So I hooked up the ps3 to the CRT...

[RyaNtheSlayA]

and I asked myself, "why are we shelling out all this money for HD sets". Really besides the fact that everything was cut off into a wide aspect ration (gah!) everything looked fine, sure you couldnt see the wrinkles as clearly or the cracks on the ground as deep, but otherwise it was fine. Anyway Id like your opinions on this, it really makes me mad though that I shelled out 800 dollars for my HDTV and now im back saying whats the point...

[RCBH928]

I wanted HDTV
but when I plugged the 360 to the living room's hdtv i couldn't tell if i am in hdtv mode or sd.

makes me want to save those 100's of $ for something that looks , to be honest, slightly better, i dont see enough difference to go out ofyour way to buy hdtv

[baphomet_irl]

and I asked myself, "why are we shelling out all this money for HD sets". Really besides the fact that everything was cut off into a wide aspect ration (gah!) everything looked fine, sure you couldnt see the wrinkles as clearly or the cracks on the ground as deep, but otherwise it was fine. Anyway Id like your opinions on this, it really makes me mad though that I shelled out 800 dollars for my HDTV and now im back saying whats the point...

as someone coming from a long period of obsessing about gfx cards when I was a PC gamer, I can DEFINITELY see the difference, but a lot of less pernicity people really dont seem to see the big deal, and tbh I wish I could be like that :p - I would say however that the difference between say an RF connected console and a HDMI 1080p output is indeed massive... but when you're talking RGB (or component I spose also) I dont think the difference is that big - having said that I have to admit that when I play on my Wii nowadays I do find myself wishing it were a bit higher res :s - I dontr really get that with my DC cos the colours are so high contrast that they 'feel' really sharp - also my kind of 'arcade-in-a-box' attitude to my DC makes the lower res seem appropriate

[Spoiler Duck]

Improved picture quality and definition. That's the point. And that's all that matters. It's a tool for artists to create more intricate work and for me to enjoy it, so I take it without question.

[RemyC]

I have some friends that play their 360's and PS3's on lower end, fairly small CRTS. I can barely make out text, and alot of things seem smudged.
Then i have another buddy who had his 360 rigged up to some massive 50+ inch with 5.1 surround sound....their certainly was a difference. Everything was crisp, the colours jumped off the screen (not literally), character and environment detail was noticeable.
When compared to a mid-range CRT, I could understand how certain people wouldnt care for the extra graphical enhancement. If you do check out some big-budget games on a full blown system. You will certainly notice the improvement.

[Niode]

Increased definition is a must for next-gen consoles. Especially on games like Lost Odyssey and Dead Rising where it's almost impossible to make out some text without squinting. In fact Dead Rising was completely unplayable for me for a long time until I got a VGA cable for my 360.

[RyaNtheSlayA]

Increased definition is a must for next-gen consoles. Especially on games like Lost Odyssey and Dead Rising where it's almost impossible to make out some text without squinting. In fact Dead Rising was completely unplayable for me for a long time until I got a VGA cable for my 360.

...and thats the result of the switch to HD. Many games I cant make out the incredibly small text. I wish that all games were standard in both 4:3 and 16:9 but eh what am I gonna do about it. Also of all the games to fill the screen and work wonderful on a CRT, WipeOut HD!

[NebachadnezzaR]

Besides the obvious, that is, greater definition (and in most cases, a bigger screen), with some games it's hard to read the text (Mass Effect comes to mind), but I totally understand what you're saying. Now that I have an HDTV I just can't go back, but for two years I played my 360 in an SDTV and most games still looked and played awesome, that's why it took me so long to finally go HD (that and the price of a tv...).

[pixelbender]

I have a 42" HDTV plasma in one room for my xbox, my wii, and my 360 (and at one point my dreamcast). In the other room on a 20" CRT TV i have my saturn, dreamcast and did have my snes/nes. I think this is most appropriate.

However, I had a 30" HDTV CRT before and honestly I miss it. It couldn't do the job of the 42" to play with other people, but in a smaller me-only game room it had the best of all qualities.

Wish they made a slim crt 42" hdtv.

[elvis]

Improved picture quality and definition. That's the point. And that's all that matters. It's a tool for artists to create more intricate work and for me to enjoy it, so I take it without question.

Higher resolution does not equal higher quality graphics.

I posted this in another thread, but I'll post it here again:
http://insomnia.ac/commentary/not_powerful_enough/

Resolution is only a very small part of it. There's a whole bunch of stuff that's been around in cinema since Terminator 2 hit the big screen that consoles still can't do in realtime yet. As the linked article shows, watching a DVD in 480i gives more realism than a modern console in 1080p due to reasons outside of resolution.

Beyond that, LCDs and Plasmas still don't have the colour definition of CRT. Many graphic artists and broadcast professionals are still creating and colour-checking work on CRTs before pushing them out to flat panels.

You shouldn't take anything "without question". You should do the research to understand why it's being used, and if there's a better way of doing it.