I've started looking for DVD players that do upconversion from standard 480 to 720-1080. My question is how is the dvd upscaled to 720? What in the player upscales it? And should I get one or wait until blueray becomes more affordable?


I'm a newby on stuff like this and I'm trying to figure out how they work. Any help would be appreciated.

I've started looking for DVD players that do upconversion from standard 480 to 720-1080. My question is how is the dvd upscaled to 720? What in the player upscales it? And should I get one or wait until blueray becomes more affordable?


I'm a newby on stuff like this and I'm trying to figure out how they work. Any help would be appreciated.

Upscaling consists of interpolating between the provided pixels of data. The more sophisticated the interpolation algorithm, the better the possible resulting picture. A good upscaler can work wonders while you wait to step into the HD video disc melee :).

What YOU should get is for you to decide.

No upscaling player can ever look as good as a true high def player with true high def discs (HD-DVD or BD).

No upscaling player can ever look as good as a true high def player with true high def discs (HD-DVD or BD).

With the select few exceptions of crappy HD transfers. If the studio took 480p and upscaled it to 1080p then called the result HD and put it on BR or HD-DVD... then it's entirely possible that the upscaling method used in a decent DVD player could be better than the upscaling the studio used on their source material.

Of course these instances appear to be very very few. Only Traffic and The Fifth Element come to mind.

With the select few exceptions of crappy HD transfers. If the studio took 480p and upscaled it to 1080p then called the result HD and put it on BR or HD-DVD... then it's entirely possible that the upscaling method used in a decent DVD player could be better than the upscaling the studio used on their source material.

Of course these instances appear to be very very few. Only Traffic and The Fifth Element come to mind.

Actually, there's no reason to believe either Traffic or TFE look any worse than their masters. My understanding is Traffic HD and SD and the original film all have the same look -- which is the way it should be -- though there appears to be a question as to whether the master really was HD (as opposed to upscaled SD). It seems the master used for TFE BD was poorer than the one Sony said they used (the SB version) and it shows. Still, in neither of those cases is it the fault of the HD transfer, it appears to be a mastering issue for both.

I've started looking for DVD players that do upconversion from standard 480 to 720-1080. My question is how is the dvd upscaled to 720? What in the player upscales it? And should I get one or wait until blueray becomes more affordable?


I'm a newby on stuff like this and I'm trying to figure out how they work. Any help would be appreciated.

Upscaling DVD players simply include video processing capabilities that perform the video scaling to a higher resolution. You can also purchase standalone video processors that do the same. And most displays nowadays have their own video processing capabilities as well.

This thread makes me wonder: Why does SDTV look so bad upconverted on a large HDTV. I have a 4 year old $70 progressive scan DVD player that only puts out a 480p signal and yet standard DVDs looks good on my 61" 1080P TV. Apparently my tv does a good job of upconverting to 1080P.

My digital cable channels look pretty lousy compared to DVDs. Why does my digital cable tv channels not get upconverted as nicely as DVDs? Do cable tv channels not utilize the full 480 lines or is it bitrate or something?

My digital cable channels look pretty lousy compared to DVDs. Why does my digital cable tv channels not get upconverted as nicely as DVDs? Do cable tv channels not utilize the full 480 lines or is it bitrate or something?

A bit of both, but generally it's because of very low bitrates being used. Somone in NZ posted stats on Satellite DVB transmission from a subscription supplier (SKY) and bit rates for many channels were below 2 mbit. When you consider DVD averages 4-6mbit (peaks at 10) one can easially guess the quality isn;t goign to be up-to-snuff.

Upscaling DVD players simply include video processing capabilities that perform the video scaling to a higher resolution. You can also purchase standalone video processors that do the same. And most displays nowadays have their own video processing capabilities as well.
could you or anyone explain the differing methods of hardware upscaling (as in dvd players) vs. software upscaling (as with PC graphics cards)? any advantages to either?

could you or anyone explain the differing methods of hardware upscaling (as in dvd players) vs. software upscaling (as with PC graphics cards)? any advantages to either?

In what way, that's not really a meaningful question per se.