If you are talking about TVs then they contain up and down converters to allow the video to be played. PC monitors depend on the video card or mobo video to do this. How well this is done depends on the quality of the circuits involved. Native resolution in is usually best. Most cable and broadcast channels run at 1080i (which is alternating 540p frames) not 1080p so the TV has to reconstruct the picture. Some sports channels run at 720p to minimize artifacts caused by fast motion on 1080i.