1080i and 720p

[Compnewbie01]

I want to get a Xbox 360 in the next month and I am wondering what the difference is between 1080i and 720p. I think my current TV plays at 1080i for regular TV, but I wonder which is better and how much of a difference there really is because I really want the new Xbox 360 games to look awesome. Also, is there a way to find out for sure which one it plays and whether or not it can be changed?

EDIT: Okay, 720p it is

 

[Rage187]

it's 720p not 740p


the difference between 1080i and 720p is personal preference, I however prefer 720.

 

[rahzel]

many prefer 720p over 1080i.

some HDTV's that are native 1080i can display 720p though (like my TV).

 

[ND40oz]

720p looks better to me. Theoretically, you have more pixels on the screen at any given time with 720p, but since most tv's just scale to their native resolution (unless your using a crt), it really depends on the TVs scalar as well.

 

[IceBreakerG]

1080i has a MUCH higher resolution than 720p, but 1080i is interlaced while 720p is progressive, which is why alot of people are saying they think it looks better. I don't really care for interlaced video because its not as smooth as progressive. But overall, thats the main difference. Also, most HDTV's don't display 1080i very well either (some do, some don't, kinda varies). Also, if i remember correctly, 720p is DTV, not HDTV, 1080i is HDTV. I still haven't quite figured that one out myself yet though.

 

[Sentry2]

720P is HD. There are some 1080i HDTV's(CRT) out there that will also do 720P. I know that most newer Sony's and Samsungs will. Usually they do 720P in a widescreen format though. I have a 32" Sony Wega and as far as I can tell it will only do 720P in widescreen. If it was the 34" Widescreen model it wouldn't be a big deal but it's not so it kinda sucks. 1080i still looks good though so I would wait and see what it looks like on your HDTV. I'm thinking about getting a 40"+ LCD or Plasma that has a native res of 720 or 768 myself. Just waiting for prices to come down a little. So I think your best bet would be a widescreen LCD or Plasma TV that does 720P as it's native resolution.

 

[imported_ST]

720p is 720 lines of progressive horizontal resolution. 1080i has 1080 lines of horizontal resolution but interlaced. Most people prefer 720p, because it takes a lot of horsepower (cpu/gpu) to do proper deinterlacing of 1080i to 1080p, thus most box will downscale and omit the 2nd field to display at 540p or so instead, lower than 720p.

If you have sufficient hardware, 1080i / 1080p is much much better.

 

[ZimZum]

1080i looks better on still and slow moving visuals, much better. 720P is better for sports and action movies or anything with a lot of fast motion visuals.

Almost all displays convert images to their native resolution. If your TVs native res is 720p it will convert the 1080i signal to 720p which is why it may appear that 720p is superior when it in actually the 1080i signal is suffering because your display is down converting the image. Causing a loss in image quality. Same goes for displays that are 1080i native.