PS3 upscaling question..

[spotdog14]

Ok so i have been farting around with the settings on my PS3 in terms of upscaling DVD playback etc.

Am i to understand that the PS3 can only upscale regular DVD's if it is using HDMI? The reason i ask is because is i am using the component hookups (the red blue green type), and all the games look great, but he only Blu-Ray i have does not look that good, but then again it might be a bad example (Its Dracula). But my media center PC does a 1,000 times better job of upscaling DVD's than what my PS3 is doing right now.

So is it true that the PS3 only upscales DVD's over HDMI? Or will it do it over my component connection?

 

[Spaceman_Spiff]

Yep, dvd upscaling only happens over hdmi, and you'll find this is the case with any upscaling player. Its a content restriction that they can't do anything about, unfortunately.

 

[jsu718]

The upscaling on the PS3 is actually very good. I have HDMI and have used it a few times. It isn't as good as blu-ray is, but it still looks much better. I would imagine that it would look pretty much equivalent to what your media center does.

 

[aramis]

Has to do with good 'old HDCP. Any player can only upconvert over HDMI to my knowledge. Also... yeah, Bram Stoker's Dracula has pretty bad image quality, unfortunately. Check out some of Pixar or Disney's recent animation movies, Apocalypto, Pirates movies, Spidey 3 or any other # of movies that have much better PQ.

 

[Porter_]

Has to do with good 'old HDCP. Any player can only upconvert over HDMI to my knowledge. Also... yeah, Bram Stoker's Dracula has pretty bad image quality, unfortunately. Check out some of Pixar or Disney's recent animation movies, Apocalypto, Pirates movies, Spidey 3 or any other # of movies that have much better PQ.

the latest Pirates movie was the first blu ray to make my jaw drop. looks phenomenal.

 

[Nicksterr]

Using HDMI w/ my 360 and gotta say it does a great job at upscaling.

 

[Mac[X-D]]

The upscaling on the PS3 is actually very good. I have HDMI and have used it a few times. It isn't as good as blu-ray is, but it still looks much better. I would imagine that it would look pretty much equivalent to what your media center does.

i couldn't agree more when i saw a regular dvd on my PS3 compared to my5 disk upscaling dvd i couldn't believe the difference. the PS3 upscales very well.

 

[TheCreator]

Yes, only over HDMI...

I too have been impressed with my ps3 as a movie player, both upscaling and bluray.

 

[movax]

The PS3 IMO has less trouble with dropping/losing HDCP handshakes too (my Pioneer upconverting DVD player loses it sometimes on some discs). Thanks MPAA, fucking us over again!

Slightly more useful though, yeah, some DVDs will look like ass upscaled; darker movies (long dark movies will suck hardcore; its a side effect of MPEG-2, darker areas need more bitrate, and will block). Gladiator IMO could have used a better transfer to DVD in the first place, but it doesn't look too hot. Matrix on the other hand looks really really nice upscaled. But this all coming from a guy who still swears at LCDs/Plasmas/fixed-res technologies ushering in the upscaling market.

 

[Numan]

You need HDMI for the Bluray playback too or it's stuck at some barely higher than a DVD res.

 

[milkweg]

Also... yeah, Bram Stoker's Dracula has pretty bad image quality, unfortunately.

It does? This is one of my favourite movies for visual content (how can you not like Winona Ryder in a see-through gown?) and I thought the SD version looked pretty good. Just got the BluRay version but haven't even opened the wrapping yet. I'll be disappointed if the quality is not good.

Best BD quality content I have seen so far is the BBC series called Planet Earth but that was filmed with HD cameras so was expected. There is a horror movie from Australia called Wolf Creek and that was filmed with HD cameras too so I expect that would look great in BD. Don't know if it is available yet in BD though.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0416315/

So what is their point in allowing upscaling over HDMI but not component? 360 allows upscaling over VGA but not component. What's their stupid reasoning for that BS?

 

[erwos]

Has to do with good 'old HDCP.

That's not really the whole truth of it. The restriction has to do with DVD-CCA's rules for implementing CSS decryption - which prohibit upscaling over non-protected interfaces. The only reason that the 360 gets a pass with VGA is because VGA is considered a legacy PC interface, not a consumer electronics interface.

Ironically, even a fully-protected BR-D (one that includes ICT) will play at a higher resolution (540p) than a DVD (480p) when using component. You can invent your own answers as to why.

 

[milkweg]

Yea, and they said HDCP wouldn't cause us any issues. More BS. I have already ran into an issue when I couldn't play back a DVD movie from my PC to my LCD projector using a DVI>HDMI cable because of content protection. I believe that was using WMP and it wanted me to lower the resolution to be able to play it from my PC. Solution was to play it back using VLC instead. Lot of fucking good that did them.

 

[Opie]

I'm going to go against the grain and say that the PS3 is a barely adequate upscaler, especially if you have a large TV that is in the 50"+ range. If you are at all interested in picture quality do yourself a favor and investigate some of the stand-alone options from Oppo. Both the 981 and new 983 blow the PS3 away with the 983 being the only DVD player ever to score a perfect 100 on the Home Theater and Hifi test battery. The PS3 scored a 61. Link:
http://www.hometheaterhifi.com/cd-d...-player---a-secrets-dvd-benchmark-review.html

The Oppo players are also truly universal, playing Divx, Xvid, and just about every other video and audio format available. I just installed my 983 and am floored. Its in the same price range as the PS3 (the 981 is $200ish and very, very good) but IMO well worth it.

 

[MelonSplitter]

Yes, only over HDMI...

I too have been impressed with my ps3 as a movie player, both upscaling and bluray.

Too bad it does a crappy job of upscaling games. Hey devs, talkin to you.

 

[wildfire99]

If you are at all interested in picture quality do yourself a favor and investigate some of the stand-alone options from Oppo.

In terms of PQ the PS3 is one of the best, and I've seen a lot (from $2000+ standalone scalers, dedicated PC solutions (ugh, Theatertek), and upscaling players). Where the PS3 does flop rather badly is on what Secrets tested for, and that is conformance to oddball standard-def disc flags and bad encode jobs. But raw PQ on most (well-authored) discs is still pretty darn jaw-dropping, IMO. That's on a 110" diagonal screen.

On the other hand, I can't understand people who praise the Toshiba HD players for upscaling (the HD-XA2 notwithstanding). It looks positively mundane.

The Oppo doesn't output 24p for SD (neither does the PS3, unfortunately), so it won't have a place in my setup. Motion judder is almost as bad as half-baked deinterlacing.

 

[Opie]

Well, I'll agree with about 50% of that, but much of the Secrets test can hardly be labeled oddball. A good player should be able to handle all comers but I will say, what really makes the player shine is the deinterlacing and the Anchor Bay scaler.

I hear you re: judder, but interestingly (and albeit subjectively) I found the PS3 to be the worst offender in that category I've ever encountered. I own a PS3 as well as the Oppo and I've had to inure myself to it. Doesn't stop my eyes from bleeding while watching the good stuff.

 

[milkweg]

I'm going to go against the grain and say that the PS3 is a barely adequate upscaler, especially if you have a large TV that is in the 50"+ range. If you are at all interested in picture quality do yourself a favor and investigate some of the stand-alone options from Oppo. Both the 981 and new 983 blow the PS3 away with the 983 being the only DVD player ever to score a perfect 100 on the Home Theater and Hifi test battery. The PS3 scored a 61. Link:
http://www.hometheaterhifi.com/cd-d...-player---a-secrets-dvd-benchmark-review.html

The Oppo players are also truly universal, playing Divx, Xvid, and just about every other video and audio format available. I just installed my 983 and am floored. Its in the same price range as the PS3 (the 981 is $200ish and very, very good) but IMO well worth it.

Friend of mine just bought the Samsung BD and he had PS3 and he says it is not better than the PS3 quality. I think you make more of an issue of something that is really a negligible difference in quality. It's well known that the PS3 has good quality upscaling. I use the PS3 and use it with a 62" screen. I have no qualms about the quality.

 

[chameleoneel]

You need HDMI for the Bluray playback too or it's stuck at some barely higher than a DVD res.

Not true. Most Blu-rays should play fine at 720p and 1080i over component. A few of them may have some problems with still demanding handshakes, but as i said---most should work fine. They aren't being super stingy about that stuff yet and likely never will.

 

[spotdog14]

ANYWAYS, thank you for all your responses. I have since found my long lost HDMI cable i had laying around (why a $30 DVD player from Sams Club can come with one and not the PS3 is beyond me). Dracula still looks like crap... hahah. But i recently purchased 2001: A Space Odyssey and I Am Legend and they look amazing, also the text on screen with just the normal screen looks different as well, i am not sure if it is better or not yet, i havent had time to play around with it to much.

 

[obs]

I'm going to go against the grain and say that the PS3 is a barely adequate upscaler, especially if you have a large TV that is in the 50"+ range. If you are at all interested in picture quality do yourself a favor and investigate some of the stand-alone options from Oppo. Both the 981 and new 983 blow the PS3 away with the 983 being the only DVD player ever to score a perfect 100 on the Home Theater and Hifi test battery. The PS3 scored a 61. Link:
http://www.hometheaterhifi.com/cd-d...-player---a-secrets-dvd-benchmark-review.html

The Oppo players are also truly universal, playing Divx, Xvid, and just about every other video and audio format available. I just installed my 983 and am floored. Its in the same price range as the PS3 (the 981 is $200ish and very, very good) but IMO well worth it.

This is true but in real world data this difference is very hard to notice. Plus, the lack of HDMI ports can be an issue as well. 1 for PS3 and 1 for cable box doesn't leave room for much else when most reasonably priced receivers only have 2 inputs.

 

[Morpheus'rig]

Question for all you home theater experts.... My HD TV is an early generation so it does not have an HDMI input - only component video. If I hook up my PS3 to my receiver via HDMI will I be able to output the upconverter image to my TV via component or will this just not work out?

 

[Domingo]

This is true but in real world data this difference is very hard to notice. Plus, the lack of HDMI ports can be an issue as well. 1 for PS3 and 1 for cable box doesn't leave room for much else when most reasonably priced receivers only have 2 inputs.

Well, you could always skip hooking the cable box via HDMI. They're just doing 720p/1080i and normal Dolby 5.1. Essentially you could just hook it up via components/DVI/VGA/etc. and use an optical cable to get the same results. Granted I have mine running via HDMI at the moment, too - but the second I get another HDMI device I'm going back to component/optical. There's no real difference outside of convenience.

 

[Demon10000]

Question for all you home theater experts.... My HD TV is an early generation so it does not have an HDMI input - only component video. If I hook up my PS3 to my receiver via HDMI will I be able to output the upconverter image to my TV via component or will this just not work out?

I've never seen a DVD player upscale without HDMI.

 

[Opie]

This is true but in real world data this difference is very hard to notice. Plus, the lack of HDMI ports can be an issue as well. 1 for PS3 and 1 for cable box doesn't leave room for much else when most reasonably priced receivers only have 2 inputs.

There are several full-featured HDMI switches available that allow seamless integration of multiple HDMI devices. I have 2 ports as well and run the PS3 direct to the TV and my HD Tivo and DVD through the switch. At the risk of sounding like a shill, Oppo makes a great switch, but Monoprice also carries several options at great prices.

I'm running the whole thing via a Harmony 880 and adding the switch functionality was a breeze and signal quality is in no way compromised.

 

[JohnleMVP]

I've never seen a DVD player upscale without HDMI.

They exist. There are DVD players that will upscale to 1080i or even1080p over component. Microsoft couldn't break the rules and upscale to 1080p over component because they are worth sueing. While Coby or some el cheapo brand isn't worth sueing.

 

[Opie]

Here's some good news, hot off Engadget:

The PS3 engineers are adding 1080 deinterlacing and full DTS-HD MA to the machine via firmware at an unspecified point in the future. This is, like, wow. With this kind of suppport the PS3 becomes easily the best bang-for-buck purchase for your HD setup, if not in outright performance.

 

[wildfire99]

I've never seen a DVD player upscale without HDMI.

They're not supposed to, but for a while you could hack or unlock them to do so. Component at 1080 was a little softer than HDMI/DVI, and so for most SD titles it was subjectively preferable since it smoothed out the macroblocking and mosquito noise.

Of course, if your title isn't CSS protected it should upscale fine. Because CSS is the end-all-be-all of copy protection. And HDMI... there are no HDCP strippers available, anywhere. So keep punishing those legal consumers, movie publishers!

 

[Morpheus'rig]

I've never seen a DVD player upscale without HDMI.

Let me ask my question differently.... If I upscale by using HDMI to my receiver (assuming the receiver has an HDMI input), can my receiver translate (?) to component video and output at 1080i? Or is the receiver not going to be able to output via component video because the input was HDMI? Hope that makes some sense....

 

[jsu718]

Let me ask my question differently.... If I upscale by using HDMI to my receiver (assuming the receiver has an HDMI input), can my receiver translate (?) to component video and output at 1080i? Or is the receiver not going to be able to output via component video because the input was HDMI? Hope that makes some sense....

Seems very similar to the old S-video & composite situation. Very few things would cheaply convert between the two. Even with receivers you could only output in the same format as what was input... TVs being the same way. Either S-video was plugged in, or composite video... but not both... ever.
I imagine that HDMI can only be output over HDMI... or DVI/VGA that supports HDCP.
Technically anything even as low as composite video will support 1080p, but lots of hardware now just won't do it due to system settings and whatnot. There is tons of signal loss at that point, but it will still do it. Just like VGA can do 2560x1536, but people talk about needing HDMI or DVI to do 1080p... not because it can't but just because it shouldn't.

 

[wildfire99]

Let me ask my question differently.... If I upscale by using HDMI to my receiver (assuming the receiver has an HDMI input), can my receiver translate (?) to component video and output at 1080i? Or is the receiver not going to be able to output via component video because the input was HDMI? Hope that makes some sense....

Well you have a few challenges there. First, you're doing a digital-to-analog conversion, which at HD resolutions requires decent hardware that no receiver manufacturer is going to bother to pay to include until you get into the airy heights of dedicated processors (like the $5,000 Anthems).

Secondly, at high-definition scale, you're breaking the purpose of HDCP, which is that the fancy-schmancy high-def video never sees a non-encrypted analog signal, which is easily rippable by all those terrorist-supporting, child-eating pirates. Thus, the only box you get that would do such a thing would not be HDMI licensed. In the U.S., you're probably also a terrorist-supporting criminal by possessing such a device that circumvents copy protection.

I assume it's been covered here already, but until the ICT flag is used with native high-def content, you can output 1080i/p over component just fine (subject any of the player's build constraints), and send it across any receivers that support HD bandwidth over component. It's the DVD Forum is the one that supports the bass-ackward policy of disallowing upscaled SD content over analog if it has copy protection set.

If it's just an issue of your TV not having HDMI or DVI, then you can try an HD Fury which is making the CRT projector rounds.

 

[Domingo]

Here's some good news, hot off Engadget:

The PS3 engineers are adding 1080 deinterlacing and full DTS-HD MA to the machine via firmware at an unspecified point in the future. This is, like, wow. With this kind of suppport the PS3 becomes easily the best bang-for-buck purchase for your HD setup, if not in outright performance.

DTS-HD's really been my only gripe for Blu-Ray, so that would be nice. Right now I have everything set to PCM, so it just outputs normal DTS to PCM. It still sounds good, but it's not the same (obviously).

Now we just need in-game messaging

 

[Creepingdeath1977]

Here's some good news, hot off Engadget:

The PS3 engineers are adding 1080 deinterlacing and full DTS-HD MA to the machine via firmware at an unspecified point in the future. This is, like, wow. With this kind of suppport the PS3 becomes easily the best bang-for-buck purchase for your HD setup, if not in outright performance.

Yeah it will be firmware 2.30, available April 15th.
Same day the new store goes online

 

[Morpheus'rig]

Thanks wildfire your writeup was very informative, plus now I can look into the Fury!

Well you have a few challenges there. First, you're doing a digital-to-analog conversion, which at HD resolutions requires decent hardware that no receiver manufacturer is going to bother to pay to include until you get into the airy heights of dedicated processors (like the $5,000 Anthems).

Secondly, at high-definition scale, you're breaking the purpose of HDCP, which is that the fancy-schmancy high-def video never sees a non-encrypted analog signal, which is easily rippable by all those terrorist-supporting, child-eating pirates. Thus, the only box you get that would do such a thing would not be HDMI licensed. In the U.S., you're probably also a terrorist-supporting criminal by possessing such a device that circumvents copy protection.

I assume it's been covered here already, but until the ICT flag is used with native high-def content, you can output 1080i/p over component just fine (subject any of the player's build constraints), and send it across any receivers that support HD bandwidth over component. It's the DVD Forum is the one that supports the bass-ackward policy of disallowing upscaled SD content over analog if it has copy protection set.

If it's just an issue of your TV not having HDMI or DVI, then you can try an HD Fury which is making the CRT projector rounds.

 

[milkweg]

DTS-HD's really been my only gripe for Blu-Ray, so that would be nice. Right now I have everything set to PCM, so it just outputs normal DTS to PCM. It still sounds good, but it's not the same (obviously).

Now we just need in-game messaging

The only difference will be that the audio is uncompressed. Do you really think you will be able to tell the difference? I say no.

 

[movax]

You won't be able to tell the difference (probably) if you're an old fogey too Us young'ins might have a better shot at it, but its still really hard to test, people usually fail blind listening tests horribly IIRC.

 

[Domingo]

I bet anyone that has a set-up that can do it probably can tell you the difference. That's pretty much the key. 99.9% of the people can't take advantage of it and won't notice.
If you have a receiver that can do it and at least a 5.1 set-up, you could tell, too.
It' certainly not night/day - but there are movies that only have one option other than Dolby 5.1. Often times that will by the DTS-HD track. I'd bet money that you could tell the difference between Dolby 5.1 and DTS-HD. Between DTS-HD and PCM or Dolby-HD? Different story.

 

[milkweg]

You won't be able to tell the difference (probably) if you're an old fogey too Us young'ins might have a better shot at it, but its still really hard to test, people usually fail blind listening tests horribly IIRC.

Yep, I'm an old fogey and bought the Onkyo SR505 instead of the 605 for that reason. I don't need uncompressed audio, don't need HDMI upscaler on the receiver because I don't want to do video processing twice so just go direct to the LCD projector. Only benefit 605 would give me over the 505 is 15watts more power per channel and I don't need that either.

My 505 does DTS but not DTS-HD audio. Lots of movies have DTS and 5.1 dolby as option but you need BluRay or HD movies for uncompressed DTS audio.