For other strugglers like myself whom are lttp concerning 4:4:4 image reproduction:
Low latency monitors, low latency controllers...
It's pretty well established amongst hardcore how low latency is important when choosing our HDTVs (the time it takes for an image signal that has reached your TV to be converted to glorious photons). Most TV's come with Gaming modes that cut out all the nonsense image-processing that adds lag to our gameplay experience. 2013 TV's (Sony Bravias taking a clear lead) have been great at pushing for very low latency.
Can't wait to update to a PS4 or Xbone for a refined visual experience? Especially looking forward to improved AA? Then you should pay attention to what is known as '4:4:4 Chroma'. Most PC Monitors (all?) support this creating a crisp image but most TV's do not! You might be surprised how crisp the graphics your old X360 or PS3 are actually producing only to be neutered by your HDTV! Only now in the last couple of years have this started to pick up support amongst TV manufacturers and I'm telling you it makes a BIG difference! Playing Uncharted 3 on a non-4:4:4 HDTV and it gets a lot of artifacts but on a HDTV that supports 4:4:4 it gets plenty sharper! A lot of that aliasing was actually artificial due to your TV compressing the image the console feeds it.
Like low-latency, 4:4:4 image reproduction is usually part of a TV's 'Game', 'Graphics' or 'PC' mode. Note that some TV's have it on their 'PC' mode but not their 'Game' mode for whatever reason. Just switch between the two and check if there's a difference.
Here's Wikipedia's explanation:
Examples:
tltr: Buying a new HDTV anytime soon? Make sure it has support for 4:4:4 image reproduction in addition to low-latency image output.
Low latency monitors, low latency controllers...
It's pretty well established amongst hardcore how low latency is important when choosing our HDTVs (the time it takes for an image signal that has reached your TV to be converted to glorious photons). Most TV's come with Gaming modes that cut out all the nonsense image-processing that adds lag to our gameplay experience. 2013 TV's (Sony Bravias taking a clear lead) have been great at pushing for very low latency.
Can't wait to update to a PS4 or Xbone for a refined visual experience? Especially looking forward to improved AA? Then you should pay attention to what is known as '4:4:4 Chroma'. Most PC Monitors (all?) support this creating a crisp image but most TV's do not! You might be surprised how crisp the graphics your old X360 or PS3 are actually producing only to be neutered by your HDTV! Only now in the last couple of years have this started to pick up support amongst TV manufacturers and I'm telling you it makes a BIG difference! Playing Uncharted 3 on a non-4:4:4 HDTV and it gets a lot of artifacts but on a HDTV that supports 4:4:4 it gets plenty sharper! A lot of that aliasing was actually artificial due to your TV compressing the image the console feeds it.
Like low-latency, 4:4:4 image reproduction is usually part of a TV's 'Game', 'Graphics' or 'PC' mode. Note that some TV's have it on their 'PC' mode but not their 'Game' mode for whatever reason. Just switch between the two and check if there's a difference.
Here's Wikipedia's explanation:
Chroma subsampling is the practice of encoding images by implementing less resolution for chroma information than for luma information, taking advantage of the human visual system's lower acuity for color differences than for luminance.[1]
It is used in many video encoding schemes — both analog and digital — and also in JPEG encoding.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chroma_subsamplingBecause of storage and transmission limitations, there is always a desire to reduce (or compress) the signal. Since the human visual system is much more sensitive to variations in brightness than color, a video system can be optimized by devoting more bandwidth to the luma component (usually denoted Y'), than to the color difference components Cb and Cr. In compressed images, for example, the 4:2:2 Y'CbCr scheme requires two-thirds the bandwidth of (4:4:4) R'G'B'. This reduction results in almost no visual difference as perceived by the viewer for photographs, although images produced digitally containing harsh lines and saturated colors will have significant artifacts.
Examples:
4:2:0
4:4:4
tltr: Buying a new HDTV anytime soon? Make sure it has support for 4:4:4 image reproduction in addition to low-latency image output.