720p vs 1080i

[GormanHarvey]

Just wondering which is supposed to provide a sharper picture when viewing HD channels on your TV? Thanks

[Tailgat0r76]

For the most part; you'll be better off running 720p; especially for sports. 1080i can feel a little slow and have a "stepping" problem when it comes to fast-moving sports and action.

[GormanHarvey]

Thank you Tailgat0r

[T B0NE 10]

For video games 720 no doubt

 

I've noticed a huge lag with 1080i

 

But 1080p is just awesome.

[mtrebs]

For the most part; you'll be better off running 720p; especially for sports. 1080i can feel a little slow and have a "stepping" problem when it comes to fast-moving sports and action.

Does this "stepping" problem look like a bunch of pixelated squares for a brief moment, especially when they pan over a crowd or change the cameras? I've noticed that this happens often in certain channels (especially CBS HD football games) but never on other channels (ESPN HD, FOX HD, FSN HD). My TV is set to run at 1080i, so is the problem possibly that CBS is broadcasting in 1080i and the others are in 720p?

[Godspeed]

mtrebs --- CBS & NBC run 1080i. ABC & Fox run 720p.

 

I have both a 1080i TV and a 720p TV. Honestly, I can't tell the difference between the two. It's more a matter of the source material than anything.

 

And for what it's worth, I haven't noticed any sort of lag on the 1080i set that I use for gaming. Do they still make 1080i sets, or has it all progressed to 1080p?

[bjkrautk]

mtrebs --- CBS & NBC run 1080i. ABC & Fox run 720p.

 

I have both a 1080i TV and a 720p TV. Honestly, I can't tell the difference between the two. It's more a matter of the source material than anything.

 

And for what it's worth, I haven't noticed any sort of lag on the 1080i set that I use for gaming. Do they still make 1080i sets, or has it all progressed to 1080p?

My 1080i set is a 200# CRT, so I also have zero gaming lag. (That, plus the QAM tuner and exceptional black-levels, are the reasons why I bought the thing.)

CRTs are the last of the 'interlaced' - only formats....or at least I've never heard of a CRT that displayed an image in progressive scan. I know some old plasmas used to display in 1080i native resolution, but I haven't seen one of those in the stores in quite some time.

[GormanHarvey]

Thanks for all the info guys. My tv is a Samsung 50" DLP (HLS 5088W) with 1080P cabability, but obviously that isn't an option until someone starts broadcasting in that resolution. I switched it from 1080i to 720P last night so I will have to see if I notice any difference. I love that tv though!

[mtrebs]

mtrebs --- CBS & NBC run 1080i. ABC & Fox run 720p.

 

...

Do you think if I set my TV to only display 720p that when I watch CBS & NBC that I won't see those blocky pixels when the camera changes to a high-motion shot? Or will it still probably do that because that is how the stations are filming the broadcast? I really hate how CBS and NBC get those blocky pixels....

[T B0NE 10]

Well on my TV's I notice a pretty significant lag when playing video games with my 360 when its on 1080i.

 

Especially on shooting games like Call of Duty.

[Godspeed]

Do you think if I set my TV to only display 720p that when I watch CBS & NBC that I won't see those blocky pixels when the camera changes to a high-motion shot? Or will it still probably do that because that is how the stations are filming the broadcast? I really hate how CBS and NBC get those blocky pixels....

It's probably a matter of the source material than anything. I've seen slight pixelation on CBS and NBC on my native 1080i TV as well as my 720p. I'd just set your set to display it's native resolution.

[bjkrautk]

(This is a generic reply to a variety of the formatting questions, not a specific reply to any one post.)

 

HDTVs all have a "native resolution," which is what you see when the TV is being advertised. If the content you're experiencing (watching / playing) is not in that resolution, the TV has to scale the content up (or down) to its native resolution. For example, if you're watching 720p video on a 1080p LCD, the 'guts' of your TV has to decide which pixels turn which color, since there are about 1.5x as many pixels in your TV then are being used in your content.

 

If your HDTV has pixelation issues, it's going to be a result of either a poor quality signal (my over-the-air HD stations sometimes have issues that their QAM equivalents don't) or the image processing in your HDTV.

 

Gaming consoles make this even more confusing. An XBox 360 has its own internal scaling hardware; it takes whatever image you are looking at (including DVDs at 480p) and scale it to whatever you've set the box to display. Forcing the 360 to display something other than the HDTV's native resolution will force the HDTV to rescale the images a second time (thus creating additional lag). PS3 does not have an internal scaler, so it sends whatever image the HDTV accepts naturally. Since most PS3 games output in 720p, the lack of an internal scaler is a real problem to people with old 1080i HDTVs that do not accept 720p content. Not every native-1080i HDTV has this issue (My Sony CRT handles 720p just fine). Those 1080i sets that do not support 720p will end up down-scaling the content to 480i/p if the game does not support 1080i. (I believe that the original Resistance is one such title.)

[Invader3K]

One way to get around the scaling issue is to get a newer AV receiver with HDMI video switching and upconversion capability. You can get a good one for $500 or even less sometimes. Just a thought.