Finally taking the HD plunge

I couldn't stop myself.

Ebuyer have a cheap 37" LCD TV with good reviews. So I've just order it to replace my 28" CRT TV, the difference should be massive, especially with the 360 console.

I've been putting this off for ages but having bought some games recently on the 360 and finding it hard to read some of the text and other things which were obviously designed for HD TV's I just decided to hell with it and ordered one. So HD TV owners, I'm joing your club!

I'm sure it'll make all the difference when there's nothing on but repeats of One Foot in the Grave and Dads Army.

Thanks GFK, luckily I don't watch much TV, but do play a lot of 360.

It's night and day when your playing 360 on an HD set. Wide screen alone makes a big difference. 37" is a nice size too. Welcome to the club!

HD gaming is great :o) I too struggled to see the onscreen instructions for a game (Condemned?) until i got my HD telly. I realise there is a setting to change the xbox to 480 p mode. Dunno if that makes a difference on a normal telly?

I certainly love mine.. I picked up a 47" 1080p LCD about a year go... other than some small HDCP handshake issues with my PS3 it has been outstanding.

OMFG! I got it yesterday and the difference is amazing!

I've gone from using a 360 on s-video on a 28" normal TV, to HDMI connection on a 37" LCD HDTV.

Running games at 720p is amazing! I've been playing crackdown a lot lately and the dfifference is huge! Even DVD's running on the 360 look alot sharper and clearer. I can't beleive I left it so long to go to HD! I'm never going back to normal TV again

You bought a HDTV to play video games on? Hrmmm.

Know what's more amazing? Running them on a real computer.

No, it's not amazing to spend ten times the money for "a real computer" just to get the same gaming performance that my Xbox 360 gives me for 379 Euros (and the price already dropped in the meantime). And my 360 lets me play at 1080p on my 24" TFT display.

When it comes to gaming, "real computers" can no longer compete with consoles. Or where do you get a real computer with a triple core 3.2 GHz PowerPC processor for less than three hundred bucks that can play all those high-end games?

well said winni.

I do have a "real computer" 4200+ dual core with 7600gt. Which can alomost match the xbox in the graphics department. But there's just something more relaxing about sitting back on the sofa with a control pad. I do play PC games on a 22" widescreen monitor. But the point is, I'm not playing on the xbox thinking about whether to upgrade it or not, the games will just keep getting better without me having to buy any new hardware, can't say that about PC games.

Yep HD is very nice, I'm using 40" Samsung myself and it's definatly a huge improvement. I found Assian's Creed difficult to play at the standard TV resolution and the type very hard to read indeed.

More HD content is still needed, we are way behind the US.

Yes, PC Gaming is over, it's too costly and there is no benefit to it any longer and all the innovation is being done on consoles now anyway.

My HD TV was around £700 but you can buy good models now for as little as £300 and your very unlikely to need to upgrade from 1080P for a long time.

Darkheart

I think I have an HDTV set up with my 360, but that may just be my dad lying to me... It has a little smudge, but my dad got it because it was cheap :P

I never really play my 360 anyway though.

I can always tell if it's HD cause it's crazy clear. :P

Turns out, going upstairs, I find out that he hooked it up with a CRT just today :P I liked it when it was on the HDTV...

PC gaming isnt over, you pit someone on pc against someone on x360 playing COD4 and the pc player should win; gamepad just sucks arse for some games.

I just can't find any games that tempt me enough to buy a 360 or PS3. There were some great games for Xbox, but console games just seem to few and overpriced.

I still find more PC games that interest me, maybe it’s my age or something, but console games tend to have dumbed down controls and gameplay so that anyone from 4 and up can play them. I want games to be a challenge without being repetitive or forcing me to play the same bit of level over and over.
Even games that do interest me end up being a huge disappointment when I finally play them. Assassins Creed being a good example.

Oh I'm sorry. I wasn't aware that gaming was about "performance". I thought it was about "the games". Sure, if you don't care what game you play, I suppose you have a point.

To quote maddox: Saying the Xbox is a good system because it's powerful is like saying you made a great painting because you used the best set of paints.

You do realize that you can get control pads for the PC right?

Aside from the distinctly non-HD Wii, which innovation is that exactly? Dumbing down the controls with auto-aim so shooters are feasible? Way to innovate there - except aim-bots aren't really an innovation.

For once, we agree. The idea that the price of a HDTV, an XBox 360 and Mass Effect somehow constitutes "good value for money" is absurd.

Console gaming will "win" when consoles are matter of factly a PC, hopefully without the mammoth OS. Just look at the PS3 and XBox360, and all the different configurations they're available in. If that isn't a sign, I don't know what is.

Evak, don't buy the games rent them, buying games for consoles (unless they are really exceptional) is just dumb. I liked Mass Effecet but I wouldn't have paid £30-40 for it.

People complaining about the lack of keyboard and mouse just emphasise that PC Gaming has become too heavily dependant on the FPS genre where fast pin point accuracy is necessary. It's not even as if the keyboard mouse was a natural choice anyway, it was simply a lack of optons. Intergrating a keyboard and mouse would not be difficult. TBH playing Halo 3 on two analogue sticks is easy enough once you get used to it.

Currently there are two configurations of the Xbox 360 and 1 or 2 versions of the PS3, crucially which all perform to exactly the same spec, there are 1000's PC configurations which perform to differents specs. So I do not agree consoles are becoming like PC's in this way.

Practical decisions will change the market:

PC Gaming is too expensive
PC Gaming's main advantage (HD vs SD) is now gone.
Innovative periphals are much easier to introduce on a console because developers can be sure the end user will have them.
PC Gaming has compatibility issues.
PC Gaming has the problem of hitting a changing tech platform at the right time (e.g. Crysis, good game, wrong time).
PC Gaming is targetting a shrinking group of (mostly male) PC enthusiasts as opposed to a growing group of console gamers (of mixed sex and ages).
The PC gaming industry is totally out of touch with the real market (Quad SLI for example).

Darkheart