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[Gamedude]

I've bought a Sanyo Z3 Projector recently but I didn't had the chance yet to test the difference between 480i and 480p on my 85" projected screen. If I could I wouldn't have made this thread. (I live in Europe, PAL XBOX & PAL GameCube doesn't support 480p.. I can buy a freeloader though but I'd like to know the difference first)

Since 480i and 480p are the same resolution I'm not expecting a dramastic difference like 720p.. if people have in-game shots where they compare 480i with 480p post them please, that would be great!

 

[Ponn]

It won't be dramatic like going to 720p or higher. It will look crisper and really depends on your source of video if it's a good thing or not.

 

[Jeff-DSA]

The difference isn't massive, but it's definitely noticeable. Once you get used to 480p though, going back to 480i is a real bummer if you ever have to.

 

[Raiden]

If you have to enable a 480p game by holding down triangle+X, how do you know 480p is enabled?

Also, in God of War do you activate 480p by menu or the holding down buttons thingie?

 

[Ghengis Cohen]

If you have to enable a 480p game by holding down triangle+X, how do you know 480p is enabled?

Also, in God of War do you activate 480p by menu or the holding down buttons thingie?

Menu. and there is a noticeable difference.

 

[Skullkid]

If you have to enable a 480p game by holding down triangle+X, how do you know 480p is enabled?

Also, in God of War do you activate 480p by menu or the holding down buttons thingie?

Usually there is a dialog box that tells you it's enabled (a lot of TVs also display the current screen setting). I think for GoW it's in the options menu.

It's a little annoying that you have to manually activate it every time for most PS2 games, though.

 

[Gamedude]

the question is.. is it worth it to buy a freeloader + NTSC cube games I still have to buy and boot up the freeloader everytime I want to play (only way to play 480p)

Keep in mind that I'm using my consoles on a projector so the difference between 480i and 480p can be affected by how big your tv/screen is diagonally.

 

[sammy]

it makes a great differenct on the Cube, mostly because cube games run at great framerates ----- 480i is completely useless at lower framerats, and it's candy at 60 fps.

The cube is usually my benchmark for my TV, since those damn expensive cables for it do something with the conversion through component.

Metroid Prime looks great at 60fps.

 

[sirris]

Totally noticable. Eveything is richer and cleaner.
Got to where I wouldn't even touch non-progressive titles for a while.

 

[Eggo]

I'm no videophile, but isn't the difference between 480i and 480p similar to the difference between VHS and DVD? If not, just ignore this post.

 

[Pachinko]

depending on the games original graphic quality it can make things look much nicer or far worse. Stuff with really nice texture work and perhaps mild antialiasing will look fantastic in 480P, games with shitty textures and no AA to speak off actually seem to look worse, the jaggies that were slightly noticable in 480i are now more then capable of slicing a limb off in 480p. For the most part xbox games look better as long as they arent' being upscaled, DOA volleyball for example becomes a pixelly mess thanks to upscaling.

So yes there can be a big difference, for better or worse. I'd say it's quite like comparing RCA jacks to Svideo or component. That kind of leap going from 480i to 480p, and that's IF you allready have something hooked up with component cables. Going from oldschool RCA jacks to component 480p would be like the darkest night compared to the brightest day.

 

[rod]

i tend to dissagree with the "not much difference" posts. i hate running games in 480i and i think the improvment in clarity and sharpness is a lot. of course its not like going from 480i to 720p but its still a big improvement imo

 

[Fatghost]

It really depends on the TV. On some TVs, 480i running though a quality input isn't far off from 480p. On other TVs, 480i looks like complete shit.

 

[Bebpo]

It really depends on the TV. On some TVs, 480i running though a quality input isn't far off from 480p. On other TVs, 480i looks like complete shit.

Exactly. Component 480i on TV's like the top of the line Sony CRTs looks near identical to 480p due to the special filters of the TV. 480p looks slightly sharper but in most games its pretty hard to notice on a good TV.

 

[koam]

I find the difference isn't worth the price of the cable that you'll need.

 

[vatstep]

I've only tested out PS2 games, and there's definitely a difference, but it's not overwhelming in most cases. Of course, that's probably because it's a PS2. I'm sure the difference between 480i and 480p on, say, Xbox is a lot larger.

Though I must say, God of War looks absolutely stunning in 480p - the difference is huge. Only problem is that it's not anamorphic, it's just cropped in 16x9 mode.

 

[rod]

god...i think god of war looks horrible in 480p. i prefer playing it in i

 

[Thaedolus]

The difference between 480i and 480p on my Gamecube is pretty noticable...I love it. The Nintendo cables are very high-quality.

 

[DaCocoBrova]

Not a big difference. Color saturation is better and makes the picture look richer overall.

On the Gamecube, I get vertical lines in 480p. I've tested this on mulitple displays, from high end plasmas, to CRT Projectors. Same thing. I have 2 GCs aswell.

 

[Raiden]

god...i think god of war looks horrible in 480p. i prefer playing it in i

Oh crap...that sucks

 

[Nick Laslett]

God of War looks much better in 480p, you must turn off the soften mode first.

Visit this site for all your HDTV needs:

HDTV Arcade

The effect progressive scan will have depends a lot on how you currently play games.

You need to be using screen size greater 32" for real benefits to kick-in.

LCD screens, Plasma panels, DLP/LCD projector and good TV's will already de-interlace a 480i signal and turn it into 480p. How good they are at doing this depends on the quality of the de-interlacing solution.

A lot of people say that something like an DVDO iScan HD when fed a 480i signal can output a better 480p picture than the progressive scan mode of some games.

If you have only been using an S-video connection or god forbid just composite then the step up to 480p through component is huge.

For must console games 480p is effectively doubling the games resolution. 480i mode uses only 240 lines of resolution. (This is a simplification)

For fixed panel displays like Plasmas and LCD they only display in progressive.

Another thing to take into account is the native resolution of the display device. There is not much you can do to get a decent picture if the source signal needs to be upscaled, de-interlace, etc.

480p looks best on a 480 resolution display, the 1 to 1 pixel mapping gives a clear, brighter more vibrant picture. With HD already here having only a 480 resolution display seems a bit redundant.

You can get both your PAL GC and Xbox to output 480p very easily. With the GC you get Freeloader and buy US releases. With the Xbox you need to apply the softmod using Splinter Cell or Mech Assault and then run the Enigmah Video Selector app. To get the most out of 480p on the PS2 you need to be able to play US releases because most PAL PS2 games lose their 480p option, e.g. GT4, SCII, God of War, Burnout(s), Socom, etc.

The problem with a lot of GC software is it is only 4:3 only.

The HDTV site will cover all this sort of stuff.

Best looking 480p titles by platform:

GC
Star Wars: Rogue Leader II
F-Zero GX
Metroid Prime

Xbox
Splinter Cell 3 Chaos Theory
Ninja Gaiden
Far Cry Instincts

PS2
Primal
Burnout4
God of War

 

[DIrtyWeasel]

I'm FAR from being a TV expert, but for me it seems to depend on the TV. I have 3 new TVs in my home and they're all so different... A Sharp 27" standard tube tv (27F541), 30" lcd hdtv, and a 42" Akai (supposedly the same as Samsung) plasma hdtv.

On my LCD every videogame looks blurry, progressive scan or not. Out of the TVs in my home, i'd choose to play games on this the last.

On the standard 27", when I use the old yellow/red/white composite cables, colors looks bad and everything is blurry. I actually didn't notice until I tried the component cables on it. Compnent made everything look much sharper and colors were more vivid despite yje fact that it is still 480i. I have friends with standard TVs with component input and their sets don't seem to have a drastic a improvement with component like I have.

On the plasma, games played on composite cables don't look so bad at all, but games with 480p enabled look amazing. Mostly Gamecube games looks great, just as others have said. All of the good cube games have 480p.
but there are some games on ps2 that look better on the standard TV on with component 480i.

 

[DaCocoBrova]

When fixed pixel display sets receive content that is not their native resolution, they take it upon themselves to interpolate the image, adding pixels and what not. That's why PS2 looks shitty on high end sets.