You know I really don't like LCDs

[vazel]

If you actually apply some lateral thinking, this whole problem is rather silly. If the native res of a 24inch monitor was 1280x720, so no scaling was involved, the image would look just as bad. There is no miracle cure to scaling up an image. CRT monitors are generally smaller than LCD, so its a mute point (I have a 22inch CRT and its as high as a 22inch 16:10 LCD, i.e. considerably smaller).

Why are you even bringing up CRT? Scaling isn't a problem with CRT since the image is drawn on the screen, there are no fixed pixels.

Just use 1:1 pixel mapping, run the game in 1680x1050 and you won't have a problem. The 9600GT can run every game in that res or higher, so I don't see a problem.

No, I will not run all my games at high resolutions. Not all of us have the latest hardware so newer games will most likely choke at the native resolution of the monitor. A lot of games won't let you go past a certain resolution. And I don't like running certain games past 1280x960 because of how small it makes the UI and text.

EDIT: If you have a problem with the 1:1 scaling size, just sit closer... I game with my Xbox 360 on my 24inch LCD with 1:1 mapping. I've tried the internal Xbox Scaler and the one insider the monitor and they both produce an identical result. In the end I had two choices, sit closer with 1:1 or sit further away with scaling. I chose 1:1 as its on my desk.

Are you kidding me? Sit closer? No, I do not want to run my games in a small box on my screen. And we are talking small when it comes to some of these older 640x480 and 800x600 only games. New adventure games are 1024x768 max because of their prerendered backgrounds.

Go have some fun with photoshop, or ffdshow on in game native-res trailers. It doesn't matter what algorithm you use. Aliased images scale quite poorly.

Native res with an aliased image just has an illusion of good quality. You're seeing false sharpness with the polygon edges and text.

It's good to see that games like UT3 are taking the right approach.

PsychoZA: Well put.

What you seem to be describing is blowing up an image on a bigger screen makes its deficiencies more noticeable. That is blatantly obvious and will happen on any display techology.

What some of us are disappointed at is bad scaling in PC monitors which involve a blur filter or no blur filter with just cheap simple scaling that adds lots of horrible jaggies. If you're still hesitant to believe that scaling can be better you need to see some high end HDTVs(Pioneer plasmas have been consistently good in this area).

 

[Simon F]

Why are you even bringing up CRT? Scaling isn't a problem with CRT since the image is drawn on the screen, there are no fixed pixels..

Ahh, but there is the dot pitch. Perhaps if/when LCDs have a similar density of dots it will solved.

 

[vazel]

The dot pitch doesn't give noticeable artifacts though. All that happens when you go above a resolution that the CRT's dot pitch isn't capable of resolving is you don't get to see all the detail(trying to display 1920x1440 but the monitor only being able to resolve 1600x1200 of that image).

And oh boy is it even possible to have fixed pixels as dense as the dot pitch on CRTs? That would be heavenly.

 

[Simon F]

The dot pitch doesn't give noticeable artifacts though..

If you were to try to drive a CRT monitor to a resolution that is near to (or exceeds) the dot pitch then you would (and do!) get aliasing artefacts.

 

[nutball]

And oh boy is it even possible to have fixed pixels as dense as the dot pitch on CRTs? That would be heavenly.

It certainly is an small scales -- my old Nokia N80 has a 352x416 pixel screen which is 35x41mm in size, so a dot pitch of ~0.10mm. It looks lovely too (well it did when it was new!). There's also the age-old Big Berthas which were ~200dpi IIRC (0.12mm) and cost >£10k. So that's the too-small-to-be-useful and the £WTF?LOL! covered. So it's possible, whether it's economically viable is a different issue.

 

[pcchen]

There are some small LCD which have very high density, such as the Nikon D300's LCD, which is 3" and 640x480. That means the dot pitch is slightly < 0.1mm. Of course, manufacturing something like that for a large panel LCD will be quite difficult (a 1920x1200 panel with this density will be about only 10", compared to more common 24").

 

[PsychoZA]

If you're still gaming in 8x6 and are so happy with your CRT, then keep using your CRT? Upgrade your hardware before getting a new screen though.

 

[Freak'n Big Panda]

If you actually apply some lateral thinking, this whole problem is rather silly. If the native res of a 24inch monitor was 1280x720, so no scaling was involved, the image would look just as bad. There is no miracle cure to scaling up an image. CRT monitors are generally smaller than LCD, so its a mute point (I have a 22inch CRT and its as high as a 22inch 16:10 LCD, i.e. considerably smaller). Just use 1:1 pixel mapping, run the game in 1680x1050 and you won't have a problem. The 9600GT can run every game in that res or higher, so I don't see a problem. Ideally 24 inch monitors would have the resolution of the 30inch. I would much rather have a higher dot pitch monitor than the current ones.

Now the real problem with LCDs is their displaying of dark colours/blacks. A screen which creates light sources rather than filters one big one will always be superior in that regard.

EDIT: If you have a problem with the 1:1 scaling size, just sit closer... I game with my Xbox 360 on my 24inch LCD with 1:1 mapping. I've tried the internal Xbox Scaler and the one insider the monitor and they both produce an identical result. In the end I had two choices, sit closer with 1:1 or sit further away with scaling. I chose 1:1 as its on my desk.

Well the dot pitch would obviously be a lot higher but it would be sharper right? The thing I can't deal with is the blurring caused by scaling a 1280x720 image up to 19x12 or 1080p. And as for the second comment doesn't that sort of defeat the purpose of buying a large LCD in the first place?

 

[vazel]

If you're still gaming in 8x6 and are so happy with your CRT, then keep using your CRT? Upgrade your hardware before getting a new screen though.

All the answers come simple to you don't they? I'd want to go over to a flat panel because CRTs are huge and heavy and you get better geometry and convergence with flat panels. Those benefits aren't exclusive for high end gaming.

 

[PsychoZA]

Well the dot pitch would obviously be a lot higher but it would be sharper right? The thing I can't deal with is the blurring caused by scaling a 1280x720 image up to 19x12 or 1080p. And as for the second comment doesn't that sort of defeat the purpose of buying a large LCD in the first place?

If I understand it correctly, you'd prefer the scaler to just use a simple block algorithm to 'increase' the pixel size with no other process being applied? I'd definitely be interested in seeing the result of that. It sure would look blocky, like low res on a large CRT, but that actually might be better than the smudged look of current upscaling 'algorithms'.

 

[Jawed]

If I understand it correctly, you'd prefer the scaler to just use a simple block algorithm to 'increase' the pixel size with no other process being applied? I'd definitely be interested in seeing the result of that. It sure would look blocky, like low res on a large CRT, but that actually might be better than the smudged look of current upscaling 'algorithms'.

Presumably the best way to test this is by getting a game to render at 960x600, for a precise 2x upscaling.

FEAR does pixel doubling...

http://www.tweakguides.com/FEAR_6.html

Jawed

 

[PsychoZA]

Presumably the best way to test this is by getting a game to render at 960x600, for a precise 2x upscaling.

FEAR does pixel doubling...

http://www.tweakguides.com/FEAR_6.html

Jawed

If I get the time I'll definitely give it a try, ta.

 

[Freak'n Big Panda]

If I understand it correctly, you'd prefer the scaler to just use a simple block algorithm to 'increase' the pixel size with no other process being applied? I'd definitely be interested in seeing the result of that. It sure would look blocky, like low res on a large CRT, but that actually might be better than the smudged look of current upscaling 'algorithms'.

Well truthfully I'd prefer a high end 24" CRT to bypass the scaling all together. If only they still made them....

 

[PsychoZA]

All the answers come simple to you don't they? I'd want to go over to a flat panel because CRTs are huge and heavy and you get better geometry and convergence with flat panels. Those benefits aren't exclusive for high end gaming.

Honestly, I understand where you're coming from. For a long time I used two monitors, my CRT and a 22inch LCD. Both were connected to my PC so I could make use of the different advantages, but now with latest 24inch panels I have reclaimed the desk space.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v383/MrBored69/awesome.jpg

 

[Simon F]

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v383/MrBored69/awesome.jpg

You shouldn't leave your keyboard near strong heat sources.

 

[PsychoZA]

You shouldn't leave your keyboard near strong heat sources.

I was more worried about the radiation my crotch was receiving under the desk.

 

[dragon695]

I just wanted to chime in as someone who only lurks on this board occasionally. I, too, am distraught about having to abandon my 24" Sony one day. One thing does give me hope, unlike SED, apparently Sony has developed a method for their nano-crt technology, FED, that will allow for multi-sync capabilities. Word is that supposedly Sony will unveil FED monitors Q4 of 2009, but we'll see. Like all of their new technology, it'll be at least a couple thousand dollars, so don't expect them to be available to the average joe anytime soon. Still, it does give one hope that there will be multisync ready and waiting when I need to get a new monitor. Anyway, put this (patent:6559602) into google and look around page 16. That's where the inventor, who works for Sony, discusses the limitations of fixed pixels and how he adapted it to allow for this functionality. The best part about FED? No morons in Texas crying over patent infringement.

 

[Moloch]

Well truthfully I'd prefer a high end 24" CRT to bypass the scaling all together. If only they still made them....

Keep checking ebay for the Sony GDM-FW900. Pity most of them are pickup only and shipping on them sucks since they're 80 pounds.

 

[vazel]

I just wanted to chime in as someone who only lurks on this board occasionally. I, too, am distraught about having to abandon my 24" Sony one day. One thing does give me hope, unlike SED, apparently Sony has developed a method for their nano-crt technology, FED, that will allow for multi-sync capabilities. Word is that supposedly Sony will unveil FED monitors Q4 of 2009, but we'll see. Like all of their new technology, it'll be at least a couple thousand dollars, so don't expect them to be available to the average joe anytime soon. Still, it does give one hope that there will be multisync ready and waiting when I need to get a new monitor. Anyway, put this (patent:6559602) into google and look around page 16. That's where the inventor, who works for Sony, discusses the limitations of fixed pixels and how he adapted it to allow for this functionality. The best part about FED? No morons in Texas crying over patent infringement.

Very nice! Now I have something to look forward to instead of just hoping manufacturers stop cheaping out on scalers.

 

[duralisis]

Regarding scalers; you don't have to wait for an eternity for decent display scalers. Some LCD's do indeed have excellent scaling options and near CRT quality resize. My HP w2408h for example has an awesome scaler which is as close to my old CRT as I've ever seen in an LCD.

It's also got options for scale to height, 1:1 pixel size, and stretch. Quite honestly the first time I fired up an old game (War3FT), I almost didn't realize I was running in a lower resolution from before I hooked up the panel, it didn't have the characteristic blurring of other CRT's. I've found that under medium resolutions (like 1280x800 and lower), you can notice a small amount of sharpening artifacts, but you have to get really close to the screen to see them.

I'm not sure if it uses the Farjouda chip that many people extol as the best scaler available, but it's very good and surprised the hell outta me. The only thing I can't stand about large TN panels is the shit viewing angles, but I found if you sit back aways (2-3ft), you don't see any color shift, otherwise the scaling alone (especially in older games) has me completely sold on this panel.