One of the main questions for a person who is going to buy a smartphone, tablet, monitor or TV was and remains issue of resolution. Whether to choose HD or Full HD, it would seem that the answer is clear - the second option, this is what manufacturers and sellers of equipment “play” on, one “magic” word “Full” and the TV costs more. But it's not that simple. To determine the difference between these two concepts, let's first find out what is HD and what is Full HD. Firstly, HD (HD Ready) or Full HD (what we see on equipment cases) are not video formats, as many people think, but simply trade names. “HD Ready” means that the TV, smartphone, etc. are ready to work with images in high definition format, and “Full HD” indicates that this or that device is fully suitable for working with HD images.
What other concepts regarding screens do you need to know when choosing a gadget?
Actually,permission. This is the number of dots (pixels) per unit of image dimension.
Scan. Scanning is a video display method. There are two types of scanning: interlaced and progressive.
- At interlaced In scanning, the frame is divided into two half-frames, and the image is divided into lines and transmitted through one - hence the name. When using this type of scan, place a marker “i” (for example, “1920x1080i”)
- Using progressive scanning, the frame is not divided into half-frames, it is divided only into lines, and all lines are fed in turn. When using progressive scan, put a “p” marker (for example, “1280x720p”).
What is HD and Full HD?
What do these two letters mean? HD or High Definition (English) - translated as high definition, it is with high definition that equipment manufacturers lure us. The HD format starts from a resolution that is higher than 720x576 (which is the standard). In other words, everything above 720x576 is HD.
It turns out that Full HD- this is the same HD, only with support for higher resolution (1920x1080).
What do HD and Full HD have in common?
- As we have already said, Full HD is also an HD format, but with more high resolution.
- Both formats can use interlaced scanning.
- Both HD and Full HD can play standard video format (720x576).
- Both HD TVs and Full TVs HDs have HDMI and/or DVI digital inputs that support copy protection.
This is where the similarities end.
What is the fundamental difference between HD and Full HD?
- We have already named the very first and most important difference - resolution, speaking about minimum sizes matrix resolution, it is worth noting that for HD this value is 1920x720 pixels, while for Full HD it is 1920x1080, what does this mean?
- This means that by multiplying the first number by the second we get the number of pixels on the screen; in the case of HD, the screen will be 921,600; in Full HD, the image will be transmitted through 2,073,600 pixels. The numbers speak for themselves; this is the case when more = better.
- HD format devices mainly use progressive scanning; in rare cases, slightly modified HD can use interlaced scanning, but in this case the image will be slightly distorted, which, you see, is not very pleasant. Full HD devices can use one type of scan or another; there are gadgets that even support some combinations of them.
- The biggest difference for most people is the price. As we said at the beginning, Full HD devices can cost an order of magnitude more than their HD-labeled counterparts, this is due to the fact that for productive work Full HD gadgets are equipped with more powerful processors— due to this, such a difference in price is achieved.
Who is most suitable for what, and why?
If you are going to buy a TV, then do not forget that the human eye can only notice the difference in playback in HD and Full HD if the diagonal of the purchase is above average (81 cm or 32 inches), i.e. if you need a small TV for the kitchen or in the car, you don’t need to overpay for a Full HD TV, because you won’t feel the difference.
It is also worth considering what image resolution your television transmits; if the signal carries an image with a resolution of 1920 by 720, then what is the point of buying a Full HD TV if it does not fully reveal its potential.
When choosing a monitor for your computer, you should consider what resolution the video card supports, otherwise you can greatly overpay for a Full HD monitor.
If you choose a smartphone or tablet, then you need to focus not on the screen size and its resolution, but, for example, on screen production technology (for example, Super AMOLED much better IPS technology, not only with equal resolution, but also provided that the resolution on the IPS screen is several times higher).
For those who like to watch movies in excellent quality and play XBOX and PlayStation on large screens, a Full HD device is more suitable.
Resolution is certainly an important parameter when choosing equipment, but in order to choose correctly, you need to take into account much more details, and not always listen to the seller (it happens that some of them do not always know what they are talking about).
When we are proudly shown TVs, monitors, and displays labeled FullHD, this “highest” resolution seems to be the highest good. But high-definition television or HD video came to us relatively recently, so we have not yet had time to demand replacement in accordance with technology updates. Naturally, with sometimes a rather insignificant difference in price, for example, FullHD and HD ready TVs, the consumer wants to know exactly what he is purchasing and whether he made a mistake in his choice. The displayed pictures do not always give the opportunity to make a decision: the quality of the image depends not only on the resolution, but also on many other factors (brightness, contrast, viewing angles of the screen, etc.), and the subjective opinion is again marking time. Let's see what the difference is between the main attractions of television and video equipment - FullHD and HD resolutions.
Definition
HD resolution standard(High Definition) includes any resolution higher than the standard format (that is, 720x576). Today HD resolution (HD ready label) means minimum requirements The resolution is 1280x720, but less common resolutions, for example, 1920x1440, are also considered high definition. Marketing introduces the designation HD ready to designate matrices capable of displaying the HD standard along with standard resolution.
In fact, Full HD- this is HD with a resolution of 1920x1080, that is, higher than HD.
Comparison
The Full HD name is not a quality standard - it is a marketing tag created to attract buyers and prevent them from being confused by digital resolution values. There is a standard HD ready 1080p, corresponding to a resolution of 1920x1080, but not equivalent to Full HD: often video equipment does not technically comply with the mentioned standard, limiting itself to matching the resolution. HD ready is a standardized designation for receivers.
For the consumer, the difference between Full HD and HD resolutions is image quality. High clarity is due to increased detail due to an increase in the number of pixels of the screen matrix. Accordingly, a Full HD image contains more information than an HD or standard definition image. According to experts, the difference in the amount of information can reach four times.
Also, Full HD display matrices are capable of displaying both images with a resolution of 1920x1080 and 1920x720, and standard 720x576, while HD ready does not aspire to a higher resolution. This does not mean that when playing a video of a different format we will get a TV grid or “snow”. HD displays increase the standard video resolution to the resolution of the installed matrix, the HD720 image is displayed without changes, and the HD1080 is reduced - again, to the physical capabilities of the matrix. Full HD displays, any resolution below 1920x1080, “match” their own matrix. As a rule, large screens involve playing media content, so picture quality will be fundamentally important, and the choice remains with Full HD.
As for scanning, HD implies exclusively progressive scanning, although such devices can also reproduce (interlaced scanning) with slight distortion. FullHD offers both interlaced and progressive scanning. This compromise makes it possible to receive a signal, for example, from a satellite without problems with data flow and throughput channel.
Today, the price range of television and video equipment has a very wide range, so it is not possible to talk about a clear advantage in the cost of this or that class of devices. However, most manufacturers, in addition to Full HD matrices, install powerful processors capable of quickly processing images, so if the diagonals are equal, such models can be significantly more expensive. Another important point: Full HD is not the same as HD1080p, so TV and monitor models that technically do not meet the quality standard can be labeled Full HD (without deceiving potential buyers), but such devices are much cheaper than those labeled HD1080p.
Conclusions website
- The minimum resolution of Full HD matrices is 1920x1080, while HD is 1920x720.
- The image quality on Full HD displays is higher than on HD.
- The HD ready standard places high technical requirements on technology (with the exception of matrix resolution); the Full HD label is actually responsible only for resolution.
- Full HD supports interlaced scanning without changing the image.
- Full HD may not meet the HD1080p quality standard.
- Manufacturers often equip Full HD devices with powerful processors, which affects functionality and performance.
What it is?
Format High Definition Video(abbreviated as HD) is new standard video that offers the user more high quality(that is, clarity) of the image by increasing the resolution (number of pixels) on the video image of the playback device (TV, monitor, plasma or LCD panel). Therefore, its more common name is "high definition format" or "high resolution".
What is High Definition Video?
In principle, any video content with a resolution greater than 1280x720 pixels can already be classified as high-definition video. At the same time, this format has its own:
What forms of HD are there?
The HD format is developing in two directions: HDV (High Definition Video), intended for playback from various media, and HDTV- intended for broadcasting on cable, satellite and terrestrial television channels, it is also called HDTV High Definition Television.
What is the resolution?
Today the main ones are: HD1080 (1920x1080) And HD720 (1280x720).
Both of them have a frame (screen) width to height ratio of 16:9.
Also, video with a resolution of 1920x1080 pixels can have progressive scan or interlace alternation of frame fields. And Video with a resolution of 1280x720 only line-by-line interleaving (scanning).
Video formats are also designated accordingly, for example HD1080i - where the letter " i" indicates interlaced alternation of fields, or 720p - where " R"line-by-line alternation.
How many frames per second should there be in HD?
In this regard, high-definition video does not have many differences from DVD video: with line-by-line interleaving of fields in the Pal- 25
frames/second, in NTSC- 30 (29,97)
frames/second; with interlaced alternation of fields in the Pal system 50
half-frames/second, in NTSC- 60
half frames/second.
But in the IVTC Film system everything 24(23.976)
frames, which is a standard for film, thanks to which it is possible to keep the film speed at the original.
What are the advantages of HD video over standard video (SD)?
The HD picture looks more advantageous compared to SD video, plus HD video has a significantly clearer picture on large screens.
The pictures below show a comparison of frames of different formats.
How to play High Definition Video?
You can view HD video in all its glory only on playback devices (Monitors, TV panels, projectors...) that support a screen resolution of at least 1280x720 points.From what media can I watch high-definition video?
The main carriers of HD content are high data density disks, such as Blu-ray. Or view via TV receiver that receives and reproduces TV programs in a HDTV signal.What codec is the HD video signal encoded with?
HD video is encoded in various codecs: MPEG-2 HD- MPEG-2 to DVD receiver. It provides fairly high image quality, but its compression algorithm is very outdated and does not provide a sufficient level of compression. Nevertheless, this format was chosen as the main one for high-definition consumer video systems. And it is no coincidence: it is well known and mastered; complex decoders are not needed to implement the path.
H.264 AVC (MPEG-4 v.10)- a young and promising codec based on the new generation MPEG-4 H.264 codec standard. AVC stands for Advanced Video Coding.
Unlike its older brothers of the h.263 standard (divx, XviD), it demonstrates significantly best quality images with greater path compression, which is associated with the use of significantly improved video data compression technologies. But encoding and decoding a video stream requires significant processor processing power. To ease the load on the processor, renowned video card manufacturers have recently included support for hardware HD video decoding in their new models.
VC-1- developed by MicroSoft and is used to encode HD stream into HD-DVD. It is based on the MPEG-4 algorithm.
DiVX HD And WMV-HD- slightly modified versions of the codecs of their older MPEG4 brothers.
What is Full-HD?
Typically, the Full-HD label indicates that a TV supports full resolution of 1920x1080 pixels.What is HD-Ready?
The HD-Ready label indicates that the TV supports a resolution of less than 1920x1080 pixels, for example, if the TV has a resolution of 1024x768 pixels, then it will be able to show the incoming HD signal, but at the same time it will convert (compress) the image to 1024x768, thereby reducing the clarity of the incoming signal.
Standard definition television(from English Standard-definition television, abbr. SDTV), can be deciphered as Standard Digital Television- standard digital television) is a standard based on decomposition standards 625/50 (576i) and 525/60 (480i). There is analogue and digital standard definition television, but the term SDTV mainly applied to digital television.
Analogue television is standard definition television; NTSC, PAL and SECAM color coding systems are used. Permission analog signal 640x480.
Standard definition is used in digital video transmissions with a resolution of 480 (NTSC) or 576 (PAL) lines, interlaced or progressive scanned. The image quality is better than analogue broadcasting; digital transmission eliminates the distortions and interference inherent in analogue television. SD television is not high definition television. SD can't convey as much information as HD. The SD format uses a 4:3 aspect ratio in HD 16:9, . There are also broadcasts with a 16:9 aspect ratio.
Having the low resolution of standard television, the SD video signal uses a small bandwidth used for broadcasting and a narrow video data stream for digital transmission. The DVD format is SD video.
DVD resolutions
- 720 × 480, 704 × 480, 352 × 480, 352 × 240 pixels (NTSC)
- 720 × 576, 704 × 576, 352 × 576, 352 × 288 pixels (PAL)
All resolutions that do not reach 1280×720 refer to SD formats.
HD format, HD image quality
HDTV, abbr. HDTV(English) High Definition Television, abbr. HDTV, HD). This format allows you to transmit a video signal with greater clarity and resolution:
720p — 1280×720p:
1080i - 1920×1080i or 1440×1080i
To transmit such a signal, you need to use a wider frequency band, but the picture quality, compared to SD, looks much nicer on TV. Satellites begin to broadcast in this format, and terrestrial digital television standard T2 is also broadcast (partially).
Full HD format, HD quality
Full HD is a marketing name first coined by Sony in 2007. It is used in broadcasts of high-definition television (HDTV) and in films recorded on Blu-Ray and HD-DVD discs.
HDTV (High Definition TeleVision) is television that provides image resolution:
1080i- 1920x1080i.
1080p- 1920x1080p
There are 1080p - with a progressive format and 1080i - an interlaced frame recording format, when one frame consists of two half-frames. Essentially this is the same HD, only slightly improved in the P modification.
UHD 4K format, UHD quality
Ultra High Definition Television (Ultra High Definition Television (UHDTV) or Ultra HDTV, Also Ultra High Definition Video (UHDV)) includes 4K UHDTV (2160p) And 8K UHDTV (4320p).
4K UHDTV (2160p) has a resolution of 3840×2160
8K format, 8K quality
8K UHDTV (4320p) has a resolution of 7680 × 4320
In connection with the development of recording devices, it has become possible to film with such a resolution; it is planned that such panels will be produced en masse in 2014-2016. Their advantage is the ability to create giant TVs with a diagonal of over 5 meters and the ability to watch high-quality videos.
As a result, indeed, in 2016, Sharp released a TV with 8K resolution for mass sale. But only for Japan, Singapore and China.
Other TV manufacturers only started selling 8K TVs in 2019.
To record one hour of video in the 8K standard, without using codecs to compress files, you need 300GB of memory. Therefore, 8K video is transmitted or stored in compressed form, using various codecs.
There were times when users happily enjoyed movies in DVD quality. These days, televisions that display high-resolution Full HD images have become widely popular. Although models capable of displaying highly detailed images in Ultra HD resolution have already appeared on sale, they are not yet very popular due to their high price.
A sales consultant, when listing all the capabilities and technical features of a particular TV, will probably mention that it is capable of playing high-definition video. Almost all new TVs are capable of playing Full HD video, but not all users know what Full HD is. This article will help you understand this issue. I would like to explain that when we talk about high-definition video, then, first of all, we mean the image detail increased five times.
This multiple improvement in quality is ensured by the fact that the number of pixels from which the picture is formed increases. High definition video has two main resolution formats. These are 1920x1080 pixels and 1280x720 pixels. In both the first and second cases, the aspect ratio of the image is 16:9. As a reminder, standard definition video has an aspect ratio of 4:3. If we assume the pixel sizes are the same, then we can clearly compare the Full HD standard with other standards.
Advantages of the standard Full HD
Before we figure out what Full HD is, let's find out the main advantages that high-definition video offers. Talking about increased resolution and, as a result, getting a more detailed image is good, but you need to see the real increase in picture performance when choosing a Full HD TV. If there is a high-quality video source, panels that support Full HD display an excellent picture, which is much superior to the display result of SD TVs. What explains this superiority?
Much of the credit lies in the five-fold improvement in detail, which is easily achieved by the increased number of dots that form the image. Each Full HD frame contains an increased amount of information and, as a result, there is a deep elaboration of small details that are not lost against the general background. Now you can distinguish small veins on leaves, individual hairs on animal fur, and impressive frost patterns. Such detailing gives the picture realism and it is noticeable. Particularly well-improved detail is observed on TVs with big screen. On large display all errors and inaccuracies associated with the quality of the picture are very clearly visible.
FullHDAs it is
Now the time has come to decide what Full HD is. To put it correctly, Full HD (“full” HD) is a marketing name that means that the TV supports all high-definition video formats up to 1920x1080. This means that if the TV matrix has a lower resolution (1280, 1336 or 1440 pixels in width), then there can be no talk of the Full HD standard. Matrices with a lower resolution are capable of displaying video in full HD720 quality. Such models are usually present, which can be roughly deciphered as “ready for display” HD. Next, we’ll look at the real differences between TVs labeled Full HD or HD Ready and those without it.
- If there is no marking on the TV, then even the presence of a high-resolution matrix does not provide any guarantee of support for high-definition video. In most cases, such TVs are designed to display a standard SD signal with a maximum increase in its resolution to the level supported by the matrix. As a result, the maximum SD resolution will be equal to the physical resolution of the matrix.
- If a TV is labeled as HD Ready, it means it can play both high and standard definition video. That is, the HD1080 signal resolution will be reduced to the real matrix resolution, the HD720 signal will be displayed “as is” (if the TV matrix resolution is 1280×720) or its resolution will be increased (if the matrix resolution is greater than 1280×720), the SD signal resolution will also will be increased to the actual matrix resolution.
- If a TV is labeled as Full HD, this means that it displays any signals, be it SD or HD. HD1080 quality signal is displayed as is, while other signals will be upscaled.
As a rule, TVs that support the Full HD standard are equipped with more efficient and powerful processors. Modern electronic “stuffing” easily allows the TV to interpolate HD720 and even SD signals, increasing their quality. It follows from this that you should give preference to Full HD models that have great capabilities in the field of high-quality image display.
Conclusion
We analyzed in detail what Full HD is and found out the main advantages that high-definition video brings. In view of the emergence and gradual spread of ultra-high-definition TVs Ultra HD, Full HD on TVs is already the norm and the price of such devices is affordable to everyone. Even budget models are often equipped with Full HD matrices. Now you know what Full HD is and similar markings in a TV store will not cause confusion.