration to zero /manual calibration/ and always played that way.

I tried the calibration wizard anyways because of your request and I got different results again. Again, they differed too much so I averaged the results, but well, take this with a huge grain of salt.

For audio the measures gave me something like -70ms on average. For video it gave me 37 ms on average.

In the end I set the calibration to Manual, 0 ms for both audio and video. I played a little just to see if I noticed lag and I got the Shredder achievement for the first time -performing a 100% solo- and the Blitz something achievement -staying in Blitz mode for more than 30 seconds- in this TV.

So I think that the input lag isn't an issue with this TV, even if I haven't changed the picture setting to Game mode -does it even have a Game mode?-.

I've set picture to Natural colours -my favourite setting of the bunch-, Unscaled (1:1 pixel ratio) and audio to Incredible Surround 3D -dunno if this introduces audio lag compared to Stereo, the console is set to Dolby Surround 5.1-.

Additionally, I don't know how to calibrate the TV and it doesn't bother me much. Compared with my good ol' LCD it is night and day and it looks awesome.

The TV is from this series -without the Ambilight and active 3D instead of passive 3D, 200MHz instead of 300MHz of the 5008 model (mine is 4508)-, give or take, so you get the idea.

http://www.expertreviews.co.uk/tvs/1301686/philips-42pfl5008t

 

[Cyan]

I think the main issue for me is that the 3D does affect the experience ... Negatively. I'm a huge fan, and one of the best examples on PS3 for instance was Zen Pinball 2, which just blows your mind when you first see it. But the penalty is too big for a pinball game: a lot more lag. I got more excited in the end by the Vita version of the same game, which thanks to the OLED, has some of the least lag I've ever experienced. This is why I am still leaning towards the Sony.

So right now, while you have a choice between 2D and 3D and the game taxes the hardware, 3D comes at a big price, often too big. The best experience is on PC with, imiho, 3DVision. If you have powerful enough hardware you can run a game well beyond console quality but still in 3D.

This is why I would probably be in favor of a solution where you could get a 3D version of a console that costs more, but gives you the same game, framerate, resolution and detail, but in full 3D.

Movies tend to look fantastic though, even on my cheap 27" passive LG that I use in my study.

In my personal experience 3D has been quite pleasing and had I the opportunity to buy a new TV in the future I would always purchase one with 3D support. Given the fact that I waited a lot of time to buy a new TV I am glad I took the decision to buy it with 3D support.

My only experience with 3D is Crysis and it plays the same on both 2D and 3D, -as responsive in 2D as in 3D- although it is just much more immersive in 3D....

On a different note, I have been testing games I know too well, like Red Dead Redemption and others, in the new TV and I don't know if it is the Micro Dimming support, the enormous amount of colours in modern TVs, etc etc, but the difference is so noticeable from the very first second.

For instance, when playing RDR in night scenes you can see lamps on masonry walls -Mexico-, and they are yellowish-brownish...

I remember those lamps in my previous TV but they didn't stand out. Now I can see the halo of their light surrounding the lamps pretty clearly and with a very different colour compared to the masonry walls. :smile2:

The wall looks brownish and the light is a bit more intense, yellowish. Before the light of the lamps never stood out and went basically unnoticed for me.

It might well be the superb accuracy of colours -mentioned in the review from the previous post- or the much better contrast but yes, it does make justice to the Xbox 360. Sure there are better TVs out there, but this one has an outstanding picture quality too. I am really happy with it.

On a different note, this might be interesting for Scooby_dooby

Cave 2 the most advanced virtual environment of the world for both 2D and 3D. It was launched very recently, it uses 80 LCD panels and it has a 320 degrees panoramic design for great visual acuity.

 

[Arwin]

Crysis did a nice trick, but it's not 'proper' 3D (i.e. most of the objects aren't actually rendered in 3D). That's how it managed to keep the framerate and latency pretty much on par and didn't have to compromise resolution, so that's a benefit, but once you've compared it to proper 3D games, the difference is quite large. A game like Trine 2 is truly a sight to behold, as even all the smoke effects are 3D, my PC can run it at 1080p at a good framerate (I don't need 120Hz as I have passive 3D), and it just looks stunning. It sells everyone on 3D that I've showed it to.

 

[tuna]

Yes, I tried. I used not to trust that method /calibration wizard/ because in my previous TV it gave me crazy readings.

By crazy I mean that the values differed too much to be reliable -even if I had set Game mode on the TV-, I've always understood it as something which wasn't right, so what I did was setting both the audio and video calibration to zero /manual calibration/ and always played that way.

I tried the calibration wizard anyways because of your request and I got different results again. Again, they differed too much so I averaged the results, but well, take this with a huge grain of salt.

For audio the measures gave me something like -70ms on average. For video it gave me 37 ms on average.

37 ms seems like a reasonable video lag. It is probably correct.

 

[Cyan]

37 ms seems like a reasonable video lag. It is probably correct.

I still have Rock Band 3 -RB1, RB2 and RB3 to be precise- and the game actually had a guitar which included an automatic sensor to test the input lag. I have the Rock Band 3 drums but just Rock Band 1 guitar, but I would have loved to try that.

All I can say is that I haven't experienced lag when trying to hit notes.

The only flaws I found is that the Smart TV navigation, and apps like Youtube etc, are slightly slow compared to my PC.

Crysis did a nice trick, but it's not 'proper' 3D (i.e. most of the objects aren't actually rendered in 3D). That's how it managed to keep the framerate and latency pretty much on par and didn't have to compromise resolution, so that's a benefit, but once you've compared it to proper 3D games, the difference is quite large. A game like Trine 2 is truly a sight to behold, as even all the smoke effects are 3D, my PC can run it at 1080p at a good framerate (I don't need 120Hz as I have passive 3D), and it just looks stunning. It sells everyone on 3D that I've showed it to.

Interesting... I wonder if Trine 2 has been released on consoles. I promised myself not to buy a single new game until the new consoles are released, but if there was a demo I would love to try it.

In regards to Crysis, I know what you mean. The effect is still nice, because it feels like the game is within the TV and the TV's screen seems to be actually a box and not a flat screen. The HUD "coming out" of the TV is also a neat effect, but I can't wait to try more 3D games and movies. I just love the effect so much!

Other than that, whether you use 3D or 2D, even for the untrained eye the differences with previous technologies is really noticeable.

You don't need to be an expert to notice things like the contrast between colours and areas of colour, which for me was really unnoticeable before, for the most part -what I mentioned about the masonry wall and the lamps in Red Dead Redemption-. :smile2:

The millions of colours games can display nowadays are noticeable in the way you can discern where a colour starts and where it ends and there is another colour besides it. This was really hard to discern for me before.

Thus games like Pinball FX 1 and 2 looked fine before but not nearly as amazing as they look now.

Simple things like the number showing the amount of years someone's Gamertag has been a Gold member was all white for me before.

It turns out to be that it isn't, it's half white -top- and half golden-coloured. (bottom) :smile2:

 

[Arwin]

I hear you on the colors. I went for a 768p model last time rather than 1080p because the colors and contrast were much better on the 768p model.

38ms of lag is about the best for non-Sony TVs and very good. It's still just over 1 frame of 30fps though which is why I am so interested in the Sony doing exactly one frame of 60fps (16.8ms)

 

[Davros]

It is ?
I remember when lcd's arrived people saying you need s response time of at most 25ms

 

[Arwin]

It is ?
I remember when lcd's arrived people saying you need s response time of at most 25ms

That's what various tests online told me at least. This is for TVs, not PC monitors, where 16.8ms is probably considered slow these days with 4ms apparently getting common.

 

[Cyan]

I hear you on the colors. I went for a 768p model last time rather than 1080p because the colors and contrast were much better on the 768p model.

38ms of lag is about the best for non-Sony TVs and very good. It's still just over 1 frame of 30fps though which is why I am so interested in the Sony doing exactly one frame of 60fps (16.8ms)

Yes, I couldn't describe it when I noticed the change, and wasn't entirely sure I could find the words to define what I was seeing, but even a person who has never seen a TV in their life would notice that.

This image is perfect to understand what I mean. I hadn't even seen this image when I realised the contrast between the colours and the coloured areas. The colour differences stood out a lot more.

A game like Call of Juarez though, doesn't look as hot now, because that dull look benefited the art of the game to some extent and some flaws weren't as visible.

However, changing the TVs picture settings to something like Movie, Personal, etc, /I have it set at Natural and it is my favourite setting/ pretty much gives the same result with the added greater image quality of modern TVs.

Additionally, I understand your concern for the input lag (something that doesn't bother me with this TV, and I didn't even try the Game option), and for those interested in buying a new TV my recommendation is to take your time /which I did/, and that's a decision you'd have to make based upon your own perspectives.

 

[Cyan]

I found the Game mode and tested the input lag again in Rock Band Blitz...

I didn't find any significant difference whatsoever, so I left it untouched, which means Off --just in case the changes to image quality and processing affect the final picture quality.

I played this song using Incredible Surround 3D and Music setting, and it was cool. I know Rock Band isn't what it used to be, but I have more than 800 songs for it and replaying some of them brings back good memories.

 

[Cyan]

Colour me impressed. Some more impressions.

I've been testing both the image and sound from the TV. I found out that the Personal setting produces the best results in both cases --both setting are well studied and fit perfectly the capabilities of the TV. (I was a fan of Natural setting before but now I wouldn't change Personal for any of the other settings)

Playing Super Street Fighter 2 HD at 1080p is like watching a 2D animation movie. You can discern every nook and cranny of the characters, every single line drawn.., and some of the stages are animation movie-worthy. :O

The rich colours and the perfect definition and contrast make some stages look like a Disney movie, so to say -especially T. Hawk, Blanka and Dhalsim stages-.:smile2:

As for the sound, it isn't going to win any award but it is not bad at all. The Personal setting provides the warmest sound of them all.

Incredible Surround 3D has a very lush reverb effect. Again, it's well studied by the engineers of the TV and suited to the capabilities of the TV speakers.

I managed to complete Blazblue in this TV and during the ending scene of Noel Vermillion I could hear the closest sound to what they call "surround" I heard on the TV in my experience with it.

It is a high pitched sound, a blip similar to one of those hospital machines. It only sounded in my right ear, my left ear didn't hear anything of it, and it was quite.... disturbing. I hear it every time like that, because I unlocked the ending scene.

Blazblue looked absolutely amazing again. I think its due to the rich colours, fine contrast of the TV, because those games looked good before but now they look a-wesome.

Super Street Fighter 2 HD felt more like a flash game before and now I can see the absolutely incredible work the programmers made with the HD version. As I said it is worthy of an animation movie.

I can only imagine 2D classic adventures, like this classic called Broken Sword re-programmed in HD and I drool at the thought....

 

[BoardBonobo]

Slightly OT, but I'm not upgrading the TV just the sound system. I was using an all in one Home Cinema System but I'm feeling very short changed on the audio side. So that's my upgrade!

 

[DuckThor Evil]

Well I have decided to put my 4K dream into hibernation for perhaps about 24 months to let things mature a bit. I will however upgrade my current setup and already have a little plan going

 

[baten]

The only upgrade I'm looking forward is the 1080P version of HMZ from Sony.
My TV is good enough for the next 5-6 years (a 50inch VT30 from Panasonic).

 

[Cyan]

Slightly OT, but I'm not upgrading the TV just the sound system. I was using an all in one Home Cinema System but I'm feeling very short changed on the audio side. So that's my upgrade!

Had I to upgrade something I would upgrade the sound system too. The TV I purchased can't compete with a good surround system, but that's to be expected. Anyways it's highly unlikely I am going to upgrade my sound system now.

I have other priorities -limited money too-, I don't what to overthink thinking about what new sound system to buy.

Well I have decided to put my 4K dream into hibernation for perhaps about 24 months to let things mature a bit. I will however upgrade my current setup and already have a little plan going

I think that's a sensible, smart decision because it is still a novelty and you won't be taking full advantage of it in a while.

I remember reading one of the reviews of the brand new 3D TVs -from the year when they started to be sold to the main public- and that 65" TV was really really expensive, but the image quality was so bad the reviewers said they wouldn't be capable to fix it, even if they calibrated the TV.

The only upgrade I'm looking forward is the 1080P version of HMZ from Sony.
My TV is good enough for the next 5-6 years (a 50inch VT30 from Panasonic).

I guess the HMZ has nothing to do with the VR system Sony are working on. It might well suit me though, because I LOVE playing as close to the screen as I can.

It has been always that way for me. When I was in high school I learnt like 100% more if I were closer to the wall slate. When I was sitting far from the chalkboard my grades dropped quite a bit.

 

[Cyan]

After reading Arwin's comments on Trine 2 I gave the game a try today in the hopes I could play it in 3D. Unfortunately, after downloading the demo I realised it doesn't feature 3D stereoscopic support for the console versions.

I can see why this game has to be amazing in 3D though, because even in 2D it has a lot of depth! But... it's not the same at all...

Additional, I have been searching for 3D movies in the Xbox movies app. I don't know which moves are 3D and which aren't. The only way I could find if a movie is 3D was using the search feature of the console and writing 3D.

A list of 25 movies came up, but despite the fact I wanted to purchase some of them I decided not to buy those movies 'cos I don't know if they are 3D capable on the Xbox 360 or not.

I am holding off buying movies for now until the Xbox One is out, because it has much better 3D support and is Blu-ray compatible. I can't wait to watch a lot of movies in stereoscopic 3D.

 

[Arwin]

Yeah, the 360 hasn't been very pro-active in its 3D support. It was clear that Microsoft didn't care about selling 3D tvs like Sony did.

Mind you Trine 2 isn't 3D on the Playstation 3 either.

I read the first two Batman games and Enslaved have 3D on 360, and one of the Silent Hill games as well.

 

[baten]

Enslaved - you have to buy the 3D from PSN, it's not 3D on the retail version.

 

[Davros]

I have a setting in ccc
dynamic range 16-235
why is it there why would i want to display less colours ?

 

[Brad Grenz]

I have a setting in ccc
dynamic range 16-235
why is it there why would i want to display less colours ?

You want it to match whatever your display is capable of.