PlayStation 3 can scale after all

The PlayStation 3's hardware scaling capabilities (or lack thereof) have been a serious point of contention since word first got out of the console's potential shortcoming, which left owners of HDTVs of a certain resolution unable to use their sets to their fullest potential with the console in its current state and unsure they'd ever be able to do so. Well, it looks like Sony may have a few tricks up its sleeve, with Beyond3D reporting that the company's latest software development kit includes measures that game makers can take in order to implement "hardware accelerated horizontal scaling" in their titles, ensuring that they'll always look their best, even on 1080i sets. What's not so clear is what this means for all the current games that pump out less-than-desirable results when hooked up to the aforementioned HDTVs, with patches seemingly one option but no official word given on that possibility. Although you can bet that this won't be the last word we hear on the subject.

[Via Joystiq]

[Jypson @ Jan 26th 2007 6:20PM]

On your mark.....get set.....FLAME!!!!

[Matt @ Jan 26th 2007 6:25PM]

good job sony.. now drop them prices......

[Blaine @ Jan 26th 2007 6:58PM]

The title makes it sound as if they had implemented a solution...this is more of a "PS3 will (eventually) be able to scale". Seems like they just want people to stop whining temporarily.

[Shammo @ Jan 26th 2007 7:10PM]

With existing HW or a new HW development kit?

[General @ Jan 26th 2007 9:20PM]

With existing hardware. This is just the latest version of the software development kit (SDK).

[KineticOnline @ Jan 26th 2007 7:01PM]

"hardware accelerated horizontal scaling"

What about the vertical scaling? Seriously horizontal scaling would be changing from 4:3 to 16:9 not scaling resolutions

[mirobin @ Jan 26th 2007 7:33PM]

According to the article, they don't support arbitrary horizontal scaling; they're only supporting output of a 960x1080 frame at 1920x1080 (note that 960 is half of 1920). I'd be willing to bet money they came up with some sort of hardware trick that halves the speed at which the output is generated from the framebuffer.

This isn't scaling so much as it is horizontal line doubling.

It would also explain why it only works horizontally and not vertically.

[walk2k @ Jan 26th 2007 8:06PM]

No, according to the article, it supports multiple resolutions (1280x1080, 1440x1080 and 1600x1080) in addition to 960x1080.

[mirobin @ Jan 26th 2007 9:04PM]

Didn't notice that, though they would seem to be perfect fractions of the final output resolution, which still matches my theory of how they're actually pulling this off.

920 = 1/2
1280 = 2/3
1440 = 3/4
1600 = 5/6

We'll be able to tell for certain by examining a framegrab from a game using this new functionality.

[Castle @ Jan 26th 2007 9:08PM]

>>With existing HW or a new HW development kit?

Its supported with current hardware but with new SDKs. There supposedly was a scaler in the PS3 after all.

[Castle @ Jan 26th 2007 9:14PM]

>>What about the vertical scaling? Seriously horizontal scaling would be changing from 4:3 to 16:9 not scaling resolutions

If you read the original Beyond3D article, they are having the developers use 960x1080 resolution; double the horizontal resolution you get 1080p (1920x1080). 960x1080 is similar in computational power as 720p(921,600 pixels for 1280x720 compared to 1,036,800 pixels for 960x1080). I think Sony made a conscious effort in having the developers not having to rely on scaling to make games look good(so no 960x540 resolution and graphics that look blown up)

http://www.beyond3d.com/articles/ps3scaler/index.php?p=01