How will HDDVD or BluRay quality look on a 720p plasma? (1 Viewer)

[Joe Pick]

Hi. I have a 50" Panasonic plasma (TH-50PX75U with 1366x768 [720p] native resolution) and an upconverting DVD player from Oppo. If I get into the next generation of players, will the image quality look THAT much better than what my Oppo can do (using HDMI)?

I only ask because the focus seems to be so much on 1080p, and my plasma won't even do 1080i. How will it look? How about audio output? Can I use Toslink? My AVR doesn't have HDMI, but I'm hoping the audio sounds at least as good as what I'm used to now.

 

[Chris S]

Without HDMI audio is a slight improvement but imagine quality is the big reason to upgrade (if you're not planning on getting a new receiver). Now I'm not talking VHS to DVD type improvements. It's more analogous to LD to DVD. I'm running a 720p Mits projector and it's pretty apparent the upgrade in quality is there.

 

[Joseph DeMartino]

How much better do TV shows broadcast in 1080i look than your upconverted DVDs? 1080i is really two 540 line pictures, 540 odd lines in one field followed by 540 even lines in the next to make up one frame. So your set has to upconvert that data to 720p. A true 1080p source should still look even better than that at 720p, even though you are throwing away lines.

Regards,

Joe

(Who also has a 720p set and as yet no high-def player. )

 

[Jeff Gatie]

Audio will be the same or a slight improvement on what you have now. DD/DTS will be the same, but DD TrueHD and DD+ will be mixed to 1.5mbs DTS on the HD DVD players, which is a higher bitrate than normal.

Picture quality will be an improvement, even coming from an upconvert. Some transfers will be better than others, but all should yield a better, sharper, more detailed picture. Try the 1080i output, though, even on a 72op set. Depending on the 720 display, sometimes the scaling of the 1080i to 720p is better in the TV than in the player, especially since the player is native 1080p and all it is doing is deinterlacing for 1080i. The less processing the better, say I.