360 Splinter Cell: Double Agent at 1080p? Ubisoft: yup [update 1]
[Update: Looks like the pissing contest ain't over, folks. GamePro circled back around and contacted that yay-saying Ubisoft repper who "apologized for the confusion, noting that the game currently supports only 1080i." Whoops! The GamePro pros are still trying to figure out why 1080p was enabled on their debug units. Just the software upscaler maybe?]The Good Ship Microsoft has come about a full 180 degrees over the whole 1080p issue. First they laughed at it and called it impossible, then they embraced it and, and now Ubisoft's Splinter Cell: Double Agent will be the first game to run in 1080p on the Xbox 360.
1080p support has been the most contentious point between the two consoles, with Sony constantly waving their banner "True HD" and touting 1080p as something that only their console will have. They've fired more shots back and forth about what 1080p actually means, harking back to Clinton saying, "It depends on what the meaning of the word 'is' is" during the whole Lewinsky affair.
If the whole sordid world of HD gives you a headache while you sort it out, it gets more complicated. Shane Kim told us that while the software patch could upscale all content to resolutions as high as 1080p, Microsoft Game Studios themselves had no plans to produce gaming content taking advantage of this ability. He was similarly convinced that very few other developers would see the value in producing 1080p games, with the singular exception of Sony's first-party studios, eager to validate the value of the capability.
We're not sure if Double Agent is being rendered in 1080p natively or if it's taking advantage of the Xbox 360's upcoming upscaling ability. We've asked Ubisoft for clarification, since our drinking buddy Sam Fisher has stopped returning our calls.
[Thanks, Jdaman]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
Neil @ Oct 18th 2006 9:08PM
Great job on that last story Kevin! Hopefully you won't have to cross this one out too.
Optimus Prime @ Oct 18th 2006 9:12PM
If it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck ...
Basheron @ Oct 18th 2006 9:16PM
This is just Microsft proving the gaming world that the difference between 720p and 1080p isn't worth arguing. Now that they did it, they can say 720p games pretty much look just as good. (with obvious better performance)
L3ftonm3 @ Oct 18th 2006 9:18PM
so is this the first 1080p game you can actually buy?, that is when they do the update though if thats before ps3 launches.
Optimus Prime @ Oct 18th 2006 9:19PM
My bet is on 720p--> 1080p upscaling ... As a dev, you cant just snap your fingers and say gimme 1080p .. the entire development process needs to revolve aroung 1080p ..1080p textures, models, effects ..otherwise the game is going to look like shit at 1080p and there would be no difference than if you simply went 7020p --> 1080p.
So, Ubi would have had to known about the 1080p option right from develop ment. Possibly years ago in fact...
... and even if there were 'hints' from MS that they would enable 1080p output at some point in the future...do you, as a dev. want to spend more monies on 1080p production if the 1080p may or may not be enabled in the near future? NO!
Vaylen @ Oct 18th 2006 9:24PM
Ah, so games at 1080p ARE possible, eh Microsoft? Now will you please give us a digital port with which to view this splendid resolution? (DVI or HDMI are both acceptable)
Basheron @ Oct 18th 2006 9:26PM
#5, that's not quite how it works. Whether someone plays a computer game at 640x480 or 1920x1080 (which is what 1080p is), there is little difference. It's just more pixels representing the same thing. Not much of a development difference.
Pedro Van Faulk @ Oct 18th 2006 9:27PM
Doesn't matter much anyway. 1080p with next gen graphics is impossible with any decent framerate on either system. You are only going to get it on games that are not taxing to the system, either xbox 1.5 titles (ie could have been done on xbox but are given the nextgen shiny) or games with few characters on the screen at once.
Resolutions don't mean jack. It's the games that matter.
Ed @ Oct 18th 2006 9:29PM
Xbox.com still says 720p.
Ed @ Oct 18th 2006 9:31PM
Pedro wins.
The games that run at 1080p on the PS3 are games that are not graphically intense (virtua tennis, gran turismo) or have had their eyecandy dialed down (resistance).
Anyone who has played PC games knows that if you want to run at a higher resolution, you usually need to turn down antialiasing, anisotropic filtering, texture detail, etc. in order to do it at decent framerates.
serge @ Oct 18th 2006 9:32PM
So basiclly everything Sony is about to do been done by MS before.
BTW I still refuse to beleive ps3 is more powerful than 3x3.2 ghz powerPC5 processors.
I been to digital life, and i saw ps3 in action, it did a great job running Resistance: fall of man that looked more or less like HL2 source engine. The new Sonic @ sega booth was running on ps3 and it looked so bad, i'll never buy a sonic game ever again. It looks like xbox1 game.
Since the line was too long to play resistance, i spent more time playing NFS carbon on 360 which is amazing upcoming game and some live games. Cant wait for castle crashers. :D
random @ Oct 18th 2006 9:32PM
There is no such thing as 1080p content, it's a screen resolution, just that. At most you would have to resize some HUD or UI elements to be readable.
Pedro Van Faulk @ Oct 18th 2006 9:37PM
This is all moot unless you have an HDTV. Now barring unforseen circumstances, my next TV will be HD, but right now I amstill rocking the standard def. So super duper resolutions mean nothing to me.I want a game that is fun. And as legions of sony fanboys are about to discover, good resolutions cant make a bad game good.
L3ftonm3 @ Oct 18th 2006 9:38PM
ubisoft now saying its not 1080p
http://www.1up.com/do/newsStory?cId=3154515
Insane Metal @ Oct 18th 2006 9:42PM
What ?
Splinter Cell Double Agent Not 1080p
Report from Gamepro says it is -- Ubisoft says 'nope.'
by Luke Smith, 10/18/2006
Microsoft is supporting 1080p on its Xbox 360, we know this, but Gamepro is reporting that Ubisoft's just-released Splinter Cell: Double Agent (read Shoe's review here) will support 1080p displays. The image Gamepro provides is a shot of the Xbox 360 dashboard with a selectable 1080p display and says representatives from Ubisoft told them that the game would support 1080p.
When we asked Ubisoft for clarification, company reps told us: "It's 1080i." Even if Double Agent supported 1080p right now -- and it doesn't -- there aren't any retail Xbox 360s that would support the feature. That update hasn't been released, yet.
http://www.1up.com/do/newsStory?cId=3154515
Ed @ Oct 18th 2006 9:42PM
One more thing:
If it is going to be upscaled, it seems like a really stupid thing to say. There isn't anything in the current games that keeps them from being upscaled to 1080p, so even the launch titles will work with 1080p as soon as the dashboard update comes out.
So, uh, who knows.
Optimus Prime @ Oct 18th 2006 9:43PM
"There is no such thing as 1080p content, it's a screen resolution, just that. At most you would have to resize some HUD or UI elements to be readable."
..so, they can just take PS1, Dreamcast, or GC character models and put them in games running 1080p and everything is dandy?
No!
For example, GC and PS2 character models are meant to look good at 480p ..and NO MORE! If you render them at higher resolutions (6.6x more pixels when going from 480-->1080) then flaws in the model begin to show up. These 3d modelling flaws dont appear at 480p but show up at 1080p. Ditto for textures, etc.
SO, the 3d characer models have to be redone to take into account that they are going to be rendered at higher resolutions. Diito for texture, etc.
Now, reread my second post and it will make sense now.
serge @ Oct 18th 2006 9:48PM
Optimus Prime ur an idiot! GOOD JOB :)
Haunted One @ Oct 18th 2006 10:02PM
What's the percentage of HDTVs in global households? 15% in the U.S., 8% in Europe last I heard (I have not seem any numbers for the Japanese market, sorry). Next, how many of these HDTVs actually _support_ 1080p? 3%? 1%?
This whole thing just shows that Sony and Microsoft are essentially having their 'pissing contest' about a moot point. But here's the kicker: the supporters in both camps, the professional gaming sites and all the other gaming blogs have bought the bullshit from the company's PR-bots and treat this issue as if it was the be-all-end-all argument in the console war.
Man, I'm sitting here and I am shocked at how much discussion is generated by this 'issue'. This is about adding/losing 'a bullet point' in the respective consoles' credentials. Everyone should just go 'meh' and decide what console to buy by its games, not by how good its specs looks on paper.
H.
Duscrom @ Oct 18th 2006 10:17PM
Optimus Prime: In theory, you are right.. and I understand your concept. But that's oversimplifying and overcomplicating at the same time.
Thing is a PS1/DC game CAN run at 1920x1080, and it WILL look better then the origonal 480i designed game. In 3D screen resolution dosen't matter. in 2D it does.
Now, will those PS1/DC games compare to an Xbox 360 game? No. Thing is, if you want to campare something so drastic, you technically are correct. But the thing is, the game is already "designed" to run at 1280x720, or 720p.
Her's what I want you to do. Since you are obviously typeing this from a computer, load up something like, GL Quake, or Guake 2, or any older PC game. Now, Quake 2, without Hardware acceleratin, has a maximum resolution of 640x480... which is a little below 480p. Now, take quake 2.. and turn on Open GL and run it at 1280x1024, or, 1024x768. The game will look much sharper, and much clearer. it WILL look better, but none of the source material has changed.. none of the assetts have changed.
Now, go boot up Far Cry, or even... if your computer can run it, something like Fear or GRAW... and run that at 640x480. It still loojs better then Quake 2.
In game art assets, while is part of the whole, are not resolution dependant. Sharper textures, are sharper textures. While in theory, a developer may use shortcuts if a lower resolution is expected, it dosen't really matter. Espically once you get into 480p, and even moreso when you get into 720p.
In game Assets don't need to be "thought out" for 1080p.
serge @ Oct 18th 2006 10:36PM
BAsiclly for 1080i and 1080p you need higher resolution texture and that's it!
So my guss if it's 1080i means it is was made in mind to run on 1080p... i and p are different ways of showing picture on ur TV. resolutions is all about the textures, which are made by the artists in the developing team. Welcome to the reality.
dsub @ Oct 18th 2006 10:42PM
it would have to be that the game is running in 1080p, otherwise, this isn't even a news story, because once the update is released every single 360 game will be able to be upscaled from 720p/1080i to 1080p.
The ZeroCorpse @ Oct 18th 2006 10:50PM
Duscrom-- You apparently have never tried to upconvert a 480i Standard NTSC image on a 1080i/720p/1080p HDTV. In short, making the original "textures" and content appear at a larger resolution on a better screen does NOT automagically improve the image quality. In fact, it looks like hell, with the bigger resolution just showing off all the glaring flaws in the lower quality video.
HDTV content is shot in HD for a reason. When you blow up something made for 480p to 720p or 1080i/p you will get a messy, blobby, bigger, pixelated version of your low-quality image.
Since you're at a computer, try this test for me: Take a wallpaper image- preferably one with small text- that was made for a 640x480 display. Now, using your favorite photo editing program, increase the size of that 640x480 image to 1240x1080, basically increasing it by a factor of four (we'll ignore aspect ratio for this test). Now, look at the resized image- Lots of chunky, pixelated bits show up now, huh? A bit blurry and nasty, too.
Same thing when you start with lower quality textures. If you upscale that 480i game to 1080i, you're going to get a lot of chunkiness, unless you also kick in a bunch of added effects (antialiasing, for example). This is what the 360 does with original Xbox content that was in 480. It upscales, and then it adds some smoothing to make the chunky bits look less chunky. It doesn't improve the game, and there's no way that 480 source material will ever look crispy-wonderful in 1080.
Ever watch HDTV from an over-the-air broadcast? It's crystal clear and looks entirely different from a game or video that has been upscaled from a smaller/older source.
They DO have to make larger, better textures for these high definition games. If they start with lower-quality textures and just bump them up to the higher resolution, it will look pretty unimpressive.
serge @ Oct 18th 2006 11:13PM
If the game has 1080i support it can be played on 1080p without upscaling! "i" and "p" are two different ways of streaming pictures on your TV and nothing more. Now if every game on 360 has 1080i supports it has 1080 resolution textures, and that is all you need to know. MS just have to update 360 with an option to stream 1080p, and every game that can run 1080i will be automaticly 1080p game as well. If the game was design for 720p only, then upscaling resolution to 1080i or p will really strech the textures, but it wont be seen as dramatic as everyone thnks. Models in the games are geometry made and can be scaled to about any resolution you can think of, please keep that in mind.
Serge.
rockintom99 @ Oct 18th 2006 11:17PM
zerocorpse: You DO realize he was talking about 3d models? All a 3d model is vector points in three dimensions. They could scale to infinity, and look exactly the same. The faces would be bigger, yes, but they would still be high resolution.
There is a large difference between vectors and bitmaps. Bitmaps scaled look terrible. Vectors don't.
Steve2 @ Oct 18th 2006 11:21PM
Haunted One & others like you:
Please stop saying 1080p doesn't matter because you don't have it.
Many other have it and do care. Many more will have it within a year or two, and so it's nice if their current gen hardware can output it so they can use it then.
I had a 480p TV when Xbox came out, when PS2 started doing 480p (Soul Calibur), and when Gamecube came out (I have the cable and 480p works on my Gamecube, only one game I have doesn't support it). At the time, people said to me "why do you care about 480p". Now they all have TVs capable of 480p. And now they're glad they can play those games in 480p.
So please stop saying 1080p doesn't matter because you can't take advantage of it today. Even if it isn't a revolution, it's a good thing, and you might be glad later.
Another note, yes, HDTV penetration is perhaps below 25% across the board, but HDTV penetration in households with a 360 (or soon PS3) is significantly higher. See Dead Rising sales. That game is unplayable in SD, and still sold pretty well.
Back on topic, my bet is this game is upscaled from 1080i or 720p. Or perhaps it's 1080p/30 (not /60).
Gianni Gotti @ Oct 18th 2006 11:24PM
What a complete fraud!
pixel doubling to achieve 1080p ain't what this is all about.
M$ft are such last-gen loosers.
We don't need not steenking hi-def video=HD-DVD add-on
We don't need no steeking 1080p =1080p patch
I'm glad they are sticking to their principles.
Oh yeah, what principles....
serge @ Oct 18th 2006 11:35PM
Gianni Gotti you are a bot, talk about the topic, looser.
And btw, MS gives you the choice, if you need the HD-media player or not. By the time some people will need it, the HD-dvd addon will cost much cheaper, and no matter how you look at this, MS will be cheaper than ps3, and have better games for at least another year.
I am happy fools like you are gonna spend thousands on ebay to get ps3 with the only game worth playing which looks like a HL2. The 360 users will enjoy gears of war, and some releases that will hit 360 before ps3 release, splinter cell 4 and need for speed : carbon, and some awesome games on Live.
Psaakyrn @ Oct 19th 2006 12:02AM
Just a note: 3D models are vectors, BUT 3D textures are bitmaps, at least until they develop a better version (there are vector and "generated" textures, but they're not commonplace). So a texture rendered perfectly at 720 will have graphical artifacts at a higher OR lower resolution.
However, it may not matter depending on how the game is designed. If all the upscaling does is provide more screen-space, then the game can go into any resolution without problems. Or if vector or "generated" textures are used, the same also applies.
Conclusion: UNLESS you know how the textured and game rendering is handled, you cannot safely say for sure that upscaling will cause problems. BUT based on current games, it will.
Example of vector textures: Wii avatars
Example of "generated" textures: Procedural Texturing ( http://www.allegorithmic.com/ )
Pete C @ Oct 19th 2006 1:17AM
I love how these stupid f-ing 1080p battles rage on and on and not a damn soul has a 1080p game to compare to a 720p game, or a scaled 1080p game vs a native 1080p game. Nobody knows what the difference will be, and you don't know that any of the Sony developers are developing 1080p textures rather than just displaying their 720p games at a 1080p resolution. I just bought a brand new Sony SXRD 1080p set a couple weeks ago. What game system do I have? Xbox 360. Do I plan to get a PS3? No I don't...at least not for a long while. Not all of us are salivating over a number that may or may not make a big difference in games. I bought this set because it was the best set on the market to me at the price, and my 360 games will look best on it even though I can't take advantage of the 1080p VGA connection (the SXRD has a pretty crippled VGA resolution). That tells you how much I care about "native" 1080p. I can still get full 1080p native with the HD-DVD add-on because...NEWSFLASH...all 1080p sets do 2:3 pulldown so there is no damn difference if you use a 1080i output or a 1080p output...the end result is the same. Do some research.
It will be great once people realize that the PS3 doesn't look better than the 360 and we can start arguing about things that matter.
JPRacer @ Oct 19th 2006 1:57AM
Upscaling is not so bad if the source material is clean. Look at upconverting DVD player. 480p material upscale to 1080i and the picture is really good.
And like others said, 3d model are mathematical representation and they will look better in higher resolution. Of course if the model is really blocky this won't help.
As for textures, remember that lots of games still use 128*128, 256*256 or 512*512 textures for less detailed or far objects. It's not because that a game runs at 1280*720 that all textures will be at that resolution. Run any game at 640*480 and then at 1600*1200 and the difference will be night and day and the textures, models, etc are the same. Only the UI will change. Only sky-boxes can really be affected in a negative way by upscalling since those are big textures.
Also, when artists create game asset, they don't create 128*128 textures. They create 4096*4096+ textures and adjust them for the best look/performance in the game. So if later on they decide to support a higher resolution and think the current texture is too low-res, they still have the high resolution assets. They don't have to recreate anything from scratch.
Steve2 @ Oct 19th 2006 3:17AM
serge:
That's not true. It takes more graphical horsepower and more RAM to do 1080p. You don't just flip a switch.
You can flip a switch to get full-frame upscaling, but all you're getting is scaling then. Your TV already upscales stuff to its native resolution, and no one pretends that all content on their 1080p TV is 1080p just because the TV upscales it before showing it, so you wouldn't say it is 1080p if the Xbox 360 full-frame upscales it before showing it.
Now, rerendering at higher res is possible, but again requires more graphical horsepower and RAM. Games would have to be adjusted to do it, you don't just flip a switch.
Steve2 @ Oct 19th 2006 3:17AM
Pete C:
All TVs do 3:2 1080i->1080p pulldown?
See chart. Many don't, and yours doesn't!
http://www.hometheatermag.com/hookmeup/1106hook/
Apparently you should do some research.
I own a 360, and I've played PS3 recently, and I've seen demos. From what I can tell, PS3 does look better than 360. Not enough to matter really, the quality of the game itself will shine through more than these minor differences.
JPRacer:
480p upconverted is still 480p. If you think upconverted 480p looks good, you just haven't seen enough real HD. You cannot recreate detail simply by upconverting.
JPRacer does cover textures well though. If you had sufficient memory and graphical horsepower, you could render a game that was designed at 720p at 1080p instead and it would look better. For the most part, you wouldn't have problems with textures.
However, the upconverting that 360 is likely to employ is just a full-screen upconversion. It's built into video chips, my NVidia offers to upscale all graphics modes to 1920x1200x60p (the native resolution of my LCD) in the card if I would like. If I disable that, the LCD panel upscales it itself. Neither looks anything like the native resolution. Images rendered at 720p full-screen upscaled to 1080p won't look bad, but they won't look like 1080p either. I believe 360 already uses these conversions to let games that are rendered at other than the output resolution (like PGR3 which renders at 1024x576 but displays at 720p or 1080i) output to the mode selected in the dashboard.
Don't get excited about upconversion (including 360's 1080p upconversion). There are very few HDTVs that can display images in more than one format. So if you have an SXRD, which only displays 1920x1080x60p, and you input 720p or 1080i, the TV is already upconverting it for display. So why get excited about the 360 upconverting it before sending it to the display? It's going to still look like the resolution it is rendered at, not the one it is upconverted to.
EdZ @ Oct 19th 2006 3:46AM
Let's do a simple analogy here. Compare a game rendered in 480i to a game rendered in 480p. The 480p looks better, yes? Now use a line doubler to upconvert the 480i signal to 480p. Doesn't look as good as the native 480p. Not use an incredibly expensive deinterlacer to deinterlace the 480i to 480p. It looks better than the line-doubler, but still not quite as good as the native 480p.
THE EXACT SAME THING APPLIES TO 1080P.
JPRacer @ Oct 19th 2006 4:28AM
Steve2, of course I know that 480p up-converted to 1080i is still 480p. My point was that up-conversion doesn't always create a pixelated look when it's done right and the source is already good. But of course when you up-convert you don't magically create new pixel details you just interpolate what you already have and maybe throw some sort of filtering.
That's the difference between an up-conversion to 1080p and a render scene at 1080p. A up-conversion is only the video encoder scaling the image.
Tony @ Oct 19th 2006 5:03AM
EdZ, deinterlaces are relativly cheap single chip solutions these days. In fact the samsung "TrueHD" blueray player decodes, processes, and outputs in 1080i and theres a little deinterlacer just next to the HDMI port to deinterlace it to 1080p24...which btw i argue is a complete waste of money considering the HD video signal can be sent over 1080i30 without loosing a single pixel of info.
Personally, i run a Dell 2405FPW and i find that native 1920x1080 images from my computer, although sharper...dont look as good as the 1280x768 image the 360 sends simply because the effort has been put into lighting/particle/etc effects instead of phat textures
Rember folks from a few meters away your going to struggle to see any more detail in textures and whatnot. Id rather see the effort go into other things.
cone @ Oct 19th 2006 8:38AM
Funny the box says 1080i LOL.
striderhayasa @ Oct 19th 2006 9:27AM
Look, if I had to choose between a 1080p game that runs with an inconsistent framerate vs a 720p or 480p game that runs at a silky smooth 30 or 60 FPS, I'd pass on 1080p support. Choppy/ inconsistent framerates are annoying as hell and I've had my fill of it since the 64 era when nearly every game had framerate issues.
ZD @ Oct 19th 2006 9:48AM
UPCONVERSION??? No.
MS has clearly said the 1080p support coming soon in an update is support for NATIVE 1080p. No conversion. NATIVE.
Now, if the game developer chooses not to provide 1080p support (as I suspect most won't) then it can/will upscale. However, if 1080p textures,etc. are supplied, they will be displayed NATIVELY in 1080p.
Bah...pointless arguments...
Tony @ Oct 19th 2006 9:49AM
#38
http://www.hometheaterforum.com/darthsimon/sam.JPG
Jason W @ Oct 19th 2006 10:09AM
All I know is the single player on this game is great. It looks so much better than the online demo. I was blown away lastnight when I finally put my little daughter to sleep and got to play the game. I will spend more time with it tonight, but it is a great looking game.
AG @ Oct 19th 2006 10:16AM
Microsoft are such liars...
http://www.1up.com/do/newsStory?cId=3154515
Once again, they use shady tactics to make people believe it is the real 1080p deal. The funny thing is Sony gets all this bad press, yet Microsoft is the company most notorious for being shady since day 1.
Pete @ Oct 19th 2006 10:18AM
Steve2, Sony's new SXRD sets all do 3:2 pulldown (it's actually 2:3 pulldown in this case), but it just failed this guy's test. Take that for whatever you want it to mean. Sony's literature says otherwise. Look at the spec sheet on any site that sells the product.
Pete @ Oct 19th 2006 10:50AM
AG, how are MS liars because SC is not in 1080p? MS never said it was in 1080p, and Ubi never said it was in 1080p...it was all rumors and BS. In fact, MS specifically said during TGS that no Microsoft in-house games are currently planned for 1080p. So WTF are you talking about? Why are people still bitching about this? MS did give the machine native 1080p capability via VGA, mainly for the HD-DVD player. That is a fact. Native 1080p. Not my ideal solution...not one that I am going to take advantage of, but they didn't lie. Sony are the ones that have made a big stink out of 1080p in the first place, when apparently even the latest 1080p sets have trouble displaying the format...even Sony's own according to that Home Theater mag link above!!!
joe smith @ Oct 19th 2006 11:53AM
Hey Joystiq -- be careful drinking with that Sam Fisher gu... he's a real mean drunk.
LaughingTarget @ Oct 19th 2006 12:07PM
Um, if the game was developed for 1080i, there won't be any quality degredation if played in 1080p. The software is just rendering each line concurrently instead of odd-even.
1080i has the same resolution as 1080p. The only difference is if the system decides to interlace to save processing power or renders them all at the same time to reduce flicker.
We also forget that all but first-party PS3 games will come native 720p and be upscaled if the gamer so choses. There is no argument, especially since Sony's various studios aren't exactly high-volume (meaning few games at 1080 resolutions).
The only problem that may occurr is if the developer has no skill in creating textures that scale. This is a valid concern given that console developers have not, until now, had to deal with differing resolutions. PC developers have done this for years. PC games almost always look better in 1600x1200 over the 640x480 or 1024x768 resolutions. Because very few PC systems, even among the high end crowd, can even run a 1600x1200 game, the "logic" used by console players here should state that the developer didn't even create the art in the game to run at those resolutions. Which is correct, they don't. They know how to scale even the 2D art to higher resolutions with minimal quality loss.
The argument here is if console developers can only scale art like MS Paint scales it, very badly. Photoshop can blow up smaller pictures quite nicely with minimal quality loss, because it has a great algorithm to do so.
HDMI is a gimmick Sony added to drive sales of their products. HDMI offers no advantages over the component or VGA outputs on the 360. HDMI is PURELY a means to reduce piracy on BluRay disks because it offers an extra channel for security information. The PS3 outputs 1080p in games over component, which completely nullifies the claim that HDMI is good for anything.
Steve2 @ Oct 19th 2006 12:30PM
Pete:
Sony's TVs do reverse 3:2 pulldown (you're right, it's not 3:2 pulldown) for 480i material (DVDs). You have to remember, the non-XBR SXRDs have DRC2 version 1, which predates Sony even making TVs that do 1920x1080 (it's on my 768p RPLCD). So there's no guarantee that the TVs with that processing don't mash the crap out of a 1080i signal trying to upconvert it. You're right, many of Sony's TVs (and others) can't display 1080p at full res today. As I said above, it won't remain this way forever. you're going to have your 360 for 4 years. Do you know 1080p won't matter for the next 4 years?
ZD:
The console can do 1080p native. The question here is will games be 1080p native. MS themselves had said they had no plans to do 1080p native games right now. There are technical reasons for that, that we've gone over several times here. It's not clear 360 has enough graphical power to render complex games like Gears of War in 1080p at a decent frame rate (for that matter it's not clear PS3 can either).
LaughingTarget:
HDMI has many advantages over component. Ease of cabling is first among them. Component and VGA cables get very thick and very expensive as they get long. HDMI uses superior signalling to get past this problem. You are correct that a good setup using component or VGA can display as much resolution as an HDMI setup.
As to scaling, yes Photoshop can blow up images with little quality loss. This is absolutely true. And LCD monitors do this too (with a little more loss, as they have to do it realtime). The question of scaling is can you blow up an image and GAIN quality. Because if you don't, there's no point in outputting converted 1080p. Just output the native 720p or 1080i, because you didn't gain any quality by upconverting. This (and the fact that most TVs won't take VGA or component 1080p) are the reason MS' 1080p announcement is hollow. Yes, you're getting 1080p signalling. No, during almost all games, the images containted withing that signalling aren't 1080p quality.
MS didn't lie here, but they did purposely give out certain information knowing people would jump to the wrong conclusions from it.
Tony, you do realize your 2405FPW is 1920x1200, right? I have one too. Really like it. My 360 is attached to my (sadly only 1368x768) 55" TV in the other room though.
navstar @ Oct 19th 2006 12:36PM
According to the wizards at IGN Gear, you can't even begin to see the difference in 1080p until you use a screen bigger than 50"!
LaughingTarget @ Oct 19th 2006 1:02PM
Steve2 -
Just a little adjustment, given a quick scan of their websites, all but 2 televisions sold at Best Buy and Circuit City (Mitsubishi ones) have VGA inputs on them. Even Sony thought it necessary to put one on every television they have (from cursory analysis). Mine has one, and it only does 720p/1080i.
Pete @ Oct 19th 2006 1:38PM
Well, my TV has an August manufacture date, so the problem with full 1080p bandwidth, according to that HT article, should be resolved. Also, CNET reported in their review of the SXRD a2000 series that it can resolve every line of a 1080p test pattern. I believe them.