1080i v 1080p & Blueray

[only me]

I have a panasonic 42" plasma that will run 1080i and is fantastic with sky hd, xbox and my dvd via HDMI but not 1080p, I believe Blu-Ray runs 1080p which my Plasma will not run, will it automatically convert 1080p to 1080i ?

I know the "p" is progressive and the "i" interlaced but what is the actual difference in quality ?, is it woth me getting a blu ray player or changing the tv first ?, and is it common that the blu ray players may have a 1080i setting ?.

[OldSkoolRS]

Your Panasonic sounds like it will only accept a 1080i input, which it will internally process and display in progressive (p) format in whatever the native resolution the screen in. Of the various BluRay players I've had experience of they all offer the option of outputing in 1080i or even 720p (which may work better depending on your TV's native resolution and how good the internal processing/deinterlacing is).

The only issue you may 'suffer' is that you won't be able to display BluRays in their (mostly) 24p frame rate, so it will be 'converted' to 60 frames per second which will introduce judder: There is no way round this as an extra frame is repeated at odd intervals to 'make' 60 frames out of the recorded 24. There are some discs in 1080/60i format (mostly concert or documentry discs as they were 'filmed' on video cameras) so these will work perfectly...the others you will just have to live with the 24p to 60i judder effect.

You could always buy a new TV...just don't ask me to recommend another Panasonic, though it seems to be the de faco answer on here.