PS3 Backwards Compitibility Question

[Special T]

PS1 / PS2 games look pretty bad when played on a PS3 on an HDTV. I was wondering if I purchased an SDTV & hooked my PS3 up via composite cables would it cause the PS1 / PS2 games to look as if they were being played on their original hardware i.e. PSone game being played on a PSone & PS2 game being played on PS2?

I searched around the internet and couldn't really find a definitive answer.

[Jorpho]

Doesn't your HDTV have composite inputs?

Also, in regards to an SDTV, are you talking about a CRT, or just a low-grade LCD?

[DankPanties]

Well you probably know that the reason the PS1 / PS2 games look like crap on your HDTV, is said HDTV's lack of a quality upscaler.  It would have been great if the PS3 upscaled those games internally instead but alas.

would it cause the PS1 / PS2 games to look as if they were being played on their original hardware

This almost infers that the PS3 raises the internal X and Y resolution of the PS1 / PS2 games' polygons (think ePSXe), is that true?  I never heard of that.

If you play those PS1 / PS2 games on a 4:3 SDTV, they will look the way they were supposed to, given the SDTV is a CRT model.  If it's an LCD, you'll probably run into the same crappy upscaler issue as your HDTV.

I mucked around last year and wasted a bunch of money on upscalers and component cables and crap for this same problem.  Finally I took Kaio's advice and just got a 4:3 CRT TV for my Xbox, PS2, and Gamecube gaming.  Everything has been peachy on that front since.

[LostTemplar]

I mucked around last year and wasted a bunch of money on upscalers and component cables and crap for this same problem.  Finally I took Kaio's advice and just got a 4:3 CRT TV for my Xbox, PS2, and Gamecube gaming.  Everything has been peachy on that front since.

I agree. It just looks so much better and is a lot less hassle. I kept my CRT from like 15 years ago just to play on all those retro and not so retro consoles.

[Nightcrawler]

I would have to say it's highly TV dependent. I know TVs handle 480i differently depending on how they de-interlace. Some TVs can't even display low resolution like PSX and earlier systems output. Also, your TV settings can have large effect as often there can be dozens on a good TV.

I just got a new Panasonic plasma recently and it actually looks better for PS2, PSX via PS2, SNES, and NES than my 27" CRT Sony Trinitron. There are a few tiny motion glitches I've been able to detect, but otherwise, the image is larger and clearer/sharper than my CRT. I see pixel detail at a level I was unable to see on my CRT (more blurred). All is played via 4:3 mode. I was all set to move all my old consoles into the other room with the CRT, but I was surprised to see they look better with the new TV.

[DankPanties]

You may run into some issues having black bars for hours on a plasma.

[SargeSmash]

Older, 240p material looks absolutely beautiful on my set.  480i is where things start to break.  480p looks fine as well, albeit with a little blurriness.  Unless, of course, the game has one of those stupid "flicker filters", which makes it look that much more blurry.  And a lot of Wii games, in particular, make use of that.  Super Smash Bros. Brawl is one that allows you to toggle it, and I noticed Kirby's Return to Dreamland didn't have one on at all, thankfully.  HAL is apparently rather forward-minded about these things. 

As regarding plasmas, they used to have burn-in problems, but I believe those issues have been rectified at this point.  It just depends on what model you've got now, and how new it is.

[Bregalad]

Unless, of course, the game has one of those stupid "flicker filters", which makes it look that much more blurry.

On CRT TVs, games looked terribly flickering without them.

[Starscream]

Surely there's a better option than composite available for connecting to the SDTV? Like S-Video or component - I'm not familiar with the latter (I'm using RGB scart connections).

BTW, I was recently  surprised about the quality of the TV-out of my new desktop PC. I'm still considering getting one of the so called "Mame-scart" cables for RGB output and proper 240p, but the new S-Video picture looked quite superior compared to my old desktop and my tests with a cheap VGA converter and notebooks.  It might be enough for me to play Saturn games on, since my console isn't in the best shape..

[Panzer88]

PS1 / PS2 games look pretty bad when played on a PS3 on an HDTV. I was wondering if I purchased an SDTV & hooked my PS3 up via composite cables would it cause the PS1 / PS2 games to look as if they were being played on their original hardware i.e. PSone game being played on a PSone & PS2 game being played on PS2?

I searched around the internet and couldn't really find a definitive answer.

the short answer: yes it will look better.

As stated above, the problem is that your SD games are being poorly scaled to HD, you either need to get a good scaler (which can be expensive) or simply play them at standard definition so that no scaling is necessary.

Doesn't your HDTV have composite inputs?

his problem isn't being able to plug composite into his HDTV, even if he did that his HDTV would still have to scale the SD to HD and he would have the same problem, actually worse because then it would also have composite video artifacts.

On CRT TVs, games looked terribly flickering without them.

it's not the CRT that causes the flickering, it's interlaced video, progressive video on a CRT does not require and flicker filters.

This almost infers that the PS3 raises the internal X and Y resolution of the PS1 / PS2 games' polygons (think ePSXe), is that true?  I never heard of that.

no, regular PS1 games are rendered in SD, it's only special redone games that are in HD, and they are sold as HD versions on the PSN.

I agree. It just looks so much better and is a lot less hassle. I kept my CRT from like 15 years ago just to play on all those retro and not so retro consoles.

CRTs don't suffer from scaling artifacts, they also have zero input lag or delayed response times. There are many advantages to CRT technology.

I just got a new Panasonic plasma recently and it actually looks better for PS2, PSX via PS2, SNES, and NES than my 27" CRT Sony Trinitron. There are a few tiny motion glitches I've been able to detect, but otherwise, the image is larger and clearer/sharper than my CRT. I see pixel detail at a level I was unable to see on my CRT (more blurred). All is played via 4:3 mode. I was all set to move all my old consoles into the other room with the CRT, but I was surprised to see they look better with the new TV.

Plasmas have better color accuracy and better black levels, Panasonic's are also known to be very good, and it probably has a good scaler inside. That is by far the exception though. If he already has an HDTV it's unlikely that he'll be able to get another one soon so the most affordable option would probably be to get some sort of SDTV.

You may run into some issues having black bars for hours on a plasma.

That's not really an issue anymore, plasma burn in was an issue back in the day but has been resolved for awhile now.

Surely there's a better option than composite available for connecting to the SDTV? Like S-Video or component - I'm not familiar with the latter (I'm using RGB scart connections).

yes to all of the above, although most only have composite and S-Video, a few have component but not as many. You could also get a component to VGA adapter and use a VGA CRT computer Monitor which would look really great.

[Special T]

Thanks for all the info. I wasn't really sure if it was the TV's fault or the PS3's fault for making PS1/PS2 games look awful. It sounds like it's the HDTV's fault so if I buy a CRT SDTV and hook my PS3 up to it with component cables then it look as good as if I was playing on a real PS1/PS2.

I prefer playing games on the PS3 because I don't have to worry about using memory cards and the save game data corrupting. I've had too many issues with that in the past.

[Panzer88]

yes, that should solve your problem.

[DankPanties]

You could also get a component to VGA adapter and use a VGA CRT computer Monitor which would look really great.

Provided the CRT monitor allows picture control (esp. color reduction) through the OSD, otherwise it can look not so hot.

So Panzer, do you know any really good external scaling units?  You know, something that can take a bunch of S-Video connections in, and spit out 720 or 1080 properly scaled for HDTVs (via HDMI or Component)?  I've tried a few but none of them were impressive at all unfortunately.

[Panzer88]

most of the good ones are pretty expensive because they're used more in a commercial/broadcast world.

buying something with a bunch of scalers in it would be prohibitively expensive. I've seen more cases where people pair a video switch, or 'video matrix' with a high end scaler.

that's provided you only need to use one at a time.

the shmups hardware subforum is a good place to ask questions about scalers.

the well known brands would be

micomsoft X-RGB
dvdo edge
dvdo iscan
hdfury
extron emotia
Burosch Con

a decent scaler will probably be between $100 and $200, the Micomsoft X-RGB line is more around $300

this guy is also a great resource on understanding scaling, display technology, video output technology, etc.

http://retrogaming.hazard-city.de/

http://scanlines.hazard-city.de/

the same guy that maintains that site is probably the most knowledgeable guy in that department on shmups. His name is fudoh

as far as a specific solution for you for S-Video, let me look that up and get back to you later, I'm building my whole setup around rgb, which is the native signal of most consoles, but I can try to find some info on an S-Video matrix + scaler for you.

[Nec5]

Am I correct to conclude that the only way we'll be playing these games with them looking as they intended will be via emulation (and all their fancy filters/features/scaling)?  So while buying an older tv might do the trick, the long term solution will be emulation? 

[Panzer88]

Am I correct to conclude that the only way we'll be playing these games with them looking as they intended will be via emulation (and all their fancy filters/features/scaling)?  So while buying an older tv might do the trick, the long term solution will be emulation?

as of yet there are no low level hardware emulators for PS1 or PS2, therefore the only way to play the games as they were originally is on the original system (a PS1 or PS2)

to get the best video quality you can use sony's official scph-1050 rgb cable on both PS1 and PS2, or their scph-10490 component cable. Emulators are not yet capable of playing them as they were intended. Even on older consoles where emulation is much better, I mostly just use the real systems, they are the real deal, no lag, and completely authentic. I have an original release Pong unit that's still working great, so we still have a lot of life left in all videogame systems.

alternatively you can open your console and catch the RGB and Sync signals directly off of the motherboard if you're handy with a soldering iron.

see this site for more details on that:

http://gamesx.com/wiki/doku.php?id=av:av_mods

[Nec5]

as of yet there are no low level hardware emulators for PS1 or PS2, therefore the only way to play the games as they were originally is on the original system (a PS1 or PS2)

What do you mean by low level?  I emulated some PS1 games and they were right on the money in terms of visuals.  Hell, the gamecube games I've emulated look great on the PC/monitor setup although the sound and speed are jittery like hell.

[tc]

Thanks for all the info. I wasn't really sure if it was the TV's fault or the PS3's fault for making PS1/PS2 games look awful. It sounds like it's the HDTV's fault so if I buy a CRT SDTV and hook my PS3 up to it with component cables then it look as good as if I was playing on a real PS1/PS2.

I prefer playing games on the PS3 because I don't have to worry about using memory cards and the save game data corrupting. I've had too many issues with that in the past.

If you were trying composite cables, it isn't the TVs fault. Composite damages video internally by the console. BEFORE it reaches the TV. And composite is 480i, PS3 doesn't get to use its HD upscaler with that cable. Only adding to the problem.

HDTVs also are much more sensitive to the quality of the original signal they receive. Sending a bad image to an HDTV, will get bad results. A lot of the flack HDTVs get from retro console users has roots in ignorant setups like using composite where avoidable. It's actually not near as common as believed for an HDTV model's screen panel itself to be so poor to where it would detriment gaming. Not that it doesn't happen. (timing critical games like Guitar Hero or some fighters might be affected first)

Using HDMI/component/etc helps by providing clearer source images. External scalers may offer even more. It'd night and day the kind of improvements higher end devices can make to certain consoles when configured correct.

[Panzer88]

What do you mean by low level?  I emulated some PS1 games and they were right on the money in terms of visuals.  Hell, the gamecube games I've emulated look great on the PC/monitor setup although the sound and speed are jittery like hell.

I mean that the emulator isn't doing exactly what the console does, it's loosely interpreting the software and translating it to an x86 PC architecture so that it can run on our everyday CPUs and GPUs.

They work great, but they're far from perfect, there are timing discrepancies, glitches, and changes to sound and visual effects.

In many cases an emulator can be used to make a game look better than it did originally, which is great, unfortunately it's not perfect, and can cause problems in a lot of cases.

Even in projects that are insanely dedicated to behaving exactly like the console, like bsnes, there are still timing discrepancies because you are running it on a PC architecture with a multitasking OS running in the background, and even in a dedicated project like that bugs still arrive from time to time.

The best solution is always going to be the real system. That's not to say that emulators aren't a great alternative, but the best solution is always the original.


EDIT:

If you were trying composite cables, it isn't the TVs fault. Composite damages video internally by the console. BEFORE it reaches the TV. And composite is 480i, PS3 doesn't get to use its HD upscaler with that cable. Only adding to the problem.

HDTVs also are much more sensitive to the quality of the original signal they receive. Sending a bad image to an HDTV, will get bad results. A lot of the flack HDTVs get from retro console users has roots in ignorant setups like using composite where avoidable. It's actually not near as common as believed for an HDTV model's screen panel itself to be so poor to where it would detriment gaming. Not that it doesn't happen.

Using HDMI/component/etc helps by providing clearer source images. External scalers may offer even more. It'd night and day the kind of improvements higher end devices can make to certain consoles when configured correct.

From the way he was describing things, it sounds like he is most likely hooked up through HDMI or Component, because he described switching to composite (presumably the only input he has on his SDTV)

while composite video does severely degrade the signal, I can assure you that's not the worst problem going on here. I work with a lot of systems with rgb, vga, and component, which are great source signals.

Even they look fairly poor when plugged directly into an HDTV. The reason for this is that HDTVs have cheap upscalers built into them. You have to upscale a standard definition signal to a high definition one for it to appear fullscreen on an HDTV.

there are often a lot of rounding errors, and pixel artifacts because of that, completely independent of composite video artifacts.

[Nec5]

The best solution is always going to be the real system. That's not to say that emulators aren't a great alternative, but the best solution is always the original.

Well, that's why I was thinking long term. I mean it will be tough 10-20 years from now finding the right equipment and maybe the inconvenience too. 

Of course, we won't be around because Quetzlcoatle is coming in December to eat us as he did the Mayans.