The "wow" factor..Will it happen again, even if muted? (1 Viewer)

[Andy_Bu]

Back in 1999, I purchased the wonderful (at its time) Toshiba TW56X81 rear projection 56" wide screen TV and also purchased a progressive scan DVD player to pair with it.

Even before any run time or calibration, there was a large "wow" factor for me when I plugged in The Matrix in how much better the picture was than I was used to.

Fast forward to today in which I have been watching 480p DVD's for 8+ years and 1080i satellite TV (via component) for about 3 years.

I am now ready to make an upgrade. This weekend I will be changing over from the Toshiba to a Sony Bravia SXRD KDS-60A3000 60" 1080p Rear Projection and also upgrading the progressive scan DVD player to a PS3.

When I plug in the Blu Ray Spiderman 3 disc that comes with the PS3, will I have anywhere close to the same sense of "wow", factoring in the new TV, 1080p with the fact that I have been watching 1080i sat TV for a couple of years?

 

[Jeff Gatie]

Not as much as the change from SD to HD content, but you will be wow'd. Just the fact that you can sit closer to the new TV and the quality of the source is much better than the compressed 1080i cable picture should be sufficient for the "wow". I know I was wow'd when I went from a 1080i 56" RP-CRT with SD DVD to a 65" 1080p DLP with HD DVD and Blu-ray.

 

[Stephen_J_H]

Depends on the source material. More recent films exhibit what has been described as a 3D "pop" in HD, while this is not as common in older films. Also, avoid titles like 28 Days Later on HD. Although they may benefit from reduced compression, I seriously doubt that even the hardened videophiles among us will notice, as this, Open Water, Bamboozled, Borat and other titles originated on DV are limited to 480i/p resolution.

 

[Steve Schaffer]

Unless your old Toshiba set has been meticulously tweaked and calibrated to the nines on a regular basis you'll see a big difference just with the new set.

I did a similar transition about a year ago--5 year old CRT rptv to SXRD Sony.
I already had HD DVD and BD players and the improvement was substantial even with those sources. Had the same wow factor as my first HD veiwing experience.

 

[Matt Hough]

I know this may seem ridiculous, but lately I have been stunned by some 480p transfers upconverted onto my 1080p TV.

Early last evening, I put in Fox's DR. DOLITTLE (the 1967 Rex Harrison musical), and I was flabbergasted by how detailed and razor-sharp it looked. (I was using the Toshiba HD-DVD as the player.) This is a transfer that's getting pretty long in the tooth, and yet it absolutely sparkled. I had a similar experience with GYPSY a few evenings ago.

Obviously there have been several Blu-rays and HD-DVDs that have knocked me over with their dimensionality, but I have been SO delighted that I'm going to be getting so much extra pleasure still from my standard DVD collection using the new upconversion players paired with a 1080p TV.

Even if the transition to HDM is slow, there are years of viewing pleasure to be had with collections we already possess.

 

[bigluigi]

Not ridiculous at all. I've had the same experience viewing SD DVD upconverted to 1080i via my A2 and viewed on my Toshiba 1080p HDTV. My wife normally doesn't really care about technical details but normally can tell when she's watching a HD picture. But she got fooled by the Desperate housewifes SD DVD discs we've been watching and remarked, 'what a beautiful HD picture."