Changing TV resolution? 4k to 1080p

[DariusHG]

Hello everyone, it's been a while since I last used the forum...

So I came from the TV store with a very weird doubt. 

I was gazing at 4k TVs when I asked one of the employees at the store about 1080p videos in 4k displays (because in my country, most of the content is still 720 or 1080p). 

I asked if 1080p videos on a 4k monitor would look worse, as its not the native resolution. He replied "of course they look worse, but you can change the tv resolution to 1080"... one of the 4k tvs I was looking could be configured to display 1080p.

I know that's downscaling but...

1) Is that resolution change efficient? Does 1080 look like 1080 when I change the 4k display resolution without losing display space? 

2) When I change a TV from 4k to 1080... Do 4 pixels act like one? 

3) Is all of this a scam? 

 

TL;DR: me not understanding if downscaling or changing a tv resolution affects imagen quality.

 

Ps: sorry about my english

[Electronics Wizardy]

1. Depends on the screen, but it will look worse than a 1080p screen(unless you have a crt). Id probably just get a 1080p screen if you don't watch 4k stuff often.

 

2. Normally, depends on the actual screen.

2 minutes ago, DariusHG said:

He replied "of course they look worse, but you can change the tv resolution to 1080"

Changing the res on the screen to 1080 won't make it any better.

[anybodykek]

2 minutes ago, DariusHG said:

Hello everyone, it's been a while since I last used the forum...

So I came from the TV store with a very weird doubt. 

I was gazing at 4k TVs when I asked one of the employees at the store about 1080p videos in 4k displays (because in my country, most of the content is still 720 or 1080p). 

I asked if 1080p videos on a 4k monitor would look worse, as its not the native resolution. He replied "of course they look worse, but you can change the tv resolution to 1080"... one of the 4k tvs I was looking could be configured to display 1080p.

I know that's downscaling but...

1) Is that resolution change efficient? Does 1080 look like 1080 when I change the 4k display resolution without losing display space? 

2) When I change a TV from 4k to 1080... Do 4 pixels act like one? 

3) Is all of this a scam? 

 

TL;DR: me not understanding if downscaling or change a tv resolution affects imagen quality.

If you manually downscale a TV it is the same as playing a 1080p video on a 4K screen. It should still be crisp, if your TV isn't too big.

[DariusHG]

13 minutes ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

1. Depends on the screen, but it will look worse than a 1080p screen(unless you have a crt). Id probably just get a 1080p screen if you don't watch 4k stuff often.

So LED 4k TVs are not optimal for watching 1080 content even if they can change resolution. 

I was thinking in buying 1080p too, but in my country there's a whole 4k propaganda and most of the market is filled with high end 4k tv. 1080p mid tier is hard to find and high end 1080 too. 

Thanks

[Electronics Wizardy]

2 minutes ago, DariusHG said:

So LED 4k TVs are not optimal for watching 1080 content even if they can change resolution. 

I was thinking in buying 1080p too, but in my country there's a whole 4k propaganda and most of the market is filled with high end 4k tv. 1080p mid tier is hard to find and high end 1080 too. 

Thanks

there are no led tv's. Its either LCD, oled, or plasma

 

Id just go 1080p, no real reason for a ultra high end model.

[AshleyAshes]

I gotta be honest, actually owning a 4K TV where most of the content being fed to it is 1080p, I don't personally experience any detriment that I can seen.  In my case I'm using an HTPC running Kodi, so while the PC is outputting 4K, Kodi is doing a fast Spline36 upscale to get any material up to 4K but I don't see any detriment.  I mean sure 720p looks a bit soft and SD material is obviously pretty soft on a 65" TV, but you'd see the same thing a 1080p 65" TV.  Certianly 4K content looks a bit sharper than 1080p, but I'm about 99% confident that if I had this TV next to a similar 65" 1080p TV, I couldn't appreciate any difference unless I got off the couch and put my nose to the screen.

 

I'm not going to get into any technical argument, obviously scaling 1080p to 4K with Spine36 is somewhat destructive, even the best scaling algorithm is destructive to some degree, I'm just saying that as an actual subjective viewing experience, 1080p on my 4K TV looks like any other 1080p to me without any detriment.