Titlefight: 480p v. 720p for the championship!
by Christopher Grant 
{ Nov 19th 2005 at 2:30AM }
Stills hardly do justice to the difference in appearance of current "people's champion" 480p versus the bigger and more sophisticated newcomer, 720p. It was a fair fight: same NFS: Most Wanted clip, same projection screen, but the difference was pronounced and immediate. The Hi-Def trailers pummeled the NTSC standard. We're living in the future.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
vc @ Dec 18th 2005 9:13PM
Word -- the 420p stuff just looks like crap in comparison..
Back_Lit @ Dec 18th 2005 9:13PM
I agree w/ #1 but does that mean Nintendo has made a fatal error in their next gen plans?
Steve @ Dec 18th 2005 9:13PM
I've gathered that some games like PGR render properly in HD and then scale down to 480, while others like NBA 2k go the cheap route and just render at 480. Can you determine which games go the right way and at least attempt to use the full power of the 360?
Bron012 @ Dec 18th 2005 9:13PM
i wish i have a hdtv
Blueman @ Dec 18th 2005 9:13PM
720p looks like crap compared to 1080p at 120fps!
Vannoy @ Dec 18th 2005 9:13PM
meh... It's times like this that I really hate my TV, it only supports 480p and 1080i.
For anyone thinking about upgrading their sets to take advantage of 720p for the 360 read as much as you can before you buy. I didn't and now I'm kicking myself in the ass...
burninhell @ Dec 18th 2005 9:13PM
did nobody notice that this:
http://joystiq.com/entry/1234000180068746/
goes to the remote control story?
Al @ Dec 18th 2005 9:13PM
I wonder how gameplay and visuals are on 1080i?
Mike @ Dec 18th 2005 9:13PM
burninhell: Yep, and the remote story picture goes to grover.
UO Guy @ Dec 18th 2005 9:13PM
Uhh which is which? Both look the same.
matt @ Dec 18th 2005 9:13PM
Oh god, lets not start talking about this 120fps nonsense the whole 1080p vs 720p would show a difference but 120fps vs 60fps is pointless
truf @ Dec 18th 2005 9:13PM
You do realize that you need to adjust your distance from the screen depending on what the optimum resolution of the game is.
Taking the screenshots from the same distance isnt a fair comparison, for the resolution that the game wasnt designed for.
Its like resizing videos in media player, you need to readjust your distance to regain image clarity
a change in resolution isnt a change in graphic quality. Thats why HD is unneccesary this gen
GuyManDude @ Dec 18th 2005 9:13PM
And Grover goes to downloadable trailers, and downloadable trailers goes to Joyswag Kameo caption contest.
C. Grant @ Dec 18th 2005 9:13PM
truf: how do I "adjust" my eyeballs? It looks better. 'nuff said.
Art Guy @ Dec 18th 2005 9:13PM
truf - LOL. It's completely fair comparing the image of what you will actually see sitting the same distance from the tv. As if when I'm running HD content I'm going to be sitting farther away from my tv.
And it's nothing like resizing a video in WMP. A closer comparison is changing the res on your computer. Do you sit closer or farther when changing res on your computer for different games? Thats silly.
kingoscar @ Dec 18th 2005 9:13PM
truf, you're an idiot. Look at those screens and tell me one doesn't look better. That's QUALITY.
guilty1 @ Dec 18th 2005 9:13PM
Vannoy said...
meh... It's times like this that I really hate my TV, it only supports 480p and 1080i.
For anyone thinking about upgrading their sets to take advantage of 720p for the 360 read as much as you can before you buy. I didn't and now I'm kicking myself in the ass...
I have a Tv that operates the same, 480p and 1080i only. But I've read on Xbox.com that the 360 will upsample to any resolution your TV can handle. So it will take that 720p signal and convert it to 1080i.
Yummy!
truf @ Dec 18th 2005 9:13PM
If ya dont believe me then try it with a video in WMP. Resize it then adjust your distance from the screen. eventually the video will regain clarity.
Its easier to see if you take a small video the make it bigger then move away from the screen.
Higher res makes the graphical improvements easier to see at the same distance, it also makes flaws easier to see. The resolution isnt what is making the graphics better tho!!
truf @ Dec 18th 2005 9:13PM
If ya dont believe me then try it with a video in WMP. Resize it then adjust your distance from the screen. eventually the video will regain clarity.
Its easier to see if you take a small video the make it bigger then move away from the screen.
Higher res makes the graphical improvements easier to see at the same distance, it also makes flaws easier to see. The resolution isnt what is making the graphics better tho!!
Truf @ Dec 18th 2005 9:13PM
Truf.... read over your comments and then tell us you don't sound like a moron... It's impossible. Because you don't have an HD TV don't try and lie to yourself saying that it doesn't look better. You are an idiot, stop talking.
Brandon Paddock @ Dec 18th 2005 9:13PM
The X360 will scale the games output (which will always be 720p or higher with an HD or VGA cable) to whatever you have.
So if your TV only supports 1080i, the X360 will scale the 720p games to 1080i.
Cyberclaws @ Dec 18th 2005 9:13PM
Which one is better? 720p or 1080i?
truf @ Dec 18th 2005 9:13PM
wow i dont know what to say.
Ill try again HD doesnt improve the graphics it only makes the graphical improvements easier to see over the same distance. Its designed for bigger sets as blowing up the 480i image on a 60 inch screen looks terrible but if you viewed said screen from 30 feet away it would look great. The problem is that is impractical in a n average environment hence the need for HD.
So playing the game in SD doesnt look worse because the graphics are worse it looks worse due to being viewed at the wrong resolution.
But if you adjust your distance from the screen as in move closer or farther away you will regain image clarity.
Again if you dont believe me try it in WMP. Why you think its so moronic i dont know all videos you watch in there are encoded at a certain resolution and thusly have an optimum viewing size. If you change the size then you need to adjust you distance to regain clarity. Im not saying anything stupid and its very easy for you to verify so why dont you try it before insulting me. Its not even a hard concept to grasp.
Its just sony and microsoft have got everyone thinking HD improves the graphics but it doesnt, it only improves the resolution, and the graphics would actually be better at a lower resolution.
http://www.projectorcentral.com/video_signals.htm
a little added reading
dan @ Dec 18th 2005 9:13PM
I just need to say that truf is absoloutly correct, shame on all of you for not completely rearanging your living rooms to acheive proper viewing distance. Why, I had a contractor in to MOVE THE WALLS because viewing distance is so important. Aparently I was too close to my HD display, so by a brilliant OPTICAL ILLUSION my 720p signal magicly seemed as if it had about 10X as many pixels as 480p. Thanks to truf's brave statments I now know that if I move far enough away, even an Albrecht D? masterpiece will apear as undetailed as my 6 year old neice's refrigerator art.
dan @ Dec 18th 2005 9:13PM
Sorry, I was thinking of 1080 when I made the 10X comment. The rest of it stands with my point unchanged.
truf @ Dec 18th 2005 9:13PM
ok then so when you record a film in higher resolution what has changed?? have you improved the graphics of the real world???
or have you improved the RESOLUTION allowing you to see what was already there in greater detail. i mean allowing you to see things in greater detail is an undesirable side effect of HD anyway. undesirable in that it raises the costs involved over current technology for very little in return
And im not saying you should rearrange you living room, or that HD is even bad or unneccesary. All im saying is that the graphics of the 2 screenshots are the same!!
oh And the improved graphics come from the fact that 360 hardware as actually more powerful than current consoles (i thought this was obvious) not because it uses HD
dan @ Dec 18th 2005 9:13PM
Yes, exactly. 'you improved the RESOLUTION allowing you to see what was already there in greater detail' I.E. from any real world test (you don't walk away till you can't tell the difference anymore) HD not only looks, but actualy has a better image quality. This isn't the real world, it's a game world that's just gotten a huge upgrade, and our TVs are the only window we have to it, so practicly speaking, if you increase the resoloution of the TV you realy have increased the resoloution of the gameworld. Sure no matter what your display it's still the same textures and models being streamed from the disk but, you realy, in the real world, actualy can SEE THEM BETTER in HD.
Consider an example in the reverse of moving away from the tv. Imagine an extremely simple graphic enviroment with large cube that has a high rez texture maped to it, say a geometric pattern. The cube starts out quite small and gradualy moves closer to the camera. You hit a button when you can clearly see the pattern, and the machine tells you how close in gamespace the cube is to the camera. Do this in SD and HD. Obviously you will be able to clearly see the detail in the texture at farther range on the HD output.
I realy doubt anyone here thinks HD is the reason the 360 looks so good, but it's ridiculous to claim that it doesn't look even better in HD.
truf @ Dec 18th 2005 9:13PM
Man you just wrote a long ass posting agreeing with me. And yes people are saying that HD is the reason for the improved graphics.
Im not claiming it doesnt look better, im claiming that at a lower resolution it looks the same, but the difference comes from having changed the size of the image without adjusting, either the resolution or your distance from the image.
And i guess im also claiming that you see them better because they were designed for/at that resolution. With power of 360 the games would graphically look better if they were designed for a lower resolution.
I guess my ideas are too out there in the face of sony and microsoft propaganda so ill try and find a developer comment that supports this
pete @ Dec 18th 2005 9:13PM
Was just curious, running some of the newer xbox games (in perticular xmen legends - 2) on the origional xbox at 720p..seemed very similar to most of the games I was seeing on the xbox 360 at..720p at the kiosks. I was wondering if anyone had done a comparison between old xbox HD and new xbox HD..
moose @ Dec 18th 2005 9:13PM
am i the only one whose not completely retarded. Those to shots aren't of the same frikking picture. oh and by the way, i've experiend hdtv albeit only on a 32" screen. the difference is negligable when your actually sat on a couch a 6ft feet away. I mean how many people watch tv with there face 1ft away from the screen. the truth is that resolution is a lot more important in computer moniters, because of your proximity to the screen.