Help w/ Monitor Resolution using a 42" TV

[charlottend]

I'm waiting for a proper monitor and currently have my Mac Pro hooked up to a 42" 1080i Dell Plasma. Using the Display settings in System Preferences the maximum resolution I can select is 1280x1024. I was expecting to be able to use something closer to 1920x1080. Am I missing something? The computer automatically identified the TV as a Dell 4200HDTV which is correct.

Thanks for any insight.

 

[kahine]

I thought it took 1080p for computer video cards to display at 1920x1080 -

Used one on my Westinghouse 37 w3 and it was fine at 1920x1080 with my macbook pro and detected it automatically so I know thats how it should work

I know in Windows side on the nvidia control panel theres a setting to tell it progressive or interlace for TV's ,but not sure if theres another setting like that in OS X

But for some reason I have always seen anyone running 1920x1800 from the 32" Sharp to the Westy's and others are always 1080p

Not saying its not possible just thought it required 1080p on computers

 

[Dark Dragoon]

I've just taken a look at the specification, it looks like it's native resolution is 1024x768 assuming it's a Dell W4200 HD.

Here's a review of the screen, the second paragraph is the interesting bit.

 

[MacBoobsPro]

I have an LG 42" 1080i and I believe the native res is 1024x768. I can take it higher but then stuff becomes illegible and the screen gets cropped top and bottom.

 

[Karrde721]

Plasma TVs are not 1080i natively. They can support a 1080i input, but they will resample it to match the internal resolution (usually something close to 720p, so 1366x768 or 1280x720).

Also, 1920x1080 is 1080p, not 1080i. 1080p is 1920x1080@60Hz. 1080i on the other hand is actually 1920x540@60Hz (or 1920x1080 drawing every other line each cycle through, for an effective resolution of 1920x1080@30Hz)

In conclusion, what you probably want to set your output resolution to is 1280x720, since that will result in the least picture resampling (and therefore the highest quality output)

 

[MacBoobsPro]

Plasma TVs are not 1080i natively. They can support a 1080i input, but they will resample it to match the internal resolution (usually something close to 720p, so 1366x768 or 1280x720).

Also, 1920x1080 is 1080p, not 1080i. 1080p is 1920x1080@60Hz. 1080i on the other hand is actually 1920x540@60Hz (or 1920x1080 drawing every other line each cycle through, for an effective resolution of 1920x1080@30Hz)

In conclusion, what you probably want to set your output resolution to is 1280x720, since that will result in the least picture resampling (and therefore the highest quality output)

You seem clued up. And apologies to the OP on hijacking the thread somewhat but would setting my AppleTV to 720p provide a better result than at 1080i on my 1024x768 tv?

 

[charlottend]

Thanks for the info everyone. Good to know its working the way it was intended.

 

[nightfly13]

Since neither is the native resolution, you just need to try both. The question is which scales the video better - the Apple TV or the display. Only A/B testing will tell you the answer.

I have a 720p projector, yet my A2 HD-DVD player looked noticeably sharper when outputting 1080i (and the projector de-interlacing and scaling it down to 720p) than 720p, surprisingly.

On avsforum it was nearly unanimous that our displays did a better job with the scaling than the player.

 

[Karrde721]

You seem clued up. And apologies to the OP on hijacking the thread somewhat but would setting my AppleTV to 720p provide a better result than at 1080i on my 1024x768 tv?

It has been my experience that in almost all cases, a 720p output signal will look better on a 768p monitor (such as 1024x768 or 1280x768). This is because the TV does not have to do any de-interlacing of the 1080i signal, which can sometimes cause the image to jitter.