480p upscaling on a 4K or 1080p

[eoniverse]

I've been on a 720p 50" Panasonic plasma for years now.

I am kinda old and have many TB's of media ranging from 480p to 1080p (and a few 2160p files). I've seriously considered jumping to a 65" OLED recently so I headed off to a local B&M with a flash drive containing everything from old B&W 480p shows like Outer Limits to color 480p like Get Smart to 720p, etc etc.

Only reason it to have a bigger screen. I like everything else on my TV.

I had the sales person play the flash drive on the OLED65B6P and was disappointed by how horrible the upscale (smearing and pixalation) was on it. Basically unwatchable. frankly awful. I have a fair amount of 480p that is not available in a higher resolution and after months of wanting this TV I simply could not pull the trigger. FWIW I have a lot more higher resolution material than 480p. The majority of what I have is high bitrate 1080p but even that just looked 'OK' to my eyes on the OLED (Game Of Thrones etc). Certainly not as crisp an image as it appears on my 720p Plasma. Granted less banding in the shadows but that's about the only advantage I saw. My 2160p files looked great on the OLED.

I would have been moving the 720p plamsa to a different room if I upgraded. Not getting rid of it considering how well it handles 480p. But no longer sure about upgrading or what to consider. I heard Sony's have an excellent upscaler but I have not tried them to see a comparison. Another alternative is to upgrade to a 1080p (before they are all gone) but I really wanted at least HDR if I did that (only to find out that HDR is not available on any 1080p set)

It is even worthwhile asking what is the best 1080p TV upscaler out there?

Thinking of staying put until I have to upgrade or until a superior upscaler becomes available. (I'm not expecting miracles but would like it to be 'watchable'. (I know. Relative value)

 

[TheELF]

You could search for a tv that plays the 480 files at the original resolution... on a fraction of the screen.
Or you could search around on how well upscaling looks to you from PC's since the software is much more advanced but then you would need a htpc.

 

[eoniverse]

You could search for a tv that plays the 480 files at the original resolution... on a fraction of the screen.
Or you could search around on how well upscaling looks to you from PC's since the software is much more advanced but then you would need a htpc.

The original size is too small as the only reason I have to upgrade is to have a bigger image. (I've seen the original image size running it through Kodi but prefer it larger.) But you do make me wonder if I were to have shrunk the 480p image to 50" on the 65" OLED if it would have looked reasonably close to the 720p plasma upscale.

I have a PC that I could use. What video card would you suggest? Anything under 400.00 is very manageable. Would there be a way to run the upscaled image to the TV wirelessly or would it have to be a hardwire output from the htpc to take advantage of the upscale?

I have a case with an i7 5960x but a low end video card as i don't game at all.

 

[Mike64]

This isn't an answer to the OP, but a question, the answer to which might be helpful. Do BD players typically upscale better than TV's built-in circuitry, or is that pretty much the same?

 

[Kartajan]

upscaling always brings artifacts. I think the best solution would be a projector... Second best would be something with component video (Red-Blue-Green) inputs...

 

[slashbinslashbash]

Consider a gaming console as well. PS4 Pro is 4K and will upscale any videos to 4K. Plus it's probably a bit easier to use than a HTPC for kiddos/wife/etc.

 

[giantpandaman2]

A properly set up HTPC will upscale best. You might want to throw a quick post in the HTPC section to see what's most current. It's never going to look that good though.

You'd have to check the scalar on any tv/bluray player/receiver to see which one does the best upscaling if you go the other route.

 

[darkswordsman17]

Yeah a HTPC will be best as you get control over the upscaling (its fairly subjective as there's a lot of different options), but will be somewhat finnicky.

There are other options. I think some receivers can upscale/process, and Oppo has a Blu-ray player that can do that (not sure if they have a 4K capable one yet though). There are some dedicated scalers but not sure how many for 4K just yet.

Maybe you could consider the 1080p version of that set? It might save you some money until 4K and stuff like OLED and some of the competing tech becomes more common and affordable. Or until native 4K projector becomes feasible.

 

[BarkingGhostar]

The problem isn't the current technology in the display department, but rather the OP not moving forward and reinvesting in better offerings of said content. Who the heck wants to upscale 480P to 4K? I would much rather start with 1080P if I were upscaling if 4K versions weren't available.

I have a dresser full of DVDs that I do not touch because I have better quality media to go with the better quality displays.

 

[eoniverse]

The problem isn't the current technology in the display department, but rather the OP not moving forward and reinvesting in better offerings of said content. Who the heck wants to upscale 480P to 4K? I would much rather start with 1080P if I were upscaling if 4K versions weren't available.

I have a dresser full of DVDs that I do not touch because I have better quality media to go with the better quality displays.

The problem is the content is not available in a better format. Both The Outer Limits (original) and One Step Beyond (and others) while available on DVD were not 'remastered' - just transferred and look horrible on 4k. If it was a matter of time before they were actually remastered properly I would be less hesitant to upgrade but I doubt it will happen.

I do agree. I will have to let go at some point of some of it - just disappointed.

The 720p plasma does a good job upscaling that content and I'll never get rid of it until it breaks - but I'll eventually have no choice other than to upgrade

 

[BarkingGhostar]

Region 1 DVD was the only offering for The Outer Limits beyond VHS. Region 1, North America, means it was probably an Interlaced offering (480i) and not progressive. I checked Blur-ray.com via a Global search and no one has offered anything on BD. So, 480i deinterlaced and upscaled to 4K would be insane. Much better examples of broadcast television content that had better treatment (or any treatment).

BTW, don't think I do not watch any DVD. There are boxed sets of titles not offered in North America under any form. For instance, Inspector Morse was never treated to anything other than the DVD treatment of Region 2, but at least it wasn't too bad. Wife and I watched every episode in a BD player displaying on a 1080P plasma.

 

[cmdrdredd]

This isn't an answer to the OP, but a question, the answer to which might be helpful. Do BD players typically upscale better than TV's built-in circuitry, or is that pretty much the same?

They are pretty close to my eye. Many claim that Sony's X1 chip upscales better than anything but to be honest it looks the same as my Samsung TV. Maybe I just don't notice the subtile differences. 480p on any modern display will be left wanting in many ways. It is what it is. Rtings.com does test upscaling between TVs and they report some differences between brands and/or models.

 

[cmdrdredd]

Yeah a HTPC will be best as you get control over the upscaling (its fairly subjective as there's a lot of different options), but will be somewhat finnicky.

There are other options. I think some receivers can upscale/process, and Oppo has a Blu-ray player that can do that (not sure if they have a 4K capable one yet though). There are some dedicated scalers but not sure how many for 4K just yet.

Maybe you could consider the 1080p version of that set? It might save you some money until 4K and stuff like OLED and some of the competing tech becomes more common and affordable. Or until native 4K projector becomes feasible.

Oppo's BDP-203 UHD Blu-Ray player should be available before the year's end but that is fast approaching and they may not make that date, but they have them in a warehouse ready to be shipped. There was a Twitter post that showed a picture of the racks of them. All UHD players can scale content but some people may feel their TV does a better job.

 

[AnitaPeterson]

When you upscale VGA video to 4k, it definitely won't look as good as when you upscale it to "just" 720p.

I must join those who say that a dedicated HTPC will definitely do the best possible upscaling.
Especially if you use something like MPC-BE, not VLC.

Some consoles might do it as well, but it's a lottery.
I have a Seiki blu-ray player which does upscaling, but I think the HTPC is much better in this respect.

 

[JAG87]

When you upscale VGA video to 4k, it definitely won't look as good as when you upscale it to "just" 720p.

You can upscale it to 16K for all it matters, that's not why it looks like poo.

It looks like poo because he's wanting to watch 480i material (which depending on what de-interlacing is being used can look as bad as 240p) on a 65" display... There is no way to make this look good. Even using the best scaling algorithms such as spline/lanczos, nothing will save it.

 

[eoniverse]

Thanks for all the input. I'll eventually likely have no choice but to upgrade.

It seems to me like a game based on offering consumers 'nicer looking media' but at the expense of repurchasing media they have accumulated.

I suspect that is the main push behind 1080p to 4k and soon 8k.

I realize there is no stopping it because the UHD media is too desirable too ignore but I'm disapointed that so much older media will become unviewable only because of increasing resoluton.

Thanks again everyone. I'll stick on my plasma for a while longer. (Sure wish HDR had been available on 1080p sets)