PS3 - PS3 Firmware: 720p on Blu-ray?

Aerobernardo

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Well the tittle says it all...

I knew for a long time that the Playstation 3 blu-ray player did not downconvert 1080p movies to 780p. As the majority people with HDTV's out there, my TV only offers me 780p and lets face it, why the rush to go 1080p? I can wait for a couple of years, get me a new furniture and then go on.

I have been a little away about the PS3 firmware updates; are there any improvements on that field? Can I play Blu-ray movies on 780p or will it still be looking like a DVD (480p)? I know that they do it with games, why not with movies?

countdown: 5 days for my PS3 to arrive...
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rninneman

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You are mistaken. PS3 is capable of down-converting Blu-Ray movies to 720p just fine. (BTW, it's 720p , not 780p.) What is does not do is up-convert standard DVDs to 720p or 1080i/p. Word on the street is that a future firmware update will add DVD up-scaling, but no official word from Sony. Some believe this would undermine their efforts to make Blu-Ray the next optical disc standard. If regular DVDs can be up-converted to look almost like an HD image, why buy Blu-Ray or HD discs? I think this argument is weak at best because a good HDMI up-converting DVD player can be had for under $200 now. I hope Sony does add it in the future. It will make a great system even better.

The PS3 is a sweet machine; enjoy it.

Ryan
 

maximiza

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In Sony OS you can choose 720p, 1080i, 1080p and something else i forget. I think it upscales on the 1080p/i. In Linux Yellow Dog mode it functions the same way. Next few patches it is supposed to upscale reguler DVD's.

They just enabled the WiFI in the most recent PS3 update and YDL patch so it is slowly progressing. There have allready been something like 5 or 6 Sony patches. Over 500 linux Yellow Dog patches.
 

IcY18

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This is the potential problem you were talking about. The problem was newly introduced HD tv's that only supported 1080i and not 720p. The result was that because the PS3 does not have a upscalar capable of converting 720p to 1080i it would then have to output the image in 480p.


Link
 

IcY18

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All i was doing was referring to the problem that he was trying to figure out. Unfortunately though the problem is not solved with the firmware update and since you have an EDTV you wouldn't be able to know the difference between a true 1080i source or the PS3.

the late January PlayStation 3 SDK update brings with it the ability for developers to access a hardware scaler – albeit one that’s limited to only horizontal scaling. For the a 720p image to be upscaled to 1080p/i, both horizontal and vertical scaling are required.

For example, developers can render at 960x1080,

So hmm, how does 960x1080 automatically equal 1080i at all? Well it doesn't and thats why the PS3 scaling problem isn't solved.
 

rninneman

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The article was true for November 16, 2006 it has changed though

The cell with the right software/firmware can upscale any format to the default TV resolution. My EDTV can display 1080i resolution but I am loosing 10% quality over HDTV. Far away you can't tell the differance. Yellow dog linux will have access eventually when sony allows it through the hypervisor.

http://arstechnica.com/journals/thumbs.ars/2007/03/02/7291

For you it doesn't really matter that the PS3 doesn't scale if you have an EDTV. An EDTV has a native resolution of 480p so it cannot display any more detail than the panels native resolution of 852x480 anyway. (You may see a small improvement with HD sources over 480 sources because of supersampling.) You are losing a lot more than 10%. Your EDTV has just over 400,000 pixels. A 1080i/p image requires just under 2.1 million pixels. You are actually missing over 80% of a 1080i picture with an EDTV. (I won't get into differences in temporal resolution between the formats. That's for another discussion.)

Ryan
 

IcY18

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720p and 1080i do not look very different, and often 720p is preferred more times than not over 1080i. Since 1080i is interlaced your, and i will tread lightly as others know more about this issue, you only get 540 of the lines at a time while with 720p you get all 720.

If you have a 720p TV then the problem discussed earlier will not effect you, its for TVs that only support 1080i, and not 720p. If you have a TV capable of 720p and not 1080p then just choose 720p and you won't have to worry about the potential scalar problems of the ps3.
 

Aerobernardo

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HDTV 720p, 1080i
not 1080p

Thats my TV. I know that games the PS3 can convert easily to 720p. I'm just wondering about blu ray movies, wich some say cannot be downscaled to 720p (in theory the PS3 engine converts to 480p if your TV is not full 1080p)

That link sure looks reasonable... does anyone know if it is true?
 

rninneman

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HDTV 720p, 1080i
not 1080p

Thats my TV. I know that games the PS3 can convert easily to 720p. I'm just wondering about blu ray movies, wich some say cannot be downscaled to 720p (in theory the PS3 engine converts to 480p if your TV is not full 1080p)

That link sure looks reasonable... does anyone know if it is true?

You misread my previous post as well as you must not have read the link from IcY18. PS3 does scale Blu-Ray movies; it does not scale games. The game must be designed for either 720p or 1080i/p specifically.

You should read what everyone is providing before assuming you are being called stupid even though no such thing happened. Everyone here is trying to help you with your question, myself included. You should try to be a bit more appreciative.

The short answer to your question is that as of the current PS3 firmware, you will be able to enjoy Blu-Ray movies scaled down to 720p on your television. Gaming resolution will depend on the exact title you are playing. Even if a game supports 480p and 1080i only, since your TV accepts 1080i too, it will automatically convert it to 720p internally. The PS3 is going to work great with your TV.

Ryan
 

maximiza

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I have actually checked the specs on my 2 year old Panasonic EDTV TH42PD60U. It is actually discontinued. :D When if finaly blows up I will buy a new HDTV.

I guess even thought my PS3 autodetects 1080i with the HDMI port, 480p is not high def.
 

Aerobernardo

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HDTV 720p, 1080i
not 1080p

Thats my TV. I know that games the PS3 can convert easily to 720p. I'm just wondering about blu ray movies, wich some say cannot be downscaled to 720p (in theory the PS3 engine converts to 480p if your TV is not full 1080p)

That link sure looks reasonable... does anyone know if it is true?

You misread my previous post as well as you must not have read the link from IcY18. PS3 does scale Blu-Ray movies; it does not scale games. The game must be designed for either 720p or 1080i/p specifically.

You should read what everyone is providing before assuming you are being called stupid even though no such thing happened. Everyone here is trying to help you with your question, myself included. You should try to be a bit more appreciative.

The short answer to your question is that as of the current PS3 firmware, you will be able to enjoy Blu-Ray movies scaled down to 720p on your television. Gaming resolution will depend on the exact title you are playing. Even if a game supports 480p and 1080i only, since your TV accepts 1080i too, it will automatically convert it to 720p internally. The PS3 is going to work great with your TV.

Ryan

If thats so, I am sorry. But by reading your post once again I find it almost calling me silly for not knowing which is my TV res. I do know how many pixels I get in each mode. I know that Marvel UA is on 1080p and the PS3 will scale it to 720p in my TV. What I want to know is IF i put a blu ray disc (defaul 1080p) on the PS3 it will give me a 480p picture as in the beggining or by firmware updates Sony now knows that the majority will want it to be scaled to 780p. From the link I`ve posted people are "cheating" on the PS3: if you put 1080p as your default for movies it will be scaled to 480p on TV`s like mine. What they do is set as defaul 1080i for movies, and then our own TV scales the movie to 720p. That`s a hat trick!
 

rninneman

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From day one, PS3 could scale Blu-Ray movies. It still cannot scale games. So in your situation, set the PS3 to 720p. When you watch any Blu-Ray movie, it will be scaled to 720p. Regular DVDs will be 480p. Games will depend on the exact title. If a game is designed for 1080p only and not 720p, I think if you set the console to 1080i, it will still output 1080i because conversion from 1080p to 1080i does not require scaling, only interlacing. Your TV will then automatically scale the 1080i signal to 720p which will still look way better than 480p. I cannot verify the output of 1080i for a 1080p game at this time. If someone else here knows and can post before I get a chance to test, please let us know.

Ryan
 

Aerobernardo

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From day one, PS3 could scale Blu-Ray movies. It still cannot scale games. So in your situation, set the PS3 to 720p. When you watch any Blu-Ray movie, it will be scaled to 720p. Regular DVDs will be 480p. Games will depend on the exact title. If a game is designed for 1080p only and not 720p, I think if you set the console to 1080i, it will still output 1080i because conversion from 1080p to 1080i does not require scaling, only interlacing. Your TV will then automatically scale the 1080i signal to 720p which will still look way better than 480p. I cannot verify the output of 1080i for a 1080p game at this time. If someone else here knows and can post before I get a chance to test, please let us know.

Ryan

lol thats the oposite of the link: they say games can be scaled by the Cell to 720p and movies can't. Anyway, can I set diferent res for movies and games or will I have to change it every time I decide to watch a blu ray?

And thanks for the effort
 

rninneman

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I'm not sure which link you are referring to at this point, but I do know what it can do. I work for a small high-end AV company and several of us have PS3s. We've had the oppurtunity to use it on many different displays. Blu-Ray performance on 720p displays is superb as well.

If you are referring to the link about the newest SDK allowing games access to the scaling hardware. I think it is scaling on 1 axis. That also means though that if the SDK was just released, there are no games yet that scale at all.

Ryan