casterofdreams wrote:Hello CRTGAMER,
First off I wanted to say that this is a great guide hands down for Video Inputs. I wanted to thank you for the guide. I learned a lot.
I wanted to give you some personal experience of mine regarding the Xbox 360 and video output. I don't know if this fits in this guide for sure or if it goes in a different guide. Even if this might be useless information on it's own it may spark interest to create another guide if one does not exist. In any event I recall that the Xbox 360 has 5 variants: the first model, the second with HDMI inclusion, the new S model, a second S model that has lower power requirement, and the E model that uses the second S model's motherboard.
The E model has done away with the very important A/V connector. I was very disappointed with this change. That means it can only be played via composite, through a 3.5 mm jack, or HDMI. Here is a picture:

The S model has this connector. I have both variants of the S model. These units can accept HDMI, the dual Component/Composite cable, and the VGA cables. This is the back of the S:

These are the Component/Composite cable and the VGA cables:



Note that these both have the TOSLINK (Optical) connector built right in for audio.
However on VGA cables, newer models do not have the Optical connector. They are also in black, not gray. I have this variant.
Now onto the personal experience: HDMI comes out through both an ACER 24" 1080p monitor and 32" LG 1080p TV the clearest. The Xbox automatically detected the HDMI cable and set it to 1080p by default. The issue is that while my TV had speakers built in my monitor does not. I would need to use that Optical port on the back of the S variant or run separate cables through the A/V connector port. Uses two separate cables at most.
The VGA cables were defaulted to 480i and 4:3 resolution. I had to adjust the settings. When I did adjust it to 1080p 16:9 it was not as clear compared to 1080p on the monitor. On the TV the resolution was spot on. Perhaps it is being affected by certain options on the TV/monitor I am not sure. I do not have the variant of the cables above. I have newer ones in black that did away with the Optical port but most importantly it added a protruding piece of plastic that blocked the HDMI port when connected via A/V port. These cables do have audio cables as well. Good combo for both TV and monitor users. Just use one cable.
The third way I connected the Xbox through was component with the combo cables above. Monitor is out in this test. On the TV went to 1080p. In the past I had a 720p/1080i Sony WEGA Projector TV that would not output 1080p when selected through the Xbox display menu. This LG TV I can. I've heard that certain TVs would not accept 1080p output through component.
Well I hope I've given some insight here. Granted it may not be organised but I hope this may be useful to you. If you have any questions or if you would like me to run specific tests with actual pictures please feel free to ask. And also thank you for your time in advance.