How does 1080p look at 4K/UHD?

[Deus Gladiorum]

Let's say you had two monitors. Both are the exact same size, have the same manufacturer, screen technology, etc. The only difference is one is consumer 4K/Ultra HD (3840x2160) and the other is your standard 1080p (1920x1080). If you were to display the same 1080p signal to both monitors, would it look just as good on the UHD / 4K as on the 1080p? After all, it's exact twice the linear resolution or exactly quadruple the pixel count, so wouldn't the image just display four times the number of pixels and it'd look the exact same? Blurry interpolation bums me out.

 

[Deus Gladiorum]

Bonus points for an answer from someone who's seen this personally! Working in theory is great and all but, you know.

 

[Hard Line]

1080p on a 4k will not look 4k it's the same as playing 720p on a 1080 screen or sd on a 720p screen

 

[JackNaylorPE]

The pixel count doesn't change when displaying a 1080p image on a larger screen capable of more pixels.... I haven't don it on 4K but have on 1080p screens with various other resolutions (i.e 1024 x 768) ... the interpolation makes the stretched image look worse

 

[i7Baby]

1080p will look like 1080p on either screen. The 4K will just use multiple pixels for each 1080p pixel.

 

[Deus Gladiorum]

1080p on a 4k will not look 4k it's the same as playing 720p on a 1080 screen or sd on a 720p screen

I mean, that's not really a helpful explanation because I'd like to know why. After all, in the case of 720p to 1080p, it's a 2.25x resolution difference so it can't map perfectly. But in 1080p to 4K/UHD, it's exactly 4x the resolution difference.

 

[digitaldoc]

As the others have said, you cannot create extra pixels, so if the base signal is 1080p, it will not look any better on a 4K screen.

Just think about how standard def content looks on an HDTV- still like SD.

 

[someguynamedmatt]

I have an Asus PB287Q, and yep - it scales each pixel of 1080p to 2x2 pixels of 4K, if that makes sense. No 'extra' resolution is created - it will look exactly like a 1080p screen. The only problem is that the pixel density on a 28" screen at 1080p is a bit lacking, but I used to run my 4K screen at 1080p in maybe half of my games when I had a single GTX 760 to power it. It did a respectable job, actually... things like Guild Wars 2 were perfectly playable maxed out at full 4K resolution. I think it would surprise you what you could do with a 770. Excellent choice of power supply, by the way.

So, while it might not be 100% the same quality as a 1080p screen of identical size due to the tiny amount of added pixel pitch and whatnot, it comes pretty close due to the 2:1 linear scaling on a panel of decent quality. If you're thinking about going for a 4K screen, I'm all for it - 28" of 200+ PPI space is glorious provided you can get used to the tiny little icons and UI elements that come along with it. I'll save my half page of fawning over 4K for another post, though.

 

[Hard Line]

Oh i misunderstood the question my bad. the reason is you are stretching the image to fit the new resolution this in essence stretches the pixels. Upscaling 1080p content to 4k doesn't really improve the picture quality. An algorithm cannot know what lies between the pixels. It can only guess, which result in a kind of average. This makes the picture blurry. It is the same reason watching standard channels on a 1080p television makes the image appear blurry.

 

[someguynamedmatt]

EDIT:
I'll repost this down below, since it might be passed up in my original reply. I just dropped both TERA and Skyrim down into 1080p to verify what I'd said, and it is not an EXACT 2:1 scaling from 1080p - there does appear to be some interpolation between pixels. I can't tell if it's due to hardware anti-aliasing or something similar, but it still does a respectable job of upscaling, but it still does a respectable job of upscaling and is still miles ahead of something like what you'd see from something like 1080p to 1440p. It just isn't going to be the precise 2x2-to-one scaling I thought it would be.

 

[geofelt]

I have both a 4k monitor and a 1600P monitor.
If I drag a window from one to the other, the size and appearance of the text looks identical.
Because the physical dimensions are different(40" vs 30") the size of the window does not fit on the smaller monitor.

 

[Deus Gladiorum]

Most of you guys are actually misunderstanding the question. When you upscale generally, for example a 720p signal to a 1080p signal, the interpolation causes it to look worse than on a native 720p screen. But that's examples where the ratios aren't exact. In the case of 1080p to UHD, it's exactly a 4:1 ratio, and as such doesn't have to deal with things like uneven ratios.

So I'm asking, if you have two monitors that are the same size, screen type, etc, will a 1080p image look as good as it does on a 1080p screen on a UHD screen? I know it obviously won't look better because no resolution is added, but if the quality doesn't look the same and in fact still looks worse than on the 1080p screen, then why? Why wouldn't having exactly twice the resolution/4x the pixel count make it easy for the algorithms just to look at a 1080p image, and then for every pixel in that image make it 4? It's exact, so wouldn't the UHD screen displaying a 1080p image be indistinguishable from the 1080p screen displaying the same image?

 

[Deus Gladiorum]

someguynamedmatt knows what I mean, thank you for your response. Is the worsening of the image quality because of interpolation do you think for sure, or do you think it's just because it doesn't look as good as it did at 4K and you just don't have a 1080p monitor of similar size to compare it to?

 

[NightHawkinFlight]

From personal experience, when I watch videos on YouTube that are 1080p on my 4k monitor, the picture DOES appear blurry. It might be because my monitor is only 27", but for those making the argument that it *should* make no difference, I cannot speak to what ought to be in this circumstance, only what is. And I have turned off scaling and turned on scaling in order to test the theory in Win 10, and neither has changed the result. I have tried 1080p on Crunchyroll and gotten the same result, it appears more noticeably pixelated than the native 4k content on YouTube.

Does this fly in the face of what a lot of people are saying? Potentially. Is it my honest experience with consuming 1080p content on a 4k panel? Yes.

I have not tried to test whether gaming at 1080p on a 4k panel would result in a similar result, but I can vouch for watching videos and consuming media-content. No word on pictures, as I have not tested that yet, either.

 

[Suzuki@1473780084@1473780163]

Yeah. Its guessing pixels, monitor scalers arent even close to TV scalers that actually get 1080 on 4k near perfect. Fact: On a monitor, once you lose 1:1 pixel mapping, youre going to blur the whole image. Meaning EVERYTHING except native resolution is going to appear blurry in comparison. Unless you force aspect ratio, so that you get black bars.

However, using online videos is not a good way to compare. Theres too much compression.

 

[NightHawkinFlight]

Yeah. Its guessing pixels, monitor scalers arent even close to TV scalers that actually get 1080 on 4k near perfect. Fact: On a monitor, once you lose 1:1 pixel mapping, youre going to blur the whole image. Meaning EVERYTHING except native resolution is going to appear blurry in comparison. Unless you force aspect ratio, so that you get black bars.

However, using online videos is not a good way to compare. Theres too much compression.

Do you know how to force aspect on a monitor? I would be interested in doing that, since a lot of the shows I watch are on Netflix, Crunchyroll and YouTube. Gaming at 4k is not an issue for me, but I am hoping to be able to watch my shows without staring at a massive square pixel.

 

[Suzuki@1473780084@1473780163]

In your monitor's menu. What it's called depends on what brand you're using. Manufacteres don't seem to like agreeing on one name, they have to confuse everybody.

 

[thebunnyrules]

Great thread you guys. I saw this on youtube thought it would interest you guys.
[strike]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MvBU27UBle4[/strike]

EDIT: yeah. I posted too soon, video's about 4K footage scaled down to a 1080p monitor as compared to 1080p footage on the same monitor. What we want to know is how well does 1080p footage/games scale on a 4K monitor compared to 1080p footage on a native 1080p monitor.

 

[Sunderlandgreen201503]

Most 4K television set you bought can automatically upscale all the content you play on it. Obviously, full HD will continue to look better on it as compared to standard definition content. However, only a good scaling can make 1080p content look good on 4K TV. A better 4K TV with good upscaling technology will make 1080p Blu-ray upconverted to the 4K screens looks great, although not appreciably better than 1080p on a 1080p TV. Just because a TV is 4K doesn't mean it has a good scaler built-in. On cheaper 4K TVs, for instance, you probably save money because of a sub-par scaler. So in these cases, 1080p content probably won't look any better (and possibly worse).

 

[Pdiddy1134]

Wanted to chime in. Just bought a Asus pg279q as my first ever monitor and a 4k Sony x850d 55" 4k Tv to make the jump from 1080p gaming. I can tell you that on either a 1440p monitor or 4k Tv that 1080p looks like is has an fxaa filter from hell. It's blurry beyond belief compared to my 3 Samsung 1080p's (48", and two 55" all different model numbers). It's a bummer to say the least as I cannot quite run 4k @ 60fps yet (only 1 1070, waiting for 1080ti) and 1440p @ 27" didn't wow me like I expected especially when coming from a 55" 1080p and gsync is overrated if you can lock a 60 or 120 fps vsync. Basically if you are happy with your current 1080p setup do not jump on the wagon yet unless you have dual 1080s. I almost have buyers remorse for both of my new acquisitions. Probably returning the montior, still deciding if it's worth it to keep the 4k yet as that's more of a future proof thing. Side note I was also able to get gsync to screen tear on multiple titles/frame rates/resolutions. It was minor but I managed to make it happen which is really disappointing.

 

[Sami 1999]

Gaming in 1080p on a 4k monitor will look blurred ass just like playing 720x450 on 1440x900 etc. Because no matter what, the GpU driver will cause interpolation if you scale the image using GpU. And if you leave the scaling to monitor, it will still blur the image.

But if you run a 1080p game in Window mode and then Use any Borderless tool to stretch the window to fullscreen, the image wont be blurred out at all. Even if its not 2:1 scaling.

I have tried it myself and window mode stretched to fullscreen by borderless tools is the best option.

And about movies, it actually depends on the movie player and afaik, all movie players actually use filters, unfortunately.

And a lot of games dont function as desired in window mode, even when forced with dxwnd. But atleast for games, there is a way. Keep in mind, some games (example: Fifa 13-17) will actually increase the resolution if you make it borderless, thus you wont be able to play at 1080 and get lags.

 

[gmaledawtcom]

Ok I had a old tube tv for many years getting sd and I finally decided to get an hdtv cause I could barely read the guide with my cable. The first tv I got was a 40" hisense 1080p60Hz tv and I did not like it so I returned it for a Sanyo 1080p60Hz but the sound on it was terrible like it was echoing and coming out a toilet paper tube. So I eventually found a bigger 43" Sharp 4k uhd tv but my cable provider does not broadcast 4k yet so its on 1080p but I swapped the cord for one that supports 4k and it looks so much better than the other 2 no matter what anyone says about it being the same. Its not and maybe the 4k cord has something to do with it, maybe its same with regular HDMI and better with 4k HDMI I'm not sure but I'm here to tell you that the picture is 10x better and this tv was only 299. Well that's my answer I hope it helps someone