576i (50Hz) or 480i (60Hz)?

[cereal_killer]

Which mode should I choose for my Wii 576i (50Hz) or 480i (60Hz)? I mean which one is better in terms of performance, quality, etc?

 

[pinbi7]

depends on your display but Hz is usually linked to your FPS, 60Hz=60FPS
i'd rather have a higher refresh rate then a higher resolution

 

[Marc_LFD]

While 576 is a higher resolution (720x576), 480 (720x480) is ultimately the ideal one as it runs in 60hHz than 50Hz.

So, if I ever see games (or backups) that ask if I want to run in 50Hz or 60Hz, I choose the latter.

 

[Marc_LFD]

depends on your display but Hz is usually linked to your FPS, 60Hz=60FPS
i'd rather have a higher refresh rate then a higher resolution

720x576 is admittedly bigger than 720x480 (no doubt), but it looks somewhat squashed/stretched. I just don't like that resolution/aspect ratio.

 

[spectral]

Also since most games were never properly PAL optimised they don't take advantage of the extra resolution anyway. It'll either just stretch and 480 resolution or add black bars to take up the space.

Edit: Beaten too it.

 

[pinbi7]

i feel like the NSTC vs PAL debate is a thing of the past

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PAL_region

 

[Marc_LFD]

Also since most games were never properly PAL optimised they don't take advantage of the extra resolution anyway. It'll either just stretch and 480 resolution or add black bars to take up the space.

Edit: Beaten too it.

And movies/shows in PAL were sped up, while games were slowed down.

I gotta be honest, I don't get why it was either faster or slower, but not the same as NTSC.

 

[spectral]

And movies/shows in PAL were sped up, while games were slowed down.

I gotta be honest, I don't get why it was either faster or slower, but not the same as NTSC.

I think for TV shows it was a done intentionally to try and compensate whereas game devs just didn't care. I must admit I'd never heard of video being faster before. I dont think either slower or faster would make a huge difference there though. The main problem with games is that being interactive you could feel the speed difference.

 

[pinbi7]

I think for TV shows it was a done intentionally to try and compensate whereas game devs just didn't care. I must admit I'd never heard of video being faster before. I dont think either slower or faster would make a huge difference there though. The main problem with games is that being interactive you could feel the speed difference.

not necessarily laziness
20% speed difference is huge, with video playback slap on that 20% increase and it will play just fine
with video games there's optimizing needed to be done ,timings get screwy ect....
some developers are better then others

 

[Marc_LFD]

I think for TV shows it was a done intentionally to try and compensate whereas game devs just didn't care. I must admit I'd never heard of video being faster before. I dont think either slower or faster would make a huge difference there though. The main problem with games is that being interactive you could feel the speed difference.

Shows sped up even makes the audio sound unnatural, same goes for games (although there you could feel it being slow).

 

[FriendlyPolygon]

Is there even a way to output 576p?

 

[spectral]

not necessarily laziness
20% speed difference is huge, with video playback slap on that 20% increase and it will play just fine
with video games there's optimizing needed to be done ,timings get screwy ect....
some developers are better then others

I was wrong in what I wrote. I meant the publishers didn't care. They knew a PAL version was needed right from the start, it's not like they HAD to just make an NTSC version and convert it. But it was the cheaper faster route and resulted in some shockingly poor versions of great games.

 

[pinbi7]

Is there even a way to output 576p?

Video format	Display aspect ratio (DAR)	Resolution
576i	4:3	704 × 576 (horizontal blanking cropped)
720 × 576 (full frame)
576i	16:9	704 × 576 (horizontal blanking cropped)
720 × 576 (full frame)

 

[Marc_LFD]

Video format	Display aspect ratio (DAR)	Resolution
576i	4:3	704 × 576 (horizontal blanking cropped)
720 × 576 (full frame)
576i	16:9	704 × 576 (horizontal blanking cropped)
720 × 576 (full frame)

I know it's 4:3, but if people look at it, it doesn't actually look 4:3. It seems to be thinner and taller than 4:3.

 

[spectral]

I know it's 4:3, but if people look at it, it doesn't actually look 4:3. It seems to be thinner and taller than 4:3.

Probably because the assets used are still 480 and are being stretched into the extra vertical resolution. It's why games often filled the space with black bars instead.

 

[pinbi7]

I know it's 4:3, but if people look at it, it doesn't actually look 4:3. It seems to be thinner and taller than 4:3.

Pixel aspect ratio​

The table below summarizes pixel aspect ratios for the scaling of various kinds of SDTV video lines.

Video format	Display aspect ratio (DAR)	Resolution	Pixel aspect ratio (PAR)	After horizontal scaling
480i	4:3	704 × 480 (horizontal blanking cropped)	10:11	640 × 480
720 × 480 (full frame)	655 × 480
480i	16:9	704 × 480 (horizontal blanking cropped)	40:33	854 × 480
720 × 480 (full frame)	873 × 480
576i	4:3	704 × 576 (horizontal blanking cropped)	12:11	768 × 576
720 × 576 (full frame)	788 × 576
576i	16:9	704 × 576 (horizontal blanking cropped)	16:11	1024 × 576
720 × 576 (full frame)	1050 × 576

it's because they might share the DAR but the PAR is way off

 

[N7Kopper]

It's a complex topic to break down technically, so I'll keep it simple, stupid.

60hz is better for games developed with 60hz in mind. (This is most of them, but there are standout exceptions - Sonic 3D Blast for example has a bad reputation for being too fast, but it's actually a bad 60hz conversion to blame.)
50hz is better for games developed with 50hz in mind, TV and films. (3:2 pulldown is, to be completely blunt, AIDS.)

As a side note, I think it's kinda cute when I play 24hz Blu-Rays on my Xbox One, and the menu has to run at 24 FPS rather than 60.

 

[flo]

On a CRT you couldn't notice much difference between PAL and NTSC resolution but on modern displays PAL looks slightly better, even with black borders. Also, the refresh rate is not so relevant anymore on LCDs. Regarding the speed, some games seem too fast for me and it's almost a " hack " to use the PAL version to slow it down a bit .

 

[Marc_LFD]

On a CRT you couldn't notice much difference between PAL and NTSC resolution but on modern displays PAL looks slightly better, even with black borders. Also, the refresh rate is not so relevant anymore on LCDs. Regarding the speed, some games seem too fast for me and it's almost a " hack " to use the PAL version to slow it down a bit .

Sonic 2 NTSC isn't fast enough for me.

 

[N7Kopper]

On a CRT you couldn't notice much difference between PAL and NTSC resolution but on modern displays PAL looks slightly better, even with black borders. Also, the refresh rate is not so relevant anymore on LCDs. Regarding the speed, some games seem too fast for me and it's almost a " hack " to use the PAL version to slow it down a bit .

On a truly old-fashioned set, the difference between PAL and NTSC (which are colour standards) can be more noticable than the difference between 50hz and 60hz (which are refresh rates - PAL60 and NTSC50 exist for a reason).

But a good 50hz game can look a little cleaner thanks to the higher display resolution - but the game's native resolution matters more. Does it use the framerate hit (from 30 or 60 to 25 or 50) to render more stuff per-frame?