Does anyone actually like those 120Hz & 240Hz TVs?

[Zenimus]

You can see them displayed prominently in any electronics store now. They're the ones that look like they're stuck on fast-forward. I think they make everything seem too smooth and unnatural, kinda like how you can instantly tell the difference between a 24 FPS movie and footage from a 29.97 FPS camcorder.

Does anybody out there actually like those 120+Hz TVs? If so, what are they better for? Certainly not watching movies, right?

 

[Ancient Flounder]

Every time I see one of these TV's, I want to fiddle with the options and turn it back down to 60hz. Movies don't look right at all on them. I've never seen any games played on the displays I've seen, so I'm not sure how I'd react to that. Probably with the same disdain.

 

[k'_127]

Defenitely not suitable for movies. But I always keep it on while watching a cartoon, or playing videogames.

 

[Artemio]

The problem is not really the technology, it is teh setup. You see, the only way to make the movie slooks good on home cinema, is 120hz. This is because 120 is divisible by 24, 60 and 30. Hence, the 120 hz displays can show these framerates as they are intended.

However, they do have a setting to "smooth" things out and convert 24 hz video and give you "more frames". That is the bad setting and idea.

Rarely you will find on a storte flooir a player that is set to 24 hz and a TV at just 120 hz without this mode turned on so you can see what the movie looks like.

If you use a 60hz TV, you'll end up always converting from 24 frames to 30 or 60, which has a ton os problems and is never precise.

Having that smoothing setting turned on is ignorance at its best.

240 hz though, is just marketing. It gives no real advantage.

 

[Nesagwa]

I just set my PC to 24hz and don't worry about it. Smooth video playback as it was intended.

120hz is horrible and makes things look incredibly bad.

 

[JediKiller]

I have a samsung 52" tv with the 120hz...I love it! I don't know why people are putting it down for movie watching, I enjoy watching blu-rays on it. fiddle with the settings a little, pop in a movie like into the blue with lots of outdoor/ocean views and it's like looking through a window. and gaming on it kicks ass. My game actually improved on COD:WAW when I got this tv. mind you I was upgrading from a 32" 720p lcd POS from wal mart... but the picture seemed so much clearer and I could see a lot more details. I got this TV when map pack 2 was out, and the level with the caves was like a whole different leve lto me....I could actually see into the caves to tell if someone was hiding in there rather than running in blindly.
anyway, probably in the minority, but I'm loving the new 120hz tv.

 

[not sonic]

120/240hz displays are marketd for movies as to reduce the problems from 3:2 pulldown when converting from theatrical 24hz to 30 or 60hz.

the problem is 24hz is just really bad for motion/video.

the way a regular film projector in a theater displays the image is different than a digital display showing 24 different images per second. so youll get judder.

the other problem is that video shot at 30 definitely looks and feels different than 24.

and 60hz+ ends up looking weird and unnatural.


i read a great article about 24hz and judder, if i find it ill link it.

 

[thirdkind]

Artemio pretty much nailed it. The frame rate isn't the problem here, it's the processing.

Displaying film at even multiples of 24 is totally natural. My plasma has a 72Hz film mode that looks like film, not video. Panasonic's latest models have 96Hz film modes. A 120Hz display without any funky processing looks great with both film and video material because 120 is the magic number where both standards meet (24fps x 5, 30fps x 4).

The weird smoothness you're seeing is frame interpolation. Special processing creates new frames that are a combination of 2 adjacent frames. These extra frames cause film to look more like video. I agree that it looks gross. When it's disabled, 120Hz displays look great (as great as they can, anyway). I've never observed it being used on video material, but I could see it offering improvements there if used judiciously since video already has that "smooth" look.

 

[SpamYouToDeath]

I was considering buying one, until I read that they don't actually take a 120hz input.