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Subject: NFG's new plasma TV and retro games
I finally caved and bought a new plasma TV. Fifty inches of astonishing clarity at a price I could justify, and wow, it makes digital TV (which I've enjoyed since moving to Australia 4 years ago) look amazing. The Xbox 360 looks astonishing as well, with HDMI at the TV's native resolution of 1033 x 720. It doesn't have 15kHz RGB/SCART inputs, but based on its handling of non-interlaced signals, I don't think I'm really missing it.
Put simply, this TV handles non-interlaced signals, but it makes them very ugly when upscaling for display. To illustrate this, I hooked up Vampire Savior using Capcom's CPS Changer. The problem seems to be in its application of de-interlacing to an already non-interlaced signal. It doesn't just double up the rows, it seems to try and apply some horizontal logic as well, which completely fails on a static screen.
Check out this Capcom logo. Top is an emulated screenshot, where I tripled the size and offset every third row by one pixel, and applied 0.6 gaussian blur. The bottom is a TV screenshot. Except for vertical lines (the P) it looks just about accurate.
![[Image: /grafx/games/plasma-Capcom-2.png]](/grafx/games/plasma-Capcom-2.png "/grafx/games/plasma-Capcom-2.png")
Check out the close-up view of the C:
![[Image: /grafx/games/plasma-Capcom.png]](/grafx/games/plasma-Capcom.png "/grafx/games/plasma-Capcom.png")
Finally, here's the Q-sound logo. The upscaling does a really good job of maintaining horizontal detail, but totally fails to preserve the vertical clarity.
![[Image: /grafx/games/plasma-Qsound.png]](/grafx/games/plasma-Qsound.png "/grafx/games/plasma-Qsound.png")
Interestingly the TV does a beautiful job with interlaced signals most of the time. Games like Internal Section (PS1) and Frequency (PS2) look gorgeous. Strangely it absolutely failed to make Mushihimesama look good. The best way I can describe it is 'revolting' but I think the PS2's internal upscaling was rubbish anyway, scaling the yoko image by ~50%.
To play older games, I've decided that the Xbox is the way to go. Unlike my last TV (A TEAC CRT) this Panasonic does a beautiful job with component video, and playing mednafen (SNES, MD, PCE) at 720p is just glorious. Yoshi's Island has pixels that are about 1cm square, but ultra-clear and I can choose the scaling mechanism of choice (I stick to plain old pixel scaling).
Note that sitting too close to a large TV while playing Yoshi's Island WILL make you motion sick in a very short time!
My ultimate goal is to hook up a media PC of some sort for emulation. DVI -> HDMI is cheap and easy, and unlike the xbox, 720p movies should be playable. Considering either an Acer Revo, or a proper PC in a small case... Given my experience with onboard soundchip lag (Hello Realtek!) I may stick to a real PC...
Your experiences and suggestions are welcomed. =)
Put simply, this TV handles non-interlaced signals, but it makes them very ugly when upscaling for display. To illustrate this, I hooked up Vampire Savior using Capcom's CPS Changer. The problem seems to be in its application of de-interlacing to an already non-interlaced signal. It doesn't just double up the rows, it seems to try and apply some horizontal logic as well, which completely fails on a static screen.
Check out this Capcom logo. Top is an emulated screenshot, where I tripled the size and offset every third row by one pixel, and applied 0.6 gaussian blur. The bottom is a TV screenshot. Except for vertical lines (the P) it looks just about accurate.
Check out the close-up view of the C:
Finally, here's the Q-sound logo. The upscaling does a really good job of maintaining horizontal detail, but totally fails to preserve the vertical clarity.
Interestingly the TV does a beautiful job with interlaced signals most of the time. Games like Internal Section (PS1) and Frequency (PS2) look gorgeous. Strangely it absolutely failed to make Mushihimesama look good. The best way I can describe it is 'revolting' but I think the PS2's internal upscaling was rubbish anyway, scaling the yoko image by ~50%.
To play older games, I've decided that the Xbox is the way to go. Unlike my last TV (A TEAC CRT) this Panasonic does a beautiful job with component video, and playing mednafen (SNES, MD, PCE) at 720p is just glorious. Yoshi's Island has pixels that are about 1cm square, but ultra-clear and I can choose the scaling mechanism of choice (I stick to plain old pixel scaling).
Note that sitting too close to a large TV while playing Yoshi's Island WILL make you motion sick in a very short time!
My ultimate goal is to hook up a media PC of some sort for emulation. DVI -> HDMI is cheap and easy, and unlike the xbox, 720p movies should be playable. Considering either an Acer Revo, or a proper PC in a small case... Given my experience with onboard soundchip lag (Hello Realtek!) I may stick to a real PC...
Your experiences and suggestions are welcomed. =)
![[Image: http://nfggames.com/system/arcade/special.php/b-d/bp-5/y-kof97/z-10/x-40C%20is%20too%20hot%20for%20humans./.png]](http://nfggames.com/system/arcade/special.php/b-d/bp-5/y-kof97/z-10/x-40C%20is%20too%20hot%20for%20humans./.png "http://nfggames.com/system/arcade/special.php/b-d/bp-5/y-kof97/z-10/x-40C%20is%20too%20hot%20for%20humans./.png")
