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[epsilon72]

Confirming what we already knew....


At least this'll put to rest all of the "HDMI adapter for current 360" speculation.

[TheIrishLad]

QUOTE(epsilon72 @ Mar 30 2007, 08:10 PM)

At least this'll put to rest all of the "HDMI adapter for current 360" speculation.

Seriously, that it was even brought up boggles my mind...

[ILLusions0fGrander]

QUOTE

Very few HDTVs will not accept 1080p over component

= Most HDTV's accept 1080p over component ?

was that misstated or just written to try and confuse people?

[kidkinetix]

QUOTE(ILLusions0fGrander @ Mar 31 2007, 04:10 AM)

= Most HDTV's accept 1080p over component ?

was that misstated or just written to try and confuse people?

hehe, i'm sure the word "not" was extra.

[HackMy360]

   Well we all new this a long long time ago. We all new hdmi wasn't possible on current 360's
cuz of the analog signal even though MS said it was possible and I think thats what is pissing a lot of people
off including me MS don't say hdmi is possible when you know it ain't. So i guess I bought a HD DVD for nothing and when the AACS is enforced I will have to buy another 360 damm well way to screw us MS

[Maverick0984]

QUOTE(HackMy360 @ Mar 30 2007, 10:49 PM)

   Well we all new this a long long time ago. We all new hdmi wasn't possible on current 360's
cuz of the analog signal even though MS said it was possible and I think thats what is pissing a lot of people
off including me MS don't say hdmi is possible when you know it ain't. So i guess I bought a HD DVD for nothing and when the AACS is enforced I will have to buy another 360 damm well way to screw us MS

Explain to me how you bought an HD DVD drive for nothing?  I'm pretty sure they would plug into the Elite boxes as well, if HDMI meant enough to you to buy a second 360.

[epsilon72]

QUOTE(llindeen @ Mar 30 2007, 10:03 PM)

Hmmmm... well I guess I'm stuck in a pickle then.  I care less about the hard drive, but I do like HDMI because of the fewer wires, and the 1080P.  But I get 1080p over component on my Sharp LC46D62U TV anyway.  Is 1080p going to be THAT much better over HDMI, versus component if your TV does 1080p over component?  I've not even played a game yet that looks any different to me at 720p vs 1080p.  I guess we'll have to see some screenshots of games built at 1080p to really know.  Right now its all upcoversion to 1080p.  I play gears of war at 720p and 1080p.  I cant see a difference at all.  Any ideas?

There may be a slight difference, depending on what tv you have, but probably not enough of an improvement to justify buying another 360 on that alone.

[lcprove]

QUOTE(llindeen @ Mar 30 2007, 11:03 PM)

Hmmmm... well I guess I'm stuck in a pickle then.  I care less about the hard drive, but I do like HDMI because of the fewer wires, and the 1080P.  But I get 1080p over component on my Sharp LC46D62U TV anyway.  Is 1080p going to be THAT much better over HDMI, versus component if your TV does 1080p over component?  I've not even played a game yet that looks any different to me at 720p vs 1080p.  I guess we'll have to see some screenshots of games built at 1080p to really know.  Right now its all upcoversion to 1080p.  I play gears of war at 720p and 1080p.  I cant see a difference at all.  Any ideas?

i can see a good bit of difference between playing games at 720p or 1080i (my tv only supports to 1080i) so i'd imagine difference between 720p and 1080p is even greater.  1080p component vs 1080p HDMI i'm not sure.  either way, 720p looks good enough to me, my tv just goes to 1080i so i use that (and it does look just a bit better, little less cartoony).

[The Zep Man]

DVI-D/HDMI: 10 = 10
YPbPr: 10 ~= 11

Off course, an uncompressed (or lossless compressed) digital connection is better compared to an analogue connection. I can even point the differences to you on a 1366x768 27" LCD with a VGA port and a HDMI port and a PC connected using the native resolution of the LCD (over both VGA and DVI-D/HDMI, off course).

QUOTE

1: DVDCCA, AACS consortium & ICT (& 360 VGA wonkiness)

DRM does not seem like an advantage to me.

QUOTE

2: Very few HDTVs will not accept 1080p over component, and most will not take it over VGA.

Just make sure that if your TV has a native resolution of 1920x1080 (and can use that with progressive), that it also supports 1080p over the different inputs. When I would buy such a TV, I would at least do my research.

QUOTE

3: HDMI 1.3 provides audio options that optical or coaxial audio do not.

He means DRM. Not an advantage.

QUOTE

4: HDMI can carry higher quality video.

Compared to what? If he talks about analogue, he is correct.

QUOTE

5: HDMI is a wonderful cabling solution. If you have 4 component video devices on a switch box (4:1), like I do, you have at least 20 cables on the back of that box.

Sure, if you have a 2000$ receiver with multiple HDMI inputs and at least one HDMI output (for your TV). Otherwise, you can just send the audio analogue, since it's probably impossible to hear the difference on the crappy speakers of most LCD TV's. Most people with a HiFi set will use the 'classic' optical cable.

[ashlar42]

QUOTE(llindeen @ Mar 31 2007, 07:03 AM)

Hmmmm... well I guess I'm stuck in a pickle then.  I care less about the hard drive, but I do like HDMI because of the fewer wires, and the 1080P.  But I get 1080p over component on my Sharp LC46D62U TV anyway.  Is 1080p going to be THAT much better over HDMI, versus component if your TV does 1080p over component?  I've not even played a game yet that looks any different to me at 720p vs 1080p.  I guess we'll have to see some screenshots of games built at 1080p to really know.  Right now its all upcoversion to 1080p.  I play gears of war at 720p and 1080p.  I cant see a difference at all.  Any ideas?

I wonder why Microsoft isn't making a far bigger deal about how 1080p is pretty much useless for screens not bigger than 50", when watched from the pretty much usual 8-10 feet. You have a 46", how far do you sit from it? Chances are your eyes won't even be able to tell the difference from 720p to 1080p *from your sitting distance*.

Everybody zooms in closer, eyes stuck to the TV and cry "Wow! Look at the marvelous definition!". Then they sit on the couch and their eyes are not bionic... go figure.  

PS
This is not an attack on you, mainly on the whole consumer electronic industry, for creating a need that really didn't need to be satisfied for the majority of consumers.

QUOTE(zoltari @ Mar 31 2007, 08:01 AM)

I hooked up my standard DVD player via component and HDMI, and I can easily tell the difference without having to check and my PS3 (hooked up via HDMI) most definitely looks a lot sharper and more vibrant than the 360 - although I haven’t seen the PS3 via component to be fair, and it is a different machine / graphics chipset.

This is totally anectodal evidence, you know? It could tell far more about your TV's connections quality than it could about the respective merits of analogue vs. digital.

[BasicAir]

I am a huge home theater nut, but at the same time I don't care about the HDMI improvements right now. When I get a 1080p tv, sure. Right now? I really don't care at all.

Here's my responses to each advantage listed:

1: DVDCCA, AACS consortium & ICT (& 360 VGA wonkiness)
2: Very few HDTVs will not accept 1080p over component, and most will not take it over VGA.
3: HDMI 1.3 provides audio options that optical or coaxial audio do not.
4: HDMI can carry higher quality video.
5: HDMI is a wonderful cabling solution. If you have 4 component video devices on a switch box (4:1), like I do, you have at least 20 cables on the back of that box.

1: Don't care.

2: Don't care. My TV is 720p native so until I get a 1080p tv I could care less. And I won't get a 1080p tv until more HDTV stations broadcast in 1080p and lots of 1080p games are released.

3: Don't care. My surround sound system cost well over $1,000. It may be 4 years old but it is still superb. It only supports 5.1 DD and 5.1 DTS so the top-notch audio tracks on my HD-DVD discs mean nothing to me. I would love to upgrade to a receiver and more speakers so that I can listen to the better quality tracks but honestly it's not worth more than $1,000 more to me.

4: True, but not by much. When you compare video quality of 24-karat gold plated component cables by Monster (which is what I have) to that offered by an HDMI cable, the video quality is extremely small and 100% unnoticeable unless you're determined to spot differences. In other words, even a home theater nut like me doesn't notice. Plus, my 720p native only has 1 HDMI jack and it's being used by my HD TiVo.

5: ROFL. Anyone who has '4 component video devices on a switch box' clearly needs to upgrade their tv and/or devices. Besides, this is a retarded 'reason' to go to HDMI.


AGAIN PEOPLE, I am a huge home theater nut. However, upgrading to HDMI is NOT worth the money in a new 360 **unless** you have a 1080p tv and/or a surround sound receiver that accepts/decodes the HD audio tracks on HD-DVDs.

I am a big fan of HDMI but for my 360 and for me it makes no sense. I don't have another HDMI port, I can't afford a 1080p tv right now, and I don't want to bother spending ~$1000 to upgrade by already awesome home theater.

[The Zep Man]

QUOTE(jhoff80 @ Mar 31 2007, 09:32 AM)

All this completely wrong information going around boggles my mind.

I've taken the points from this post that are completely wrong and quoted them here.
Because HDMI allows for a trusted path, means that if/when the image constraint token does get enabled on HD-DVD software, that an HDMI output will not be limited.  Meanwhile, those of you who are using the component outputs because "they don't have DRM" will be limited to a 960x540 output, effectively making your HD-DVD into a slightly better than DVD picture.  HDMI will not prevent you from anything you do already, but is more future proof.

I know perfectly well what the 'ICT flag' does. And it's a form of DRM, whether you dress it up with fancy words or not. But don't worry, it'll be cracked in no-time, once the 'flag' starts being enabled on different discs.

QUOTE

The second sentence I quoted is in reference to HDMI 1.3.  The new audio formats that HDMI 1.3 supports are Dolby TrueHD, DTS-HD, and LPCM passthrough.  If not using HDMI as an output, the 360 will convert these lossless formats to a lossy format- standard dolby digital.  In other words, you're basically getting slightly better than DVD quality sound, as opposed to the formats that exist on the disc.

Where in my story do I counter your words? Furthermore, you still do need a supported receiver. It ain't much use sending these signals digitally to an LCD TV, unless the TV has a HDMI output port for the sound.

QUOTE

Like I said, I'm completely shocked at the number of times I've had to point out how misinformed people are about the image constraint token.

Like I said before: where do I counter your words? It is a form of DRM.

QUOTE

It doesn't take anything away because of DRM, which people seem to think, but allows people to watch HD-DVD in full quality as opposed to a downrez which would happen to all analog outputs as soon as discs are released with the image constraint token enabled.

My point: it's a form of DRM. They manage digitally whether you have the right to watch the video on full resolution or not on your slightly older equipment (which just might not support HDCP).

[llindeen]

QUOTE(llindeen @ Mar 31 2007, 12:03 AM)

Hmmmm... well I guess I'm stuck in a pickle then.  I care less about the hard drive, but I do like HDMI because of the fewer wires, and the 1080P.  But I get 1080p over component on my Sharp LC46D62U TV anyway.  Is 1080p going to be THAT much better over HDMI, versus component if your TV does 1080p over component?  I've not even played a game yet that looks any different to me at 720p vs 1080p.  I guess we'll have to see some screenshots of games built at 1080p to really know.  Right now its all upcoversion to 1080p.  I play gears of war at 720p and 1080p.  I cant see a difference at all.  Any ideas?

I know I'm not an expert.     That's why I'm asking some of the home theatre folks and people who really pour over this stuff to tell me with my setup....  Should I look at getting the Elite? I dont care about watching movies, I already have my digital cable connected via hdmi and have one free spot left so I can hook up a 360 elite if I want to.  But is it worth it for me.

1) Dont care about movies, will never buy an hd-dvd player, I dont watch regular movies now
2) Dont care about super high quality audio.
3) I got Sharp LC46D62U because it has a great picture, got good reviews, and did 1080p via componet.
4) I sit 10-13 feet away.  If I would have gotten a bigger TV.  I would be to close for optimum viewing on anything larger.... right?

If you guys could should some light I would be appreaciative... Bottom line.... Should I get the Elite?

[CrazyOldBernice]

I work for a videogame peripheral company and a few months back tested an HDMI adapter for the Xbox 360.  My TV does 1080p only through HDMI, so it was pretty sweet to see what it looks like through the 360 using Sonic.  I also noticed when I am using component cables I get a white bar, only visible when the screen is completely black, scrolling through my TV.  With the HDMI adapter, the bar was completely gone.  I am not sure why Microsoft says there will be no HDMI adapter, unless they are going to stop us from selling it.  I was asking one of our product developers if it was going to be released and he said it was.  Hopefully Microsoft won't stop us from doing so.

[jhoff80]

QUOTE(The Zep Man @ Mar 31 2007, 10:24 AM)

I know perfectly well what the 'ICT flag' does. And it's a form of DRM, whether you dress it up with fancy words or not. But don't worry, it'll be cracked in no-time, once the 'flag' starts being enabled on different discs.

Where in my story do I counter your words? Furthermore, you still do need a supported receiver. It ain't much use sending these signals digitally to an LCD TV, unless the TV has a HDMI output port for the sound.

Like I said before: where do I counter your words? It is a form of DRM.

My point: it's a form of DRM. They manage digitally whether you have the right to watch the video on full resolution or not on your slightly older equipment (which just might not support HDCP).

The big problem with what you're saying, is that this DRM that is so restrictive isn't on HDMI, its on Blu-ray and HD-DVD themselves.  HDMI is just a solution, a way of letting you watch it digitally.  If you're going to complain about things because of DRM, complain about Blu-ray and HD-DVD, not HDMI.

You're acting like HDMI/HDCP will prevent you from doing things, when all its protection does is enable to see the DRM-covered Blu-ray and HD-DVD formats.  As the other article says, HDMI is a good thing, it prevents you from needing to worry if this other DRM already existing in the two high res formats is enabled.  The only thing that HDMI would prevent you  from doing is making a copy using a settop deck or something along those lines, but if you're going to be ripping HD-DVD/Bluray, thats done on the PC anyway, using an entirely different method, so HDMI doesn't prevent anything there either.