Is Xbox 360 HDMI Cable Required for 1080P?

Ever since XCM announced it would build a new HDMI cable for vanilla Xbox 360 word hit the web - then slightly contorted, as words often do. Confusion started when some stories referred to XCM's new cable as a 1080P. This insinuates that 1080P video is not possible without the HDMI format. This is technically not correct.

 

We just covered some info on XCM's new HDMI cable for Xbox 360 in our last post. This time we'll dig a little deeper into exactly what it all means. 

 

Component video cable system, used by original Xbox 360, is capable of full 1080P/60 (1080 progressive lines of resolution at 60 frames per second). The trouble is that component cannot cope with copy protection requirements outlined for HDCP. So, it can but it may not as in component doesn't have permission of the AACS to do so.

 

Confused? Read more about AACS and HDCP.

 

What all this means to you as an Xbox 360 gamer is you will need the HDMI upgrade cable only if you want to watch movies on your HD DVD player in full 1080P/60. You won't need it for games. I don't know of any Xbox 360 games that are made to take advantage of 1080P. In fact – very few 1080P titles are even planned for PS3 which was touted for its full 1080P capabilities out of the box.

 

My advice … if you've got a 1080P display and want to watch HD DVD movies in full 1080P you might be interested. If you have 1080P display and only play games – HDMI won't do a thing for your viewing enjoyment. And, if you're using a 720P display you'll never have any need of an Xbox 360 HDMI cable.

 

Despite the sales pitch, HDMI is only for HDCP compliance, not for better viewing quality over Component.

5 comments
Posted by KnowBuddy on September 17,2007 at 11:22 AM

Please provide us a working hotlink to the previous article you referenced near top in RED text.  One without wild-card characters in the page name ***.

Thanks.

And why don't theses pages have a SEARCH engine feature?

So much for state-of-the-art.

Over & ouch!

Posted by Mr. X on July 21,2007 at 6:32 AM

Thing is, there are some TVs that display 1080p via HDMI ONLY! For these TVs owners, the XBOX HDMI cable will be a great thing, if the price is right.

Posted by Wayde on June 26,2007 at 8:43 PM

Hey Elder.

Upconversion is done via processors, you could get a set top box with processors by companies like HQV that use famous Silicon Optix chips for high end video processing.

http://www.necvisualsystems.com/Products/Product/?product=342410a9-72e8-4e9f-b0bb-60cb62ada326

These are expensive but do a good job upscaling any resolution to your HDTV's native res.

If you're asking if HDMI means upconversion, the answer is no. In fact your HDTV is already up/down-converting any inbound video signal to its native resolution.

If you're interested in upscaling 480P DVD to HDTV. I'm not one to champion the cause of upsampling DVD players. I've always thought they were a waste of time. I've never seen them do anything compelling. A DVD only has 480 lines of resolution written to disc. You cannot change that with a scaler. If you want a high def video experience you have to start with high def source material.

Posted by Elder Gamesman on June 26,2007 at 6:11 PM

So, will this new cable allow old 360s to upconvert normal DVDs?  This has always been my biggest gripe, in that, as I understand it, upscaled DVDs can only be output via HDMI or DVI connections, not over component.  I hope that this new cable will allow this to be done.

Posted by Bill Patterson on June 26,2007 at 5:22 PM

Good info, I always thought HDMI was overrated, I don't want to have anything to do with it.