I've heard the Xbox 360 has an HDMI converter so the older Xbox's(like the one I have, originally released pro from '05) that don't have an hdmi port can use one. I only think about getting it because I'm not buying a new xbox just so I can play in 1080p.(I have a ps3 for that)

But I've read elsewhere that it's not worth it because you would lose resolution in the anolog to digital transfer. Is there any truth to that?

The 360 can't render in 1080p anyway, so no, it's not worth it.

What do you mean it can't? The original line can't but 2007 onwards they all had HDMI ports.

Like PhYoshi said, yeap the older 360s does not have the internal GPU capable of ouputting an hdmi signal. So from that I'm guessing going from anolog to digital would mean a loss in something as anologue and digital are two different things. So more likely not worth it. To improve upon your anologue the best would be to use a compotent as I did this with my Wii.

BUT slightly off topic from the other reply, from the top of my head I remember reading that both Xbox 360 and PS3 uses an upscaler to get 1080p of course you'd have to have a tv capable of outputting at 1080p to get the best quality. I have a HDMI capable on both Xbox 360 and PS3.

I'm using component right now. I was thinking maybe I should just buy a new arcade and then transfer my 60 G hard drive. I would get the built in hdmi and I believe a better chip set/processor so it runs quieter. Plus since this xbox is about 6 years old it would renew my warranties.

Yes that's what I did when my 1st Xbox died on me. I got the arcade with the Jasper chip set (more quiet and less power-consuming and more reliable then other chip sets at the time, you can tell from the serial number on the box or console and from the power supply/plug/port socket). I put a 120gb or 250gb (can't remember) on it and I have not had any problems since. I got a reasonable HDMI cable off play.com and use some sort of super gold plated one or something on my other set-up but they both give the same results regardless of the price between them both.

Hope that helps.

It still doesn't matter.

Well, sort of: I'll elaborate.

There are two important resolutions here, the render resolution and the output resolution. The 360 is, was, and always will be utterly incapable of rendering all but the simplest scene at 1080p - so let's call the render resolution 720p.
The output resolution you're on now is almost certainly 720p - that's being sent to your TV, which then upscales the image to whatever your TV can output.

If your xbox was capable of outputting 1080p (I don't think the original ones are? Could be wrong on that point, though) then it'd *still* render at 720p, except it would upscale before it sent it to your TV, which would simply display it without upscaling it.

Now, if you have a half decent TV, there is absolutely no advantage to your 360 outputting in 1080p. Cheap TVs can have very poor hardware upscalers, in which case there is a small advantage, as a good upscaler can produce marginally better looking images. But this is certainly nothing worth spending money on, because whatever way you do it you're not going to get *any* more data in that image.

ya I got my pro a couple years ago and it has an HDMI port and it can go in 1080. I don't think it is worth it dude. If you already have it for PS3 then why are you worrying about it? Are you thinking for the exclusives like Gears of War?

If you already have it on one console, then I don't think you need to get it on another one. It's a waste of money for something you already have.

The only reason to use HDMI on the 360 is just because it's easier (one connector as opposed to 5), and more devices support HDMI, like computer monitors.

PhYoshi has it right. The 360 renders in 720p, so by outputting 1080p all it's doing is shoving a 720p image into a 1080p frame. The up-scaling algorithm is doing a little bit of "smoothing" of the image, but it's still a 720p render for the most part. Some TVs do a lousy job with component and handle a DVI/HDMI signal better, so that would be a reason to do HDMI. Converting from component to HDMI, however, isn't worth it IMO unless your TV handles component really poorly.