[hoffo]

I have a question for those who are more knowledgeable. I have a Toshiba HD CRT and a Toshiba HD-A3 HD-DVD player and I have experimented with outputting 480p via HDMI with a DVD source as well as letting the HD-A3 upscale to 1080i also via HDMI. I seem to think that the 1080i upscaled image looks better but it is hard to tell. So my question is which is better for DVD sources and why? Is the upscaling by the HD-A3 superior to just outputting 480p or is the fact that DVDs are native 480 make 480p the better choice?

 

[trivial]

Our HD tubes are "natively" 1080i / 540p. They scale 480p to 960i mostly. Don't approach this like a flat-panel owner whose native rez is important for very different reasons.


As a practical matter, I've never seen my HD-D1 do any harm by upscaling widescreen material to 1080i. But I'd still rather watch 4:3 material at 480p so my Sony TV doesn't autoshift into 16:9 Enhanced mode.


My Samsung TV let me turn 16:9 vertical shrink off at 1080i. If your Toshiba does the same, I think you might consider upscaling everything, even 4:3 material, just for the hell of it. Provided of course that your CRT isn't widescreen; none of mine are.

 

[hoffo]

The TV I have is a widescreen model 30HF66.

 

[trivial]

Okay. So you probably have no reason to turn upscaling off, ever. The scaler in an HDDVD player is far more up-to-date than what's in an HD CRT, and as I said these CRTs are natively 1080i AFAIK. But then again, 960i involves a perfect 1:2 scaling ratio, which simple electronics handle very well.


To upscale or not makes less difference than it would make to a flat-panel with an equally bad internal scaler. A swept electron beam is an analog device even if it's controlled digitally (talking about the TV's guts here, not HDMI vs. component video).

 

[hoffo]

Ok gotcha. Yeah I have been using 1080i upscaling thinking that it was probably a lot better than switching to 480p for dvds. Also it seems a bit better looking than the 480p/540p mode. Just was curious as to whether or not the lack of interlaced flicker in 480/540p mode was supposed to give better temporal resolution than say 1080i. I don't really see too much difference in terms of flicker myself but I have never really noticed interlaced flickering much.

 

[harpeth]

Our LG LST-3510A tuner/DVD player upscales to 1080i if desired, though it will also play at 480i and 480p. I think, if it's connected to an LCD, it will also upscale to 720p. I keep it set on 1080i. We have a Philips 30PW8420/37 widescreen.


Our ClearPlay DVD player doesn't have HDMI connections, but only component. It's only option is 480p, other than the native 480i. I have it set to 480p. I was thinking about this issue when watching a DVD on the ClearPlay player, and concluded that the most notable difference is the lower resolution of small text, such as seen in credits and small signs or other text in the movie itself. Other than that, I don't see a whole lot of difference.