Upconverting to HDTVs

[Joey04]

I have noticed that upconverting DVD players are rather pricey. Yesterday I paid $299 + $25 tax for the SONY NS-975V for my 60 inch widescreen HDTV.

I was thinking, my video card has a DVI output. Can I upconvert on my P4 machine and output 1080i through my video card to the HDTV? Is there a way people with HDTVs do that?

Thanks,

Joey

[edDV]

I have noticed that upconverting DVD players are rather pricey. Yesterday I paid $299 + $25 tax for the SONY NS-975V for my 60 inch widescreen HDTV.

I was thinking, my video card has a DVI output. Can I upconvert on my P4 machine and output 1080i through my video card to the HDTV? Is there a way people with HDTVs do that?

Thanks,

Joey

sorry for the rant but

[rant]
First, the DVD disc is 720x480. The DVD player can output it 480i (native) or construct a true progressive output 480p (60frames/sec) from the interlace fields on the DVD. It can also play tricks like removing 3:2 pulldown artifacts when constructing the 480p image. Most HDTV's can display the 480p in two ways, it can actually adjust its scan to 720x480 (equiv to a computer monitor doing full screen zoom) or it can convert the 480i or 480p input into the native resolution of the TV set. Usually, the HDTV will "know" through design how to best display a DVD at the TV's native display resolution and offer you choices.

DVI connection of a DVD player to a EDTV/HDTV at 480p resolutions is more of a interconnection convenience than a measurable quality improvement technology (for short cables). In some cases a digital DVI connection will look better than component analog Y,Pb,Pr, but the HDTV has to be above average to see a dramatic advantage (e.g. high native display resolutions). Whether the 480p connection is DVI or Y,Pb,Pr, the HDTV will still offer the same internal scaling options.

Next comes the idea of a "upconverting" DVD player that will output in 1080i or 720p in addition to 480i and 480p. What you are buying here is an alternative set of 480p scaling/processing electronics to those already in your HDTV set. Could be better, could be worse but my money goes to the HDTV set designer to knows how best to display a DVD on that particular set.

Most HDTV sets have internal resolutions that differ from 1080i or 720p. Some sets are designed to be optimum at 720p (1280x720) and those are most likely to look good with an alternative processor. There are no (or very few) sets that are native 1080i (1920x1080). The 1080i input must be downconverted by the TV to its native resolution. So what you are doing is processing a 1080i image in the DVD player and then downconverting that processed image to the native display resolution in the HDTV. The results will be unpredictable and usually worse than using the 480p output of the DVD player.

[/rant]

now for your question

"I was thinking, my video card has a DVI output. Can I upconvert on my P4 machine and output 1080i through my video card to the HDTV? Is there a way people with HDTVs do that?"

Upconverting (upsizing) a DVD would be compute intensive and unlikely to yield good results for the same reasons as above.

However, formatting high resolution material that is on your computer for display on a HDTV may be desirable.

Hooking up a computer to a HDTV is much more difficult than you would think. Mileage varies but I have this recycled response that you can use if you wish.


Easiest way to hook up a computer to a HDTV?

Easy way, ATI AIW 9600 pro with HDTV componet analog adapter (Y, Pb,Pr) on one VGA and the computer monitor on the other. Nice to have both monitors for setup.

Hard way, Nvida or ATI card* hooked up VGA to HDTV VGA-HD (also sometimes possible if the HDTV has HD-DVI-I that accepts VGA directly, most times it won't). Then use Powerstrip software to create 1080i, 720p, 540p, or 480p inputs that the HDTV will accept. Wrong settings may damage the set.

*card needs to support at least 1920x1440 resolutions, 3D performance is irrelevant.