Initial review of PS3 1.80 upgrade

JoeSp

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Oct 11, 2003
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First, I have been using my PS3 thru the componet with my Pioneer 630HD 58" RPTV. This set has two DVI inputs and I hooked up the PS3 to one of the DVI inputs. Setup was quick and I had no handshaking problems. Sync was immediate and worked without a hitch. This set can also accept a 720p signal and will upconvert that signal to 1080i (its native resolution)

First, I tuned on both the Full RGB mode and the White setting. This made an immediate improvement in colour redition. I did not try HDMI with these turned off so it could be a result of HDMI but in the past using the DVI input has not made any significant differance in the PQ at the native resolution of the input so I feel that the upgrade is providing the boost.

Second, I noticed that things ran considerably faster. Title screens really looked good and they ran by quickly -- much more so then before the upgrade. When looking at PS2 games with both the upscale set at full and the smoothing on the title I used was (Soul Reaver) which definately looked better. Its not HD quality but definately better quality then the usual 480 PQ.

Third , PQ while playing games is definately improved. If your set can do deep blacks then you will see more detail and your colours will be richer. Not significantly but noticable. The detail is what really pops out, being able to go to the deep black setting really improves the PS3's black and white reproduction which as everyone knows is where you get your detail in HD. This feature really makes the HD games pop. Just being able to see the textures as they were meant is a significant plus.This should of been available when the PS3 first came out.

All in all a very nice upgrade for playing games on the PS3. I will review the DVD upscaling and HD movie impressions in the BluRay section later.
 
Was the PS2 game you tested full screen or were there black bars on the side? As i have only seen PS2 games played on a PS3 via HDMI on my 42'' Philips
42PF9631D/37 I'm not sure if this is an issue with my rig or if the lines are due to an issue the PS3 has when rendering PS2 games on all widescreen tvs. I have forced the tv to 720p and 480p but still had bars just as on 1080i. I 100% agree there is an improvement in PQ with PS/PS2 Upscaler set to full screen. With Smoothing turned on it made the overall PQ "softer"on my set. I prefer a "sharper" look so I have left this setting off.
 
I've noticed my old PS1 games are much better after the update. Bust a Move 4, I think. :) Not nearly as many jaggies, and I can get 4:3 unstretched!

As for the streaming media... I'm still up in the air about how well that was implemented. I have unencrypted DVDs on my hard drive in video_ts folders (ie: VOB files). I can use VOB2MPG and create large 4GB mpeg2 files and share them with Windows Media Player 11. Most of them play on the PS3, but some don't. I've tried to convert to PS3 formatted videos using SUPER and PS3Video9, but the results are "Unsupported Video". I must be doing something wrong.

Streaming MP3's and JPG images works perfectly, tho. Those JPGs look real nice in HD! :)

-John
 

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