Just saw this old thread and wanted to make a few comments.
ABC, Fox and ESPN-HD all transmit 720p for HD shows. Most other content providers use 1080i. So if your favorite HD shows are on ABC, Fox or ESPN, I'm not sure a 1080 native display would make much difference.
In theory 1080i material would look better on a native 1080 display, at least for scenes not involving lots of motion.
However -- I think all current 1080i providers aren't transmitting full-bandwidth 1080x1920 at 30 fps, but a cut-rate version using 1080 x 1440. This is due to limitations in current HD camera equipment and inability of the distribution chain to handle compression at full bandwidth.
By contrast providers of 720p (1280x720 at 60 fps) can handle the full bandwidth of that format, since the data rate is lower.
Stored HD source material such as Blu-Ray are in 1080 resolution, so a native 1080 display would be optimal for that.
However for current equipment, over-the-air, satellite and cable HD providers are only transmitting 1080i frames using 1440 x 1080 resolution for 1.55 megapixels per image. At 30 images per second, that's a data rate of 46.6 megapixels/sec.
By contrast, 720p images are 1280 x 720 for 921k pixels per image. At 60 images per second, that's a data rate of 55.3 megapixels per second.
So current 1080i still images have more pixels, but the overall data rate is lower. Thus when considering movement (panning, zooming, object movement) the effective delivered resolution may be less for 1080i than 720p as currently implemented.
The full 1080i implementation is 1920 x 1080, for 2.07 megapixels per image, at a data rate of , 62.2 megapixels per second. However it's unclear when content providers will be able to transmit this -- possibly not for a long time.
Native 1080 displays used to be very expensive, but prices have come down a lot. If I were buying a new display I'd get a 1080 native display.
