XBOX 360 HD-DVD player add-on

[Paulo Teixeira]

Dave Ferdinand,

When Sega released the Dreamcast with a capacity of around 1 gig, a lot of people were saying that 1 gig of storage is overkill and Nintendo thought 1.5 gigs of storage was enough and because of, some of the Game Cube games were sold as 2 to 3 disc packages.

At the moment there are only a few 1080p games and in 2 years their will be a whole lot of 1080 60p games and there is no way Sega, EA, Namco, Konami, Sony etc is going to fit 1080 60p games on 9 gig DVDs. These companies that I mentioned will make massive games. Resistance: Fall of Man is only 720p and its capacity may be as high as 22 gigs. This is a launch title with a capacity that is more 2 DVD9 discs. You can only imagine how future games will look like.

[Mike Curtis]

The stuff that takes up room on the discs is pre-rendered content. Even cutscenes are being done in the game engine more and more now.

Assuming the assets of a 720p game were perfectly optimal to take advantage of 720p worth of resolution, you could always just render those at 1080p or 1080i.

If you did increase the resolution of the maps, and increased the geometry density of the models to match the increase in resolution, that could make them bigger. Pre-recorded content would obviously grow in size as well.

But if you've got a well optimized game running at 720p, if you start rendering at 1080p or 1080i it would bog down the machine (assuming you were running close ot max fps to begin with). So you'd want even lower res stuff perhaps to render larger outputs size.

There's very little viable argument that 1080p would need to take up more room than 1080i.

You mention 1080p 60fps - but that's not a broadcast standard, HDTVs aren't built to do that.

Anyway, all this makes me think just because you run at higher render rez doesn't mean the assets have to bloat equivalently.

-mike

[Paulo Teixeira]

Originally Posted by Mike Curtis

You mention 1080p 60fps - but that's not a broadcast standard, HDTVs aren't built to do that.

So are you telling me that Sony is lying when they say that their TVs can handle up to 60 frames per second in 1080p?
http://www.sonystyle.com/is-bin/INTE...pixels&nonav=1
And if I’m not mistaken, I think Pioneer’s top Plasma TVs can do 1080 60p as well.

[Mike Curtis]

OK, that's two.

But just two.

But it isn't a broadcast standard, it is another refresh rate/style supported by particular models.

[Paulo Teixeira]

Well most of the new Sony TVs will be 1080p and Sharp and others already have 1080 TVs so its safe to say that theirs plenty of different 1080p TVs to go around.

Why would it matter if its not a Broadcast standard since were talking videogames?

[Mike Curtis]

only from the perspective that (at present) most HDTVs are built with the expectation of watching HDTV on them, and they are geared towards suiting the spec.

In any case, the main reason why I jumped into this was that 1080p/i games don't necessarily have to be that much bigger than 720p games...it is just a rendering issue primarily, possibly a texture and geometry issue...and nobody's doing 22GB of textures & geometry. The game code remains 99.9% the same either way.

[Peter Jefferson]

Originally Posted by Mike Curtis

Jeff -

I wonder if, and I have no hard data, Sony is paying for placement, or offering spiffs, or other sales enticements to the staff at the big box retailers? Certainly the possibility of higher profit (margin and gross) would be of interest to the big box retailers. Anybody have any hard data on any of this?

-mike

like apple, sony, panasonc and other companies now(these days) pay for shelf space in certain stores.. in the past it wasnt like this, but now, with the way the world looks at this technology, shelf placement is essential for product success..

[Andrew Kimery]

Originally Posted by Peter Jefferson

like apple, sony, panasonc and other companies now(these days) pay for shelf space in certain stores.. in the past it wasnt like this, but now, with the way the world looks at this technology, shelf placement is essential for product success..

AFAIK pretty much any product that's prominently displayed has paid to be there. Even the prime spots for soda and chips at the local gas station aren't free.

-A

[Dave Ferdinand]

Doom 3 can look pretty amazing, probably very close to what the 360/PS3 will do and it occupies 2.2GB on the hard disk. Half-Life 2 on its own (without Counter Strike, etc.) occuppies about the same space. Both this games look beautiful @ 1280x1024 or 1600x1200.

Also, have you taken a look at Gears of War? It looks amazing and I doubt the PS3 games will look much better.

I'm not saying games won't grow and need more capacity but 9 Gigs seems more than enough IMO. GT4 takes 2.5GB on DVD, will GT5 take 10x more?

[Jon Fairhurst]

Originally Posted by Paulo Teixeira

Well most of the new Sony TVs will be 1080p and Sharp and others already have 1080 TVs so its safe to say that theirs plenty of different 1080p TVs to go around.

Why would it matter if its not a Broadcast standard since were talking videogames?

My day job is at Sharp Labs of America. That disclosed, the following is my position, not a company statement...

The current crop of TVs in the US handle all 18 formats from ATSC. That includes 720p/60 and 1080i/60 (fields/sec). There are a number of sets with 1080p displays, but not all have 1080p inputs. That's because some of the older HDMI implementations only handled 1080i. (Before buying an 1080p set, check the manufacturer's spec to make sure the HDMI input accepts 1080p.)

Regarding scan rates, HDTVs aren't necessarily multi-scan monitors. You need to set your PC to a resolution and rate compatible with the TV. Again, it varies by manufacturer and model, but expect broadcast-like formats to be accepted and not much else.

Regarding TVs with a 1080p compatible analog input (as output by the Xbox 360 HD DVD sidecar), my guess is that's fairly rare. The CE industry has been expecting 1080p to come from the new crop of HD disc players, and we've expected them to require copy protection, limiting us to 1394 and HDMI - and for disc players, HDMI is the interface of choice. With the push from Hollywood to "close the analog hole", I'm really surprised that Microsoft went with YUV outputs for HD. HDMI is definitely the way forward.

BTW, some people have bashed 1080p TVs because there is little 1080p content available. Flat panel technology is progressive - you can't buy a 1080i LCD TV display. The "p" comes for free.

Here's the deal: 1080i will always get converted to progressive by the flat panel TV's signal processor. The question is: do you want to then scale it down to 768 lines, or leave it at 1080 lines? Unless you have a small screen or sit far away, I'd choose 1080.

And if the 1080i source is film-based (24fps) and has a proper 3:2 pull-down cadence, the better sets will detect the 3:2 pull-down and perform the interlace to progressive conversion perfectly. Voila! 1080p from a 1080i transmission.

So... get a 1080p set with good 3:2 pulldown detection, connect a 1080i source, watch a 24 Hz film and enjoy 1080p.

[Paulo Teixeira]

As I was searching for HD-DVD and Blu-Ray new, I came across an article that talks about a certain porn company backing Blu-Ray for now and HD-DVD later on. I wouldn’t normally post something like this but a lot of people had been saying that it was Sony’s refusal to allow porn to be on BETA that caused JVC’s VHS format to win the competition.

Vivid's Steve Hirsch On Adult HDTV
http://www.tvpredictions.com/hirsch111006.htm
If you think this article may offend you then don’t read it but I don’t mind Chris Hurd taking it off if it’s too much.

Here’s an interesting question in the article.

TVP: The former president of Playboy TV told me a few years ago that he was concerned that adult actresses might not look good in high-def. That the picture is too clear. Is that a concern?

[Paulo Teixeira]

I wonder if this guy has read one of my posts in this thread because having a title that reads “Nintendo: Same Old Mistakes?” is very suspicious. http://www.gamersmark.com/articles/234

But anyway, he has a good point about Nintendo not offering component cable right away for the Game Cube and I remember having to order one by phone. I admit that wanting the unit to be strictly a game system may not be such a bad idea since it keeps the system price much cheaper than the XBOX 360 and the PS3 but they should have at least allowed the Wii to support 1080 60i if 720 60p would have been too much.

Its no wonder Nintendo is putting a lot of emphases on the controller because they realize that it’s the only thing revolutionary about the Wii. This type of mentality is going to finally hurt their GameBoy DS because the Sony PSP is already catching up to the DS sales and Sony have said they will release a hard drive and a flash drive version of the PSP so that you’ll have enough room to fit a lot of the original PlayStation games that you can buy from the PS3’s web service. The hard drive PSP will also strongly compete against the Ipod. This is why Apple has no choice but to make a 4” or greater version with WiFi capabilities by February of 2007.

At least Microsoft was smart enough to make an HD-DVD add on because they knew a standalone XBOX360 will never stand a chance competing against the PS3 without it.

[Jon Fairhurst]

Personally, I think Nintendo will do reasonably well if they focus on games for young children. Sony and Microsoft can go head to head for the big bucks from young adults and their first person shooters, but a less expensive SD console with lots of safe kids' games still has a sizable niche.

[Stefan Hartmann]

Originally Posted by Jon Fairhurst

And if the 1080i source is film-based (24fps) and has a proper 3:2 pull-down cadence, the better sets will detect the 3:2 pull-down and perform the interlace to progressive conversion perfectly. Voila! 1080p from a 1080i transmission.

So... get a 1080p set with good 3:2 pulldown detection, connect a 1080i source, watch a 24 Hz film and enjoy 1080p.

Hi Jon,
many thanks for the technical description.

Can you please name a few TV sets that can do this reliable ?

Many thanks.

Regards, Stefan.

[Jon Fairhurst]

Originally Posted by Stefan Hartmann

Can you please name a few TV sets that can do this reliable ?

Well... I work for Sharp, so I can say that Sharp's 16x9 TVs have included 3:2 pull down detection for a few years now. I'm not sure about which competitors' models might include it, but I know that the feature isn't unique to Sharp.

Here's another point about the latest 1080p sets... They go for a bit more money, and need a bit more processing, so they tend to include the higher end signal processing chips. That means better I-to-P conversion, scaling and level processing. That's not to say that the brand-name 720p sets have poor signal processing chipsets - it's that the 1080p sets tend to be the cream of the crop.

The people who recommend 720p just don't get it. Even if there is little 720p content today, people keep their TVs for more than ten years on average. I expect that there will be a lot of 1080p discs available in the next five to ten years. The only situation where 1080p doesn't make sense is when you'll be sitting far away from a smaller screen - in that case you won't be able to see the added resolution, so you might as well save your money.