Reply With QuoteAre the consoles set to scale the content up to 1080p? If not, it might be that this TV has a worse scaler than your old one.
Hey, we just bought a new Panasonic 50" Plasma (TC-P50G25) and are having a weird issue I thought someone here might be able to help with.
The unit is hooked up to a Blu-ray player, an Xbox, and a PS3. All are connected via HDMI. The problem is this: Blu-ray content looks amazing, and games look fine, but standard definition movies and text looks fuzzy or jagged. Oh, also a Wii (via component cable) and that looks fuzzy.
The text on the Xbox dash is fuzzy. The text on the unit menus for the Blu-ray player looks fuzzy. The text on the PS3 looks fuzzy. A first I thought it was because we're sitting too close to the tv, but all the menus generated by the tv look crisp and fine.
All of the game console dashboards look worse than they did on the LCD we replaced.
I tried The Abyss (SD) and it looked fuzzy. I tried The Road Warrior (Blu-ray) and The Road Warrior (the older movie) looked terrific. It really feelslike there's a split between HD and SD content happening.
Each input has its own discrete settings and I've fiddled with them all. I'm preparing myself to pack it up and send it back and thought I'd check in here in case Qt3 has some insights.
advTHANKSance
metta
Are the consoles set to scale the content up to 1080p? If not, it might be that this TV has a worse scaler than your old one.
Definitely sounds like a scaler issue, and your consoles are probably set to 720p rather than 1080p for their main interfaces. You didn't mention the most important facts -- what's the native resolution of the new plasma and the old LCD?
Sounds like the difference between matching native rez and not. Better make sure everything's set for 1080p. Try playing a DVD on the PS3 once it's set for 1080p (assuming an HDMI connection) and see if it upscales better to your eye.
Okay, so after a day or so of testing here's what we've learned:
PS3: The PS3 dashboard looks great; sharp and crisp with bright colours. A+
(The PS3 is set to 1080p in it's internal settings.)
Xbox: The Xbox dash doesn't look great; the text isn't sharp except...when streaming an HD show via Netflix. When we do that the user-came-online graphic pops on sharper than when someone comes on and we're just staring at the dash. So, clearly there's an issue with the way the TV is reading the signal from the Xbox. Maybe the Xbox is only pretending to output 1080p? (The Xbox is set to 1080p in it's internal settings but it doesn't seem to make much difference. I even tried setting it to 720 to see if it would get upscaled (it didn't) and to all the other settings to see if there was any difference between them (not much, except 480 which really looked like arse). Games look fine.
Wii: the Wii dash looks like arse; the games are fine.
Blu-ray: Blu-ray discs look jaw dropping; this is the most cinematic experience I've had outside of a cinema. AAA+++
SD DVD: Not that great; text is fuzzy like the Xbox, and depending on how well the movie was mastered the image can be soft.
So, I'm sort of at a loss but - with the exception of the Xbox issue (which is weird) - I'm starting to chalk it up to SD content on a really big HDTV that we only sit 6 feet away from (even though that is considered fine for a 50" set). Thanks for your counsel so far; does anyone have any further advice?
(The tv is this one it's rez is 1920x1080.)
Six feet is actually considered at the close end for that size TV. The general rule is 1.5 to 3 times the size of the TV in distance. So six feet is actually a bit below the 1.5 margin (50 inches x 1.5 = 75 inches = 6.25 feet). And that's the newer "rule" for how far away you should be, the old rule was even farther. Depends on the person, though, obviously.Originally Posted by metta
1. Was your LCD much smaller than the plasma? Because, yes, it will look sharper.
2. The 360 does not actually generate 1080p video for the most part, no; it's 720p that's scaled internally to 1080p, I think.
3. SD video does, in fact, look awful if you are looking at it carefully. 50" at 6 feet on a good display qualifies as carefully.
Yeah, the old tv was a 32" LCD so I expect some of that. On the other hand, there are no viewing angle issues with the new one. Just a few feet off centre was a diminished experience with the LCD. Plus, you know, truer blacks and contrast. We have zero issues with HD content; it is jaw-dropping.
It makes sense to me that the Xbox isn't actually putting out a true 1080p signal, even though it claims to be, because the PS3 looks amazing. And, now that you point that out, I realise something else: with the old tv, whenever we'd turn on the Xbox, there'd be a pop up message in the top right corner of the screen telling us the display setting. I've not seen that pop up once since we switched to the new tv.
Thanks all, for your counsel.
Are you playing SD DVDs through the PS3, Xbox or Blu-ray player? The PS3 was known, at least a couple of years ago, to have had a pretty good SD scaler compared to most stand alone players. Since all three can play SD movies you might try playing an SD DVD through all three and see if you can tell a difference.
Ahh, that's a good idea; I'll give it a shot. Thanks Enidigm.
If you're using the Wii on progressive try interlaced instead , I've got mine running on a low end 42" panasonic plasma and was surprised it looked fuzzy on 480p and fine on 480i .
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