Anyway to compare PS3 Upscaling to Normal SD?

[CyberGhostface]

I've watched some regular DVDs on my PS3 and occasionally I've set the A/V settings to turn the upscaling feature off to see if the difference is is significant. That being said, the screen goes black for a couple of seconds before changing so it's hard to really compare. But from what I can see, the differences look minimal and it's hard to see any changes between the two.

Is there anyway to have the screen split half and half and compare it that way or anything similar? And is it possible that the problem is with my HDTV itself? I think I have the Sony WEGA KD-34XBR970 34-Inch FD Trinitron Digital HDTV.

I've sampled a number of DVDs on it, including the Lord of the Rings EE DVDs.

[nmycon]

the differences between a DVD and an upscaled DVD ARE minimal (in my experience anyway)

your PS3 is basically "filling in the blanks" that is left by the lack of high resolution video on the DVD, it's "guessing" how the video "should" look if it were in HD

thats putting it in simple terms, i'm sure this isn't a 100% accurate description.

You've probably read that some upscaled DVDs look as good as blu-rays and yadda yadda yadda... this is not true 99% of the time (a really poor blu-ray transfer may look similar to a DVD) and is spread around by people who are unwilling to invest in blu ray and are purposely trying to look for faults in the firmware

to summarize: there is no issue, not with the TV, not with the PS3, not with you. Upscaled DVDs barely look better than a regular DVD playing in 480i.

[McGarnigal]

when you switch back and forth it seems minimal, but if I use a regular dvd player I miss upconversion. I think ps3 480i is more forgiving than most stand alone sd dvd nonupconverting players as well.

[nmycon]

Originally Posted by McGarnigal

I think ps3 480i is more forgiving than most stand alone sd dvd nonupconverting players as well.

i kind of felt that way too

i've never used a regular DVD player since getting an HDTV, but just comparing my SDTV with DVD player and HDTV with PS3 playing DVDs in 480i (not upscaling) i think the PS3 looks better

but i still stand by what i said before... there is nothing "wrong" with you or your equipment if you are not seeing a difference

[richieb1971]

XBR is a CRT right? Therefore its not going to be really that important anyway. Plus your talking 34", which is still in the domain of the size of TV DVD's were designed for.

Scaling is the term used to force an image to fit the screen's native resolution/ratio. If the image is filling the screen then its because at some stage something somewhere is doing the scaling. If you don't have any scaling equipment the TV will render the image already scaled by the time you see it on your TV. If using the PS3, unscaled it would only take up a fraction of the screen with black borders all the way around.

The thing is with the XBR's is that they will render the image scaled to fill the screen at the correct ratio no matter what setting you put on the PS3. So its either a case of the PS3 doing the scaling, or your TV.

So likely -

If PS3 scaling is turned off your getting scaling done by the TV itself

If the PS3 scaling is turned on, the TV is accepting a 1080i/1080p upscaled signal.

Wether it looks better one way or the other depends on the scaling processors used in the PS3 and the TV itself. Which one is better? Likely you'll not be able to tell the difference.

The perfect test -

Whilst DVD is playing, press triangle. Press X on the setting that changes the screen settings. Then you'll be able to see the differences.

[CyberGhostface]

Originally Posted by richieb1971

XBR is a CRT right? Therefore its not going to be really that important anyway. Plus your talking 34", which is still in the domain of the size of TV DVD's were designed for.

Scaling is the term used to force an image to fit the screen's native resolution/ratio. If the image is filling the screen then its because at some stage something somewhere is doing the scaling. If you don't have any scaling equipment the TV will render the image already scaled by the time you see it on your TV. If using the PS3, unscaled it would only take up a fraction of the screen with black borders all the way around.

The thing is with the XBR's is that they will render the image scaled to fill the screen at the correct ratio no matter what setting you put on the PS3. So its either a case of the PS3 doing the scaling, or your TV.

So likely -

If PS3 scaling is turned off your getting scaling done by the TV itself

If the PS3 scaling is turned on, the TV is accepting a 1080i/1080p upscaled signal.

Wether it looks better one way or the other depends on the scaling processors used in the PS3 and the TV itself. Which one is better? Likely you'll not be able to tell the difference.

The perfect test -

Whilst DVD is playing, press triangle. Press X on the setting that changes the screen settings. Then you'll be able to see the differences.

This explains a lot. Thanks! (and thanks to everyone else in the thread too)