HD Gaming Set Up

Tech Talk
#1

Hey there guys,

My current set up for playing SSF4 is on my PS3, through HDMI on a 50 inch Panasonic Plasma (Viera G10 model for those that know). This is a full 1080p HD TV but SSF4 on PS3 is always outputted at 720p ? which I believe is the intended resolution for this game, although the Xbox 360 upscales the game to 1080p. Should I then be concerned about lag when playing SSF4 on my PS3 if the TV?s native resolution is 1080p? I read somewhere that a HDTV will always output at its native resolution and it?s when it?s forced to scale the image to that resolution through processing where the lag is caused. When I play SSF4 on my PS3 an information box always pops up in the top left corner of the screen telling me it?s now outputting at 720p, and then when I quit the game back to the PS3?s XMB a new box tells me it?s now 1080p again. This is slightly confusing because I?m not sure if this means that when I see the 720p message the TV is telling me what the source (ie PS3) is outputting rather than what I?m actually seeing on the screen. If TV?s only output at their native resolutions then what?s the point of telling me what my input is producing?

I?ve recently stopped playing SSF4 altogether on my 32 inch 1080i LCD Samsung because the lag difference between that and my Panasonic was so apparent that I?d miss combos and punishes. Coupled with the apparent input lag of the PS3 over the 360 with this game it would appear that I was playing in another time zone (lol!).

For these reasons I?m considering getting a TE Stick and game for my 360 as I want to play this game competitively but now that my LCD Sammy?s not fit for this sort of game I need another tv to practice on ? yeah, you try telling my missus to stop hogging the Panny in the living room!

I know this has been a long post but is there anybody out there who could offer any clarity on the above or suggest an alternative to the Samsung for a bedroom practicing environment? I?m considering the 42 inch version of my Panasonic (TXP42G10) as I?m quite confident that for gaming this is a very good set, but I don?t know of much other options. Also what do you reckon about changing set ups from PS3 to the 360? I have the console already so all I?d need is the TE Stick and game.

Frank

P.S. I?m based in London so some models may be different or unavailable here.

#2

From what I read in the tech forums, there are not many “tvs” that have a small amount of input lag. I remember when I used to play on my friends big screen that he said had very low lag according to the specs, but I then tried the Evo monitor (Asus VH236H) and noticed a big difference. The Asus is known to have hardly any lag at all. You said you were looking for 42" screen, and no tv that big has suitable lag for a serious gamer. If you want to get serious, then you should get the Asus (this model is only 23"); it has gone down in price a lot. It may be small, but its your best bet for really good practicing.

#3

The problem is that it’s all depending on the TV. Some tvs will match the output of the source, but some will scale it to the max/native resolution. So really, the only solution is to find out for yourself by research. The easiest way to do it yourself would probably be by hooking a computer up to the monitor, setting it to 1280x720, and then doing some tests. I know Nvidia cards have an option where you can set the output so that it displays in its native resolution, so it should be an image in the middle surrounded by black borders. If you do that and the image is still taking up the full screen, then you have an upscaling TV. Now, this is all theoretical and I’ve never done it myself, and it could differ among TVs. But it’s worth a shot.

#4

Thanks for the display recommendation; I thought no-one was gonna bite.

In the Input Lag War thread on the avsforum there’s a link to a European site which tested my current Panasonic as having only 15ms of input lag whether in game mode or not. I believe this is roughly just under a frame which should be pretty good right?

Frank

#5

Interesting… anyone think it might be a smarter decision to get a Tv thats only capable of 720p?

This way there would never be any lag issues due to the forced up-scaling and what not.

#6

I haven’t looked at input lag tests for this year’s model of TV’s, but virtually every test that I’ve looked at in the past few years shows that 720p and 1080p have almost identical video processing times. At worst, 720p scaling was within 1 frame of a true 1080p source. Most TV’s have a hard time de-interlacing 480i and 1080i content, they don’t have a problem with 720p>1080p scaling since it’s an even resolution multiple. That being said, BluRay looks much better on a 1080p TV since that is it’s native resolution.

To muddy the waters even more, most 720p LCD’s and Plasmas do not have a true 720p (1280x720) resolution. For example, the Samsung LN32C350 is listed as a 720p set, yet it has a native resolution of 1366x768. So you’re still going to have scaling.