HDTV-Good at what it's designed for...anything else, well...

[The Clonus Horror]

I picked up a Samsung 26" Widescreen HDTV in the Fall, a floor model at Sears, for around $500. It has 2 component video inputs, 1 S-Video input, and 3 composite inputs. I have a Panasonic 5-disc DVD player with 480p output. It looks great. The X-box looks great in progressive.

Now, the rest. PS2 games, if not outfitted for progressive, look jaggy.

Anything older looks PAINFULLY JAGGY. Since the TV automatically converts signals into digital, Genesis, SNES, PSOne, N64, etc...look absolutely vibrant in color and crispness, but you can almost see every single little pixel. Genesis games look incredibly bad.

NES games, I'm torn. At times, the picture is so crisp that it looks like your character is "floating." This is especially evident in top-down games like Jackal.
Some games look good, but make no mistake about it, they are "burnt to a crisp."

I've owned a 27" RCA with an S-Video input since 1999. I'm a huge fan of S-Video. Though I just slammed "crispness" in my previous statements, I really like how text and graphics look on S-Video. There is a significant difference between S-video and composite, but if you are only looking for a difference in COLOR, then you won't be impressed. The color is essentially the same, it's the dark/light that is different.

I guess what I'm saying is that-for anything that doesn't have progressive output-there is no need to go higher quality than S-video. Keep it analogue.

For anything that DOES have progressive, and if you can afford it, then go digital or HD or whatever. However, S-video still is pretty damn good for DVD or X-box.

I'm going to sell my Samsung TV soon. As long as my old RCA is working, I feel like a glutton and am suffering guilt from being so impulsive and tricked into thinking that an HDTV would be "better" or something that I "needed" in order to enjoy my media fully. I fell into the trap for a short moment of time. Don't get me wrong, the TV did everything it was designed to do--I just don't think they had old school gaming in mind, and why should they?

Thoughts?

[LocalH]

That's because most HD sets use stupid ugly deinterlacing algorithms which tend to fuck up the image more than they help, especially with computer- or console-generated images. If they'd use a straight bob algorithm, the results would likely look much better (although not up to par with true HD content, of course).

Also, analog component at 480i is vastly superior to S-Video, although not many consoles support it directly outside of the current generation. I seem to remember hearing about a box designed for the Neo-Geo that converts BGR into component, which should work with any console that can output BGR, given the correct cable (which only really leaves out the 8-bit systems, and the N64 without modification, since it doesn't present BGR on the multi-out). S-Video still exhibits chroma bleed (look at highly saturated reds to really see this). The main benefits to S-Video are increased luma bandwidth and loss of chroma crawl, but since the two chroma signals are still combined, you still get the bleeding on saturated color. Component keeps the two chroma signals separate, which means you get the absolute best possible picture from the set.

[cityside75]

One other item I would add is that in many cases with modern TV's the sharpness setting should be set all the way down to zero. Many people have a hard time accepting this, but it's true. I have a Home Theater calibration DVD that explains exactly why, but to put it simply, the sharpness control actually ADDS noise to the picture through edge enhancement. This tends to greatly exaggerate the already extremely crisp pixels on a modern HDTV.

Incidentally, it can also enhance the edges of light snow and static that is inherent in many non-HD television signals and can make the picture on those signals look really bad.

Try setting your sharpness to zero and leave it long enough to get used to the slightly softer look, it's likely the most "accurate" picture and you may find that your games are not so obviously pixelated.

[Mr Mort]

Try setting your sharpness to zero and leave it long enough to get used to the slightly softer look, it's likely the most "accurate" picture and you may find that your games are not so obviously pixelated.

Forgive my ignorance, but are you talking about older systems that are hooked up via S-video, or something else?

I got an HD tube-TV, and as stated, HD games and movies look amazing, but my NES, SNES, Genesis, Saturn, etc, look like ass on that TV. I actually get a much crisper picture for those consoles on my Trinitron with S-Video cables, so all my older consoles are hooked up to the Trinitron, while the GC and Xbox are hooked up to the HDTV.

[SoulBlazer]

I'd keep the HDTV just cause of all the new systems and channels that are coming out that will support it.

[Anthony1]

It's true that alot of HDTV's and old school gaming systems don't mix too well, but, a modded XBOX running games emulated in 1080i and 720p is a totally different ballgame!!!


If you have a HDTV and are into NES, Genesis, Super NES, Sega CD and 32X, and you have a XBOX, then you should mod it, and put a hard drive in it, and all the great emulators. Especially the ones for the systems that I mentioned above. You can actually go into the settings and change the output to 720p and widescreen! Or 1080i and widescreen!

Seeing Contra on the NES in 720p widescreen, was an amazing site for me.

Also, make sure to turn on XBOX Tri Linear Filtering, and also set it to SuperScale 2X video mode.

The Genesis in 720p with those settings looks very, very, very damn close to R.G.B. quality. Not quite, but damn close!

[cityside75]

Forgive my ignorance, but are you talking about older systems that are hooked up via S-video, or something else?

I'm actually talking about the settings of the TV itself, regardless of the input. With very few exceptions the sharpness should be set all the way to zero.

[GarrettCRW]

Seeing Contra on the NES in 720p widescreen, was an amazing site for me.

And a violation of that game's OAR, it should be noted.

[Promophile]

I think I'll hold off on getting an HDTV until you don't have to be a freaking hardware engineer to uderstand ANYTHING about them.

[LocalH]

Try setting your sharpness to zero and leave it long enough to get used to the slightly softer look, it's likely the most "accurate" picture and you may find that your games are not so obviously pixelated.
I did this, but found that on both of my sets (one 20-inch and one 27-inch, both fed from a digital cable receiver via S-Video), that setting it *all* the way down was a bit too soft, so I brought the sharpness back up until defined vertical edges were clean, without ringing - the box's program guide is a perfect test for this. I only had to bring the sharpness up a very minor bit from the absolute lowest setting. And I agree with you, this made the video look much better (it especially helped mask the artifacts from my DVR box). The slightly higher sharpness did not seem to add any noise to analog cable channels versus the absolute lowest setting. And I have a trained eye, being a videophile and professional master control operator at the local TV station.

[cityside75]

I did this, but found that on both of my sets (one 20-inch and one 27-inch, both fed from a digital cable receiver via S-Video), that setting it *all* the way down was a bit too soft, so I brought the sharpness back up until defined vertical edges were clean, without ringing - the box's program guide is a perfect test for this. I only had to bring the sharpness up a very minor bit from the absolute lowest setting. And I agree with you, this made the video look much better (it especially helped mask the artifacts from my DVR box). The slightly higher sharpness did not seem to add any noise to analog cable channels versus the absolute lowest setting. And I have a trained eye, being a videophile and professional master control operator at the local TV station.

Cool, glad to hear that it improved your picture. The calibration DVD does mention that some sets go very soft at the very lowest setting and should be brought up a notch or two, sounds like that's the case with yours.

To Promomphile - It gets even worse if you have a Rear Projection CRT-based HDTV like I (and many others do). Converging the colors is a pain it the butt and it seems like these TVs get out of convergence weekly in the first few months of ownership! But boy is the picture pretty when some good HD programming is on!

[The Manimal]

buy a video processor (line doubler)??? if it's better than what's in your TV, you'll be bypassing your problem.