The “Break it Down” Blog

Some of you might not know this, but if you are looking into an HDTV and plan on gaming on it, you might want to do some research before deciding. Most of the newer HDTVs have native resolutions of 1080p. “Native resolution” meaning that is the only resolution the TV displays. Most all will infact take all the different signal formats (480i, 480p, 720p, 1080i, 1080p) but internally the TV’s processor will upscale or de-interlace the image (in the case of 1080i) into a 1080p signal before displaying it. This is all nice and dandy but in the case of gaming it can introduce a slight lag that can prove to be a real pain in the ass for fast-twitch games. Luckily long time AVS Forum user “AVBill” starts a HDTV gaming thread over at AVS. There has been a lot of good feedback from people on the 2005 Sony SXRD sets and 2006 Samsungs.

The worst case scenarios are when your TV is taking a really low signal (480i or 480p) and upscaling it all the way up to it’s internal 1080p display. Complaints of lag were very common back in early 2005 models and earlier. The solution both Sony and Samsung introduced was a “game mode” into their TVs. Most specifically the “game mode” does less imaging processing so less lag is introduced as the TV does less before displaying the image. Right now folks are saying the Samsung game mode is more intuitive, applies to all inputs and can be applied at all signal levels. Aparently the Sony ‘05 “game mode” is very selective and only applies to certain inputs (no DVI) and only applies at certain resolutions (480i, 480p). A slightly more detailed description of the Sony game mode as summarized by “Zechman” is below:

Direct Mode essentially turns on 10-bit color processing instead of 8-bit processing. This does shut down some of the DRC & Cinemotion stuff, but it’s faster (i.e. less lag), more color-accurate, and still does the 3:2 pulldown stuff.
(At least, this is what UMR told me when I asked him about it.)

Game Mode, well, I’m not 100% sure, but I think it has something to do with activating a fast deinterlacing algorithm (and I’d speculate weaving, since that would make the most sense for a game source)–but that’s just my speculation. It’s only available on 480i sources and it disappears if you select Direct Mode. In the end I think you’re better off with Direct Mode.

“AVBill” then came back with even more clarification after speaking with a Sony rep and technician:

SXRD 480i (GameMode on)
SXRD 480p, 720p, 1080i (GameMode and DirectMode both off)

Samsung HL-S 480i, 480p, 720p, 1080i, 1080p (Game Mode on)

In the new Mitsubishi thread for the XX731/732/831 models a few of the gamers I’ve seen comments from have said that there is no lag to speak of while gaming. Unfortunately the people reporting on this were using an XBox 360, which is going to be outputting a 720p or 1080i signal anyway, so there isn’t much scaling to do. I haven’t seen information on people setting their XBox 360s to 480i or 480p then seeing if they see lag on their new Mitsubishi sets.

The concensus so far seems to be that if you are running a next-gen console (XBox 360 or PS3) you don’t need to worry about game modes, direct modes or anything else. If you are running a last-gen console or the new Wii console (runs at 480p as native resolution) it’s hit or miss if you need the game mode/direct mode or not. I personally think there is also an issue here similar to RBE’s and RPTVs (rainbows on rear-projection-televisions). Some people will think they have lag and need a game/direct mode and other people won’t percieve a lag at all. It depends on what kind of gamer you are. I know that on my PC where lag is not an issue, I will sometimes dial up the graphics so high that I can introduce mouse-lag as the screen “lags” trying to update. If I tone down the graphics things get snappy again. I also know that I have played through entire FPS with some small margins of lag just in order to keep the super beautiful graphics and not need to turn them down at all (for example Far Cry on my old machine). So who knows, you may be playing 480i games on your new 60″ TV and have no idea what “lag” even means… in which case I salute you, you just made your life a hell of a lot easier.

If you are a super hard core twitch gamer, I am getting the impressions that going with one of the newer Samsungs (assuming you aren’t one of the folks that feels the Samsungs produce too much noise) may appease your inner gamer more. I’ll try and keep you all abreast of the gaming situation (especially once some people post some information on the Mitsubishi’s). (Digg this)