Xbox 360: HDMI vs VGA

[Gavin]

I'm using HDMI rather than VGA, only because my Plasma handles VGA horribly and tears all over the place.... a fault of the TV not the 360 of course....

[SmokeMeAKipper]

I've been using VGA for nearly a year and have tried HDMI since recently purchasing an Elite. I felt the colours were more vibrant using HDMI (and the blacks looked darker) but there's the issue of overscan and resolution - I have a 1366x768 TV so with VGA I can output the 360 at 1360x768 whereas via HDMI I'm stuck with either 720p or 1080i.

In all honesty, I don't think there's much difference either way but I'm sticking with VGA primarily because I only have one HDMI input which is currently being used by my PS3.

At the end of the day it's down to which you think is better - beauty is in the eye of the beholder!

[EvilBoris]

That reminds me a fellow forumite upgraded to High Definition by having a sight test and finding out he needed glasses for distance.

[sj33]

If I had a TV that could do HDMI with no overscan, I'd probably use HDMI. Since I don't, I use VGA. That's all there is to it really o_O

All things being even, there shouldn't be any real difference between VGA and DVI/HDMI because both output an 8-bit RGB signal (ignoring the extra modes HDMI is capable of). The different is whether the signal is analogue or digital, and depending on the source/TV/cables/environment, one may or may not be better than the other.
VGA from my PC @ 1360x768 on my TV is better than anything I've ever seen... but DVI/HDMI would look as good (if my TV was capable of that resolution over HDMI).

Saying VGA is better than HDMI is a bit misleading, because that's talking about whether or not image processing is used or not, as opposed to the actual quality of the signals. It's true that VGA can be better because most TV's disable any kind of processing over VGA (because PC signals don't require it), but that's a different thing altogether.

[Red_Breast]

If I had a TV that could do HDMI with no overscan, I'd probably use HDMI. Since I don't, I use VGA. That's all there is to it really o_O

All things being even, there shouldn't be any real difference between VGA and DVI/HDMI because both output an 8-bit RGB signal (ignoring the extra modes HDMI is capable of). The different is whether the signal is analogue or digital, and depending on the source/TV/cables/environment, one may or may not be better than the other.
VGA from my PC @ 1360x768 on my TV is better than anything I've ever seen... but DVI/HDMI would look as good (if my TV was capable of that resolution over HDMI).

Saying VGA is better than HDMI is a bit misleading, because that's talking about whether or not image processing is used or not, as opposed to the actual quality of the signals. It's true that VGA can be better because most TV's disable any kind of processing over VGA (because PC signals don't require it), but that's a different thing altogether.

So I was just reading what HDMI is capable of. RGB and Colour space component. It sounds like you're saying the 360 outputs RGB through HDMI. Is this fact?

[sj33]

So I was just reading what HDMI is capable of. RGB and Colour space component. It sounds like you're saying the 360 outputs RGB through HDMI. Is this fact?

I'm pretty sure games render in 8-bit RGB. HD-DVD movies are encoded in YCpPr, but I've no idea if it actually ouputs at YCpCr or RGB. Both should be preceptionally transparent though anyway.

HDMI 1.3 supports up to 48-bit xxYCC and 24-bit sRGB, but I'm not aware of anything that actually uses that colour depth. The PS3's HDMI is capable of it though. 360 only has HDMI 1.2a.
The PS3 in default settings will output 8-bit RGB for games and YCpCr for Blu-Ray (their native colour modes).

[MattyD]

This thread has piqued my interest in VGA since I don't have a HDMI model 360. I have a couple of n00bish questions to add:

1) Overscan - what is it and how can I spot it? I understand it's something to do with HD tellies having a slightly different native resolution than exactly 720p / 1080i?

2) How do official and non-official VGA cables compare?

3) Where's a good place to get one?

[sj33]

It's not really to do with the non-native resolution. Basically, most TV's will actually loose a small amount of the sides/top/bottom of the image when using TV connections like Component or HDMI. This is actually a throwback from the CRT days, but for some reason is still the norm on HDTV's. It's really noticable on Perfect Dark Zero, where the HUD is cut off on most tellys.
Some TV's have an option to get rid of this, the majority do not.
Most 1080p TV's have an option called 'Full Scan' or 'Exact Scan'... which is just a marketing term for saying this TV shows the full image - the cheeky buggers!

VGA connections tend to be free of overscan, because they're intended for PC signals which output at full resolution. It's also why hooking up a PC to a TV via HDMI will result in overscan unless the TV is capable of disabling overscan.

[TheBlackLodge]

Oooo, weird, I asked pretty a similar/related question about this last week......

And thanks to EvilBoris I switched from HDMI to VGA with pretty much the same results as yourself MarioMark. (and also had the same reaction to Halo 3 oddly..........)

[paul]

This seems like an appropriate place for me to say that I recently acquired the 360 VGA cable and hooked it up to what I thought was a pretty crap LCD TV.
I take it all back. I've been agog ever since, as the results through this connection tells me there's some life in this glorified monitor yet! In summary, VGA's been spectacularly great for me. Then again, I could only compare it to the out the box 360 compo****e connection.

[mr_sockochris]

My TV, which has a native res of 720p loses about 2 inches of the right side of the screen through VGA. No idea why this happens it's fine with everything else which is just typical as my 360 easily sees the most usage on it. I got a new HDMI mode the other day and am tempted to switch over, does the PS3 have any kind of VGA support?

[Finsbury Girl]

I've only ever used 1080p via vga & it consistently blows my mind how good the picture is....really really stunning.

[EvilBoris]

Overscan - what is it and how can I spot it?

Have a look at this test pattern here

http://www.evilboris.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/11/1280x720_overscan.gif

That is a 1280*720 resolution image (720p) the output resolution of most games this generation.

Basically if your TV is overscanning it is stretching the image it is fed beyond the borders of the TV (so you can't see it) So whilst you have got 1280x720 worth of pixels to see you are actually losing some of that resolution so the overscan.

http://www.evilboris.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/11/overscan-copy.jpg

Here is a little diagram I just whipped together to try and explain a bit better. You can actually see how the upscaling of the lower resolution is causing the image to become blurrier.
View the test pattern on your 360 if you want to see how much resolution you are losing.

[Soi]

That reminds me a fellow forumite upgraded to High Definition by having a sight test and finding out he needed glasses for distance.

HiDef eyes FTW.

[Freddo]

Just as an asside some modern hdtv's do still have a legitimate reason to overscan, just not LCDs or Plasmas, rear projector sets often have a small amount of optical overscan due to the difficulty of lining up the optical block precisely enough to perfectly fill the screen.