PS3 vs XBOX 360 1080p ?

[Shifty Geezer]

GTA4 on the PS3 is 640p, so it upscales to 1080p using the SPU method. GT5 at 1080p actually has 50% more resolution, thus sharper, crisper visuals compared to GT5 at 720p so it's not an apples to apples comparison.

What if you want less resolution and smoother framerates with less tearing?

TBH I'm not sure what you're even saying. 1080p output from PS3 is always better than 720p output? That's not true as there are usually compromises to get 1080p, hence the forcing of 720p. In the case of a 720p panel that supports 1080p input, like all the EU ones that are HDMI ready, 1080p output gives no increase in fidelity but does have the rendering or upscaling impact, so disabling 1080p certainly makes sense. Most other games I've seen render in 720p by default with very few upscaling to 1080p unless forced. I don't know if anoyone's (DF) done a study into how forcing scaling affects tearing and framerate to get a real cost.

 

[Nesh]

What if you want less resolution and smoother framerates with less tearing?

TBH I'm not sure what you're even saying. 1080p output from PS3 is always better than 720p output? That's not true as there are usually compromises to get 1080p, hence the forcing of 720p. In the case of a 720p panel that supports 1080p input, like all the EU ones that are HDMI ready, 1080p output gives no increase in fidelity but does have the rendering or upscaling impact, so disabling 1080p certainly makes sense. Most other games I've seen render in 720p by default with very few upscaling to 1080p unless forced. I don't know if anoyone's (DF) done a study into how forcing scaling affects tearing and framerate to get a real cost.

My TV is supposed to be able to output 1080p (at least thats what it recognizes in the PS3 display settings and thats what it says when something is supposed to run at 1080p like Wipeout HD). Is it better to force 720p for 720p games on my PS3?
In most cases they automatically run at their native 720p resolution (unless its a 1080p game) but I am not sure if there is any for of upscale involved then and if there is any kind of impact.

Now of course there is the case sometimes that some games will automatically run at 1080p mode like MGS4 even though thats not their native resolution but I have no idea whats the impact in those.

Is the impact related to lag, framerate or picture quality mostly?

Also lets say a game which is sub 1080p (1280x1080p instead of 1920x1080p) like GT5, obviously there is some upscaling involved. What happens with those?

I assume 1080p games are better to play at 1080p like Wipeout HD unless there is a performance hit right?

 

[Shifty Geezer]

It depends. My 720p TV, 1366x768, supports 1080p in and PS3 defaults to outputting 1080p, but most games switch to 720p when they see it's available. Of the games that don't and output at PS3's XMB resolution, like Booty, I'll sometimes disable 1080p output . They are few and far between though, with almost every game defaulting to 720p.

 

[Nesh]

Ahh now I wonder if my TV is indeed 1080p heh.

 

[corduroygt]

If your native panel resolution is not 1080p, there's no reason to have 1080i/p boxes checked in the output settings. AFAIK, there are no games that support 1080i/p without supporting 720p as well.

 

[makattack]

If your native panel resolution is not 1080p, there's no reason to have 1080i/p boxes checked in the output settings. AFAIK, there are no games that support 1080i/p without supporting 720p as well.

Not so. Even though my panels native resolution *is* 1080p, I have more games on the PS3 that behave worse when I have 1080p checked than I have that properly set their native resolution correctly... hence, I tend to leave it unchecked. There are so few 1080p native applications that I don't miss having it set.

As Al Strong alluded, the biggest pain is media viewing. Since I rarely watch BluRay movies, and stream most of my content now with other devices (my TiVo and the LG TV both have internet streaming via. Netflix, VUDU, et al), my PS3 hasn't been used for media view in a while now.

Oddly enough, now that I have better streaming options, it's now properly performing more as a games machine over my year of ownership.

I believe you are correct in stating there are no games that only support 1080i/p. That would rather drastically limit the audience who could play it, and probably violate some Sony acceptance requirements. The problem has always beeb the other way around for older HDTV owners: 720p games that don't support 1080i

 

[Nesh]

If your native panel resolution is not 1080p, there's no reason to have 1080i/p boxes checked in the output settings. AFAIK, there are no games that support 1080i/p without supporting 720p as well.

Well how do you know for sure if the panel is truly 1080p?

 

[corduroygt]

Not so. Even though my panels native resolution *is* 1080p, I have more games on the PS3 that behave worse when I have 1080p checked than I have that properly set their native resolution correctly... hence, I tend to leave it unchecked. There are so few 1080p native applications that I don't miss having it set.

Which games do you have that behave worse? I'd say GT5 is a personal preference, and I actually play that one in 3D

 

[corduroygt]

Well how do you know for sure if the panel is truly 1080p?

It would say in the manual, no? If not you can always look up the specs from the manufacturer's website.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Or just post Google make and model number. Or even as a rough approximation, 32" or less is likely going to be 720p unless really new. Larger sizes tend to be 1080p native resolution if bought within a couple of years - 40" 1080p sets were fairly few and far between in the EU when PS3 launched.

 

[makattack]

Which games do you have that behave worse? I'd say GT5 is a personal preference, and I actually play that one in 3D

GTA4, CoD4, MGS4,FF13 just off the top of my head... I don't play GTA4 nor CoD4, but have seen them running on my PS3 when friends have come over to play on my screen with their copies. We kept flipping the 1080 option to see what our preference was, even putting our eyes a 1/2 meter from the screen...

 

[Nesh]

It would say in the manual, no? If not you can always look up the specs from the manufacturer's website.

Well its a Polaroid model which is hardly credible. It says 1080p on the box, the TV notes HD READY 1080p whereas usually full 1080p TVs say FULL HD. Then there were sites over the internet with some writing 1080p and some 1080i in the specs

 

[swaaye]

My Xbox 1 can display its dashboard at 1080i.

Quake 2 at 1280x720 with 4X MSAA, too.

 

[i nerini del buio]

IIRC, I think most if not all the Framework Engine games have the tearing issue in 1080p. Quite bizarre. No idea if that extends to intermediate display outputs though. Maybe if there's a Framework game that actually interests me, I'll check that out since I use 1360x768.

it does.
resi5, lost planet 1&2, dead rising all have the same issue.

 

[swaaye]

It seems pretty clear to me that the current boxes are essentially designed for 720p. 360 was basically developed with it in mind (eDRAM sizing) and PS3 isn't really powerful enough to go higher. It's unfortunate that developers actually choose to go beneath 720p to get a few extra effects and end up with a non-native resolution that needs to be upscaled.

I think the situation right now is similar to the old Xbox with respect to 720p. It was capable of 720p but only a few games went for it. That's 1080p's status right now. There's also fragmentation of the user base with surely many people on 720p TVs so 1080p is perhaps unjustifiable simply because of that.

I'm sure the next machines will be 100% 1080p but isn't there a resolution jump coming to TVs down the road again? Surely there is.

 

[Nesh]

It seems pretty clear to me that the current boxes are essentially designed for 720p. 360 was basically developed with it in mind (eDRAM sizing) and PS3 isn't really powerful enough to go higher. It's unfortunate that developers actually choose to go beneath 720p to get a few extra effects and end up with a non-native resolution that needs to be upscaled.

I think the situation right now is similar to the old Xbox with respect to 720p. It was capable of 720p but only a few games went for it. That's 1080p's status right now. There's also fragmentation of the user base with surely many people on 720p TVs so 1080p is perhaps unjustifiable simply because of that.

I'm sure the next machines will be 100% 1080p but isn't there a resolution jump coming to TVs down the road again? Surely there is.

I am not sure if its going to be worth it to go above 1080p. Good AA seems to do a good job at eliminating jaggies and next gen consoles will be capable at offering great levels of AA most likely. As the resolution grows bigger, the bigger the displays have to be to be able to notice the difference, and the larger the distance between the user and the display.

I dont think everyone can afford or has enough room to put a 60'' TV (or bigger) in a room. And by the time TVs that can go higher are available most will already have 1080p panels.

Unless of course people start to buy 3D TVs which can produce 1080p 3D images for each eye by default and consoles target 3D games for 1080p for each eye as standard

 

[AlNom]

I still wouldn't put it past developers to simply target 720p, especially with less than half the pixel processing overhead that could be spent on prettier pixels, and the configuration of the hardware ought to narrow things down too e.g. 720p MRTs might fit better into an eDRAM pool, using FP16 MRTs @ 1080p is just too much memory, spend GPU cycles with higher res shadows/filtering/MSAA, etc etc.

 

[(((interference)))]

I still wouldn't put it past developers to simply target 720p, especially with less than half the pixel processing overhead that could be spent on prettier pixels, and the configuration of the hardware ought to narrow things down too e.g. 720p MRTs might fit better into an eDRAM pool, using FP16 MRTs @ 1080p is just too much memory, spend GPU cycles with higher res shadows/filtering/MSAA, etc etc.

Yeah, all they really need is a great built in scaler perhaps with some fancy upscale filter like NNEDI3 (which does a great job of suppressing aliasing)
http://www.infognition.com/articles/video_resize_shootout.html
http://bengal.missouri.edu/~kes25c/nnedi2_images/

Eg. Original:

NNEDI3 4x resize:

 

[AlNom]

4x upscale in each direction is a bit much considering the amount of data interpolation is needed, but point taken. It'd be more akin to upscaling 960x540 to 1920x1080. A more flexible and better scaler would be nice too for those developers who are more particular about pixel alignment (e.g. Ratchet & Clank rendering to 704p).

 

[Npl]

4x upscale in each direction is a bit much considering the amount of data interpolation is needed, but point taken. It'd be more akin to upscaling 960x540 to 1920x1080. A more flexible and better scaler would be nice too for those developers who are more particular about pixel alignment (e.g. Ratchet & Clank rendering to 704p).

would it really hurt having 16 black lines of pixels? I`d take that over a picture that gets blurred by a scaler (and then gets blurred again when upscaled to 1080p on the TV).