It took some research, but this is what I ended up doing.
I have a Sony 32" 4:3 CRT SDTV for all my old consoles (PS2 and below)
I bought a Sony 34" 16:9 CRT HDTV for my PS3. It displays 1080i for 1080p games with no lag, and it displays 720p games at 480p with no lag. (PS3 issue - Xbox360 can run all games at 1080i)
For the Sony CRT HDTV, the huge plus is no lag gaming - which I think is most important. There are a few minuses though:
the biggest size is 34"
720p games display at 480p. No lag, but the graphics take a hit. (PS3 only)
you can’t buy sony hd crts in retail anymore. The last model was the xbr970, and they are super-hard to find now - even online. I was lucky to find a decent one on craigslist when I realized this is what I needed. Buying used is risky, because you don’t know if they burned in the screen watching 4:3 content on it, or if they used it in vivid mode. (You might still be able to find Samsung 30" HD CRTs in stores though.)
they’re heavy! My 34" Sony weighs 200lbs.
As I mentioned above, Evo could buy Samsung 30" HD CRTs and that would be a no-lag widescreen solution for PS3/Xbox 360 tournaments. They’d also be perfect for Wii Smash Bros, because HD CRTs can natively display the wii’s 480p widescreen format.
I’m no expert, but HD CRT is still the fastest display for HD content available right now.
I’ve played on a DLP set and the input lag is noticablely terrible (Tekken 5DR at 1080i and CVS outputting at 480i) In comparison, the HD CRT played 1080i content w/o lag.
I don’t have direct experience with LCD or Plasma gaming, but I’ve read that the fastest LCD TV out right now (The Sharp LC-32GP1U) still takes 6ms for pixels to change colors. That lag is inherent to the LCD technology.
If there is slight lag playing 1080i games on HD CRT like you say, then it seems that input lag for next gen gaming is something just we can’t avoid. I still think HD CRT is the best no-lag solution, but I can only backup that claim so much.
For tournament gaming like Evo, the most realistic prediction is that we will play PS3/360/Wii games on basic 480i tube tvs for several more years. No widescreen, no nice graphics, but at least no lag.
The dork that I am, I have to take a stand on one thing: PS3/360/Wii games displaying at 480p (component cables required) will have absolutely NO input lag an HD CRT. It’s irrefutable.
If the same supports progressive scan, a good quality CRT PC monitor and a lagless VGA box will give you just about the best performance possible with HD. The vast majority can adjust scan resolution so that upscaling is not necessary. It will, however, give you a scanline’d image.
Sorry, but this is wrong and is a common misconception. CRTs do display the image very quickly, but the input lag associated with HDTVs is rarely a product of the actual process of displaying the image. It’s the image processing before display that causes the lag, and this can happen as easily with an HD CRT as it can with any other HDTV.
The delay will usually be less with a progressive image (480p, 720p, 1080p) than with an interlaced image (480i, etc), but depending on the amount of image processing and the speed of the image processing components, there may still be lag.
Any HDTV with a fast scaler and little (or very fast) image processing can have less lag than a more poorly-equipped HD CRT.
I should’ve assumed you’d say that. Read my post more carefully. “PS3/360/Wii”. PS2 is not in there.
Yes, 480i content will lag on an HD screen. I have a 32" SDTV for my PS2 and older consoles.
I wouldn’t play 480i PS2 games lagged on an HD screen if I were you.
He’s talking about PS2 480i games lagging on an HD CRT. Component cables won’t help him. I’m talking about playing PS3 games at 480p over component, which does not lag on an HD CRT. Check out www.fubarduck.com for good HDTV lag info.
Okay, it’s clear that my last post was too simple and I need to give some clarification.
An HD CRT can display 480p natively. The Wii, the PS3, and the 360 can output 480p with component cables (and HDMI). When the video signal (480p) and the native display (480p) of the CRT are the same, there is no lag. That’s it.
Everyone trying to chime in about 480i PS2 games I’m not talking about, or processing 480p signals into 1080p displays causing lag. Yes, it’s true. However, those situations are all outside of my statement.
No fucking shit. I brought up the PS2 because, at the moment, it is the most salient issue to me with regards to HD sets. And considering how many of the “current” games are featured on the PS2, I doubt I’m the only one in this situation.
I wouldn’t play them on an HD screen if I were me either.
RoboKrikit, from the last statement of your post, it looks like you are even less informed that I am!
HD CRTs are the best scalers! Here are all the resolution scenarios:
HD CRT displays both 1080i and 480p natively.
1080p signal: The CRT drops/ignores half the lines to display 1080i. No extra time used to process the image.
720p game: The CRT won’t display this, so it drops A BUNCH of lines to display at a mere 480p. No extra time spent processing the image.
480p: As mentioned before, this signal shoots straight though and displays natively on the HD CRT. No additional processing at all.
480i: The scaler must now add double the lines so it can display at 480p. HD CRTs reportedly does 480i-480p conversion faster than any other HDTV (Buy an sdtv for sdtv (480i) content - lag is not worth it!)
I would prefer to avoid any situations where image processing creates lag.
As you can see, HD CRTs are not poorly equipped at scaling.
You’re talking about scaling only; I’m talking about image processing. Many HDTVs do additional processing on their inputs to make the picture look “better”. Blanket statements like “all HD CRTs have no lag at 480p” (or any res) are flat out wrong. Some HD CRTs have no noticeable processing lag at their native resolutions (usually 480p/1080i), while others do. Each set needs to be judged individually.
In any case, games that are not outputting at 480p or 1080i may have issues even with good, non-laggy HD CRTs. The most flexible solution is a big ol’ widescreen computer monitor like my Sony GDM-FW900, via VGA or HDMI/component transcoders. What sucks about this option is picture size (fine for a desk, bad for a living room), and black bars (16:10’s not as wide as 16:9).
Fortunately for us we’ve got newer displays like the Sharp Aquos “gaming” HDTV that aim to induce as little lag as possible. Hopefully HDTV lag will be a thing of the past soon.
I have to agree with you in general that finding a no-lag HD solution is way more complicated compared to the old days where everything worked perfectly on one kind of TV.
It’s frustrating trying to discuss these issues when I admittedly don’t have “all” the knowledge on the subject (though I’ve done alot of research), and neither does anyone else.
I rebutted your point that “HD CRTs are poor scalers”. Now you’re saying, “Image processing features that ‘improve’ picture quality are too random to make any blanket statement about HD CRTs valid.” Well, it’s not that random.
I have my 3d combfilter turned off. Reverse 3-2 PullDown technology only activates for DVDs, and DRC - Digital Reality Creation only activates with 480i content. So AFAIK, I’ve got no features impeeding my game speed.
You’re right that all HDTVs have “image improving” features, but let’s set that aside. In the end, it’s all about the scaling. If you have to upscale in a way that creates lag, that sucks. Here’s some common losing scenarios:
You have a 1080p HDTV. It has to upscale 720p-only games (several PS3 games are like this). It also has to upscale 480p games (Wii) to display at 1080p.
You have a 720p HDTV (this is the next tv to disappear from retail). It still has to upscale 480p games (Wii)
Err, I’ve gone off-course on this thread. GL to all tourney organizers with next-gen consoles!
because majority of the ps2 games including all fighters output 480i and most crt hdtvs are 480p(minimum…otherwise you cant really call it hdtv). only way it will be 100% lag free is when you run your ps2 games on a STANDARD resolution crt tv.
because 480i=240 lines and 480p=480 lines so there are some scaling.
It’s a CRT vs LCD shootout. I linked section 3 because of “LCD Motion Artifacts” section towards the bottom. It shows how LCD pixels are a slower technology than CRT. There’s tons of other good info on that site, too.
It believe it is time, unless they’ve already began, to buy VGA boxes/converters for DC/PS2/ Do they sell vga cables for the PS3? I know that they have them for the XB360, but as of now, Evo doesn’t feature any games that would require XB360 consoles.
I’ve been looking around, and it really doesn’t look like stores will stop selling SDTV’s. From what it looks like, there’s alot of digital SDTV’s right now, this all just means that they’ll stop selling SDTV’s with analog-only tuners and that all HD broadcasts on these digital SDTV’s will be displayed in 480i.
I wonder what EVO staff does with TV’s, both before and after. At the 2007 event, nearly every single TV was the exact same model, so I would think the sponsor or someone else bought these in bulk. After EVO though, what do they do with them? Sell, or keep them for next year? If it’s the latter, then at the very least, we don’t have to worry about the biggest FG tournament.
Alright this may be a silly question, but would playing regular non-fighting games be just as bad? Like does it make any game lag so bad that its noticeable and not really playable? Or does this just matter to fighting games the most because of the competitive aspect?
