1080p Scaling? What does that mean??!

[admin_exported]

Hi,

I had (after about 3 months of umming and ahhing) recently decided to buy a 37" Panasonic LZD800. Reason was because it's full HD and so when coupled with the DMP-BD30 I'm going to buy will produce the best quality viewing in terms of resolution.

BUT, getting nervous about whether I'm making the right choice, I just had a look on the Pioneer website. Under the HD-ready models, and in particular the PDP-4280XD, it says:

" The 550HX enables a scaling option up to 1080p via HDMI. So you’re guaranteed the highest viewing resolution, regardless of the source."

My question is how, on a screen which is 1024x768, can you get "the highest viewing resolution" which is 1080p isn't it??! It just doesn't make sense to me? I can understand how a 1080p tv can upscale an HD-ready signal to 1080p because the 1080p tv has the pixels to be able to do that. But how can an HD-ready tv upscale to 1080p, because it just doesn't have enough pixels to be able to do it?!

I'm obviously missing something here (or what's on Pioneer's website is a load of marketing waffle!).

Can someone PLEEEEASE clarify this for me?

Thanks!

 

[Anonymous]

I think they're refering to the fact that the Pioneer can accept 1080p and then re-scale it to the panel resolution, 1024x768. Personally I don't think i'm missing a trick but only having an HD Ready Kuro.
And the benefits of 1080p on a 37" and very debatable too, even at 42".

R

 

[Alsone]

From what you've said its downscaling in that case ie. It will discard some pixels to reduce the picture to the panel size. You lose some detail but very little quality with downscaling generally.

Upscaling (ie increasing the size to fit the screen) is more problematic as the device doing the upscaling, has to guess and create the missing pixels, but the Pioneer 428XD which is what I have, makes an excellent job with DVD - some of the pictures are simply stunning eg. House of Flying Daggers (probably the best disc), Pearl Harbour (I rather like this film, love scene aside and it upscales fantastically to an unbelievable quality of picture in places), etc etc.

The real problem with upscaling comes with aerial signals as broadcast quality is low compared to a DVD source and it really shows. SD TV on a large screen looks quite poor compared to when it's viewed on a SD screen.

BTW, just for the record, the largest number of pixels doesn't equal the best picture. The 428XD which was / is What Hi Fi's top 42" screen beat off competition from the Full HD screens for the title.

Also, the higher the res, generally the poorer SD sources will look as the more interpolation is needed. eg. at HD ready resolution there's twice as many pixels as SD, at Full HD there's 4 times as many pixels. The more missing pixels, the more guessing by the software and generally the more scope for mistakes made / softer the picture.

The trade off between the two is you get more detail at full HD but not necessarily the best picture (see my previous comment). Detail is only aspect. Its 3D appearance, colours, tonal range etc are all as important as detail and all contribute to the overall picture quality.

One warning on Pioneer, their screens are excellent picture wise, but if you get a dead pixel, you may find them refusing to exchange it - thats what happened to me but luckily my dealer did it off his own back. I'm not impressed by Pioneer's customer care to say the least.

 

[professorhat]

[quote user="Alsone"]
One warning on Pioneer, their screens are excellent picture wise, but if you get a dead pixel, you may find them refusing to exchange it - thats what happened to me but luckily my dealer did it off his own back. I'm not impressed by Pioneer's customer care to say the least.
[/quote]
That's true of most manufacturers. Generally, the warranty covers it if more than a certain percentage of the screen is made of dead pixels. Before then, it's tough luck matey (as a general principle - of course some may fix or replace the TV out of courtesy).

 

[Alsone]

[quote user="professorhat"][quote user="Alsone"]

One warning on Pioneer, their screens are excellent picture wise, but if you get a dead pixel, you may find them refusing to exchange it - thats what happened to me but luckily my dealer did it off his own back. I'm not impressed by Pioneer's customer care to say the least.

[/quote] That's true of most manufacturers. Generally, the warranty covers it if more than a certain percentage of the screen is made of dead pixels. Before then, it's tough luck matey (as a general principle - of course some may fix or replace the TV out of courtesy).[/quote]

Some are better than others though. There have been several people with problems on here with Panasonic where Panasonic have exchanged the panel even though it perhaps wasn't technically regarded as faulty. With Pioneer you're buying a premium product - often twice the price of Panasonic - so for me if I was buying a Rolls I'd expect Rolls Royce service - service where they couldn't do enough for me.

Sadly my experience was anything but that, polite but extremely awkward service - no give or take just a "tough sh*t" attitude, is how I would describe it, and my pixel was stuck on bright fluorescent green!

I wouldn't ever buy anything Pioneer again after this.

Thank god for good retailers - Moorgate Acoustics of Sheffield absolutely rock. (Thanks for the exchange guys 🙂 ).

 

[Anonymous]

Hi, thanks all for your replies - it does make sense. So I actually just bought a Panasonic 37LZD800, took it home, set it up with freeview last night and it looked good at first. But after an hour or two I noticed that 2 of the corners looked as though there was too much brightness! After a bit of googling, I think this is what's referred to as "backlight bleed". I'm very, very annoyed - the LZD800 is supposed to be panasonic's flagship LCD!!!! It's not just the corners, but at the entire very top of the screen, there is also faint backlight bleed. I'm going to have to return it! (In fact, I think I'm going to start a new post just to let everyone know).

Problem is that 37" is the perfect size for our living room - I don't really want to go to 42". But I am considering plasma now. Other thing is that when I went to the shop and compared the LCD to the Plasma, the LCD lookde far superior in terms of colour and sharpness, but now after watching it at home, the colours seem to be artificially vibrant an it's hard to get a natural looking picture.

I'm back at square one deciding which TV to buy again! :-(

 

[Alsone]

Thats the problem with viewing instore and one reason why LCD's outsell plasmas to Joe Public who knows very little about tv's. Their very technology means they have superior brightness whereas plasmas have superior contrast (better blacks - lcds have tradionally tended to be a little greyish with their blacks). In a normal bright store the LCDs with their brightness turned up as they inevitabley are out of the factory, look to have a far better picture making plasmas look dull by comparison. Its only when you get them home in a room of ordinary brightness and have to turn the brightness down that you see the true picture so to speak. Thats not to say that all LCD's are bad, just that they appear better in store than what they perhaps are when correctly adjusted to a comfortable viewing brightness.

Also, something you'll probably only ever notice with an LCD next to a Plasma when instore, is that LCD's tend to overblow colours. Often faces look artificially red. You probably wouldn't notice in store without a comparison but put a good plasma and an LCD together and in most cases the faces on the plasma look far more natural.

That said, there are some good LCD's out there but many still think that for ultimate picture quality, plasmas the way to go.

 

[Anonymous]

If you want to stick with 37" but want plasma then don't worry about lising your Full HD resolution and just go for the old What HiFi forum standard Panasonic 37PX80 plasma. If you sit really close to it you might lose a little bit of detail in Full HD pictures, but other than it'll be spot on.