RedAssedApe
Banned
Myself and others have been voicing our concerns about a video playback bug in the new Xbox 360 dashboard. In effect the 360 appears to be setting incorrect black levels for all video playback (i.e. all video apps, Windows Media Center, Dashboard videos, etc.) which is resulting in washed out colors and blacks appearing as gray. This is in contrast to the old NXE dash which did not exhibit these color inaccuracies. Quoting a poster at AVSforum:
Beta/Preview Feedback Bug Report (LINK IS DEAD...DELETED BY MS...Sigh)
Xbox.com Support Forum Thread Discussing the Issue
I know I've posted this a few times in the threads related to the new dashboard but I figured a separate thread might help better get the word out and get more people involved in verifying and reporting the issues discussed to Microsoft and the XBox team. Thanks for reading.
UPDATE From Digital Foundry: (Yay someone read my e-mail!)
UPDATE 2: Digital Foundry has posted their article.
UPDATE 3: The dashboard preview/beta is officially over with no resolution or official comment about this issue from Microsoft. The preview feedback made by testers is no longer viewable. Digital Foundry is supposedly working on another article that more fully details the issues with video playback on the dashboard compared to the NXE. I'm crossing my fingers that more media outlets will pick this up after the second article is posted. Eurogamer follow-up article posted.
UPDATE 4: Microsoft acknowledges issue via @majornelson tweet
Previously, Standard reference level corresponded to 16-235 black/white levels. On the new dashboard, none of the reference levels play video back at 16-235, meaning no matter how you calibrate your display, there will be a discrepancy between video content and the dashboard/games. Intermediate and Extended both clip black ABOVE digital 16 now, which makes them unusable.
Beta/Preview Feedback Bug Report (LINK IS DEAD...DELETED BY MS...Sigh)
Xbox.com Support Forum Thread Discussing the Issue
I know I've posted this a few times in the threads related to the new dashboard but I figured a separate thread might help better get the word out and get more people involved in verifying and reporting the issues discussed to Microsoft and the XBox team. Thanks for reading.
UPDATE From Digital Foundry: (Yay someone read my e-mail!)
Hi,
Thanks for the message.
I am actually looking into this now.
I put the Skyrim timelapse we produced onto a USB drive and grabbed it via the 360, and then extracted the same frame from the original file. I put these files into Photoshop and used Levels to bring up a histogram for both images (attached).
As you can see, the entire colour range has been compressed. Blacks are indeed no longer black and the darkest colour does seem to be around RGB level 235, which would suggest limited range RGB being implemented. However, there is still information in the 0-16 range, which we should not be seeing.
We get different colour shifts depending on whether limited, intermediate or expanded levels are set. The same file played on PS3 looks nothing like any of them!
Ill post something about it when Ive done a more thorough analysis, but yes, its clearly borked.
UPDATE 2: Digital Foundry has posted their article.
UPDATE 3: The dashboard preview/beta is officially over with no resolution or official comment about this issue from Microsoft. The preview feedback made by testers is no longer viewable. Digital Foundry is supposedly working on another article that more fully details the issues with video playback on the dashboard compared to the NXE. I'm crossing my fingers that more media outlets will pick this up after the second article is posted. Eurogamer follow-up article posted.
UPDATE 4: Microsoft acknowledges issue via @majornelson tweet
Were aware of the colorspace issue w/ some Xbox video apps & are working on a fix. No ETA yet but we hope to have an update soon.