Plasma HDTV's

[RaistlinZ]

I saw a side by side comparison at my local BB today of two Plasma screens, one with 60Hz and one at 120Hz. The 120Hz one did appear smoother, but I couldn't tell if it was just on their demo that they set up or if all t.v. shows and movies would also be smoother.

Has anyone had any experience with 120Hz plasma/lcd screens and are they worth the money over 60Hz models? Thanks.

 

[krotchy]

There are no 120hz plasma TV's, it is a feature found only on LCD's at this time. LG does have a Plasma that they say has 180Hz processing, but its unclear what that means, and it doesnt help the main benefit of 120hz in that it can do 5:5 Pulldown.

As far as LCD's go. I think it definitely improves on motion clarity which is the main reason the feature is touted to begin with. The actual effect tends to polarize people, with some who absolutely love the smoothness it gives and others complain it makes everything look like a soap opera. Personally I like it, as it definitely removes judder among other things, and if you have it on max it definitely smooths basically everything, though older implementations (Samsung 71F) had some side effects like causing baseballs to split into 3 when moving fast. However the new samsungs (650) have addressed this.

 

[coreyb]

I'll have to head out to my local BB this weekend and check out the 120Hz sets. I'd like to know what this "soap opera" effect looks like.

 

[krotchy]

Originally posted by: coreyb
I'll have to head out to my local BB this weekend and check out the 120Hz sets. I'd like to know what this "soap opera" effect looks like.

They complain it looks like the camera is on rails.... which... it is.

However 24FPS film makes all motion have a stuttering effect, that is largely unnoticeable unless you look for it. This effect though not noticed does give movies a very different feel to television and especially live TV. The 120Hz processing makes both equally smooth and some purists don't like that, especially since it is interpolating more frames than actually exist.

 

[erwos]

Originally posted by: krotchy
However 24FPS film makes all motion have a stuttering effect, that is largely unnoticeable unless you look for it. This effect though not noticed does give movies a very different feel to television and especially live TV. The 120Hz processing makes both equally smooth and some purists don't like that, especially since it is interpolating more frames than actually exist.

Um, no. What you're describing is not an artifact of the HDTV being 120hz, but rather turning the "Motion Enhancer" setting on (and almost certainly setting it to high). Motion enhancer actually generates _new_ frames based on temporal data, whereas any high-end 120hz HDTV will simply repeat frames with motion enhancer off. Doing the former is what makes it look like the frame rate is artificially raised.

I own a 120hz HDTV which actually handles 1080p/24 properly, so I do know.

Another useful thread:

http://forums.highdefdigest.co...037415a2e3e347&t=25688

 

[krotchy]

Originally posted by: erwos
Um, no. What you're describing is not an artifact of the HDTV being 120hz, but rather turning the "Motion Enhancer" setting on (and almost certainly setting it to high). Motion enhancer actually generates _new_ frames based on temporal data, whereas any high-end 120hz HDTV will simply repeat frames with motion enhancer off. Doing the former is what makes it look like the frame rate is artificially raised.


I own a 120hz HDTV which actually handles 1080p/24 properly, so I do know.

Another useful thread:

http://forums.highdefdigest.co...037415a2e3e347&t=25688

First off this stuttering effect I am referring to is built into movies themselves because 24FPS is not quite fast enough to appear as smooth motion to our eyes, I am not referring to 3:2 pulldown, which has a much worse stutter to it. If you look hard at any 24FPS source you can see it (In theaters too, and during 5:5 pulldown with no motion enhancement). Movie motion is just your eye blending an image jump 24 times a second and most people do not notice these jumps, I do and trust me it is there and can be annoying on certain sources, although most of the time I simply ignore it.

However motion interpolation is just one way to remove or filter out this stuttering in film in a way that smooths things moreso than 5:5 pulldown, so you are right the smoothing "soap opera effect" is an artifact of the interpolation, but calling it an artifact implies that it isnt the intended purpose of the smoothing itself, which it 100% is. If we really want to get technical though, there are really 4 typical ways to do 120Hz that are common, but motion interpolation is one every store employee in the world is trying to tout when they say a TV has 120Hz. There are others beyond these 4, but they are much more rarely used.

1. Frame repetition (2:2 (60FPS), 5:5 (24FPS) Pulldown, simply show the same frame repeatedly)
2. Motion Interpolation (Described above and on 99.99% of TV's it is called 120Hz Processing, AMP, Smooth Motion or some other proprietary marketing name, but its what they are selling as 120Hz)
3. Black Frame Insertion (Put black frames in between real frames to remove the static hold from LCD's, removes image retention from your eye and tries to simulate CRT clarity for motion. It was going to be the next big thing and suddenly motion interpolation took hold and BFI didn't really become much on the market.)
4. 3D Alternating (2 60Hz images displayed in alternating frames with glasses to separate the images, can also be used to display 2 completely different sources on the same TV where each pair of glasses is tuned to the one they want to watch)

 

[erwos]

Originally posted by: krotchy
First off this stuttering effect I am referring to is built into movies themselves because 24FPS is not quite fast enough to appear as smooth motion to our eyes, I am not referring to 3:2 pulldown, which has a much worse stutter to it. If you look hard at any 24FPS source you can see it (In theaters too, and during 5:5 pulldown with no motion enhancement). Movie motion is just your eye blending an image jump 24 times a second and most people do not notice these jumps, I do and trust me it is there and can be annoying on certain sources, although most of the time I simply ignore it.

Well, yeah. In fast-moving scenes, you'll get that at any frame rate.

However motion interpolation is just one way to remove or filter out this stuttering in film in a way that smooths things moreso than 5:5 pulldown, so you are right the smoothing "soap opera effect" is an artifact of the interpolation, but calling it an artifact implies that it isnt the intended purpose of the smoothing itself, which it 100% is. If we really want to get technical though, there are really 4 typical ways to do 120Hz that are common, but motion interpolation is one every store employee in the world is trying to tout when they say a TV has 120Hz. There are others beyond these 4, but they are much more rarely used.

Perhaps calling it an "artifact" was a bit unfair, but it remains that there was a strong implication in your first response in this thread that 120hz always has this "soap opera" effect, which is definitely not the case. Most serious home theater folks like to play with it for effect, but I don't think many of them care about it more than proper 5:5 implementation (something not all 120hz TVs do right, for whatever reason).

Plus, there are varying levels of "Motion Enhancer" - standard on my TV, for instance, won't produce the soap-opera effect, but will smooth out broad pans.

The OP was asking whether 120hz was worth the premium, and I would say "no, unless you can actually notice 3:2 pull-down judder".

 

[AstroManLuca]

I saw a demo of a 120 Hz TV at a Best Buy a week or two ago and it was quite unusual. They were showing Pirates Of The Caribbean 3 with a split down the middle showing the comparison between normal sets and the 120 Hz set, and it was very noticeable, especially during fast action sequences. I totally know what you mean by the soap opera effect - strangely, it makes it look like it's being shot with a Handycam or something, even though it's technically the same quality frames with added smoothness between them. It seems SO "live" in that it is removing one of the barriers separating movies from real life. We're so used to movies being slightly stuttery that when we're shown live action (not 3D rendered) video at 120 fps, it's jarring. I think it would grow on me over time, but you should check it out in person before you just buy something.

Another consideration is gaming. Does a 120 Hz panel make games look better?

 

[ZetaEpyon]

Originally posted by: AstroManLuca
Another consideration is gaming. Does a 120 Hz panel make games look better?

I don't really want to hijack the thread further, but this is also something that I'm interested in; in my case, PC games more than console. I would imagine that you can run the smoothing on any input from HDMI, but I don't think I've seen anything that really states this one way or another for PC input.

The game I play most is FFXI, and it's software-capped at 30fps, so decent frame interpolation would be a godsend. Any input lag wouldn't really be a concern either, as the inherent "mmo-lag" would far exceed it anyway.

 

[erwos]

Originally posted by: ZetaEpyon
The game I play most is FFXI, and it's software-capped at 30fps, so decent frame interpolation would be a godsend. Any input lag wouldn't really be a concern either, as the inherent "mmo-lag" would far exceed it anyway.

There is a considerable amount of lag involved with motion enhancer - I suspect this might not work as well as you think...

 

[Genx87]

Saw this in action the other night and honestly didnt like it. They showed Spiderman 3's opening scene with the man coming out of the sand. It had a weird effect that felt like parts of the scene were layered on the other.

Needless to say that set was out of our impulse buy that night. Settled on a Samsung 40" LCD for 1200.