What’s the Difference Between DVD Upscaling and Blu-Ray?
With the arrival and popularity of high definition TV sets over the recent decade, there have been many developments made to players trying to fit and utilize the high resolution which HDTV offers. One of these developments was the ‘upscaling’ capabilities of the standard DVD player, which allowed the DVD player to perform much better with HDTV and produce a superior quality picture.
But now that Blu-ray players are on the scene, how efficient are these ‘upscaling’ DVD players? Some may get confused as to what to purchase and which device is best? What is the difference between the upscaling of standard DVD and Blu-ray?
The answer all comes down to resolution output.
The everyday, standard DVD player that you can find in most homes has an output video resolution at 480i(720×480), this is without upscaling of course. A progressive scan DVD player can produce an output video resolution of 480p (720×480).
Most HDTV have the capability to display video resolution up to 720p (1280×720) – 1080p (1920×1080). (Remember 1080p is the highest video resolution.) So you can clearly see that just using a standard DVD player you will not get the full benefit of your High Definition TV. What the upscaling DVD feature does is mathematically formats the pixel count of the output to the DVD signal to the pixel count on a High Definition TV. The resulting effects produces a superior picture display better suited to your HDTV.
But while the upscaling method does a very good job upscaling the pixel output of a DVD so that it corresponds to the pixel display resolution of the HDTV, it can not convert a standard DVD pictures into real High Definition pictures. What DVD upscaling mostly accomplishes is smoothing out the edges of the images, but it does not add extra details to them.
Some points to remember:
* 480i: 720 pixels per line which has 480 horizontal lines displayed alternately. In other words Interlaced Scanning where all the odd lines are displayed, then followed by all the even lines.
* 480p: 720 pixels per line which has 480 horizontal lines which uses Progressive Scanning each line displayed following another. Progressive scanning is the better because it produces a smoother video which has a clearer image, especially with fast-moving scenes.
* 720p: 1,280 pixels per line which has 720 horizontal lines – displayed through Progressive Scanning – each line displayed following another. (720 High Definition TV)
* 1080i: 1,920 pixels per line which has 1,080 horizontal lines – displayed alternately. Interlaced Scanning – all the odd lines are displayed, then followed by all the even lines. (1080i High Definition TV)
* 1080p: 1,920 pixels per line which has 1,080 horizontal lines – displayed progressively. Progressive Scanning – each line displayed following another. (1080p High Definition TV/ Blu-ray Disc)
In conclusion, you can only get high definition images through the use of a Blu-ray player and blu-ray disc. An upscaled DVD will look slightly blandish and balmy compared to a Blu-ray player. When dealing with colors such as reds and blues, the difference is very noticeable. DVD upscaling tend to eliminate details, while in a blu-ray player these details are very sharp and clear. DVD upscaling produces a very good similarity to the High Definition experience, but to truly get the best high definition experience you need to have a Blu-ray player (with a Blu-ray disc) connected to your HDTV via an HDMI cable.