DVD Upscaling

Forums › Home Theatre (including HTPC and EPG Collector) › DVD Upscaling

bronzeman

3 posts

Wannabe Geek

#29076 22-Dec-2008 04:18

Hi all,

Firstly, I'm new to these forums, so greetings!

I've just bought a dvd upscaler to go with my first plasma tv, as I have a large collection of DVDs (3000+) and am not ready to start buying Blu-Rays considering the cost of replacing my collection. On the advice of a friend, and after reading a few reviews, I bought a Denon 1740.

On the standard HDMI setting 480/576, films look better than when I was using my old player, which I used with component leads. However, if I select the 720 setting, films actually look worse, sharp and grainy. If I select the 1080 setting, there is no visible change to the 480/576 setting. My television is a Samsung 42 plasma HD-Ready, capable of maximum 1080i.

I'm wondering do I need a full HD television to see the 1080 upscaling? Or does it sound as if the Denon might be faulty?

Any advice would be appreciated - when it comes to home entertainment I'm a newbie!

bronzeman

3 posts

Wannabe Geek

#185610 22-Dec-2008 08:54

Update...

After staring at my tv for ages and constantly changing settings (ive become obsessed!), there seems to be a very small difference between 480/576 and 1080 if I look at the edges of objects or people. The higher setting looks a bit smoother, but both me and my partner agree the changes are very, very subtle and difficult to spot. After reading reviews about upscalers I was expecting a lot more than this for my money...

wellygary

8321 posts

Uber Geek

#185619 22-Dec-2008 09:24

bronzeman:
My television is a Samsung 42 plasma HD-Ready, capable of maximum 1080i.

I'm wondering do I need a full HD television to see the 1080 upscaling? Or does it sound as if the Denon might be faulty?

There is probably a whole lot of converting and reconverting happening in your telly at those higher resolutions too, what is the native panel format of your TV ie: 1366×768, or 1920x1080, if it the latter that use 1080 as your output, but if you TV has a 768 panel using 720p *should* give you the best result,

While people talk about upscaling giving great results, be aware that it is essentially trying to guess the missing pixels, and it is hard to make something from nothing,

Masterpiece

247 posts

Master Geek

#185701 22-Dec-2008 16:05

Bronzeman, welcome to the forums.

A couple of fundimental things happen,one is your display already upscales the 576i input from your original source to the native display scaling.
With the source DVD player now upscaling which may and probably is a better upscaler than the displays ability, however you strike the second issue with HDready displays that is they typically never match native 16:9(1.78:1) of 1280*720 or 1920*1080 pixel scale ratios. Thus dispite upscaling, the upscaled image is at 720p or 1080i/p, doesn't match your native display scale so your display rescales to fit it's native rate.

If you see the issue your performance increase is undone by the display native rescale.
You might find a mixed bag though where some material from your collection will indeed still look better with your upscaling ability, depends on the quality of the original source.

What can you do?
Live with it for the time being.
Upgrade to a 1080p display or projector.
Get an external video processor that resides between the DVD source(s) and the display designed for processing only.
THese can cost as much as a new display, although they can also solve alot of colour issues with displays, they can be hard to justify in NZ.

Dispite the arguments that TV signal of 576i looks crappy on 1080p displays and freeview is typically just upscaled itself I would personally always advise displays that natively fit the native video ratios and resolutions.

Being 1280*720 or 1920*1080

You don't find many if any panels of 1280*720, mostly projectors. THe 720p projectors are becoming very cheap high hit power for buck units. Personally a well setup 720p projector looks better than most panels, even 1080p types.
Projection isnt for eveyone though, depends on how when and why you watch what you do.

HDready displays are fine for those who don't really care about absolute imagery.
When one starts to care about maximising quality throughout the whole video chain Source~display then choice of components matters.
Of course there is alot of people who bought HDready displays when that was all that was avaliable, unfortunately the best you can do here is limited to the weakest link.

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bronzeman

3 posts

Wannabe Geek

#185761 23-Dec-2008 03:03

Thanks for the replies.

Masterpiece, your advice has given me a clearer understanding of how things work, cheers. The native resolution of my tv is only 1024x768. I should have done more research before rushing out and buying my new setup, although I am somewhat limited in budget at the minute. Guess I'll just have to live with it for now!